Mary Ball Washington

by Craig Shirley

  When Mary looked in her small mirror and saw the gray hair, she may have thought of the Book of Proverbs: “The hoary head is a crown of glory, if it be found in the way of righteousness.”

  But there was still one goal in her life as she aged. And it was just as true when she was young as it was now: to be faithful for God and the proclamation in both words and deeds of His existence. Her attendance at Saint George’s Church continued well past her prime, and she certainly saw her age just as much a proof of God as any other.

  But those years, she noticed, would be coming to an end soon.

  A MERE SHORT MONTH BEFORE THE OFFICIAL START OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL Convention, designed initially to correct the errors of the Articles of Confederation and result in the creation of a unique government, George Washington was in a state of unease.

  If the stress wasn’t enough, between four and five o’clock in the afternoon of April 26, a hurried and exhausted courier rushed to his Mount Vernon plantation with news of his Fredericksburg family. His mother and sister, the letter said, were in “extreme illness.” The timing could not have been worse, as Washington was ready to head north to attend the convention. To boot, he himself was ill, suffering from rheumatism. He was to leave in three days, on a Monday, when the news arrived. In a letter to Henry Knox, he wrote that he was “summoned by an express who assures me not a moment is to be lost, to see a mother, and only Sister (who are supposed to be in the agonies of death) expire. I am hastening to obey this melancholy call, after having just bid an eternal farewell to a much loved Brother who was the intimate companion of my youth and the most affectionate friend of my ripened age.” The trip to Fredericksburg would undoubtedly delay his going to Philadelphia.13

  His life seemed to be coming apart all at once.

  A fatal illness was almost expected for his mother at this point, given her advanced age. But his lovely sister Betty? At nearly fifty-four years old, she was still a woman of vigor. And now, she was dying along with their mother.

  George traversed to Fredericksburg the next morning, a Friday, and arrived that afternoon. He “was prepared to expect, the last adieu to an honoured parent, and an affectionate Sister.”14 There, he was greeted with some good news. He found, he wrote in his diary, “both my Mother & Sister better than I expected.” Betty was “out of danger” of whatever had afflicted her. But Mary had been diagnosed with breast cancer. She would live another two years, but at the moment, to George’s relief, she was doing well. (Descendants of the Ball family reported centuries later that the women were susceptible to cancer, especially later in life.15) He knew there “was left little hope of her recovery.”16 But his fears of this being his final sight of either his mother or his sister were alleviated.

  He spent the next couple of days in Fredericksburg, dining with his sister and neighbors. He left on Monday, April 30, returning to Mount Vernon.

  Within a couple of weeks, he left his home, once more returning to public life. His wife, Martha, was again left at Mount Vernon.

  He arrived at Philadelphia on May 13, escorted by a parade of soldiers and other officials. Many along the damp roads came out to see, as the Pennsylvania Packet called him “this great and good man.”17

  THE CONVENTION OFFICIALLY CONVENED ON FRIDAY, MAY 25, 1787, AFTER representatives from New Jersey arrived to form the necessary quorum of seven states. They met at the Pennsylvania State House, where a decade earlier the Declaration of Independence was signed.

  The convention would last four months. In total, there were fifty-five delegates from twelve of the thirteen states, though not all fifty-five were there from the beginning to the end, nor were fifty-five delegates ever in the same room at the same time; Rhode Island, with a penchant for trouble in the newly forming United States, refused to participate. The previous years of trouble over the state’s sovereignty from its neighbors earned it the irritating nickname “Rogue Island.” From Virginia came seven delegates, including Washington, James Madison, George Mason, and Edmund Randolph.

  The very day they convened, George’s responsibilities at the convention expanded greatly: he was to be presiding officer of the convention. It was a unanimous vote.18 Joseph Ellis describes his relationship with fellow delegates: “His importance was a function of his presence, which lent an air of legitimacy to the proceedings that otherwise might have been criticized as extralegal, if not a coup d’état.” Note that the convention was called to amend, not overthrow, the Articles of Confederation, a distinct difference. Washington hardly if ever participated in the months-long and often fierce debates at the State House. As president, he was to lead and keep order, not to butt in. He’d leave the political philosophy to Madison and Benjamin Franklin and Alexander Hamilton and many other heavyweight thinkers.19

  The discussion quickly evolved from “how to fix the Articles of Confederation” to “how to overrule the Articles of Confederation.” It was clear to many that the Articles were not working, that they had become a failed experiment threatening the infant nation. Various plans were drafted and rejected or modified to create the final product known as the Constitution of the United States.

  “The Constitutional Convention,” wrote historian James Thomas Flexner, “was, in its most creative aspects, less a forum of debate than experimental laboratory.”20 Indeed, it was decided that the system of government, unlike any other that had existed at that time, did not work. How were they to replace it? With something familiar, with something different, with something wholly unique to history?

  Three major plans were proposed:

  One of most important was the so-called Large State Plan, or the Virginia Plan, the brainchild of Virginians such as Madison and presented to the convention on May 29 by Governor Randolph. George and the other Virginian delegates attended the brainstorming sessions days prior.21 The Virginia Plan proposed the “National Legislature,” which under the Articles was unicameral, be split into two branches and be representative of a state’s population. It also asked that “members of the first branch” (which would become the House of Representatives) be elected directly by the people for fixed terms and then be ineligible, for a period of time, for other government positions after they finished their term.

  The “second branch,” the precursor to the Senate, was proposed to be elected by the first, with nominations coming directly from the states’ individual legislations. Like the pre-House, the pre-Senate would be proportional, with fixed terms; those elected would be ineligible for other positions for a certain number of years.

  The legislature would have the responsibility of electing the “National Executive,” a separate branch from the legislature, for an unspecified length of time for only one term. That individual would have the power to “compose a Council of revision with authority to examine every act the National Legislature before it shall operate.” This council, which had no specificity of how, when, or where it would operate, would then have the power to veto both national and state laws.

  The Virginia Plan also called for a separate judiciary branch. Like the executive powers, these judicial appointments were a brand-new confederate system of government.22

  Up next was the so-called New Jersey Plan, or the Paterson Plan after framer William Paterson. Keeping the Articles’ unicameral congress, it provided additional powers of raising and collecting taxes, and placing tariffs, among other regulations. A federal executive of several people would be elected for one term, which would itself have the power to use the legislative-raised army and appoint the judicial “supreme tribunal,” a lifetime position. While, again, executive and judicial branches were new, the New Jersey Plan more or less improved the roles of the one-house legislature of the Articles of Confederation, with each member nonproportionally representing each state, and each state receiving one vote. Madison was skeptical of such a plan, wondering whether it would prevent state-level abuses that so plagued the current crisis. “Will it secure the internal tranquility of the States themselves?” he asked.
“Will it secure a good internal legislation & administration to the particular States? . . . Will it secure the Union [against] the influence of foreign powers over its members[?]”

  In short, Madison believed, it would fix nothing.23

  Alexander Hamilton of New York, later the first secretary of the Treasury, liked neither Randolph’s nor Paterson’s proposals. His own, called the British Plan, was very similar to the British government setup, in which Hamilton effectively did away with any statehood under the federal system. It called for a two-house Supreme Legislature: the Assembly, directly elected by the people; and the Senate, chosen by “Electors” who themselves were elected by the people. The Assembly would have three-year term limits, and the Senate would be elected for life. The Senate could declare war, along with advising and approving anything in the executive. The directly elected Assembly, on the other hand, had the power only to create laws and appoint state-level courts, with the Senate’s cooperation. It was clear which house was “lower” and “higher” in Hamilton’s plan.

  These Electors, who were not chosen by the state but rather by “election districts,” would also have the power to appoint a life-serving governor. The governor was effectively like the monarchy of Britain, and had a plethora of powers. This individual had the absolute power to veto any law passed by the Supreme Legislature. He was to command the army and navy forces, and have the power, “with the advice and approbation of the Senate,” to make treaties. He was to nominate, again with the approval of the Senate, any ambassadors and “heads or chief officers” of the departments of war, finance, and foreign affairs. He also had the power to pardon any criminal, except for those convicted of treason, which needed Senate approval. When the governor died, the power would temporarily shift to the president of the Senate.

  The similarity to the British system was not lost on anyone. Madison noted, “It would be objected probably that such an executive will be an elective monarch and will give birth to the tumults which characterize that form of gov[ernmen]t.”24

  THROUGHOUT, GEORGE WASHINGTON SAT AND LISTENED. THE LETTERS HE wrote were unrelated to the convention or his thoughts on the very future of the United States. He wrote to his manager of Mount Vernon, his nephew, George Augustine Washington, who had replaced Lund after the war. On June 3, the elder George wrote his nephew about observations from the plantation’s previous harvest, in hopes that George Augustine would know what to do in the coming months. “All the grass that is fit for Hay should be cut, or my horses [etc] will be in a bad box next winter,” he advised. “In making Bricks let the Mortar be well neaded [sic]—much I believe depends upon it.” The carrots and parsnips had failed, according to the estate’s manager, and George Washington wondered whether it was bad seed or bad soil or bad weather, offering advice on the potato harvest. It was, all in all, a very plain letter from one farmer to another.25 The letters continued as such for the next couple of months, noting expansions to the plantation house and the management of the logistical nightmare that was his home.

  To fellow delegates, however, he had strong opinions. “In a word, I almost despair . . . and do therefore repent having had any agency in the business,” he wrote to Hamilton, who had returned to New York soon after presenting his proposal. “The Men who oppose a strong & energetic government are, in my opinion, narrow minded politicians, or are under the influence of local views.”26 Insults were being thrown, distrust running rampant not just between cross-border delegates but among states’ own. Some threatened to leave and never return, putting the already fragile convention at risk.

  It was decided ultimately by the delegates of the Constitutional Convention to use the Virginia Plan as the basis for the new form of government. The so-called Great Compromise, first proposed by delegate Roger Sherman and subsequently modified, alleviated fears from smaller states that proportional representation would naturally favor the more populated states.

  On July 24, a committee of detail was established to draft a rough outline of the to-be-formed Constitution. Chaired by John Rutledge of South Carolina and containing Virginians such as Randolph and Connecticut’s Oliver Ellsworth, it created positions and institutions of “president,” “Senate,” “House of Representatives,” and “Supreme Court.” A two-house legislature, one with proportion and the other with a fixed rate per state, placated both the smaller and larger populated states. Twenty-three articles were drafted, making a rough if not workable document. Flexner noted the miraculous nature of the committee: “Who, for instance, could three months before have guessed that delegates from the north, the middle, and the south, from small states and large, would agree that the federal government could bypass all state bodies and collect taxes directly from individuals in the local streets and fields?”27 The powers and limitations, both extraordinary, of all three branches proposed made the job of the next committee, the committee of style, that much easier. By September 12, it presented the final draft, with the twenty-three articles combined to a mere seven, with an additional preamble and eschatocol. A vote was raised on September 15, and it received unanimity from each of the twelve attending states. Two days later, thirty-nine of the forty-three attending delegates signed; George was the first. Edmund Randolph and George Mason did not sign, nor did future vice president Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts. They all objected to a lack of guaranteed rights.

  Washington’s diary plainly stated: “The business being thus closed, the Members adjourned to the City Tavern, dined together and took a cordial leave of each other—after which I returned to my lodgings—did some business with, and received the papers from the secretary of the convention, and retired to meditate on the momentous wk. which had been executed, after not less than five, for a large part of the time Six, and sometimes 7 hours sitting every day, sundays & the ten days adjournment to give a Comee. opportunity & time to arrange the business for more than four Months.”28

  He went home, again, on September 18—“I am quite homesick,” he wrote a week earlier to George Augustine—and arrived on Saturday the twenty-second, around sunset, “after an absence of four Months and 14 days.”29

  And though the fight for the drafting and approval of the Constitution was over in Philadelphia, it would move through the next year for ratification by each state.

  NEARLY TWO HUNDRED MILES TO THE SOUTHWEST, MARY’S OWN FREDERICKSBURG was going through a miniature crisis of its own. Back on November 5, 1781, only a month after Lord Cornwallis surrendered at the Battle of Yorktown, it had been incorporated into a town, with the creation of its own mayor, recorder, alderman, and councilmen, twelve in total, as well as a court of law, all separate from Spotsylvania. They had the power to buy and sell land, to act as justices of the peace, to hold two “market days, the one on Wednesday, the other on Saturday, in every week, and from time to time to appoint a clerk of the market, who shall have assize of bread, wine, and other things.”30

  The residents of Fredericksburg apparently didn’t like it. John Dawson, representative of the Virginia House of Delegates of Spotsylvania County and the stepson of James Monroe’s uncle, was a vocal opponent. “You,” he wrote to James Madison in June 1787, “I know, are oppos’d to the plan of incorporating towns, which in this state, has been so much in vogue, for some years past.” He continued, “The people in this county, convinc’d of the bad policy, intend to petition the next assembly for a repeal of the law incorporating this town. I have promisd to forward their wishes.”31 Evidently, he overestimated the residents’ anger at incorporation. The repeal, if it was ever submitted, failed; Fredericksburg was eventually incorporated as a city a century later in 1879.

  George Washington remained composed yet concerned about his mother’s illnesses. He still received reminders of her hometown: in September of that year, he received letters from Fredericksburg residents such as William Roberts, a miller George had once employed.32

  MARY BALL WASHINGTON, AT THIS POINT, WAS PRETTY MUCH SETTLING into her final years. Fredericksburg grew aroun
d her; she stayed put. There is little evidence and only a handful of legal papers that open a window into her final years. Perhaps most people had more important things to do than speak with an elderly lady, even if she was the mother of the commander in chief.

  MARY STAYED IN HER HOME OF TWO LOTS, VALUED AT 300 POUNDS. SHE REMAINED uninvolved with her son’s role in Philadelphia, Mount Vernon, or the events in Fredericksburg. Anything more about these months and last years of her life would be speculation. Sadly now deteriorating from age and cancer, Mary tended to her gardens, moving about the house with the help of a slave holding her arm. She sat outside and watched the young Fredericksburg children play in the snow of winter or the heat of summer. She feebly got on her knees as she did her daily prayer, or read Hale’s Contemplations with an earnestness not previously found in her youth. Mary may have gone into town; she may have spent the remainder of her days locked in her house on Charles Street. One resident recollected decades later that she “was remarkable for taking good care of her ducks and chickens,” so reported historian Jared Sparks as he visited the town in the mid-1800s.33

  Tax records from 1787 indicated she had six slaves over sixteen years of age, three horses, one cow, and a four-wheeled open carriage. This was a decrease in her slaves in 1785 from ten total (five above sixteen years old, five below), though the next year, 1788, records report her losing one, bringing it down to only five slaves.34 Still, that number of slaves was “unusually large” and “too many,” opined J. Travis Walker, archivist at the Fredericksburg Circuit Court, for a house of its size and a woman of her age, and records are scant on whether she lent the slaves out for others’ use.35 It showed either a lack of management skills—or at the very least a deterioration of them—or a deliberate desire to keep things “the old way” as at Ferry Farm, where she was once in charge of their world.

  THIS NORMALCY IN FREDERICKSBURG CONTINUED INTO 1788, DETACHED from the grander US politics. By New Year’s Day in 1788, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey ratified the drafted Constitution of the United States. Pennsylvania in particular had been a hard-fought battle, with its final delegate count being 46 for and 23 against. The next day, January 2, came the fourth state, Georgia. January 9 came Connecticut, and in February Massachusetts. Maryland and South Carolina and New Hampshire all ratified within the coming months, bringing the count to nine of thirteen, each with their own suggested revisions or addendums.