The furnace was a profitable venture, but Augustine was equivocal and irresolute in his relations with his associates in England. This was perhaps the prime reason why he determined in the summer of 1729 to go to England and deal directly with his partners. If, in dull days aboard ship, he took occasion to review his career, he had reason to be gratified. At thirty-five, he had a wife and three children, Lawrence, Augustine and Jane. He was not rich, but he was prospering and was discharging the duties and holding the offices that usually fell to a gentleman of the county. In spite of vexations and occasional reverses, Augustine Washington was established and, it would appear, was financially stronger every year.
Augustine’s strange attitude toward a new bargain kept him a long time in England. When he returned to Pope’s Creek May 26, 1730, he had the shock of his life: his wife had died the preceding November 24.
One thing that could not be deferred by the father of three young children was the finding of a new mother for them. Augustine looked about, visited and, on March 6, 1731, married a healthy orphan of moderate height, rounded figure, and pleasant voice, Mary Ball, aged twenty-three. Augustine took her to his home on Pope’s Creek, where it was not for many months that Mary’s thoughts of children were confined to those of her husband’s first marriage. By June 1731 she knew that she was pregnant and that, if all went well, she would be delivered in midwinter. At 10 A.M. on February 22, 1732, Mary Ball Washington was delivered of her first-born child, George Washington.
As George grew to consciousness and learned to walk, there was a new sister, Betty, born June 20, 1733. Before she was a year and a half old, another baby arrived, a brother christened Samuel. In his friendly little neighborhood of Washingtons, Monroes, Marshalls and like-minded folk of the Northern Neck George experienced the first sorrow of his life: On January 17, 1735, shortly before he was three years old, they told him that his half-sister Jane was dead.
Another event of 1735 led George in a new direction. Augustine purchased from his sister Mildred 2500 acres more on Little Hunting Creek. As this property, then called Epsewasson, included land that had never been under the plow, Augustine caught anew the spirit that was carrying settlement up the Potomac and concluded that it would be to his advantage to establish his family on his up-river farm. On the new site, he probably owned a dwelling that may have been built by his father. It was not large but neither was his household. Lawrence and Augustine (familiarly “Austin”) were at school in England, and the family to be sheltered at Epsewasson consisted of five only—the parents, George, Betty and Samuel—until it was increased to six by the birth of Mary Washington’s fourth baby and third son, John Augustine, on January 24, 1736.
Augustine Washington was faced with a serious business dilemma when in 1735 the death of John England raised a question concerning the future of the iron furnace at Accokeek. It was profitable to a reasonable degree but it was not making the partners rich. There was no assurance that the deposits of ore were large enough to support indefinite operation. Could it be continued; should it be suspended? Where could an experienced and diligent ironmaster be hired? How was the quality of the product to be maintained? For an answer to these questions, Augustine concluded to consult his partners. In 1736 or early in 1737 he went again to Britain. When he returned in the summer, he had signed a beneficial contract under which more of the work of the furnace fell to him. On occasion he had to set an example of manual labor. Strong as he was, he could not direct a plantation, look after his other farms and at the same time supervise an iron furnace thirty miles from Epsewasson. If he was to have a continuing personal part in the management of the furnace he had to be closer to Accokeek.
It probably was while Augustine was reasoning towards this conclusion that George made two new acquaintances. One was of a sort no longer to be classed as a surprise. On May 2, 1738, he had his first look at another brother, Charles. This boy was the fifth child of Mary Ball and the ninth of Augustine by his two marriages. Of the nine, only two had died—an unusual record in a Colony of hot summers and hosts of flies. George’s other new acquaintance of 1738 was his elder half-brother Lawrence who, at twenty, returned to Virginia. As a result of his long and careful schooling in England, the young gentleman had grace, bearing and manners that captivated George. The lad quickly made a hero of Lawrence and began to emulate him. Augustine, for his part, entrusted to his eldest son a part of the management of Epsewasson in order both to train the young man in agriculture and to lighten his own load.
There appeared in the Virginia Gazette of April 21, 1738, an advertisement that seemed to offer Augustine a means of continuing as a planter and a manufacturer, too. William Strother of King George County had died in the winter of 1732-33 and had left land which his wife was authorized to sell for her benefit. As she took a second husband who had an establishment of his own, she offered for sale the Strother place of about 260 acres on the left bank of the Rappahannock about two miles below the falls. This property attracted Augustine. It was within easy riding distance of Accokeek. Moreover, its location across the river from Fredericksburg held out the possibility of sending the boys to school there. Investigation deepened Augustine’s interest and led him to acquire the land. In addition, he leased at £4 per annum three hundred acres that adjoined the place he had bought. By December 1 he moved to the new home, which then or thereafter was styled Ferry Farm. In the advertisement the residence was pronounced a “very handsome dwelling house,” but it probably did not deserve the extravagant adjective. With a nearer approach to accuracy it could have been described as a livable residence of eight rooms. The site was high and fine, but there was an unhappy difference from Epsewasson in the width of the water. Compared with the Potomac, the Rappahannock was a mere creek. Pleasant or unpleasant in this particular, Ferry Farm was now George’s home, the third of his seven years, and it was located opposite something the boy had never seen before, a town.
George had his seventh birthday soon after the family established itself at Ferry Farm; that was the age at which boys were taught to read and then to write and to cipher. George was in the first stages of this bewildering but rewarding process when he had a new sister; he was progressing in his reading when the Colony, his father, and particularly his brother Lawrence were stirred by news of war with Spain. On January 11, 1740, the Virginia Gazette reported that Admiral Edward Vernon had carried his British warships to Cartagena on the Gulf of Darien, opposite the Isthmus of Panama, “taken a view of it,” returned to Jamaica, prepared an expedition, and gone back to the South American coast to deliver an attack on Cartagena. Three weeks later, the paper announced that Vernon had proceeded with seven men-of-war to Porto Bello in the hope of burning the Spanish ships there. Actually, these accounts reversed the sequence of events. Vernon, then in home waters, received orders July 19, 1739, to open hostilities against Spain, and on the twenty-third he started for the West Indies. By October 19, when war was declared formally, he was at Port Royal, Jamaica, and ready for action. He descended swiftly on the coast of Panama and boldly assailed the defences of Porto Bello. Finding them feeble, he pressed his attack and within forty-eight hours after his arrival off the town, forced its full surrender. This easy success fired the imagination and fed the pride of Britain.
After the first confused reports were set right, Virginians’ next news was that three thousand troops for the land expedition to accompany Vernon were to be Colonials. All the company officers, except one lieutenant for each company, were to be nominated by the Governors of the Colonies that supplied the men. Virginia’s quota was to be four hundred men. Immediately every wealthy planter’s son who had military ambitions wondered how he could get one of these commissions from Gov. William Gooch or through former Gov. Alexander Spotswood. Spotswood had proposed that an American contingent be raised and was entrusted with the task of recruiting men but death at Annapolis on June 7, 1740, spared him the pain of saying “No” to some applicants and denied him the pleasure of smiling “Yes
” to others.
Among those who sought Gooch’s signature on the King’s commission none was more determined than George’s older half-brother. Lawrence had diligent rivals. To procure a captaincy, Richard Bushrod of Westmoreland raised a company at his own expense. So far as the records show, Lawrence did no recruiting, but he must have procured the strongest endorsements from influential Colonials, because when the Governor announced to the Council June 17, 1740, the four leaders he had chosen for the Virginia companies, Lawrence was the first named. Beside him and Bushrod, the fortunate young Captains were Charles Walker and James Mercer. There was much satisfaction at Ferry Farm over Lawrence’s advancement, but, as often happens in war, long delay occurred between the promise of a command and embarkation for foreign service. Although shipping was supposed to be available by August 20, 1740, it probably was not until October that Lawrence said farewell and sailed with his companions in arms.
After Lawrence went away life at Ferry Farm dropped back to its unexciting norm. Only rumor born of rumor mocked the minds of those whose sons had gone. The infant Mildred died October 23, 1740; George continued at school; Augustine probably had more than the usual troubles with the iron furnace. Other such enterprises were closing down or were operating amid continued discouragements. As for Lawrence, he wrote often but the receipt of his letters was uncertain. Summer was approaching, probably, when the family heard that Lawrence had reached Jamaica and then had sailed to Cartagena. While vague snatches of bad news were arriving thereafter, the Washingtons suffered a fire that involved formidable loss; but that soon was made to appear small in comparison with the good news received in another letter from Lawrence: He was safe after a disaster that had shamed British arms.
Lawrence Washington had been denied a part in the operations ashore. For the period of fighting, he had been among those held on the vessels and had been given no more exciting task than acting as Captain of the Marines on the flagship. His view of the disaster was typically that of the young officer who wished to think that his side had inflicted heavy losses to pay for those it had sustained; but he could not make out a case. He had to admit: “. . . the enemy killed of ours some 600 and some wounded and the climate killed us in greater number. Vast changes we have in each Regiment; some are so weak as to be reduced to two thirds of their men; a great quantity of officers amongst the rest are dead. . . . War is horrid in fact but much more so in imagination. We there have learned to live on ordinary diet; to watch much and disregard the noise or shot of cannon.” Finally, word reached Ferry Farm that the American Regiment had been broken up and that Lawrence had sent the Council of Virginia a memorial in which he had set forth a claim to the vacant office of Adjutant General of the Colony. Later he brought back to the Old Dominion some of the survivors of the expedition. It was not a triumphant return, nor did he receive until later the post of Adjutant of Virginia.
When the veteran of Cartagena came back to Ferry Farm, his full brother was there to welcome him. In June 1742 Austin had returned from Appleby, the English school where his father and Lawrence also had been instructed. George soon came to love Austin, but he found his interest and his admiration more than ever fixed on Lawrence—on the brother who had seen the forts of Cartagena, had heard the cannons roar, and had watched the battle. In study for George, and in business activity for Augustine, Lawrence and Austin the winter of 1742-43 passed. With the coming of spring and the approach of Easter, George was permitted to go down into the Chotank district of the Potomac to visit some of his cousins. He was in the full enjoyment of the sports of the farm, when a messenger rode up with instructions for him to return home at once: his father was dangerously sick. George set out as soon as practicable. He had seen little of his father and later was to remember only that his sire had been tall, fair of complexion, well proportioned and fond of children; but, of course, it was a deep grief for George when he reached home. The stricken man had made his will and now faced death in content of soul. It was on April 12, 1743, that he died.
The body of Augustine Washington was carried to the family graveyard on Bridges Creek and buried there. His will was probated by Lawrence May 6, 1743. It divided an estate that included seven or more tracts, of a total acreage in excess of ten thousand. Slaves numbered at least forty-nine. Lawrence, as the eldest son, received much the largest share of his father’s estate. Everything on Little Hunting Creek was to be his, as was land on Mattox Creek. He was to have, also, Augustine’s interest in the iron furnace, subject to the purchase from the profits of three young slaves for Austin and the payment of £400 to Betty. Half of the debts due Augustine were to go to Lawrence on his assumption of a proper share of Augustine’s obligations. To Austin went all the lands in Westmoreland not otherwise bequeathed, together with twenty-five head of cattle, four Negroes and a moiety of the debts due his father, less 50 per cent of the liabilities of the testator.
George received the Ferry Farm, half the Deep Run tract, ten slaves and three lots Augustine had acquired in Fredericksburg. In addition, he was to have his fifth of residual personal property that the father wished to be divided among his wife and her four sons. Samuel, John Augustine and Charles received farms and Negroes besides shares of the personalty. Almost in the language of his own father’s will, Augustine wrote that the estates of all these children of his second marriage were to remain in their mother’s care during the minority of each of them. Protection of their interest was to be assured in the event their mother remarried.
The widow was to have certain slaves in lieu of dower right in the Negroes as a whole. Besides her fifth of the undivided personalty and her tenancy of her sons’ property during their minority, Mary Washington was given current crops on three plantations and the right of working the Bridges Creek quarter for five years, during which time she could establish a quarter on Deep Run.
A businesslike document the will was. If Augustine had not attained to the goal of the rich planters, who sought to have every male heir maintain the baronial style of the family on a great estate, he had assured a living to all his sons who would make discreet use of what he had left them. So far as eleven-year-old George was concerned, the farm he would receive when he became twenty-one was of moderate size, in a district not particularly fertile. His other property was not valuable. The boy was too young at the time to realize it, but his inheritance was just large enough to raise a question: Would he be lulled into contentment as a planter of a second class, or would he be spurred by what he had to seek more?
Circumstance shaped in a natural manner the first approach to an answer. Lawrence was now seated permanently on Little Hunting Creek and was courting Anne Fairfax, daughter of Col. William Fairfax, cousin and agent of Thomas, Lord Fairfax, proprietor of an almost boundless tract in northern Virginia. William Fairfax was fifty-two at the time, and, besides acting for His Lordship in the issuance of land grants and the settlement of quit rents, he held office as Justice, as Burgess and as Collector of Customs for the South Potomac. After a residence comparatively brief on the Potomac he had become the most influential man in that part of the Northern Neck. On a point of land on the southern shore of the river Colonel Fairfax had acquired a pleasant tract and had built a handsome house which justified the name Belvoir.
On July 19, 1743, a little more than two months after Augustine’s death, Anne Fairfax became the wife of Lawrence Washington. It was both for Lawrence and for George a fortunate day. To Lawrence it meant alliance with the most powerful interests of the Northern Neck and marriage to a girl who already had valuable lands and before many years was to hold patents for a total of four thousand acres. George, in his turn, found new and desirable associations. Increasingly, after Lawrence’s marriage, George visited on Hunting Creek and at Belvoir, where he came under the fine influence of Colonel Fairfax.
George’s brother Lawrence, about fourteen years his senior, stood almost in loco parentis and had developed the character his friendly face displayed. To Fairfax and to all his se
niors, Lawrence was carefully courteous and deferential. Among men of his own age and station, he showed energy, ambition and the urbanity of good schooling. His greatest gifts were social, but they did not make him soft. In business, his judgment was average, or better. If he lacked the mathematical mind George was beginning to develop, he was genuinely intellectual. His letters were well reasoned and well written. Lawrence possessed political sense and he had religion without bigotry or pious protestation. Arms were his avocation. He preferred horses to books, apparently, but he had culture and probably gave the impression of wider learning than he had mastered. For the enlargement of George’s mind and the polishing of his manners, Lawrence was almost an ideal elder brother.
At Ferry Farm life had not been stinted or meagre, but neither was it opulent or gracious; on Little Hunting Creek social relations were more polished and discourse was often of larger subjects. The house itself was perceptibly different from the little dwelling in which George had lived on the Potomac in 1735-38. Lawrence either tore down that structure, or else fire had saved him the trouble. A new residence was rising over the cellar and foundations of the original house. The structure was of wood and not of fine interior finish, but it was comfortable and soon well furnished. In this new house George found delight not only because it was new, but also because its master was his beloved Lawrence. There was still another stimulus: In honor of the Admiral of the Cartagena expedition, Lawrence styled his home Mount Vernon and, in so doing, unconsciously made the very name a challenge to the imagination of his younger brother. Lawrence talked, too, of war and of the honors and glories of a soldier’s life—not a distant theme to a boy who lived within two days’ ride of the trail the Indians sometimes followed in their raids.
Conversation at Mount Vernon was of lands as well as of armies. Lawrence had the confidence of his father-in-law, and of course knew of the patents issued from Colonel Fairfax’s office to speculators who were looking eagerly to the west. Everyone hoped, through the years, that Lord Fairfax would win in the long controversy over the boundaries of his domain. Hope there was also, that the Five Nations could be induced to make the Allegheny range and not the Blue Ridge the eastern line they would not cross. If these two uncertainties were resolved favorably, the Shenandoah Valley would be open to settlers, and by their knowledge of conditions there and farther westward, William Fairfax and Lawrence Washington might enrich themselves. If the Indians could be induced to make a larger bargain, the great valley of the Ohio might be tapped.
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