Washington: A Life

Mount Vernon’s history is inseparable from that of its resident slaves, who toiled in its shadows and shaped every inch of it. The mansion renovation absorbed a vast amount of human labor: sixteen thousand bricks were forged for two new chimneys that arose at either end of the house, and slaves scoured nearby woods for the white oak that underlay roof shingles. For more specialized work, Washington typically hired a white craftsman or indentured servant to supervise skilled slaves as assistants. By the late 1750s Washington had assembled an expert team of seven slave carpenters. During the remodeling, overseer Humphrey Knight assured Washington that he didn’t hesitate to apply the lash, if necessary, to these enslaved artisans: “As to the carpenters, I have minded ’em all I posably could and has whipt’em when I could see a fault.”4 It was a relatively rare example in Mount Vernon a

AS GEORGE WASHINGTON introduced new splendor at Mount Vernon, he needed a wife to complete the pretty scene, and Martha Dandridge Custis made her timely appearance. Their speedy courtship began in mid-March 1758, right after Washington journeyed to Williamsburg to consult Dr. John Amson, who allayed his medical fright by reassuring him that he was recovering from dysentery. Relieved and elated, Washington rode off to nearby New Kent County to stay with his friend Richard Chamberlayne, who introduced him to his neighbor, the widow Custis. Her husband, Daniel Parke Custis, had died the previous July, as had two of her children in early childhood. She now lived with her four-year-old son John Parke (called Jacky) and two-year-old daughter Martha Parke (called Patsy) in baronial splendor on the Pamunkey River at a bucolic mansion known, prophetically enough, as the White House. Family legend suggests a spontaneous romance between George and Martha, but the mutual attraction may well have been anticipated. Though this was their first documented meeting, their social circles must have crisscrossed in the small, clubby world of the Williamsburg elite.

On leave from the Virginia Regiment, Washington courted Martha with the crisp efficiency of a military man laying down a well-pla

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By marrying Martha Dandridge Custis, Washington swiftly achieved the social advancement for which he had struggled in the military. Almost overnight he was thrust into top-drawer Virginia society and could dispense with the servility that had sometimes marked his dealings with social superiors. Marriage to Martha brought under his control a small kingdom of real estate tended by dark-ski

George and Martha Washington formed an oddly matched visual pair: she barely cleared five feet, and her hands and feet were as petite as George’s were famously huge. A portrait of Martha done shortly before Daniel died displays nothing especially soft or alluring to set a young man’s pulse racing. She wears a low-cut, satiny blue dress, shows a shapely figure and bosom, and wears her dark hair pulled back, adorned with pearls. The small head, set on its elongated neck, isn’t especially pretty: the forehead is too low, the hairline receding, the nose too hooked, the mouth too short, the jaw too round. Her hazel eyes are serious and watchful. It is the portrait of a plain, sensible young woman who already seems a trifle matronly. All the same, one suspects that the artist failed to catch the irrepressible warmth and charm that animated her features. The sitter’s soul is smothered by the stiff pose of a woman holding a blossom and staring at the viewer. It should also be said that Martha had the reputation of being a beauty in her youth. “She was at one time one of the most beautiful women in America and today there remains something extremely agreeable and attractive about her,” recounted a Polish nobleman several years before her death.9 From surviving artifacts, such as the purple satin shoes with high heels and silver sequins that she wore on her wedding day, we know that Martha Custis was a stylish young woman and even something of a clotheshorse.

In the eighteenth century, marriage was regarded more as a practical arrangement than as a vehicle for love, and the Washington marriage may never have been a torrid romance. But that aside, in selecting Martha Dandridge Custis, George Washington chose even better than he knew. She was the perfect foil to his mother: warm and sociable, always fun to be with, and favored with pleasing ma