While I was a child, my father, as I have said, made many voyages to
England and fetched back with him convicts, and perhaps also indentured
servants. Often in those days some of the unfortunate people thus sent
to the colonies were under sentence for political offences, but many,
of course, for crimes. One of these, a convict I was told, was my first
schoolmaster. We called him Hobby, which was, I believe, a nickname;
but he was named Grove, and was sexton of the Falmouth church, two
miles away. Of what our sexton schoolmaster had been convicted I never
heard, but of this I am assured, that my father would not have used
as a schoolmaster a common thief. I used to ride the two miles to the
“field-school,” as they called it, in front of a slave named Peter, and
later was allowed a pony, to my mother’s alarm when he would tumble me
off, as happened now and then. Hobby was a short man, with one eye,
and too good-humoured or too timid to be a good teacher, even of the
a-b-c’s and the little else we learned.
My father was kind to this man, and perhaps knew his history. He would
even have allowed him the use of the rod, with the aid of which I might
have profited more largely, for I am of his opinion that children
should be strictly brought up. Hobby, being of a humourous turn, seems
to me, as I remember him, to have resembled the grave-digger in the
play of “Hamlet.” He sometimes amused and at other times terrified us
by tales of London or of his recent life as a sexton. He believed many
of the negro superstitions――as that if a snake’s head was cut off the
tail would live until it thundered――and was much afraid of having what
he called black magic put upon him by the negroes.
I did not learn much from Hobby and preferred to be out of doors. My
father considered, I believe, that, as I was a younger son and must
in some way support myself, I should be well trained in both mind
and body, and had he lived the chance of the former might have been
bettered. The latter was often made difficult by my mother, who was
unhappy when I was subject to the risks to which all lads of spirit
are exposed. I remember that, when later my father was teaching me
to leap my pony, the pony refused over and over, and this being near
to the house, my mother ran out, and at last had a kind of hysterick
turn. My father sat still on a big stallion and took no notice of her
entreaties. At last I got the pony over, and he fell with me. I jumped
up and was in the saddle in a moment. My father said that was ill
ridden, I must try it again; and upon this my mother ran back to the
house, crying out I would be murdered. But my father was this manner of
man; he hated defeat, while my mother was ever desirous of keeping me
out of danger, because it made her uncomfortable; and this was strange,
for I have never been able to see that she was greatly pleased when I
was successful, or was much moved by what the great Master allowed me
to attain in later years.
My elder brothers, Lawrence and Augustine, were both at different times
sent to England for education at Appleby School, near Whitehaven, when
I was a child. Lawrence had the family liking for enterprises and
martial employment. I was eight years old, and he of age, when Lawrence
served with Admiral Vernon and General Wentworth in the disastrous
attack on Cartagena. I remember as a boy the interest this expedition
caused in our neighbourhood. It was said that Harry Beverley and other
Virginians captured by the Spaniards had been made to work as slaves,
and this stirred up much feeling among us. The ex-Governor Spottiswood,
although an aged man, would have gone as a major-general, but died
suddenly at Temple Farm, near Yorktown, where forty-two years later
Lord Cornwallis met me to sign the capitulations.
Lawrence was away two years. The letters wrote by him to my father were
full of interest, and, as I remember, were the means of arousing in me,
who was but a little lad, the liking for warfare, of which we all had a
share.
I can remember how, as we sat about the hearth at evening, my father
read aloud to us these letters, and explained to me the military terms
used, and why, for want of foresight, the gallantry of soldiers and
sailors served only to give opportunity for loss of life. This was
especially in connection with the last letter we received, after the
dismal failure of the attack on Cartagena. He wrote:
HONOURED AND DEAR FATHER: What with dissensions between the
General Wentworth and Admiral Vernon, who was, as we think, not
to blame, we have come away, leaving the Spaniards to crow, and
our Colonel Gooch ill at Jamaica. When I am to have another
dose of glory I pray to have better doctors.
We were to storm Fort _Lazaro_――which must mean Lazarus――at
night. But we were too long getting there, or the guides
treacherous, and the ladders too short and no sufficient
breach. This _Lazarus_ fort was too much alive, but we were
actually on the rampart when Colonel Grant was killed, and
we were driven back in sad confusion, and half of us, a good
thousand, killed or wounded for want of forethought. I came off
with no more hurt than to be so spent that I had no breath to
curse the folly for which so many brave men died. The climate
was worse than the dons, and we took ship with our tails
between our legs and some two thousand shaking with agues and
racked with fever.
When I heard this I jumped up and said I wished I could have been
there, upon which my father laughed and said I was better off where I
was, and my mother that I had better go to bed.
I was at that age when lads of spirit are apt to ask questions, and
concerning these my father was always patient, and encouraged a
reasonable curiosity; but, on the other hand, my mother disliked this
habit of curiosity, and when my father talked of Indian wars and of my
brother’s fine conduct at Cartagena she was sure to say I should never
go to war. My father would reply that it was sometimes the business and
also the duty of a gentleman, and then there was no greater pleasure
than to hear over and over how Sir Henry Washington, said to be of our
family, defended Worcester in the civil war in England.
In those days all the world was at war, and with us there was always
the dread of Indian outbreaks. It was no wonder that I and other
little fellows at Hobby’s school played at soldiering. A lad named
William Bustle, a fat, sturdy boy, was commander of the Indians, and
in the woods we imitated the red men and the frontier farmers, and
passed from tree to tree throwing stones, or, in winter, snowballs,
with mock scalping and much pulling of hair, which was worn long.
This was interfered with one winter because Bustle hit me in the eye
with a snowball in which was a stone, a thing not considered fair.
My mother wished Bustle punished. My father said I must take care of
my own quarrels, and this I did, for, being then ten years old, and
very strong, as soon as I went back to school I gave Bustle a good
beating. In fact, I was of unusual strength, and because of my violence
of temper felt no hurt, and would not listen when Bustle called,
“Enough.” My mother’s uncertain discipline and her too affectionate
weakness did me great harm. For if my father punished me on account of
disobedience or outbursts of temper, my mother was sure to interfere,
or to coddle and pity me, a thing I greatly disliked. I never learned
much self-control until a later day, which, in its place, I shall call
to mind.
My sister Betty, who afterwards married Fielding Lewis, was, next to
my half-brother Lawrence and my brother Jack, most dear to me. Samuel
had some of the weaknesses of my mother, and Charles, in later days,
some worse ones of his own. In after life Samuel was often in debt,
and was married five times, being extravagant in this as in all other
ways. Mildred was sadly affected from birth and died young. It was
unfortunate for me that while I was a child my half-brothers were sent
from home and put in charge of the plantations of Wakefield and of
Mount Vernon, which had been rebuilt and given the name of the admiral
whom Lawrence much admired.
V
In 1742 Lawrence came from Cartagena, and meant to continue in the
service, but, after our sudden way, he fell in love with Anne, the
daughter of William Fairfax of Belvoir, our neighbour, the cousin and
agent of my lord of that name, and this, luckily for my own character,
ended his desire for a military life. I too well recall the event which
delayed his marriage. I was at this time, April 17, 1743, being eleven
years old, on a visit to my cousins at Choptank, some thirty miles
away. We were very merry at supper, when Peter, who was supposed to
look after me, arrived with the news of my father’s sudden illness. It
was the first of my too many experiences of the ravage time brings to
all men. I heard the news with a kind of awe, but without realizing how
serious in many ways was this summons. I rode home behind Peter, and
found my mother in a state of distraction. She led me to the bedside
of my father, crying out, “He is dying.” The children were around him,
and he was groaning in great pain; but he kissed us in turn, and said
to me, “Be good to your mother.” I may say that throughout her life I
have kept the promise I made him as I knelt, crying, at his bedside. He
died that night, and I lost my best friend.
My mother for a month talked of him incessantly, and after that very
little, except to say, “If your father were alive I should be more
considered.” I do not know why I, too, was averse to speaking of him,
and yet I loved him above all people. But concerning such matters
children are puzzled, and unable to express themselves, nor have I ever
been other than shy in saying what I feel in the way of affection,
whereas on paper I do not suffer this shyness, nor feel the reserve
which occasioned Colonel Trumbull to say to me once that I was often
unjustly regarded as cold because of my difficulty of being outspoken
concerning my regard for those dear to me. I am little better of it
to-day.
My father had much land and little money. As was usual in Virginia,
he left to his elder sons the larger share. To Lawrence he gave his
interest in the iron-works, with Mount Vernon and two thousand five
hundred acres, also the resident slaves and the mill, and, in case of
his failure to leave a child lawfully begotten or such child dying
under age, this property was “to go to and remain” to me. To Augustine
he left Wakefield; to me his farm on the Rappahannock and one moiety of
his land on Deep Run, with ten negro slaves. Samuel, John, and Charles
were also given land and slaves, and Betty four hundred pounds.
My mother was to have my estate for her use until I was of age, and
with whatever else was left her, and her own sixteen hundred acres,
might have sufficed with economy; but that virtue she found difficult
to practise, and was never a prudent or managing woman. She soon
felt her children to be a heavy burden upon an estate which was
none too large, and complained, as was common for her to do all her
life, that she was poor, and this even when I was assured that she
was comfortably cared for. I never knew a more affectionate mother.
She was said to have been foolishly fond of her children, and I was
more than once brought to feel that her love of us did interfere with
good judgment. Certainly whatever were her opinions,――and we did not
often agree,――these differences never lessened my love for her, as
differences often do. As she grew old her peculiarities were more and
more notable. With very many good qualities, she was hard to satisfy,
and this did not cease until the end of her life, for she could not be
restrained from borrowing money and accepting gifts from those who were
not her relations. Indeed, I once had to write her that while I had a
shilling left she should never want, but that I must not be viewed as
a delinquent, or be considered by the world as unjust and an undutiful
son. But so was she made, and even her doctor, Thornton, wrote to me in
her last illness, in which his cousin, Dr. Rush, was also consulted,
that he “had every day a small battle with her.”