[Illustration:  From a painting by T.P.  Rossiter and L.R.  Mignot The Washington Family] Lawrence Washington was the father of four children, but only an infant daughter, Sarah, survived him, and she died soon after him.  By the terms of his father’s and Lawrence’s wills George Washington, after the death of this child, became the ultimate inheritor of the Mount Vernon estate, but, contrary to the common idea, Anne Fairfax Washington, who soon married George Lee, retained a life interest.  On December 17, 1754, however, the Lees executed a deed granting said life interest to George Washington in consideration of an annual payment during Anne Lee’s lifetime of fifteen thousand pounds of tobacco or the equivalent in current money[1].  Mrs. Lee died in 1761 and thereafter Washington owned the estate absolutely.  That it was by no means so valuable at that time as its size would indicate is shown by the smallness of the, rent he paid, never more than four hundred sixty-five dollars a year.  Many eighty-acre farms rent for that much to-day and even for more.

[1] From entries in Washington’s account book we know that this equivalent in 1755 was L93.15; during each of the next four years it was L87.10, and for 1760 it was L81.5.

Up to 1759 Washington was so constantly engaged in fighting the French and Indians that he had little time and opportunity to look after his private affairs and in consequence they suffered.  In 1757 he wrote from the Shenandoah Valley to an English agent that he should have some tobacco to sell, but could not say whether he did have or not.  His pay hardly sufficed for his personal expenses and on the disastrous Fort Necessity and Braddock campaigns he lost his horses and baggage.  Owing to his absence from home, his affairs fell into great disorder from which they were extricated by a fortunate stroke.

This stroke consisted in his marriage to Martha Custis, relict of the wealthy Daniel Parke Custis.  The story of his wooing the young widow has been often told with many variations and fanciful embellishments, but of a few facts we are certain.  From a worldly point of view Mrs. Custis was the most desirable woman in all Virginia, and the young officer, though not as yet a victor in many battles, had fought gallantly, possessed the confidence of the Colony and formed a shining exception to most of the tidewater aristocracy who continued to hunt the fox and guzzle Madeira while a cruel foe was harrying the western border.  Matters moved forward with the rapidity traditional in similar cases and in about three weeks and before the Colonel left to join Forbes in the final expedition against Fort Duquesne the little widow had been wooed and won.  After his return from that expedition Washington resigned his commission and on the 6th of January, 1759, they were married at her “White House” on York River and spent their honeymoon at her “Six Chimney House” in Williamsburg.