Washington's Lady by Nancy Moser Read Free Book Online Page B

depth, more complexities, more excitement that was yet to be harvested. In his presence the world was vast and wide and held secrets I longed to explore. My role by his side would expand beyond the normal framework of a plantation wife. I did not know how, but the possibilities were enticing.
    And frightening.
    I had never traveled beyond the twenty-five miles to Williamsburg. When I married Daniel, the move from Chestnut Grove to White House encompassed but a short distance.
    But George . . . George had been to Barbados with his ailing brother. He had surveyed wilderness lands never surveyed before. He had fought Indians and the French in the far-off Ohio Valley. He knew rivers with odd names like the Monongahela and Youghiogheny.
    During our last visit he confided he had not been raised to be a gentleman. His family was considered (by his own words) second tier. His father, Gus, had sired two sons by his first wife—George’s older stepbrothers, Lawrence and Austin—before marrying George’s mother, Mary. They had six children in seven years, with George being the eldest. With each passing pregnancy, Mary grew more bitter and angry. It was not a pleasant household and was devoid of happy memories. Then Gus died young—at age forty. George, only eleven, was forced into the role of man of the house, forced to deal with a sour and resentful mother who was incapable of showing love toward her children or joy of any kind.
    When he told me the story, I grieved for him, for one of my largest goals was to create a happy home for my Jacky and Patsy. Children were a blessing and deserved the full dedication of their parents. Nothing less.
    Yet George did attain happiness through the intervention of his stepbrother Lawrence. Lawrence had been a soldier, fighting with Britain against Spain. George was enthralled with his brother’s military bearing and his uniform. When a boy is used to homespun and rough linen, the fine fabrics of a vivid costume are sure to impress.
    Lawrence had inherited some land on the Potomac that he named Mount Vernon after his commander, Vice Admiral Edward Vernon. He married the daughter of an extremely wealthy landowner who lived in Belvoir, just four miles away. The family of Ann Fairfax held nearly five million acres of land. When Lawrence lost three children in four years, he began to think of his little brother as a son, and he and Ann groomed George to be a gentleman, teaching him how to dance, speak, fence, dress, ride a horse, and otherwise giving him his first real education. Colonel William Fairfax, the master of Belvoir, gave George free rein to his vast library and taught him about art and the finer things of a cultured life. The life he experienced with his brother and with the Fairfaxes was a stunning contrast to the silence and oppression of his mother’s house at Ferry Farm, where the library consisted of a Bible and a book of sermons.
    When Colonel Fairfax’s son, George William, came home from attending school in England, he and George became fast friends, even though George William was seven years his elder.
    George confided to me that his goal, even at that young age, was to appear honourable and virtuous. Toward that end he even hand-copied a Jesuit guidebook on manners in order to instill them in his mind. He had always been self-conscious about his looks, especially his height. He was six feet three inches, and his teeth were bad. Regarding the latter, he rarely laughed full voice, and when I caught him once and saw his teeth, I knew why he kept his reactions restrained. They were gray and at least one was missing. I, for one, had been blessed with lovely teeth. If ever the time seemed right, I planned to share my homemade tooth powder with him.
    That George had had to fight for his honour and position, work hard for it . . . these things raised him in my eyes. Obtaining position and distinction through inheritance was one thing, but to obtain them through determination and