Daniel Parke Custis: Difference between revisions

| birth_place = [[York County, Virginia]], [[British America]]

As Daniel Custis was the sole male heir in the Custis family, he inherited the Southern plantations owned by his father.<ref name="gould">{{cite book|editor=Gould, Lewis L.|title=American First Ladies: Their Lives and Their Legacy|year=2014|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-135-31148-3|page=2}}</ref> However, heCustis did not choose to take a leading role in colonial Virginia politics.

Custis died on July 8, 1757, in [[New Kent County, Virginia]]. Some historians state that he died of a [[Myocardial infarction|heart attack]],<ref>{{cite book|last=Wiencek|first=Henry |title=An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of America|year=2013|publisher=Macmillan|isbn=978-1-466-85659-2|page=67}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Freeman|first1=Douglas Southall |last2=Carroll|first2=John Alexander|last3=Wells Ashworth|first3=Mary|title=George Washington: Young Washington|url=https://archive.org/details/georgewashington07free|url-access=registration|year=1948|publisher=C. Scribner's Sons|page=[https://archive.org/details/georgewashington07free/page/299 299]}}</ref> but other sources state hethat Custis died from a severe throat infection.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Brady |first1=Patricia |title=Daniel Parke Custis (1711–1757) |url=https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/custis-daniel-parke-1711-1757 |publisher=[[Virginia Humanities#Encyclopedia Virginia|Encyclopedia Virginia]]/[[Dictionary of Virginia Biography]] |access-date=November 13, 2023 |date=December 7, 2020}}</ref> He

Custis is buried in the graveyard of the [[Bruton Parish Church]] in [[Williamsburg, Virginia]] beside two of his children, Daniel Parke Custis, Jr., and Frances Parke Custis.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://marthawashington.us/items/show/249|title=Tombstone of Daniel Parke Custis, Bruton Parish Church, Williamsburg|publisher=marthawashington.us|access-date=December 1, 2014|archive-date=December 16, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141216064534/http://marthawashington.us/items/show/249|url-status=dead}}</ref> Eighteen months after hisCustis deathdied, his widow Martha married George Washington on January 6, 1759.<ref name="schneider" />

As Custis died [[intestate]], or, "without a will", his widow Martha received the lifetime use of one third of his property (known as a "dower share"),<ref>{{Cite web |last=Gigure |first=William A. |date=Spring 1954 |title=The Widow's Election to Take Against a Will |url=http://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3149&context=mulr |website=Marquette Law Review |quote=Even if Custis had died [[testate]], Martha, as his widow, could have elected against the will and taken her dower. |volume=37 |issue=4}}</ref> and the other two thirds was held in trust for their children. The January 1759 Custis estate also included at least 85 slaves.<ref>The number is imprecise because the January 1759 Custis Estate inventory listed some enslaved mothers "with children" but did not specify the number of children.</ref> According to the Mount Vernon slave census, by 1799 the dower share included 153 slaves. The October 1759 Custis estate inventory listed {{convert|17779|acre|km2}}, or 27.78 square miles of land, spread over five counties.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Account of Land and Acreage, Estate of Daniel Parke Custis |workpublisher=Worthy Partner |pages=103–04 |quote=This land inventory was incomplete, not listing Custis lots in Jamestown and Williamsburg}}</ref>

Upon George Washington's death on December 14, 1799, the dower share and slaves reverted to Martha. Through a provision in his will, Washington directed that his 124 slaves be freed following his wife's death.<ref>{{Cite web |date=1796-02-07 |title=George Washington to Dr. David Stuart |url=http://etext.virgiia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=WasFi34.xml&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=334&division=div1 |quote=Washington's private letters indicate a plan to rent out the dower slaves to other plantations, with the income going toward purchasing them from the Custis Estate and ultimately freeing them. That would have required the approval of all the Custis heirs to succeed, but it is not known why it was never implemented. |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130620230647/http://etext.virgiia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=WasFi34.xml&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=334&division=div1 |archive-date=20 June 2013 |url-status=dead}}</ref> As Washington stated in his will, he "earnestly wished" to free his own slaves at the time of his death, but acknowledged that doing so would create "insuperable difficulties" because they had intermarried with Martha's "dower negroes," over whom he had no authority. He also believed that it would "excite the most painful sensations" and "disagreeable consequences" to attempt to separate them.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Text of George Washington's Last Will and Testament |url=https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/06-04-02-0404-0001}}</ref>

[[Category:18th-century American planters]]

[[Category:American slaveSlave owners from the Thirteen Colonies]]