Evening Star Newspaper, December 15, 1929, Page 102

i T = THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, DECEMBER 15, 1929. from the great house, but those two sad events were only as far back as 1853 and 1857. In all seriousness, Uncie Jim mnaively confessed he could not remember back to 1828, “No, suh.” RS. GEORGE WASHINGTON PARKE CUSTIS, before her marriage when a mere slip of a girl, was Mary Lees Fitzhugh, a daughter of William Fitzhugh c¢f Chatham, just across the Rappahannock River from Fredericksburg. George Washington was a frequent visitor at Chatham, and it is said that upon one occasion, in writing a letter to William Fitzhugh, he said: “I have put my legs oftener under your mahogany at Chatham than anywhere else in the world and have en- joyed your good dinners, good wine, and good company more than any other.” That the mother of Mrs. Custis was a Randolph before her marriage to William Fitzhugh is fairly well established. Mrs. Robert E. Lee, her grand- daughter, vouches for the fact. In an old book, “Recollections and Private Memoirs of ‘Washington,” by the historian Benson J. Lossing, published in 1859, Mrs. Lee furnished «quite an extensive introduction, in which are set forth many interesting facts pertaining to ths ‘Parke and Custis families. In writing of the death of her mother, Mrs. Custis, Mrs. Lee refrained from entering into a eulogium, but ‘without disclosing the author she permitted ‘the publishers to print a letter, dated May 16, 1853, addressed to the editors of the National JIntelligencer, evidently by some friend of the family, an extract from which reads as fol- ews: “Happy in her descent from the union of Fitzhugh of Chatham (the friend of ‘Washington), a gentleman unsurpassed for dignity and courtesy of manncrs by any who enjoyed the society of Mount Vernon, with one of the most beautiful, accomplished and religious ladies that ever bore the name of Randolph, all the instructions and associations, th: habits and studies of her childhood and youth, were suited to nurture those just princi- ples and pure and generous sentiments which ever pervaded and adorned her " entire character.” That the Virginia Randolphs were a part of the ancestry of Mrs. Custis is further indi- cated by the fact that Mrs. Lee, th> only sur- wiving child and daughter of the Custises of Arlington, and born there October 1, 1808, was christened Mary Ann Randolph Custis. Mrs. Mary Randolph, therefore, may have becen a favorite aunt of Mrs, Custis, assuming that the beautiful and accomplished Miss Randolph, Wwho became the mistress of Chatham, had a brother who married a daughter of the house- hold of Ampthill. But if such be fact, instead of mere surmise, why did Lossing make no mention of Mrs. Randolph's grave when he wrote an account of his visit to Arlington House estate during the month of March, 1853, and which can still be read in the old bound volumes of Harper’s Magazine for Sep- ter T of that year? Perhaps it was an over- sight, but at that time it was the only known grave on the hillside that overlooks a broad panorama’of the Potomac. 'ON the day after Mrs. Randolph died the - National Intelligencer for Thursday, Jan- uary 24, 1828, carried the following obituary notice: “DEATH “In Washington, at 1 o'clock, A. M., on the 23d irist., after an illness of six days, Mrs. Mary Randolph, formerly of Vir- ginia, aged sixty-five yecars. Respected and esteemed through life by a very numerous acquaintance. Her friends are requested to ‘attend the procession of her funeral this morning, at 10 o'clock, from her late residence, to the Potomac Bridge, interment being to be made at Arlington, in a spot marked out by herself.” The identical notice appeared as of the same @date in the Daily National Journal—no more, no less—indicating that the death notice was furnished by some member of her family and paid for. The Library of Congress contains no ‘copies of the Washington City Chronicle for the latter days of January, 1828, but it 1is ‘doubtful if anything more definite would have been found. A search into “Mrs. Colvin's 'Weekly Messenger” of that date served but to ‘disclose the same meager notice. H ¥ Ampthill, .on. the James. River near Richmond, the seat o_] .the e A F FIPRE S PO RN The sunshine and storms of more than a century have not obliterated the words which a of his mother. The fact that Mrs. Randolph’s death did not occasion more comment in the public press of the day must not necessarily be regarded as indicating she was a person of no prominence, beyond her own family and friends. The news- papers of a hundred years ago were small and quaint journals compared with the great papers of today. They had no far-flung facilities for gatherings news, and no great printing presses to turn out thousands of papers in an hour. These century-old newspapers seldom consisted of more than four or six small pages, and ap- parently contained few if any local news items. The front page was generally given over to quaintly worded personal advertisements, while most of the news columns were devoted to ac- tivities In the halls of Congress the previous day. In 1828, women’'s place was regarded as being quietly in the home far more than it is today, irrespective of whether for better or for worse, But what of Ampthill, where this most estimable but now mysterious Mrs. Mary Randolph was born on August 9, 1762, and where she probably spent her childhood? For- tunately, we know something about Ampthill, “near Richmond.” . Paul Wilstach, the his- torian, tells us in his latest and most delight- fully interesting book, “Tidewater Virginia,™ that Ampthill was the seat of the Virginia Cary family and was built by Henry Cary in 1732, the year in which George Washington was born at Wakefield, in Westmoreland County, on the Potomac. He says that Henry Cary superintended also the building of the State House and governor’s palace in old Wil- liamsburg, capital of the colony, and the re- building of Willidm and Mary College after its destruction by fire. And so, being a prominent and probably rich landed proprieter of his day and generation, his colonial home of Ampthill, Cary. famil e s 2 grateful son ordered carved in marble to preserve the memory on the James River, just below the present city of Richmond, must have been perhaps an- other grand and beautiful homestead among a great many such scattered here and there throughout Tidewater Virginia. Wilstach goes on to say about the Cary family: “His son, Archibald Cary, who from his force and determination was known as ‘Qld Iron’ of Ampthill, added a particular luster to his family and to his State by his service as chairman of the committee of the Vir- ginia convention of 1776 which directed the Virginia members sitting in the Continental Congress to agitate and vote for entire inde- pendence of Great Britain.” Across the James River, almost directly oppo- site Ampthill, was Wilton, the Colonial home- stead of the William Randolphs. The Randolphs were a prominent and prolific Virginia family, excepting John Randolph of Roanoke, who was prominent enough but certainly not prolific; a fact which has been ascribed by some for all the bitterness of his stormy, disappointed life. AN the conjectures of romance add anything to solve the mystery about the further iden- tity of Mary Randolph? She married a Ran- dolph; she was born at Ampthill, across the historic old James River from Wilton, the seat of one branch of that famous family. Having been born in 1762, if we add 19 years to that date, endeavoring to guess at about the probable time of her marriage, we arrive at 1781; and on October 19 of that year George Washington received the surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown, only a few miles from Ampthill on the James. Who knows but what Mary Ran- dolph met and knew Washington, Lafayette and many other military and naval celebrities dur- ing these stirring days of the crowning achieve- M ly of Virginia, where Mary Rando{ph was. born —_— ment of the Revolutionary War? She may have known young John Parke Custis, the general's stepson and aide-de-camp and first proprietor of Arlington estate. The little village of Yorktown, or what was left of it after the siege, and the more populous Williamsburg, the capital and social center cf the Colony of Virginia, must have had their “armistice day.” Doubtless the youth and beauty of the vicinity gathered at Williamsburg to greet the victoricus warriors, whom they knew would be much in need of all the feminine pulchritude it would be possible to assemble in order to help celebrate the victory. Per- haps the war-weary Continental and French of- ficers were only too glad, ncw that their work was well-nigh finished, to accept the gracious hospitality of the nearby Virginia planters and to sit once more before mahogany tables cov- ered with fine linen and shining silver while they sipped old madeira and fine port, with many a gallant tcast to lovely Virginia ladies in full satin gowns and powdered hair, and who blushed furiously, no doubt. It may be, therefore, that Mary Randolph, either as a shy Virginia maiden or a very young matron, witnessed some considerable part of the closing drama of the 'Revolutionary ‘War. In all this intriguing supposition, who was Mary Randolph’s husband? Nobody knows. And yet, perhaps some one does know and will come forward and dispel the cloud of doubt with a historic ray of enlightenment. The Washington City Directory for 1828 is a mere vest-pocket edition. It almost makes one smile to think that, even 100 years ago, it could have served any very utilitarian purpose. It con- tains no name of Mary Randolph, and only three or four persons of that surhame. If any of them were of her famfly there is nothing to indicate the fact. Where 5 the Custis family Bible today? Who has it? Some of the descendants of Mrs, Robert E. Lee, no doubt. But who, and where? That old family Bible probably contains some reference to Mrs. Randolph’s burial in the grounds of Arlington House estate, and what relation she bore to Mr. and Mrs. Custis. In those old-time family Bibles there were espe- cially prepared pages in which to record the births and deaths of the family. Surely the importance of Mrs. Randolph, that occasioned her entombment near the front of the great mansion house, would have caused Mr. Custis to make an appropriate entry in the family Bible. Her obituary notice stated that she had selected the spot where she was to be buried. It is evident, therefore, that she was a frequent visitor to Arlington House and was intimately acquainted with its brcad and beautiful acres, Was the spot she selected perhaps a favorite one, whither she often sought retreat with a book, until she grew to love it dearly? APPARENTLY, at the time of Mrs. Ran- dolph’s death, there was no family burial ground at Arlington House estate. It would seem that one was not actually selected until the death of Mrs. Custis in April, 1853, a quar- ter of a century after Mrs. Randolph's intere ment, because both Mr. and Mrs. Custis are buried in another part of the grounds southwest of the mansion. It is also fairly probable thag the brick wall which surrounds her grave was not erected until some time after her burial on the 24th of January, 1828. The meager news- paper accounts of her death all agree that she was ill only six days and her funeral occurred the day alter she had died. It is evident, therefore, that the brick-walled vault was built some time later, perhaps when the marble slab carrying her epitaph was about ready to be set in place. ; Mrs. Lee was the last of her family to leave Arlington. Some weeks after Col. Lee had gone to Richmond and had become Gen. Lee of the Confederate States of America, she remained in Arlington House, working with desperate haste to get the furniture, family portraits, china and plate away before the Union troops should come, as she knew they surely would come. On the morning of May 24, 1861, the Arlington es- tate first saw the blue uniforms and gleaming bayonets coming through the trees, the first hostile footsteps it had ever known. A few days later, according to old Uncle Jim Parks, Mrs. Lee left, never again to return to her home, Uncle Jim said he saw her drive away in the family carriage with an escort of Union cavalry and a pass to take her through the Union lines. Presumably, she went to Ravensworth, neas Fairfax Court House, to the later homestead of her Grandfather Fitzhugh, which he had buils as a “wilderness” retreat when the demands of a universal and perpetual Virginia hospitality had nearly eaten him into insolvency at Chate ham, on the banks of the Rappahannoci. From that day forward Arlington- has been under martial dominion exclusively. The sole diers came then and they have remained ever since. Throughout the four years of the Civil War many thousands of rough-and-ready sole diers from many States of the North were en= camped upon and around Arlington estate; but the grave of Mrs. Randolph was never dese= crated, in so far as is known. Doubtless, many times some soldier in blue looked down upon Mrs. Randolph’s white marble gravestone and read those words of tribute from a devoted son to the mother who had borne him. And then, perhaps, for all the soldier's rough looks— “bearded like a pard”—he thought of another mother back home in New Hampshire, Vere mont or Michigan; and his eyes might have become a little dimmed, so that he could not see the carved letters quite so clearly; and a blue sleeve must needs wipe away a telltale tear. The War Department, the quartermaster general and Supt. Robert Dye of Arlington Cemetery have seen to it that Mrs. Ran- dolph’s tomb is kept in good repair. A loose stone atop the ancient brick wall is not suffered to remain in that condition after being discov- ered. The English ivy, which was probably planted by Mrs. Custis, still clings to the moist bricks and grows, ever green, over the top stones in riotcus profusion. The sunshine and shadows of the years come and go and more than a century has passed since they returned this good lady to mother earth. She is goneé and she is not forgotten; but who was Mary Randolph and how came she to be buried on the lawn of Arlington House estate? suws, COPTTIEY 1834 AN visnis ressrved), e