"This comes at last to bring you the news that I believe will be most agreeable to you of any you have ever heard. That you may not be long in suspense I will tell you at once. I am empowered by your father to let you know that he heartily and willingly consents to your marriage with Miss Dandridge; that he has so good a character of her that he rather you should have her than any lady in Virginia-nay, if possible, he is as much enamoured with her character as you are with her person, and this is owing chiefly to a prudent speech of her own. Hurry down immediately, for fear he should change the strong inclination he has to your marrying directly. I stayed with him all night, and presented Jack* with my little Jack's horse, bridle, and saddle, in your name, which was taken as a singular favor. J. POWER."†

Mr. Custis had already obtained the consent of Colonel Dandridge to marry his daughter. Within an hour after he received Power's message, the lover was in the saddle on the way to the mansion of his affianced with his father's written pledge of acquiescence. There he tarried a day and a night. All the preliminaries for their speedy wedding were arranged, and in less than three weeks afterwards their nuptials were celebrated.

At this time Daniel Parke Custis had a delightful residence known as "The White House," on the Pamunkey

*Jack was a small negro boy to whom Colonel Custis had taken such a fancy that when his son Daniel positively refused to marry Evelyn Byrd, he made a will bequeathing all his fortune to this boy. Through the solicitations of his friends and the power of his paternal feelings, when his passion had subsided he destroyed the will. Then he manumitted the boy, and provided his mother, Alice, with a comfortable maintenance. Copied from an autograph letter at Arlington House.

MARTHA DANDRIDGE'S MARRIAGE.

89

River, in New Kent County. Around it lay his large landed He was a kind-hearted, generous, just, and amiable young man, beloved by his friends, his neighbors, and his

estate.

servants.

A few miles from the White House stood St. Peter's Church. It was built in 1703 at a cost of one hundred and forty-six thousand pounds of tobacco, then a part of the currency of Virginia. At the time we are considering, the Rev. David Mossum had been its rector more than twenty years. He was superior in character and attainments to most of the clergy of the Established Church in Virginia, who, as a rule, had not been trustworthy guides and exemplars in religion and morals.* Mossum was from Newburyport, Massachusetts, and was the first native-born American admitted to the office of Presbyter in the Church of England. He had been married four times. He was now irritable in temper and morose in disposition, made so, it was said, by being continually harassed by his fourth wife, who was a shrew he could not tame. He sometimes displayed his petulance in the pulpit.

On one occasion he had quarrelled with the clerk in the vestry, and he assailed him in the sermon that followed. The clerk was equal to the occasion, and retaliated by giving out from the desk the psalm beginning with the lines,

* "Your clergy in these parts are a very ill example," wrote the Rev. Nicholas Moreau, of St. Peter's parish, to the Bishop of London, at the close of the seventeenth century. "No discipline nor canons of the Church are observed. Several ministers have caused such high scandal of late, and have raised such prejudices among the people against the clergy, that hardly can they be persuaded to take a clergyman into their parish."

"With restless and ungovern'd rage

Why do the heathen storm?
Why on such rash attempts engage
As they can ne'er perform ?"

The nuptials of Daniel Parke Custis and Martha Dandridge were celebrated in St. Peter's Church, on a pleasant morning in June, 1749, when the bride was seventeen years of age. She was "given away" by Colonel Dandridge. Among the happiest faces seen on the occasion was that of the venerable John Custis, father of the bridegroom, who, at the conclusion of the ceremony, saluted his beautiful daughter-in-law with a kiss on both cheeks. The assembled company of friends rode from the church to the White House, the wedded pair in a coach drawn by four white horses, flanked by six young black outriders dressed in white. A sumptuous entertainment was given at the mansion to friends and relatives and the gentry of the surrounding country; and the servants, enjoying a holiday, were made happy with feasting and presents.

In his first letter written to his agent in London (Robert Cary) after his marriage, Mr. Custis wrote. “I desire a handsome watch for my wife, a pattern like the one you bought for Mrs. Burwell, with her name around the dial. There are just twelve letters in her name, MARTHA CUSTIS, a letter for each hour marked on the dial-plate."*

This watch is still in existence. It has a singular history. Mrs. Washington presented it to one of her four nieces (Miss Dandridge) who lived at Mount Vernon with her aunt after Washington's death. This niece afterwards be

*Copied from the first draft of the letter at Arlington House, in 1853.

MR. AND MRS. CUSTIS.

91

came Mrs. Halyburton, and survived her aunt about thirty years. The watch remained in her family until after the The ruin

late Civil War.

which that catastrophe wrought in the fortunes of the family compelled them to sell the watch. It was sent to New York for the purpose. A generous citizen of Newburg, on the Hudson (the late Enoch Carter), bought the watch and deposited it among the relics in Washington's head-quarters at Newburg, where it now (1886) is.*

Mr. and Mrs. Custis enjoyed a happy wedded life for

about seven years. They were always welcome visitors among the dwellers in the Virginia capital, and indulged much in its gayeties in the winter season. The husband was a special favorite of the burly Scotch governor, Dinwiddie. When, early in 1755, the French and Indian War had begun, the governor made Custis lieutenant of Kent County, and soon afterwards commissioned him colonel of

*The engraving is an exact representation of this watch in size and figure. It has a gold case, with a circle of white enamel inlaid with gold around the edges of the face and back. Over each numeral of the dial may be seen a letter of the name of MARTHA CUSTIS, beginning at figure 1. The enamel of the face, or dial, is broken. The watch was made by Bawie, London.

the militia of his district. He was about to call him to a seat in his council, when Death summoned the master of the White House from the earth.

Four children had blessed this union of Daniel Parke