Daniel Parke Custis#Estate

File:Coat of Arms of John Custis.svg

Image:Coat of Arms of George Washington Parke Custis.svg

Custis was born in York County, Virginia, on October 15, 1711. He was one of two children of John Custis IV (1678–1749), a powerful member of Virginia's Governor's Council, and Frances Parke Custis. The Custis family was one of the wealthiest and most socially prominent of Virginia.{{cite book|last=Watson|first=Robert P. |title=Affairs of State: The Untold History of Presidential Love, Sex, and Scandal, 1789-1900|year=2012|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=978-1-442-21834-5|page=97}} Custis' mother, Frances, was the daughter of Daniel Parke, a political enemy of the Custises.{{cite web|last1=Brady|first1=Patricia|title=Daniel Parke Custis (1711–1757)|url=http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Custis_Daniel_Parke_1711-1757|publisher=Encyclopedia Virginia/Dictionary of Virginia Biography|access-date=17 June 2015}}

As Daniel Custis was the sole male heir in the Custis family, he inherited the Southern plantations owned by his father.{{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}} However, Custis did not choose to take a leading role in colonial Virginia politics.

At the age of 37, Custis met 16-year-old Martha Dandridge at the St. Peter's Church where Martha attended and Custis was a vestryman.{{cite book|last1=Schneider|first1=Dorothy |last2=Schneider|first2=Carl J. |title=First Ladies: A Biographical Dictionary|year=2010|publisher=Infobase Publishing|isbn=978-1-438-12750-7|page=2}}{{cite book|last=McKenney|first=Janice E. |title=Women of the Constitution: Wives of the Signers|year=2012|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=978-0-810-88498-4|page=184}} His father, John Custis, disapproved of the relationship, but eventually relented. After a two-year courtship, Custis and Dandridge were married on May 15, 1750.Schneider 2010 p.10 The couple lived at Custis's plantation called the White House in New Kent County, Virginia.

They had four children:Watson 2012 p.102

• Daniel Parke Custis, Jr. (November 19, 1751 – February 19, 1754)
• Frances Parke Custis (April 12, 1753 – April 1, 1757)
• John Parke "Jacky" Custis (November 27, 1754 – November 5, 1781)
• Martha Parke "Patsy" Custis (1756 – June 19, 1773)

Custis died on July 8, 1757, in New Kent County, Virginia, with some historians stating the cause of death as a heart attack,{{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}}{{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]}} but others stating that he died from a severe throat infection.{{cite web |last1=Brady |first1=Patricia |title=Daniel Parke Custis (1711–1757) |url=https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/custis-daniel-parke-1711-1757 |publisher=Encyclopedia Virginia/Dictionary of Virginia Biography |access-date=November 13, 2023 |date=December 7, 2020}}

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.{{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}} Eighteen months after Custis died, his widow Martha married George Washington on January 6, 1759.

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"),{{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}} and the other two thirds were held in trust for their children. The January 1759 Custis estate also included at least 85 slaves.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. 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.{{Cite book |title=Account of Land and Acreage, Estate of Daniel Parke Custis |publisher=Worthy Partner |pages=103–04 |quote=This land inventory was incomplete, not listing Custis lots in Jamestown and Williamsburg}}

Upon Martha Custis' marriage to George Washington in 1759, her dower share came under his control, pursuant to the common law doctrine of seisin jure uxoris. He also became guardian of her two minor children, and administrator of the Custis estate. John Parke Custis was the only child to reach his majority, upon which he inherited the non-dower two-thirds of his father's estate.

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.{{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}} 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.{{Cite web |title=Text of George Washington's Last Will and Testament |url=https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/06-04-02-0404-0001}}

Washington's slaves were not part of the Custis estate, and Martha had no legal power to free them or the dower slaves, but they were freed at her request on January 1, 1801. The principal reason that Martha gave for requesting that her husband's slaves be set free is that she was concerned about her personal safety. Washington's slaves, having found out that they would be free upon her death, were suspected of wanting to hasten her death. They were also perceived as being restive and were believed to have been the cause of several suspicious fires on the Mount Vernon estate.{{Cite web |title=The 1790's |url=https://marthawashington.us/exhibits/show/martha-washington--a-life/the-1790s/slavery |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091029171041/https://marthawashington.us/exhibits/show/martha-washington--a-life/the-1790s/slavery |archive-date=29 October 2009 |url-status=dead}}

When Martha died on May 22, 1802, her dower share reverted to the Custis estate. Because of Martha Washington's dower share, the estate could not be liquidated for more than 45 years. Martha's dower share was eventually divided between John Parke Custis's widow, Eleanor Calvert Custis Stuart, and their four children. Martha also bequeathed Elisha, the one slave she owned herself, to her grandson George Washington Parke Custis.

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Category:1711 births

Category:1757 deaths

Category:18th-century American planters

Category:Slave owners from the Thirteen Colonies

Category:Burials at Bruton Parish Church

Category:Custis family (Virginia)

Category:Dandridge family (Virginia)

Category:People from York County, Virginia

Category:Washington family