him with the funds by which he was enabled to travel, even while Washington wrote, “Poor fellow! his pursuit after health is, I fear, altogether fruitless.”  When better health came, and with it a renewal of a troth with a niece of Mrs. Washington’s, the marriage was made possible by Washington appointing the young fellow his manager, and not merely did it take place at Mount Vernon, but the young couple took up their home there.  More than this, that their outlook might be “more stable and pleasing,” Washington promised them that on his death they should not be forgotten.  When the disease again developed, Washington wrote his nephew in genuine anxiety, and ended his letter, “At all times and under all circumstances you and yours will possess my affectionate regards.”  Only a few days later the news of his nephew’s death reached him, and he wrote his widow, “To you who so well know the affectionate regard I had for our departed friend, it is unnecessary to describe the sorrow with which I was afflicted at the news of his death.”  He asked her and her children “to return to your old habitation at Mount Vernon.  You can go to no place where you can be more welcome, nor to any where you can live at less expence and trouble,” an offer, he adds, “made to you with my whole heart.”  Furthermore, Washington served as executor, assumed the expense of educating one of the sons, and in his will left the two children part of the Mount Vernon estate, as well as other bequests, “on account of the affection I had for, and the obligation I was under to their father when living, who from his youth attached himself to my person, and followed my fortunes through the vicissitudes of the late Revolution, afterwards devoting his time for many years whilst my public employments rendered it impracticable for me to do it myself, thereby affording me essential services and always performing them in a manner the most filial and respectful.”

Of his wife’s kith and kin Washington was equally fond.  Both alone and with Mrs. Washington he often visited her mother, Mrs. Dandridge, and in 1773 he wrote to a brother-in-law that he wished “I was master of Arguments powerful enough to prevail upon Mrs. Dandridge to make this place her entire and absolute home.  I should think as she lives a lonesome life (Betsey being married) it might suit her well, & be agreeable, both to herself & my Wife, to me most assuredly it would.”  Washington was also a frequent visitor at “Eltham,” the home of Colonel Bassett, who had married his wife’s sister, and constantly corresponded with these relatives.  He asked this whole family to be his guests at the Warm Springs, and, as this meant camping out in tents, he wrote, “You will have occasion to provide nothing, if I can be advised of your intentions, so that I may provide accordingly.”  To another brother-in-law, Bartholomew Dandridge, he lent money, and forgave the debt to the widow in his will, also giving her the use during her life of the thirty-three negroes he had bid in at the bankruptcy sale of her husband’s property.