John Custis
John Custis IV (August 1678 – after 14 November 1749) was a North American Colonial British politician and like his father a member of both houses of the Virginia General Assembly in the British Colony of Virginia. Often he is designated as John Custis IV or John Custis of Williamsburg to distinguish him from his grandfather, father, and other relatives of the same name.
John Custis IV | |
|---|---|
 John Custis IV by Charles Bridges, 1725 | |
| Member of the House of Burgesses for Northampton County | |
| In office 1705–1706 Serving with William Waters | |
| Preceded by | Benjamin Nottingham |
| Succeeded by | Benjamin Nottingham |
| Member of the House of Burgesses for College of William and Mary | |
| In office 1718–1719 | |
| Preceded by | Peter Beverley |
| Succeeded by | Thomas Jones |
| Personal details | |
| Born | August 1678 Arlington Northampton County, Virginia colony |
| Died | November 14, 1749 |
| Resting place | Custis Tombs, Northampton County |
| Nationality | British |
| Spouse(s) | Frances Parke |
| Children | Daniel Parke Custis |
| Parent(s) | John Custis III Margaret Michael Custis |
| Relatives | John Custis II (grandfather) John Custis I (great-grandfather) Daniel Parke (father-in-law) |
| Occupation | Planter, politician |
Early life
Custis was born at Arlington in Northampton County, Virginia. His parents were John Custis III (c. 1654–1714) (sometimes called John Custis of Wilsonia, who like his father John Custis II was also a Council member), and Margaret Michael Custis, who bore six additional sons before dying following the birth of her second daughter. As the first born son, Custis IV received a private education from tutors appropriate to his class, together with his brothers, before his grandfather sent him to England to complete his studies.[1] Under primogeniture and the terms of his father's will, he inherited considerable lands and slaves upon the death of his father.
On 4 May 1706 he married Frances Parke, the elder daughter and heiress of Daniel Parke, Jr., governor of the Leeward Islands. She was thought to a rich heiress, and her sister Lucy married William Byrd II, who would become powerful in the Virginia colony. However, when his father-in-law died, his debts exceeded his assets, so that not only Custis IV but his sole surviving son Daniel Parke Custis spent considerable time clearing them.[2] The couple also had two children who were buried at Arlington, and their daughter Frances married but died before Custis IV and without children. Relations between Custis IV and his wife were notoriously strained: although living in the same house until her death on March 14, 1715, they communicated through a servant, Pompey.[3]
Career
When he reached the legal age of 21, Custis was sent to his grandfather's Arlington plantation to learn tobacco trading and farming using enslaved labor; he would also follow his father's and grandfather's paths into public office, including the Governor's Council.[4] However, unlike his father, John Custis IV only served a single term in the lower house, during his father's tenure on the Governor's Council.[5] While his father made his Northumberland County plantation at Wilsonia Neck his primary residence, Custis later considered his pre-marital Arlington plantation years the happiest of his life. However, the plantation house burned down, and Custis IV did not choose to rebuild it, writing in 1736 about the economic difficulties inherent in tobacco cultivation.[6]
Custis had moved to Williamsburg, Virginia by 1717, when voters affiliated with the College of William and Mary elected him as their representative in the House of Burgesses, although again he did not win re-election.[7] He spent 34 years as a widower in Williamsburg, living with loyal servants at what was called the Six Chimney House. John Custis IV created a magnificent 4-acre (16,000 m2) garden, as well as traded plants and notes while corresponding with many celebrated horticulturists and naturalists, including John Bartram in Philadelphia, Mark Catesby, and Peter Collinson. He served on the governor's Council from 1727 until increasingly ill health forced him to request to be suspended in August 1749.
In 1744, John Custis took the extraordinary step of petitioning the Governor and Council to set a slave child free. The petition stated the boy was "Christened John but commonly called Jack, born of the body of his Negro wench, Alice."[8]
Death and legacy
John Custis IV died in Williamsburg soon after completing his will on 14 November 1749. At his request, he was buried on the Eastern Shore of Virginia at the Arlington plantation's Custis Tombs. In his will Custis instructed his executor/son, on pain of being cut off with only one shilling, to place on his marble tomb the wording that Custis had "Yet lived but Seven years which was the Space of time he kept a Batchelors House at Arlington on the Eastern Shoar of Virginia. This Inscription put on this Stone by his own positive Orders."
John Custis IV had followed his father's example by sending his only surviving son, Daniel Parke Custis, to learn to manage White House, a plantation on the Pamunkey River in New Kent County operated using enslaved labor. While he did not follow his family's path into politics, Daniel Parke Custis became the first husband of Martha Washington, and his grandson George Washington Parke Custis would name the mansion he built overlooking the Potomac River for the ancestral home on the Eastern Shore.
Notes
- Nora Miller Turman, The Eastern Shore of Virginia, 1603-1964 (Onancock, Virginia, The Eastern Shore News Inc. 1964) p. 114
- Turman pp. 114-115
- H. Chandlee Forman, The Virginia Eastern Shore and its British Origins: History, Gardens & Antiquities (Easton, Maryland: Eastern Shore Publishers' Associates, 1973) p. 57
- Turman p. 114
- Cynthia Miller Leonard, The Virginia General Assembly 1619-1978 (Richmond: Virginia State Library 1978) p. 65
- Susie M. Ames, Studies of the VIrginia Eastern Shore in the Seventeenth Century (New York: Russell & Russell 1940, 1968, 1973) pp.70-71
- Leonard, p. 69
- Wiencek, Henry (2004). 'An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of America', p. 73. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 0-374-52951-5
References
- Will in Prerogative Court of Canterbury Registered Wills, Searle 287, Principal Probate Registry, London, England.
- Kneebone, John T., et al., eds. Dictionary of Virginia Biography (Richmond: Library of Virginia, 1998- ), 3:636-639. ISBN 0-88490-206-4.
- Zuppan, Jo. "John Custis of Williamsburg, 1678-1749," Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 90 (1982): 177–197.
- Custis, John (2005). Zuppan, Josephine Little (ed.). The letterbook of John Custis IV of Williamsburg, 1717-1742. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. ISBN 978-0-945612-80-3.