adopted son of
George Washington; born in
Mount Airy, Md., April 30, 1781; was a grandson of
Mrs. Washington.
His father was
John Parke Custis, and his mother was
Eleanor Calvert, of
Maryland.
At the siege of
Yorktown his father was aide-de-camp to
Washington; was seized with camp-fever; retired to
Eltham, and there died before
Washington (who hastened thither immediately after the surrender) could reach his bedside.
Washington afterwards adopted his two children—
Eleanor Parke and
George Washington Parke Custis—as his own. Their early home was at
Mount Vernon.
George was educated partly at
Princeton, and was eighteen years of age at the time of
Washington's death, who made him an executor of his will and left him a handsome estate, on which he lived, until his death, Oct. 10, 1857, in literary, artistic, and agricultural pursuits.
In his early days
Mr. Custis was an eloquent speaker; and in his later years he produced a series of historical pictures, valuable, not as works of art, but for the truthfulness of the costume and equipment of the soldiers delineated in them.
His
Personal recollections of Washington were arranged and fully annotated by
Benson J. Lossing, and published in 1859, with a memoir by his daughter,
Mrs. Robert E. Lee.
