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Show IP l '"1 III" ' y" ' - H w ' ' r V ' - - ' , V w 1 I x - V KASHmsTcw Hits JiHHtoii P fillf rf By DEWITT J. MASON EORGE WASHINGTON, In his boyhood days, was a surveyor. lie had much experience in that line and he was highly successful. A neglected scene of his youthful labors now is demanding public attentionthe at-tentionthe little stone office in which he worked for Lord Fairfax Is to become a show place of Clark county, Virginia. A hundred and seventy-eight years ngo George Washington might have been found there any day, figuring busily and poring over outstretched charts and maps. In the neighborhood neighbor-hood he made his first acquaintance, as a surveyor, with a country he was later to know as a soldier. Here he became accustomed ' to hardships and privations such as were to be his lot In the Revolutionary war. The little lit-tle office is only oome sixty miles or so from Washington, D. C. When the young surveyor worked there it was on a wild frontier. Henry, Lord Fairfax, was once visiting visit-ing his relative, William Fairfax, when George Washington was present. pres-ent. Lawrence Washington had married mar-ried William Fairfax's daughter. The great man took a fancy to the boy, just past his seventeenth birthday. Findiog in hitu abilities and attainments attain-ments beyond his years, he engaged him to survey his vast tracts of land 1 .In the rich valley of the Alleghanies. Washington set out in March, 1748, together with George William' Fair fax; and, through Ashley's Gap in the Blue Ridge mountains, the western west-ern frontier of inhabited Virginia, they passed into the valley. In the wiiuerness m the Shenandoah valley, val-ley, about twelve miles from the present pres-ent town of Winchester, they stopped at a lodge where Lord Fairfax's land bailiff, or steward, dwelt with as many negroes as were necessary to farm the newly cleared land. This first arduous expedition lasted five weeks, with results of such satisfaction satis-faction to Lord Fairfax that he himself him-self moved across the Blue Ridge soon afterward, taking up his quarters quar-ters at the lodge. He laid out a manor for the place, which he called Greenway court, after his ancestral home in England; but the house was never built. The master himself slept In a wooden structure about 12 feet square. On the lawn nearby he built a one-story office, where his deeds were drawn and his quit rents collected. col-lected. There the boy Washington did his work, remninino- fnr Hi.- , in the service of Lord Fairfax. . Many fjf the now famous plats of his surveys sur-veys and subdivisions were made under un-der this roof. Washington's life as . a surveyor, gave him a splendid physique. When he had his growth he was "straight ' ; ff'- nWA J. " Ti rv. fes C f JM5 luCd 2 Jsa-Z, ?7Cs? III If i 'zr. -, as an Indian, measuring six feet two inches in his stockings and weighing weigh-ing 175 pounds." This stood him well during the Revolution. Long hours In the saddle could not tire him. He slept once under a tree with its roots for a pillow. The privations of Valley Val-ley Forge f could not daunt him. He rode a horse to death to get to the nont at Monmouth, and stop the retreat re-treat and had breath left to curse Lee for his cowardice. Washington' s life as a surveyor made him 100 per cent efficient in the ways of the wilderness, where efficiency effi-ciency means life or death. He learned to a hair's breadth what a man could do with rifle, horse and boat; how to run like a coward and come back like a brave man ; how to use Morgan's riflemen who came In response re-sponse to his hurry-up call; how to get the lay of the land and pick his battlefield. The old office has been left to the ravages of time and the elements in recent years. It is almost hidden from view by a long-stretching arm of a giant locust tree. One window Is concealed behind a screen of bushes, and over Its roof a clinging creeper climbs, drooping like a stray lock over the front. Its corners are chipped, Its windows broken and its shingled roof is leaky in spots. But repairs and. restoration are now at hand. A committee has been formed of which Graham, F. Elandy of New York-is York-is chairman, to collect funds for re- slungling the roof, relaying the floor enclosing the inside and repainting the outside walls. By spring, it Is thought all will be in readiness for visitors. , That Washington, as was the custom cus-tom among the landed proprietors of Virginia and other southern states, was a slave holder is -well known. His views on slavery are not so generally understood and while it may not be a surprise to many that on his death he freed his own slaves, the provisions of his will in this respect are of much interest. After providing that his wife Martha Washington, shall have the "use and profit and benefit of his whole estate, real and personal " dur ing her life, there follows this clause : "ITEM Upon the decease of wife it Is my will and desire that all the siaves wmcn 1 Hold in my own right shall receive their freedom To emancipate them during her ijfe would, though earnestly wished for by me, be attended with such insuperable difficulties on account of their Inter mixture with the dower negroes as to excite the most painful sensations if not disagreeable consequences, from the latter while both descriptions are in the occupancy of the same proprietor, propri-etor, it not being In my power under the tenure by which the dower negroes are held to manumit them. And whereas, where-as, among those who will receive freedom free-dom according to this demise, there may be some who from old np-Q nr bodily infirmities and others who on account of their infancy that will be unable to support themselves, it is my will and desire that all who come under un-der the first and second description shall be comfortably clothed and fed by my heirs while they lite, and that such of the later description as have no parents living, or if living are unable un-able or unwilling to provide for them, shall be bound by the, court until they shall arrive at the age of -twenty-five years, and in cases where no record can be produced whereby their ages can oe ascertained, the Judgment of the court upon its own view of the subject shall be adequate and final. "The negroes thus bound are (by their masters or mistresses) to be taught to read and write and to be brought up to some useful occupation, occupa-tion, agreeably to the laws of the commonwealth of Virginia providing for the support of orphans and other poor children and I do hereby expressly ex-pressly forbid the sale or transportation transporta-tion out of the said commonwonith of any slave I may die possessed of under any pretence whntsover, and I do moreover most positively and most solemnly enjoin it upon my executors exe-cutors hereafter named, or the survivors sur-vivors of them, to see that this clause resneefinp- cinoo j o . emu every part thereof be religiously fulfilled at the epoch at which It Is directed to take place without evasion, neglect or de lay after the crops which may then be on the ground are harvested par-t.cularly par-t.cularly as it respects the aged and Inarm, seeing that a regular and permanent fund be established for their support so long as there are subjects requiring it, not trusting to the uncertain provisions to be made by individuals." ,Ule There follows a clause providing for V8 rsonal "nlUlatt0 n" giving Wm his independence at once If hf so desires. ' e The actual reading 0f the ah clause throws an intimate " ; g, Tin Washington's extreme thoughtfu lies" , showing, ns It ri eis' -re exercised tha? lZ? in no manner be misconstrued The provisions regarding the aged and In Inn. the children, can on v more firmly to endear u9 " Pnt '6 ho, leaving no children of h,s .T |