Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 2.djvu/69

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VIRGINIA BIOGRAPHY

himbia University, New York, and is com- memorateu :n the massive marble Wa.-hing- lon Arch in the same city, and in the \\'j>i-h- ington Monument in the national capital. Statues of Washington have been erected in nearly ever> important city in the com. try, the principal ones being that by Houdo»« in the capital at Richmond, Virginia, and Crawford's equestrian statue in the same city ; and the colossal statue by Grcenough, in Washington City. Among numerous portraits are those of Stuart, Trumbull, and both the Peales.

Martha Washington, wife of President and General George Washington, was a daughter of Colonel John Dandridge, and wido'v of Daniel Parke Custis. Her daughter, Martha Parke Custis, died at the iige of seventeen: her younger children. Eleanor Parke and George Washington Parke Custis, were adopted by General Washington, who was childless.

Wythe, George, son of Thomas Wythe, r.nd Elizabeth Walker, his wife, who v/as a {a*anddaughter of the celebrated Rev. George Keith, of England and Penn^jl- vania, was descended from Thomas Wythe, who came to Elizabeth City county, from England about 1680. He was born in 1726, was schooled under the care of his r.u»iher. who was well educated, an J at- tended William and Mary College, lie .^'tudied law under his uncle-in-law, Stephen Dev/ey, in Prince George county ; settled in Williamsburg, and attained distinction at the bar, and was made attorney-general by Governor Dinwiddie, in 1754, in the absence of Peyton Randolph; was burgess for tlie city of Williamsburg, August of the same year, on the death of Armistead Burwell.

continuing till 1756. About this time be re- moved to Spotsylvania county, wheic he married Anne, daughter of Zachary Lewis. a prominent lawyer there. In 1758 he was ?gui!i in Williamsburg, and was burgess for the college of William and Mary in the assembly of 1 758-1 761, after which he re- moved to nis native county. Elizabeth City, and was burgess for that county from 1761 to 17C9, when he was made clerk of the house of burgesses, an office retained by him till 1775. During the Stamp Act troubles, he was one of the committee of corrc\spondence. which in June, 1764, pro- tested against its enactment, and he drew the remonstrance to the house of 00m- mcn* adopted by the burgesses in Decem- ber. 1764. He opposed the resolution^ of Patrick IJcnry in May, 1765, as hasty and premature. He served as clerk of the house of burge>«cs till he was appointed a mem- ber of Congress in August, 1775, ^vhere he supported the resolutions of Richard Henry Lee. in favor of independence, and afterward was a signer of the Declaratio.i of Luleptndence. In 1776 he was appointed a member of the committee to revise the laws of the state and to adapt them to the new form of government, having been one cf the compilers of the Code of 1769. In 1777 he was speaker of the house of dele- gates, and the same year was appointed one of the three judges of the chancery court es- tablished by law. While holding this posi- tion, he was appointed, in 1779, professor of bw at William and Mary College, being thus the first professor of law in the United States. As a part of his methods of teach- ing he held moot law courts and legislative assemblies in the old Williamsburg capital. He was the first judge to announce the

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