Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. I.djvu/21



, first president of the United States, born at Pope's Creek, near Bridge's Creek, Westmoreland County, Va., February 22, 1732; died at Mount Vernon, December 14, 1799. Of his English ancestry various details are given in more than one formal biography of him, and very recently several questions of his genealogy have been satisfactorily solved by Mr. Henry F. Waters, Mr. Moncure D. Conway, and Mr. W. C. Ford, which had eluded even the labors of the late Col. J. L. Chester. It is perhaps too early to regard his English ancestry as beyond all further question. At all events, this memoir may well be allowed to begin with his American history.

His earliest ancestor in this country was John Washington, who had resided for some years at South Cave, near the Humber, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, and who came over to Virginia, with his brother Lawrence, in 1657. Purchasing lands in Westmoreland County and establishing his residence at Pope's Creek, not far from the Potomac, he became, in due course, an extensive planter, a county magistrate, and a