A Mount Vernon Slave Census, 1815-1861

 

Table 4 (Background): Division of John Augustine Washington (I) estate, c. 1787

 

After John Augustine Washington, George Washington’s brother, died in 1787, the slaves belonging to his Bushfield estate were divided among three principal heirs: his widow, Hannah Bushrod Washington, and their two surviving sons, Bushrod and Corbin Washington. After Hannah Bushrod Washington died in 1801, her portion of the estate was divided between Bushrod Washington and the estate of Corbin Washington (who had died by then).

 

Many of the people enslaved at Mount Vernon between 1802 and 1861 could trace their families to the Bushfield estate. Some, including Oliver and Doll Smith, had been assigned to Bushrod Washington in this 1787 estate division. The Smiths’ son Phil, born in 1790, was Mount Vernon’s gardener from the 1820s until his death in 1846. Others, such as Sinah and her husband Joe, had been assigned to Hannah Bushrod Washington, then inherited by Bushrod Washington on his mother’s death; they and their children and grandchildren appeared on Bushrod’s 1815 list (Table 1). Still others had ancestors among the people assigned to Corbin Washington in 1787. For example, Mingo, whose placement in this table and $20 value suggest that he was a child in 1787, was probably the same man who appeared on Hannah Lee Washington’s 1810 inventory (Table 5), married to Janney (Jenny). Their son Gabriel, born in 1820, would become a Mount Vernon field worker in the 1840s (Table 3).

 

Symbols:

• = person later found on Bushrod Washington’s 1815 list of slaves (see Table 1)

† = person later found on Hannah Lee Washington’s 1810 estate inventory (see Table 5)