| Ravensworth | |
|---|---|
 | |
 | |
| General information | |
| Location | Annandale in Fairfax County, Virginia, U.S. |
| Country | U.S |
| Coordinates | 38°48′32″N77°13′23″W / 38.809°N 77.223°W |
| Completed | 1796 |
| Demolished | 1926 |
Ravensworth was an 18th-century plantation house near Annandale in Fairfax County, Virginia. Ravensworth was the Northern Virginia residence of William Fitzhugh, William Henry Fitzhugh, Mary Lee Fitzhugh Custis, William Henry Fitzhugh Lee and George Washington Custis Lee. It was built in 1796. [1]
Ravensworth was located near Annandale, Virginia, south of Braddock Road, west of the Capital Beltway (Interstate 495).
Ravensworth was one of three mansions built on the large Ravensworth land grant; the other two were Ossian Hall and Oak Hill. William Fitzhugh, who owned significant estates in northern Virginia and also served in the Continental Congress and both houses of the Virginia General Assembly, was buried there in 1809. William Fitzhugh also had a townhouse in Alexandria at 607 Oronoco Street in 1799, which his family – in 1818 – lent to their cousin, Anne Hill Carter Lee, widow of Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee, and her eleven-year-old son, Robert Edward. [2] Eleven years later, on 26 July 1829, Anne Hill Carter Lee died at Ravensworth. [3]
Ravensworth then passed to Fitzhugh's son William Henry Fitzhugh, who died in 1830. William Henry Fitzhugh's childless widow, Anna Maria Sarah Goldsborough Fitzhugh, ran the estate until her death in 1874.
William Fitzhugh and Ann Bolling Randolph's daughter Mary Lee Fitzhugh married George Washington Parke Custis (Martha Washington's grandson) and became the mistress of Arlington House. Their grandson, Confederate general William Henry Fitzhugh "Rooney" Lee, inherited Ravensworth after the death of his great-aunt and lived there from 1874 until his death in 1891. In 1897 George Washington Custis Lee moved to Ravensworth after resigning as president of Washington and Lee University and lived there until his death in 1913.
When Mary Anna Custis Lee fled Arlington House in May 1861 after the outbreak of the Civil War, she stayed at Ravensworth briefly, but then moved further south for fear of inviting damage to the home. Both Union and Confederate forces took advantage of resources and location at Ravensworth; during 1863, in addition to Union forces foraging hay, partisan forces commanded by John S. Mosby once slept in a haystack there and at daybreak discovered they were in full view of a Union encampment. All three of the Fitzhugh estates were protected by orders from both sides throughout the war. [1]
The house mysteriously burned on 1 August 1926. [4]
In 1957, Dr. George Bolling Lee's widow sold the estate for development. [4] That same year the remains from the Fitzhugh family cemetery, including those of William Fitzhugh and his wife, were removed and reinterred at the cemetery of Pohick Church in Lorton. [5] The grounds later became the Ravensworth Farm subdivision, which today is a census-designated place also called Ravensworth. The locality's population as of the 2010 census was 2,466. [6]
George Washington Custis Lee, also known as Custis Lee, was the eldest son of Robert E. Lee and Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee. His grandfather, George Washington Parke Custis was the grandson of Martha Dandridge Custis Washington. He served as a Confederate general in the U.S. Civil War, primarily as an aide-de-camp to President Jefferson Davis, and succeeded his father as president of Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia.
William Fitzhugh was an American planter, legislator and patriot during the American Revolutionary War who served as a delegate to the Continental Congress for Virginia in 1779, as well as many terms in the House of Burgesses and both houses of the Virginia General Assembly following the Commonwealth's formation. His Stafford County home, Chatham Manor, is on the National Register for Historic Places and serves as the National Park Service Headquarters for the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park.
William Henry Fitzhugh Lee, known as Rooney Lee or W. H. F. Lee, was the second son of General Robert E. Lee and Mary Anna Custis. He was a planter, a Confederate cavalry General in the American Civil War, and later a Democratic Congressman from Virginia.
Arlington House is the historic Custis family mansion built by George Washington Parke Custis from 1803–1818 as a memorial to George Washington. Currently maintained by the National Park Service, it is located in the U.S. Army's Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington County, Virginia. Arlington House is a Greek Revival style mansion designed by the English architect George Hadfield. The Custis grave sites, garden and slave quarters are also preserved on the former Arlington Estate.
George Washington Parke Custis was an American antiquarian, author, playwright, and plantation owner. He was a veteran of the War of 1812. His father, John Parke Custis served in the American Revolution with then-General George Washington. John Parke Custis died after the Battle of Yorktown that ended the American Revolution.
Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee was the wife of the Confederate general Robert E. Lee and the last private owner of Arlington Estate. She was the daughter of George Washington Parke Custis who was the grandson of Martha Washington, the wife of George Washington. Lee was a highly educated woman, who edited and published her father's writings after his death.
Mary Lee "Molly" Fitzhugh Custis was an Episcopal lay leader in Alexandria County in present-day Arlington County, Virginia. She was the mother of Mary Anna Randolph Custis, who was the wife of Robert E. Lee. In the early 1820s, Molly Custis helped form a coalition of women who sought to abolish slavery.
John Parke Custis was an American planter and politician. Custis was a son of Martha Washington and Daniel Parke Custis as well as a stepson of George Washington.
Robert Edward Lee Jr. was the sixth of seven children of Confederate General Robert E. Lee and Mary Anna Randolph Custis. He became a soldier during the American Civil War, and later was a planter, businessman, and author.
William Henry Fitzhugh was Virginia planter and politician who served in both houses of the Virginia General Assembly, as well as in the Virginia constitutional convention of 1829–1830 and as an officer of the American Colonization Society.
Ossian Hall was an 18th-century plantation house in Annandale, Fairfax County, Virginia. Ossian Hall was one of three large residences, along with Oak Hill, and Ravensworth, owned by the Fitzhugh family in Fairfax County.
Eleanor Calvert Custis Stuart, born Eleanor Calvert, was a prominent member of the wealthy Calvert family of Maryland. She was the wife of John Parke Custis who was the son of Daniel Parke Custis and Martha Dandridge Custis. She and John had seven children. She was widowed when John Parke Custis died of disease at the end of the American Revolution at Yorktown where he served with his stepfather, George Washington. Eleanor married Dr. David Stuart, an Alexandria physician and business associate of George Washington on November 20, 1783.
The White House was a late 17th-century plantation on the Pamunkey River near White House in New Kent County, Virginia. There were a total of three White Houses all built on the original pre-1700 foundation. The original White House Mansion was built by Colonel John Lightfoot III just before 1700 and while he was Counselor of State.
Nicholas Battaile Fitzhugh was a Virginia lawyer and politician who became a United States circuit judge of the United States Circuit Court of the District of Columbia after representing Fairfax County in the Virginia House of Delegates.
David Stuart was a Virginia physician, politician, and correspondent of George Washington. When Washington became President of the United States, he made Stuart one of three commissioners appointed to design a new United States capital city.
Kings Park is a census-designated place (CDP) in the eastern United States in Fairfax County, Virginia, southwest of Washington D.C. The population as of the 2010 census was 4,333.
Anne Hill Carter Lee was the First Lady of Virginia from 1791 to 1794 as the wife of the ninth governor, Henry Lee III. She was the mother of the general-in-chief of the Confederate States of America, Robert E. Lee. As a separated wife and then as a widow, she was the head of her household at Lee Corner, Alexandria, Virginia, in what is now known as the Robert E. Lee Boyhood Home. Her chronic pain and straitened circumstances play a significant role in her son Robert's biography.
Mildred Childe Lee was an American society hostess and the youngest child of Robert E. Lee and Mary Anna Custis Lee. She was the last member of the Lee family to be born at Arlington Plantation and had a privileged upbringing typical of members of the planter class, attending boarding schools in Winchester, Virginia, and Raleigh, North Carolina. A favorite of her father's, she was doted upon and given the nickname "Precious Life", often being referred to by this nickname in family letters. During the American Civil War, she sewed clothing for soldiers of the Confederate States Army and volunteered as a nurse in Confederate hospitals. Lee never married or had children, instead devoting her time to caring for her parents in their later years. After her father's death, she assisted her brother, George Washington Custis Lee, as hostess while he served as president of Washington College.
Anne Carter Lee was the fourth child and second daughter of General Robert E. Lee and Mary Anna Custis Lee. She grew up at Arlington House on her family's plantation. During the American Civil War, she stayed with relatives at Ravensworth Plantation and White House Plantation. She and her mother and sisters were placed under house arrest by Union troops in 1861 before being allowed to cross over Confederate lines to join her father in Richmond. Lee suffered from various health conditions throughout her life and died of typhoid fever at the age of twenty-three. She was buried in Warren County, North Carolina, where she died. In 1994, her body was interred at University Chapel of Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia. The Anne Carter Lee Monument stands at her original gravesite in Warrenton.
Eleanor Agnes Lee was an American diarist and poet. The fifth child of General Robert E. Lee and Mary Anna Custis Lee, she was a member of the prominent Lee family of Virginia and was affectionately called "Wiggy" and "Agnes" by her parents. In her youth, Lee kept a diary about her life at Arlington Plantation. In 1984, her diary was published posthumously under the title Growing Up in the 1850s, and was considered one of the first detailed accounts the private lives of the Lee family at Arlington. Lee also wrote poetry, often in letters to her family, inspired by real-life events including the American Civil War, the death of her favorite sister, Anne Carter Lee, and the execution of her beau and cousin, William Orton Williams.
