The Letterbook of John Custis IV of Williamsburg, 1717-1741

by Josephine Little Zuppan (Editor)

Overview

This absorbing letterbook, meticulously edited and thoroughly annotated, provides remarkable insight into the life and concerns of 18th-century colonial Virginians. We see in these 144 letters an intimate view of John Custis IV (1678-1749), best known as the father-in-law of Martha Dandridge Custis, the wife of George Washington. Custis, a third-generation Virginian, was a wealthy, influential and shrewd planter-businessman-politician who served for years on the governor's Council. The letters are especially revealing about economic life, the material culture of colonial Virginia, and the treacherous legal and financial conditions in which even important planters operated. The correspondence clearly shows how a wealthy colonial planter uses and could be misused by the British mercantile system.
The letters also provide a view of the personal side of the sober and overly frugal Custis: his fashionable passion for gardening (in which he was "inferior to few if any in Virginia"); his strife-filled nine-year marriage to Frances Parke, before her death from smallpox; his uneven relationships with his son and daughter which were especially difficult concerning the financial arrangements for their marriages; his persistent ill health; and the mixed roles Custis had with his 200 slaves (as harsh taskmaster, as personal physician, and perhaps as father of a favored slave).

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780945612803
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	12/10/2004
Series:	Virginia Historical Society Documents Series , #19
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	6.16(w) x 9.26(h) x 0.88(d)

About the Author

Josephine Little Zuppan graduated from Kent State University in 1965 and earned a master's degree in American history and historical editing from the College of William and Mary in 1978. For many years she served as editor of the Cleveland Museum of Art, where she supervised production of the museum's numerous catalogs and publications by Indiana University Press. An avid gardener like John Custis, she was drawn to his letterbook for its horticultural theme as well as for its insight into the commercial and social relations of colonial Virginia. She began editing the letterbook as her graduate thesis and completed work on the book manuscript shortly before she died in 1993 at the age of forty-nine.

Table of Contents

Part 1 Foreword Part 2 Preface and Acknowledgments Part 3 Addendum to Preface Part 4 Editorial Method Part 5 Abbreviations Part 6 Introduction Chapter 7 Letterbook Part 8 Appendix I: Extraneous Items Part 9 Appendix II: Calendar of the Letterbook Part 10 Index Part 11 Illustrations