John Lee, born abt 1724

John Lee, born abt. 1724 was the son of Henry Henry Lee and Mary Bland, both descendents of the Lee immigrants, like the Washington brothers, of Anglophile colonists at beginnings of the 18th century.

We think there is no "color purple story" to be had or made therein because the more important point to be understood was that such immigrants had the bodies and spirits that came, saw and conquered the wilderness and all that lay before them. Like George Washington and Peter Jefferson (the father of Thomas Jefferson) men like John Lee made themselves useful and valuable by mastering skills such as land surveyors of great demand by colonial aristocrats such as Lord Fairfax.

At the time of early English settlers, Leesylvania was believed to be the site of an Algonquian village, overlooking Neabsco Creek. Henry Lee II settled on the land from 1747 until his death in 1787. He and his wife had eight children at their home, including Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee, Revolutionary War hero and future father of Civil War general Robert E. Lee. George Washington mentions visiting the Lee House three times in his diaries. In 1825 the property was sold to Henry Fairfax, and later passed to John Fairfax in 1847. Fairfax later served as a staff aide to Confederate Lt. General James Longstreet.

The site was Fairfax's boyhood home, and he returned to live on the property in late 1875, remaining there until his death in 1908. The land was also used as a small Confederate force and gun emplacement during the Civil War. The Freestone Point Confederate Battery was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1989.^[2] The battery engaged with vessels of the US Navy's Potomac Flotilla on September 25, 1861. There were no casualties on either side, but the Federal vessels withdrew at the conclusion of the fighting. (Ref: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in The War of The Rebellion)

Today, only a small cornerstone of the Lee House remains. The house and its path were completely bulldozed in the 1950s to make way for a road. A restored chimney of the Fairfax House remains. Henry Lee II and his wife, along with Henry Fairfax and his third wife are buried on the property. The sites and the cemetery are accessible by trail. The Leesylvania Archeological Site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.^[2]

John Lee is perhaps best known and understood by reading about adventures undertaken by men like him and George Washington during the French and Indian War, a period of over seven years in which he learned to become a man that mattered to British masters of the future United States.

We honor him by remembering that he was the likely father of William Lee who was born a slave pursuant Virginia Law likely because his mother was a slave. To learn more about him, we searched and reviewed British records about the great war that preceded the American Revolutionary War. Link below tells the tales about what men like him saw and heard as colonial Englishmen during the time and place that William Lee was born.

The view from where we are today is that fellow Lee cousins and others in Westmoreland County knew the peculiar circumstances of William Lee upon his father's death; and, George Washington as a fellow officer in the Virginia militia did the gentlemanly act of purchasing the two boys less they be sold by the widow Lee to a family who did not know or would not care who they were.

John Lee may have left a special request that Washington do so. We do not know but accept the gentlemen's code of honor that men like Lee and Washington lived by were deep set in the region. Like all aristocrats around the world, Virginians of aristocratic standing had the privilege and power to make decisions about events desired after their death, ... and friends honored them by executing their wills as a matter of gentlemanly honor.

Email: Editors, More Mary Matters bradyenterpriseassociation@gmail.com

with questions or comments about this web site.
Copyright © 2010 Brady Enterprise Association, Inc.
Last modified: 12/29/16

Email: Editors, More Mary Matters bradyenterpriseassociation@gmail.com

with questions or comments about this web site.Copyright © 2010 Brady Enterprise Association, Inc.Last modified: 12/29/16

with questions or comments about this web site.
Copyright © 2010 Brady Enterprise Association, Inc.
Last modified: 12/29/16