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John Custis ( 8/1678 - 11/1749 )  Category ( Historical_Figures ) [suggest a correction]
 

Today, John Custis II, a prominent Virginia colonist, is best remembered for his telling and amusing tombstone epitaph. He was so insistent upon making sure that his heir had the epitaph engraved that he mentions it in his will, demanding that if the stone arrive engraved incorrectly or missing the epitaph, that it would be resent to England to correct. Furthermore, his will sternly warns his heir that he would be cut off with only one shilling should he deviate in any way from his father's wishes.

The epitaph reads, in part, that Custis had "Yet lived but Seven years which was the Space of time he kept a Batchelors "[sic] House at Arlington on the Eastern Shoar [sic] of Virginia. This Inscription put on this Stone by his own positive Orders." Based on comments and inferences in his letters, as well as popular local legend, Custis and his wife, Frances Parke, were, to put it politely, not a good match. The couple apparently argued continually and over everything. Part of the problem had to do with Mrs. Custis's upbringing as a rich and entitled daughter of General Daniel Park, Royal Governor of the Leeward Islands. She was accustomed to a busy, upscale social life that could not be had at her husband's isolated estate, Arlington. While the house at Arlington was described as being the handsomest, most elaborate, and only brick structure on Virginia's Eastern Shore, complete with four acres of formal gardens, the social whirl of London, or even Williamsburg, was decidedly absent. Custis, who enjoyed the rural setting and was held a passionate interest in horticulture, was surely equally frustrated with his society wife.

Though the tale is apocryphal, supposedly one early evening the couple were driving on their property. Custis decided to annoy and possibly frighten his wife by driving into the surf of the Chesapeake Bay. She did not flinch, only asked him, "Where are you going, Mr. Custis?" He responded only by driving further into the water. She asked again. Custis, annoyed that his trick to scare her had failed, answered, "To Hell, madam." Without missing a beat, Mrs. Custis responded with, "Well, then drive on! Any place is better than Arlington!"

Outside of his unhappy domestic realm, Custis was a powerful member of the colony's governor's Council. He was born in 1678 to the elder John Custis, who was also a member of the Council. The couple had one surviving child, Daniel Parke Custis, who was the first husband of Martha Dandridge Custis Washington, who was the grandmother of Mary Custis, the woman who married Robert E. Lee. John Custis II died in 1749 and was buried at Arlington, Northhampton County, Virginia. His infamous tombstone may still be viewed at the burial ground.


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