e Washington was a planter who owned thousands of acres of land,
most of it unimproved, besides an interest in some small iron works, but
he had been twice married and at his death left two broods of children
to be provided for. George, a younger son--which implied a great deal in
those days of entail and primogeniture--received the farm on the
Rappahannock on which his father lived, amounting to two hundred and
eighty acres, a share of the land lying on Deep Run, three lots in
Frederick, a few negro slaves and a quarter of the residuary estate. He
was also given a reversionary interest in Mount Vernon, bequeathed to
his half-brother Lawrence. The total value of his inheritance was small,
and, as Virginia landed fortunes went, he was left poorly provided for.

Much of Washington's youth was spent with Lawrence at Mount Vernon, and
as an aside it may be remarked here that the main moulding influence in
his life was probably cast by this high-minded brother, who was a
soldier and man of the world. By the time he was sixteen the boy was on
the frontier helping Lord Thomas Fairfax to survey the princely domain
that belonged to his lordship, and received in payment therefor
sometimes as much as a doubloon a day. In 1748 he patented five hundred
fifty acres of wild land in Frederick County, "My Bullskin Plantation"
he usually called it, payment being made by surveying. In 1750 he had
funds sufficient to buy four hundred fifty-six acres of land of one
James McCracken, paying therefor one hundred twelve pounds. Two years
later for one hundred fifteen pounds he bought five hundred fifty-two
acres on the south fork of Bullskin Creek from Captain George Johnston.
In 1757 he acquired from a certain Darrell five hundred acres on Dogue
Run near Mount Vernon, paying three hundred fifty pounds.

It is evident, therefore, that very early he acquired the "land hunger"
to which most of the Virginians of his day were subject, as a heritage
from their English ancestry. In the England of that day, in fact, no
one except a churchman could hope to attain much of a position in the
world unless he was the owner of land, and until the passage of the
great Reform Bill in 1832 he could not even vote unless he held land
worth forty shillings a year. In Virginia likewise it was the landholder
who enjoyed distinction and consideration, who was sent to the House of
Burgesses and was bowed and scraped to as his coach bumped along over
the miserable road