considerable distances for medical
treatment. One boy, Christopher, bitten by a dog, went to a "specialist"
at Lebanon, Pennsylvania, for treatment to avert madness, and another,
Tom, had an operation performed on his eyes, probably for cataract.

When at home the Farmer personally helped to care for sick slaves. He
had a special building erected near the Mansion House for use as a
hospital. Once he went to Winchester in the Shenandoah region especially
to look after slaves ill with smallpox "and found everything in the
utmost confusion, disorder, and backwardness. Got Blankets and every
other requisite from Winchester, and settied things on the best footing
I could." As he had had smallpox when at Barbadoes, he had no fear of
contagion.

Among the entries in his diary are: "Visited my Plantations and found
two negroes sick ... ordered them to be blooded." "Found that lightening
had struck my quarters and near 10 Negroes in it, some very bad but by
letting blood recovered." "Found the new negro Cupid ill of a pleurisy
at Dogue Run Quarter and had him brot home in a cart for better care of
him.... Cupid extremely ill all this day and night. When I went to bed I
thought him within a few hours of breathing his last." However, Cupid
recovered.

In his contracts with overseers Washington stipulated proper care of the
slaves. Once he complained to his manager that the generality of the
overseers seem to "view the poor creatures in scarcely any other light
than they do a draught horse or ox; neglecting them as much when they
are unable to work; instead of comforting and nursing them when they lye
on a sick bed." Again he wrote:

"When I recommended care of and attention to my negros in sickness, it
was that the first stage of, and the whole progress through the
disorders with which they might be seized (if more than a slight
indisposition) should be closely watched, and timely applications and
remedies be administered; especially in the pleurisies, and all
inflammatory disorders accompanied with pain, when a few day's neglect,
or want of bleeding might render the ailment incurable. In such cases
sweeten'd teas, broths and (according to the nature of the complaint,
and the doctor's prescription) sometimes a little wine, may be necessary
to nourish and restore the patient; and these I am perfectly willing to
allow, when it is requisite."

Yet again he complains that the overseers "seem to consider a Negro much
in the same