Jeb Stuart's Boxwood Trees Still Grow

Original Smoke-House and Log Barn Are Still in Use

By Blanche M. Dickey

Visitors to the Stuart homeplace in Patrick County, Va., where once lived the widowed mother of the gallant General, "Jeb," always carry away with them a strong realization of earnest living, true worth and greatness.

To reach this old homesite we drive seven miles northeast of Mount Airy, N. C., a thriving town grown up in a community the original Siamese Twins found so delectable they made it their settling place after half a life time of travel in many lands.

Leaving the paved highway at the State line, we follow, for a short distance, a sandclay road, cross Ararat River and drive to the farm by way of a narrow lane lying between washed out, honeysuckle covered clay banks. The place is none too easy of access. Some might call it isolated, and this seems as it should be, for it gives the impression of having been purposely closed in with its memories--memories of an older order where bravery and hardship, softened by dignity and gentleness must have reigned.

The first mark that attracks us--one before which we stand thoughtfully and reverently, is a grave, its rock wall and its flat grey stone still being in an excellent state of preservation. This lone grave lies in what was once the yard or garden of the estate, and the table monument bears the following perfectly legible inscription:

In memory of
William Letcher
Who was assasinated in his own
home in the bosom of his family
by a Tory of the Revolution on the
second day of August, 1870.
aged about 30 years.
May the tear of sympathy fall upon
the grave of the brave.

This man was the grandfather of Mrs. Stuart and the manner of his untimely passing, together with the thought of sorrow brought of the young wife standing by in the shadow of their new log home, brings an ache to our hearts.

Tory on Ridge Took True Aim

For the story goes that on the evening of the day mentioned above, he walked to the doorway with his baby in his arms. As he stood there, looking, no doubt with pride, over newly cleared land which would be a means of livelihood for future generations, maybe dreaming, too, of peaceful days to come, a Tory, from the ridge opposite the house, took true aim with his musket and a useful life was snuffed out.

It was through this ancestor that Mrs. Stuart who bore the beautiful name of Bethenia, inherited this large estate in Patrick County, and here, February 6, 1833, James Ewell Brown (J. E. B.) Stuart was born and spent the first 14 years of his life.

During this period of childhood he was given the careful training of a wise mother, which fitted him so well for the life spent in the service of his country. For, it was said of Stuart that he kept his heart pure and his hands clean all through his army life.

In an intimate sketch of him we are told he loved flowers, even as a child, and passed many happy hours in his mother's garden. Today, one of the most beautiful reminders of his life are the boxwoods he set out at the age of 14, his last year at home before being sent away to school. The present owners were once offered a substantial sum for their "box," but through sentiment they were left to stand, like sentinels, for being allowed to go untrimmed, they have reached the proportion of small trees, and seem to guard the walk along which that gentle mother and her gay, high spirited son once passed.

"Stuart Well" Called Best in Country

On our way to other points of interest about the place we come to the old apple orchard. Many of the trees have been uprooted by time and storm, a few are still standing, their rough, twisted bodies now rotting at the core. "What a pity," someone says, "for our newer, more carefully cultivated apples will never have the flavor of these." That is true, and we also think of the trouble some one must have gone to in the day when nurseries were almost unknown, to put in this orchard of Limber Twigs, Russets, Red Junes, and others.

When we come to the overseer's house I give myself up to reflecting on the years it has seen come and go. I look for a long time at the rock chimney, the crude door facing and daubed the chinked logs, and I can see the overseer going down in the early morning before the fog from the Ararat has lifted, to take orders from the mistress of the "Big" house. Hers would be a quiet household. No idleness, no blatant noise, no mad rush. I see smoke rising from cabins, happy, carefree Negroes going to work in field and woodland. These imaginings come easily enough for the place has always been farmed by simple methods, with horses and mules and hoe hands following the plow. No modern machinery as yet has cut its way though those river bottoms where Indians once roamed. The findings of numerous arrow heads tells us this was their hunting ground.

Next we come to the well, always spoken of in the community as "the Stuart well," and the best water in the country." A bucket tied to a rope is let down and drawn up in the old fashioned way by windlass. There is a goard here to drink from, if you choose, and water is drawn for you by a midget sized colored woman, Mary Ann, descendant from the last of the Guinea Negroes sold in the South. And strange to say, in this age of commercialism, of antique shops and tourist homes, neither the old well, nor the gourd, nor Mary Ann have been placed there for effect. The owners since the days of the Stuarts have clung to the old order of things and the result of their simple mode of living on such an historical spot, is all that could be asked for.

Except for a frame house on the site of the original home, things are but little changed. The place is unique in the fact that it is strangely natural, very dear and intimate. Still standing is the old smokehouse, put together with wooden pegs, and the original log barn. Both of the buildings are in use.

In recent months, children at play about the grounds, have found some large copper cents. One bearing the date 1807.

Life Was Short, but His Service Great

The Stuart family burying ground, where the father of General Stuart was laid to rest, is on a hill near the homesite. Today they are building a driveway leading from the J. E. B. Stuart highway directly to these graves.

It was from this quiet homeplace under the shadow of the Blue Ridge Mountains that young Stuart went out to meet the forces which called for the utmost courage and clear thinking.

After his preparatory school days he went to United States Military Academy, where he came under the influence of Robert E. Lee. Later he served with Lee in some of his most important campaigns. On May 12, 1864 he was wounded at Yellow Tavern, eight miles from the City of Richmond, and died the following day.

Although his span of life was short, his service to his country was great and his influence on those about him still great. But most of all we like to think of him as a little boy playing under the honey locust trees in his mother's garden. And in the evening the fragrance of the boxwood he planted, together with the whip-poor-will call from the ridge, turns back the years for us and in our dreams we play guest to a gracious, hospitable hostess, the mother of our own General "Jeb."