A New Page in U.S. History

Working in George Mason’s 18^th-century Georgian mansion overlooking the Potomac River, Nicholas Gentry MLIS ’26 typically spent his days deciphering and transcribing the cursive script of the Founding Father and his pen pals. The digital archives fellow at Gunston Hall, Mason’s home and now a museum commemorating the Virginian’s life, didn’t think much was out of the ordinary when he picked up a letter between Mason and his sort-of neighbor, George Washington.

But after scouring the online repositories of Revolutionary-era figures’ archives that day, he confirmed that the 1768 letter had never been digitized, giving Gentry a chance to edit the historical record.

He built a website for the document—largely about a land dispute between the two men, whose estates are roughly 11 miles apart—and shared it with the staff of the Library of Congress’ George Washington papers in February.

“It’s exciting to be hands-on—in a very safe, archivally friendly sense—with a document that old, and one that has George Washington’s handwriting on it,” says Gentry. “It was even more special to realize that you’re sort of rediscovering it.”

The letter, which is one document containing both Mason’s original and Washington’s response, hadn’t gone entirely ignored for 250 years. In 2012, Gerard Gawalt, a specialist in American history at the Library of Congress, printed the letter in his self-published book, “George Mason and George Washington: The Power of Principle.” Ensconcing the letter in an online archive allows a much broader swath of people to see it in a way “that will help protect it for the long term,” says Kate Stier, senior curator and head of collections at Gunston Hall.

It's the second gem Gentry has uncovered since starting the position last September; he found another short letter between Washington and Mason—discussing recommendations for a cook at the presidential residence—stuck to the lid of an archival box.

Mason gained prominence as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention in 1787, where he refused to sign the fledgling nation’s government charter, primarily because it lacked a bill of rights. In 1776, he had authored the Virginia Declaration of Rights, which eventually served as a model for the Bill of Rights added to the U.S. Constitution.

The longer letter found at Gunston Hall includes personal tidbits in addition to discussion of property lines. Mason offers suggestions for who Washington might hire as a schoolteacher for his stepchildren: “If you put Master Custis under Mr. Campbell’s Care, I wou’d advise you to board him in some Family in the Neighbourhood, rather than in Mr. Campbell’s own House; as I know that Mr. Campbell’s Boarders have frequently complain'd of their living, & I believe not without Cause,” wrote Mason.

Gentry has sussed out other details about Mason’s exacting personality through his work at Gunston Hall. “If you went out today and got lunch with George Mason, he would instantly send you a Venmo request,” he says.