MEMORIALS
OF
A SOUTHERN PLANTER.
CHAPTER I.
BIRTH AND EARLY YEARS.
My father, Thomas Smith Gregory Dabney, was born at Bellevue, his father's country-seat on the Pamunkey River, in the county of King and Queen, Virginia, on the 4th day of January, 1798, and he used to tell us that he was two years in the world before General Washington left it.
Two brothers had died in infancy before his birth, and the vigorous boy was hailed with much rejoicing. The christening was a great event. It was celebrated at Bellevue on so large a scale that the cake for the feast was made in a churn. Often as children we heard the old servants refer with pride to this occasion, and to the large company invited to witness it. In the old Smith Bible, for the rebinding of which one hundred dollars of Continental money is said to have been paid, is found this entry, in his mother's small, old-fashioned handwriting: "Thomas Smith Gregory Dabney, our third child, was born on the 4th day of January, 1798: was baptized the 11th May, 1798. His godfathers were Messrs. Robert Wirt, Harvey Gaines, Thomas G. Smith, James Dabney, Thomas Fox, and Edward Jones. His godmothers were Mrs. Lee, Mlles. Milly Williams, Elizabeth Robinson, Mary S. Whiting, Mary Camp, and Ann S. Dabney, and Ann Baytop." The first in--
