From George Washington to Bartholomew Dandridge, Jr., 3 April 1797
To Bartholomew Dandridge, Jr.
Mount Vernon [3 April 1797]
Dear Sir,
Mr Lear informs me the President has declined, finally, to take any part of the furniture in the Green drawing room—and that you will be requested to have the lustre in the middle of it packed up & sent round to this place.
If the latter should not have taken place before this letter reaches your hands, let it be sent to Mrs Morris, who I beg will receive it as a present; and to whom I will write so soon as you inform me of its having happened, assigning the reason why it was not done before. Let me know the results of this direction as soon as you can.1
I wish you a pleasant Passage in which your aunt joins, and the full fruition of all your reasonable and proper wishes; being your sincere friend and affectionate servt
Go: Washington
ALS, PWacD; LB, DLC:GW.
1. The lustre, or chandelier, was sent to Mount Vernon and then sent back to the Morrises in Philadelphia. See Dandridge to GW, 8 April, and GW to Mary White Morris, 1 May 1797. GW may have intended it for the marble house that Robert Morris was building in Philadelphia at this time while at the brink of the financial collapse that led to his imprisonment for debt in February 1798. In his copy of the inventory of the goods in the president’s house, GW lists in the “Green drawing Room” a “Lustre of 8 lights perfect, & in no respect injd by use,” valued at £76.13.0 (February 1797, DLC:GW).