The Shirley plantation, about six miles up the river from Westover and overlooking the confluence of the James and Appomattox rivers, was the home of Charles Carter (1732–1806), son of Elizabeth Hill Carter Cocke (d. 1769) and her first husband, John Carter (1690–1742/43) of Corotoman, Lancaster County (WATERMAN description begins Thomas Tileston Waterman. The Mansions of Virginia, 1706–1776. Chapel Hill, N.C., 1946. description ends , 358). Since Carter shared with GW a keen interest in experimental farming, this visit was probably agricultural in nature.