Douglass, Margaret

Margaret Douglas was born in 1768 in Loudoun County. She was the daughter of William Douglas, a native of Scotland, and Elizabeth Offut Douglas. Margaret had six siblings: five from her father’s first marriage, and a half-sibling from his second marriage to a widow named Sarah Chilton. Margaret never married, which was unusual for a woman during this time and likely only possible because of familial financial support.  

Margaret Douglas was close to her brother, Hugh, and his children. She likely helped raise his children after the death of his wife, Catherine Nasmythe Douglas, in 1812. Hugh Douglas’s will makes it clear that Margaret lived within his household at the time of his death. As a single adult woman and a relative, Douglas would have been in a good position to step in and take over maternal duties for her niece and nephews. In his will, Hugh Douglas left specific instructions regarding the care of his sister, stating that she should be allowed to stay within the household. He left her $200 a year, and dictated that his estate would furnish her with a horse, saddle, and bridle. The provisions in his will would have likely enabled Margaret to continue to live in the style to which she was accustomed after Hugh’s death in 1815.  

Douglas remained close to her niece and nephews after the death of her brother, leaving provisions in her will regarding most of them. Douglas dictated that an enslaved woman named Eliza and her two children, Susan and Joseph, be sent to her niece, Margarett Tebbs. However, Douglas wrote that after a period of five years, Eliza would be granted her freedom, and stipulated that when they reached the age of twenty-five, Susan and Joseph would be freed as well. To her nephew Archibald, Douglas gave two of Eliza’s children, named Celia and Daniel, plus any other enslaved people she owned when she died, dictating similar arrangements for their freedom at age twenty-five. Though she left no property or enslaved people to her nephew Charles Douglas, she appointed him executor of her will.  

Margaret Douglas was part of the Episcopalian religious community in Leesburg during her life. She was a member of the Female Missionary Society, and in her will she left the society $100. She left another $100 to a seminary in Alexandria, and $100 to the Episcopal church in Leesburg so that its yard could be enclosed. Her religious beliefs may have influenced the instructions left in her will to free enslaved people after a period of service or at the age of twenty-five.  

Douglas died in Leesburg on 20 August 1826, at the age of fifty-eight. She was interred at Saint James Episcopal Cemetery in Leesburg. 

by Caroline Greer