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Laetitia Corbin Lee

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Laetitia Corbin Lee
Born
Laetitia Corbin

August 25, 1657
DiedOctober 6, 1706
Resting placeMount PleasantinWestmoreland, Virginia
SpouseRichard Lee II
Children8, includingThomas,Philip,andHenry
Parent(s)Henry Corbin
Alice Eltonhead Burnham

Laetitia Corbin Lee(August 25, 1657 – October 6, 1706) was an American colonist. She was the daughter ofHenry Corbin,one of the most powerful and influential political leaders in theColony of Virginia.In 1674 she married the politicianRichard Lee II,and joined the prominentLee family of Virginia.The Maryland branch of the Lee family descends from her through her son,Philip LeeofBlenheim Plantation.Another of her sons,Thomas,builtStratford Hall,the futurefamily seatof the Lees.

Early life

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Born Laetitia Corbin on August 25, 1657, toHenry Corbin,an English-born Virginia merchant and planter, and his wife, the former Alice Eltonhead Burnham.[1][2]She was one of eight children, and had relatives in many of what became theFirst Families of VirginiaandMaryland.Through her father, she was a granddaughter of Sir Thomas Corbin and a great-granddaughter of Sir Gawen de Sutton Grosvenor. Her sister, Anne Corbin, married the planterWilliam Tayloe.[3]After her father's death in 1675, Lee's mother married Captain Henry Creyke.[4]

Career

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In 1660, although she was an infant, her father deeded her 2,000 acres of land in what was thenStafford County,which later becamePrince William County, Virginia.[5] In 1674, having reached legal age for her gender, she marriedRichard Lee II,a military officer, planter, and member of the prominentLee family of Virginia.[6]The land that she brought to the marriage would become Leesylvania, the home of a branch of the Lee family for generations, and now astate park.Letitia bore eight children during the marriage, includingThomas,Philip,andHenry.[7]A granddaughter,Laetitia,was named after her. Shortly after her marriage, Lee's husband was elected to theVirginia House of Burgessesand later served as a member of theVirginia Governor's Council.

She and her husband maintained one of the largest libraries in theColony of VirginiaatMachodoc,theirplantationalong thePotomac RiverinWestmoreland County, Virginia.

Death and legacy

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She died on October 6, 1706, at Machodoc and was buried at the Burnt House Cemetery nearMount Pleasant.[8]

References

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  1. ^Bruce, Philip Alexander; Stanard, William Glover (May 17, 1921)."The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography".Virginia Historical Society. – via Google Books.
  2. ^"called Laetitia Corbin Lee (Mrs. Richard Lee II, 1657-1706) – Colonial Virginia Portraits".
  3. ^Lancaster, Robert Alexander (1915). Historic Virginia homes and churches (Now in the public domain. ed.). Lippincott. pp. 343–. Retrieved 17 October 2011.
  4. ^Douglas Richardson, Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, Royal Ancestry series, 2nd edition, 4 vols., ed. Kimball G. Everingham, (Salt Lake City, Utah: the author, 2011), Vol 1, p 535
  5. ^Return Jonathan Meigs, The Corbins of Virginia (1940), p. 39
  6. ^"THE LEE WOMEN".
  7. ^"The Corbin Family (Continued)".The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography.30(3): 309–318. 1922.JSTOR4243888– via JSTOR.
  8. ^"The Lee Family".Bedinger Family History and Genealogy.