Chapter 23
[428 North Washington Street. Owners: Mr. and Mrs. Franklin F. Korell.]
Many of the citizens of this community bore the greatest names in the Commonwealth. Henry Cabot Lodge's description of Virginia society in the eighteenth century might aptly be applied to Alexandria: "We must go back to Athens to find another instance of a Society so small in numbers and yet capable of such an outburst of ability and force."
Among the great Virginia names closely associated with Alexandria is that of Lee. Virginia's (and America's) patriot, Arthur Lee, was born at Stratford, in Westmoreland County, on December 20, 1740, and died at his residence, Lansdown, in the old town of Urbanna, Middlesex County, on December 12, 1792. These fifty-two years he filled with deeds and action. His primary education was gotten at Eton. From there he went on to the great University of Edinburgh to study medicine. For a while he practiced this profession in Williamsburg, but in 1766 we find him reading law at the Temple in London. By 1770 he had begun his role as a barrister in London and there he practiced until 1776. For five years of this time he acted as London agent for Virginia and Massachusetts. Thus began his diplomatic career. With Benjamin Franklin and Silas Deane he was one of the commissioners to France in 1776, and from this he went on to other negotiations between America and Europe.
Arthur Lee returned to America in 1780, and from 1782 to 1785 he served as a member of Congress. During these years he entered somewhat into the real-estate business in Alexandria. When his will was probated, he left to his niece, Hannah Washington, wife of Corbin, a half-acre lot on Washington and Oronoco Streets.
Hannah and Corbin Washington sold a half-acre lot to Charles Lee on March 19, 1796. It is described as beginning at the intersection of Washington and Oronoco on the southwest side, running west on Oronoco 123 feet 5 inches and south on Washington 176 feet 7 inches.
Charles Lee and Anne, his wife, sold this property to their brother, Edmund I. Lee, for five thousand dollars in January 1801. Part of the lot was rented at that time to Henry Zimmerman, subject to a ground rent, and part to Howard Beale, and there were houses, ways, advantages, and so on.
Edmund Jennings (always called Edmund I., following the eighteenth century usage of I for J) Lee was born just prior to the Revolution in 1772, when great events were stirring. He grew to young manhood in the post-Revolutionary days, and developed into an able lawyer, one of those stalwart citizens, giving his time and energy to his family, his church, and his city. He has been overshadowed by his more famous brothers, "Light Horse Harry" and Charles Lee, Attorney General in Washington's cabinet, and his immortal nephew, Robert Edward Lee.