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Transcription: [00:16:53]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

Uhm, June 1775 as you know, Washington is made Commander in Chief of the Army.
[00:17:00]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

From that period till Christmas Eve 1783, he will be away from Mount Vernon for all but four days.
[00:17:15]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}
In November 1775, and I think this is really interesting in terms of their relationship, Washington's Winter Camp is in Cambridge outside of Boston where the British Army is and Martha makes the decision that she is going to join George at his Winter Camp and that will become a precedent for all of the years of the revolution.
[00:17:40]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

Including most notably Valley Forge, and most of those around Washington noted a distinct, -- rise in spirits, cheerfulness, better health when Martha came and spent those winters with him.
[00:17:56]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

We don't know how intense their feelings were whether this was a love match, or whether it was a match of convenience for both of them. Martha needed somebody to run the estate, George wanted a mistress of Mount Vernon.
[00:18:10]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

But I tend to think that if there was no love at the start of the marriage there was love formed on those times when Martha spent those winters, -that Martha spent with him in the army.
[00:18:26]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

In 1781 Martha's only living, I guess I skipped the point where little Martha dies in 1773 from epilepsy in, let me see now, in 1781 Martha's other only living child Jackie dies of camp fever.
[00:18:53]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

The Washingtons then take the two oldest children of Jackie, who had been married, and raise them as their own children.
[00:19:03]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

In 1789, you know, Washington is inaugurated as president, Martha will go to live in New York and then Philadelphia.
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{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

They don't get back to Mount Vernon until 1797, so from 1775 to 1797, 22 years they are at Mount Vernon in some kind of regular life for only five of those years.
[00:19:28]

{SPEAKER name="Sid Hart"}

Two and a half years later George dies Martha closes off their bedroom and becomes something of a recluse...[[Audio Ends]]
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