Lee’s Trail in Leesylvania Woods and the Cemetery

Potomac River

Climbing Lee’s Trail in Leesylvania woods, I reach the top where the Lee Fairfax Cemetery is located, overlooking the Occoquan Bay. Closer to where the home site used to be, I find blooming clusters of yellow daffodils, remnants of Lucy Grymes’ former gardens. This cemetery was established by the Lees when Henry Lee II died on August 15, 1787. Lucy Lee, his wife, is also buried here; she died in 1792.

                                                    Lucy Grymes' daffodils

The chimney left from the Fairfax house built in 1825

The Lees’ home, Leesylvania, hence the name of the park (Lee’s Woods), stood on the ridge to the east. Henry and Lucy had eight children born in their home, among them the famous “Light Horse Harry” Lee, Revolutionary War hero, Governor of Virginia, and father of Robert Edward Lee. A monument dedicated to “Light Horse Harry” Lee can be found at the bottom of the hill, down a winding mile-long trail, overlooking the Potomac River.

Fenced cemetery

The Lees’ other famous children were Charles Lee, Attorney General of the United States; Richard Bland Lee, the first Congressman for Northern Virginia; and Edmund Jennings Lee, Mayor of Alexandria.

The Virginia Journal and Alexandria Advertiser published an obituary on Lee’s death: “Died on the 15^th Instant, at the seat of Mr. Richard Bland Lee in Loudon County (Sully Plantation), Hon. Henry Lee, Senator for the District of Fairfax and Prince William, in the fifty-eighth year of his age, thirty of which have been assiduously devoted to the service of his Country.”

The Lee family tombstones have long since disappeared. They were replaced with a bronze plaque donated by the Society of the Lees.

Captain Henry Fairfax bought the plantation from the Lees in 1825. He and his third wife Elizabeth are buried in the enclosed portion of the cemetery. The fence seems useless as there are no headstones visible, and the entire plot is always covered in a thick carpet of decaying leaves.

Captain Fairfax died on the sixth of October 1847 and his wife Elizabeth died a month later (November 6). Their headstones were relocated in 1969 to Union Cemetery in Leesburg, close to the tomb of their son, John Walter Fairfax. But their remains are still “resting” within the fenced cemetery.

I hear in the distance the train whistle crossing the river into Leesylvania Woods and begin my descent to the bottom of the hill and fishermen’s pier crossing part of Virginia and Maryland.

Virginia is a state shaped by breathtaking landscapes, rich history, and endless wooded trails, ponds, lakes, creeks, and rivers that had been preserved and protected for generations to come.

The occasional history buff can get lost in the wilderness, contemplating the Commonwealth’s history, and wondering how many people have left their mark, literally and figuratively, on every inch of this fertile soil. If the woods and rivers could talk!