THE MEADOWS 



O be real a garden must be secluded, it must be 

 fragrant, and It must be ripened by years of close 

 association with the people who made and loved it. 

 In the year 1817, Captain Francis Smith and his 

 wife bought an estate of three thousand acres near 

 the town of Abingdon, Virginia, and named it 

 Mary's Meadows in honor of their only child, Mary, who was 

 then only five years old. The Bloor Crown Derby china made for 

 them at this time has an S, with "Mary's Meadows" in gold, orna- 

 menting each piece. The name of the place was changed later to 

 "The Meadows." 



When Mary Smith married Wyndham Robertson, at one time 

 Governor of Virginia, the family lived in Richmond, only returning 

 to their place in the mountains for part of the year. After the 

 War Between the States, however, the Robertsons made The 

 Meadows their permanent home. 



The grandson of Francis Smith, Captain Frank S. Robertson, 

 inherited "The Meadows." As a student at the University in 

 1 86 1 he was one of the "Sons of Liberty" that aided in the capture 

 of Harper's Ferry after the John Brown raid. After Virginia 

 seceded he was lieutenant of engineers on General J. E. B. 

 Stuart's staff until General Stuart was killed. Then he served as 

 engineer officer on the staff of General W. H. F. Lee until the close 

 of the war in 1865. Since that time he has made "The Meadows" 

 his home. 



The Meadows is far from Tidewater Virginia; twenty-three 

 hundred feet above sea level, and in the midst of the Alleghany 

 Mountains. It was almost on the frontier in the year 18 19, when 

 the big garden, covering two acres, was planned and most of its 

 trees and shrubs planted. This garden was surrounded by a paling 



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