Monday Is for Mothers: Lucy Westbrooke (About 1754 - 1816)

When my paternal fifth great grandmother, the widow of Kirby Bittle of Southampton County, Virginia, came to make her will in September of 1815, "being in low health," Lucy's first bequest was to her younger son Thomas Westbrook Bittle to whom she left all her land, a slave named Jim, one feather bed, and a black mare. If he were to die before reaching the age of 21* without "lawful issue" everything was to be divided among her three daughters, otherwise each of them would receive a slave and some special piece of furniture.

However in the final item of her will, Lucy named her older son, Benjamin,**  and left "thirty gallons of apple brandy to him and his heirs forever." That's all.

[Lucy Bittle's Will. The Brantley Association of America

http://www.brantleyassociation.com/southampton_project/southampton_project_list.htm#Will_B ooks]

Now Benjamin had been the the administrator of his father's estate in 1810 and among the items in the inventory are an "apple mill and trough" and a "cider press and hoops." I'm wondering if the apple brandy follows from something Benjamin did (or didn't) do as administrator which caused his mother to essentially disinherit him. There definitely seems that a message was being sent.

[Kirby Bittle Inventory. The Brantley Association of America

http://www.brantleyassociation.com/southampton_project/southampton_project_list.htm#Will_B ooks]

*He appears to have survived receive his inheritance.
**From whom I descend; the surname spelling changed to Biddle over the course of the 19th century.

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