Mary Lee Fitzhugh Custis (April 22, 1788 – April 23, 1853) was an American Episcopal lay leader in Alexandria County, Virginia in present-day Arlington County. She was the mother of Mary Anna Randolph Custis, who was the wife of Confederate general Robert E. Lee. In the early 1820s, Custis helped form a coalition of women who sought to abolish slavery.
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Early life
Mary Lee Fitzhugh was born at Chatham Manor in present-day Stafford County, Virginia, the daughter of William Fitzhugh, a delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, and Ann Bolling Randolph Fitzhugh.
Marriage and family
On July 7, 1804, she married George Washington Parke Custis, an orator, playwright, writer, and the grandson of Martha Custis Washington through her first marriage to Daniel Parke Custis. With the marriage, Molly Custis became George Washington's step-granddaughter-in-law. Her father William Fitzhugh and Washington were long-time friends, and Washington wrote favorably in his diaries about the hospitality of Molly's mother Ann Bolling Randolph Fitzhugh. In 1799, Washington left Mount Vernon to meet with William Fitzhugh, which proved to be his last trip away from Mount Vernor prior to his December 14, 1799 death.