Seth Kaller, Inc.

This scale descended in the family of Washington’s heirs, John Augustine Washington and his son, Supreme Court Justice Bushrod Washington. John was George Washington’s brother, a member of the fifth Virginia Convention and a founding member of the Mississippi Land Company. Bushrod inherited Mount Vernon. 

[GEORGE WASHINGTON]. His personal Gunter’s scale surveying tool. A wooden ruler engraved with multiple scales and functions on both sides. 24 in. long x 1½ in. wide.

Inventory #22321.99       Price: $145,000

George Washington may have made his first land survey when he was only sixteen years old. His older half-brother, Lawrence, talked him into becoming a surveyor. In March 1748, Washington took his first surveying trip to the Shenandoah Valley. In 1749, the president and masters of the College of William and Mary appointed him to his first public office, as the official surveyor for the newly formed Culpeper County. On September 20, 1749, Washington purchased a Gunter’s Scale, likely this one, from his seventeen-year-old second cousin Bailey Washington for 1 shilling and 3 pence.[1] George Washington worked as an active surveyor for only five years but surveyed his own lands until shortly before his death.

Historical Background
English mathematician Edmund Gunter invented this indispensable tool, a precursor to the slide rule, in 1624. Navigators and surveyors used this wooden ruler engraved with multiple scales and functions with a pair of compasses (dividers) to achieve amazingly accurate computations. This present example, as was typical, has approximately sixteen tiny metal “points” embedded in the wood. These points prevent the compass needles from making permanent holes in the wood.

According to eighteenth-century Scottish mathematician Andrew Mackay, “The ruler in general use in Navigation, is that known by the name of Gunter’s Scale. The length of this scale is usually two feet, and about an inch and a half broad. One side of this scale contains lines for constructing geometrical figures; and the lines upon the other side are called Artificial, or Logarithmic lines, being intended to resolve the questions in the several sailings, and to perform other mathematical operations.”[2] One side of the scale had natural lines (line of chords, sines, tangents, rhumbs, etc.), while the other side had the corresponding artificial or logarithmic ones. The Gunter’s scale or Gunter’s rule made it easier to solve the equations of spherical trigonometry necessary to navigate vessels out of sight of land or to survey land.

George Washington, having inherited his father’s valuable surveying instruments, began training in the profession. Surveyors held a prestigious place in Virginia society, and the field attracted some of the most highly educated men of the time (Thomas Jefferson is another notable example). The work was difficult but lucrative. In addition to being well-paid, surveyors often found themselves well-positioned to invest in valuable western lands.

Washington’s first dated survey was completed on August 18, 1747, and the young man’s connections with the influential Fairfax family helped him advance quickly. In 1749, the College of William & Mary commissioned Washington as surveyor for the newly-created frontier county of Culpeper, a position he held until November 1750. In addition to a license, Washington’s new role as a government official required him to swear an oath. As biographer James T. Flexner points out, “in those unfrequented areas, it was up to him to see that no fraud was done by making surveys larger or smaller than was stated in the deeds, or by laying out land in manners forbidden by the various restrictive laws.”[3]

In addition to new surveys, Flexner reports that Washington was also responsible for dividing major tracts into smaller parcels to sell or rent. He also identified the lots that would be most desirable after clearing and improving the land with roads.

Surveying the frontier was physically demanding work, often entailing travel into unexplored backcountry while braving the elements and a variety of other hazards. In a 1748 journal of his first surveying trip, Washington described riding on “the Worst Road that ever was trod by Man or Beast,” fording a flooded river, and having his bedding catch fire. His tent was “blown down by the Violentness of the Wind,” and he encountered lice, rattlesnakes, and an Indian war party, albeit “with only one Scalp.”[4]

Long after he ended his surveying career, Washington continued creating field sketches and formal surveys for use in his own real estate endeavors. The profession’s precision flowed into Washington’s future works, and his knowledge of the land and map production helped the Continental Army stay one step ahead of the British during the Revolutionary War.

Edmund Gunter (1581-1626) was born in Hertfordshire, England, and was educated at Westminster School and graduated from Christ Church, Oxford, in 1603. He took orders and became a preacher in 1614 and the following year received a bachelor’s degree in divinity. He became rector of St. George’s Church in Southwark. He was particularly interested in mathematics and its relationship to the real world. He invented the Gunter’s chain, the Gunter’s quadrant, and the Gunter’s scale, instruments used by surveyors and sailors. In 1619, the Earl of Bridgewater obtained Gunter’s appointment as professor of astronomy in Gresham College, London, a position he held until his death.

Provenance: This scale descended in the family of Washington’s heirs, John Augustine Washington and his son, Supreme Court Justice Bushrod Washington. John Augustine Washington was George Washington’s brother, a member of the Fifth Virginia Convention, a founding member of the Mississippi Land Company, and during the Revolutionary War, a member of the County Committee of Safety and Chairman of the County Committee for the Relief of Boston. He was also the father of Bushrod Washington, who inherited Mount Vernon.

Condition: Detailed workmanship; rich patina; shows obvious signs of use and age; slightly warped.