Author: Love, Charles
Biography:
LOVE, Charles (fl 1800)
For the author of a poem about an historically significant event, Love has left remarkably few traces, but since the poem bears a Latin epigraph and contains a substantial subscription list of the great and good of Alexandria VA, the possibilities can be narrowed down. He was most probably one of the four sons of Samuel Love (1727-87), who established Buckland Farm in Virginia in 1774. All four fought in Virginia regiments in the Revolutionary War. After the death of their father, besides building up the farm, Charles and his older brother John owned and operated a mill at Buckland. Two letters between Charles and George Washington are concerned with a shipment of corn and the sale or loan of a horse. A less likely candidate is Charles Love (1753-1824), who also served in the War: he was born in Mecklenburg VA, married Susanna Childs of Childs WV, and lived mainly in what is now West Virginia. But he seems not to have had roots in the area near Alexandria. (ancestry.com 24 Nov. 2019; H. J. Eckenrode, List of the Revolutionary Soldiers of Virginia (Supplement) [1913]; "To George Washington from Charles Love, Jr." Founders Online 24 Nov. 2019) HJ