Later Life
While practicing medicine in Alexandria, Mason also served as a justice of the peace in the community. Mason retired from his practice at the age of 45 to work his farm at Okeley Manor. He later served with the Confederate States Army in the American Civil War in Richmond. Mason returned home at age 72 to find the mansion at Okeley, used during the war as a hospital, burned to the ground to prevent the spread of smallpox. Mason also discovered that a negro and an Irishman were in possession of the property. By 1880, Mason's son Beverley had recovered the property and was residing in a house he built on the hill.
Mason died on 22 July 1869 at Rutledge in Fauquier County, Virginia at age 76.
Read more about this topic: Richard Chichester Mason
Famous quotes containing the word life:
“Death is an endless night so awful to contemplate that it can make us love life and value it with such passion that it may be the ultimate cause of all joy and all art.”
—Paul Theroux (b. 1941)
“This form, this face, this life
Living to live in a world of time beyond me; let me
Resign my life for this life, my speech for that unspoken,
The awakened, lips parted, the hope, the new ships.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)