His pay hardly sufficed for his personal expenses and on the disastrous Fort Necessity and Braddock campaigns he lost his horses and baggage.

Owing to his absence from home, his affairs fell into great disorder from which they were extricated by a fortunate stroke.
This stroke consisted in his marriage to Martha Custis, relict of the wealthy Daniel Parke Custis.

The story of his wooing the young widow has been often told with many variations and fanciful embellishments, but of a few facts we are certain.

From a worldly point of view Mrs.Custis was the most desirable woman in all Virginia, and the young officer, though not as yet a victor in many battles, had fought gallantly, possessed the confidence of the Colony and formed a shining exception to most of the tidewater aristocracy who continued to hunt the fox and guzzle Madeira while a cruel foe was harrying the western border.

Matters moved forward with the rapidity traditional in similar cases and in about three weeks and before the Colonel left to join Forbes in the final expedition against Fort Duquesne the little widow had been wooed and won.