Washington: A Life

by Ron Chernow

The protracted hunt for Ona Judge began when a young woman, Elizabeth Langdon, who had befriended Nelly Custis, spotted her in Portsmouth. When Langdon realized that Martha Washington was nowhere to be seen and that Judge had escaped, she asked Judge, “But why did you come away? How can Mrs. Washington do without you?” “Run away, misses,” Judge replied. “Run away!” said Langdon. “And from such an excellent place! Why, what could induce you? You had a room to yourself and only light nice work to do and every indulgence.”“Yes, I know, but I want to be free, misses; wanted to learn to read and write.”48 Ona Judge, who had stored up grievances that Martha Washington could little comprehend, afterward complained that she had “never received the least mental or moral instruction of any kind, while she remained in Washington’s family.”