Richard Cole had also specified that his body be buried on his plantation in a black walnut coffin with a gravestone of English black marble (to be imported for the purpose) and a tombstone whose epitaph read: "Heere lies Dick Cole a grievous Sinner, That died a Little before Dinner, Yet hopes in Heaven to find a place, To Satiate his Soul with Grace." Nicholas Spencer died in Virginia in 1688. In his will in April 1688, Spencer styled himself "of Nominy in Westmoreland Co. in Virginia." Nicholas Spencer left five sons: William, Mottrom, Nicholas Jr., John, and Francis (to whom his father left Mount Vernon). Spencer probably had at least two daughters, Elizabeth Spencer and Lettice Barnard to whom Mottrom Spencer referred to in his will as "my sister Mrs. Lettice Barnard" In his will, filed with the English courts at Canterbury, Col. Spencer named his "singular good friends Coll. Isaac Allerton of Matchotick, Capt. George Brent of Stafford Co. (former Governor of Maryland), and Capt. Lawrence Washington" to serve as trustees of his estates. Capt. Washington, named by Spencer as a trustee, was the younger brother of Lt. Col. John Washington and was born in 1635. He and the other trustees named by Col. Spencer in his will received forty shillings for mourning rings. Following Nicholas Spencer's death, the family's plantation at Nomini in Westmoreland was sold. In 1709 Robert Carter purchased the Spencer property from the heirs of Col. Spencer for £800 sterling, marking the end of the Spencer family's residence in Westmoreland, and delineating the future site of Nomini Hall, the Carter family seat in Westmoreland occupying the former Spencer estate. The English branch of the family continued to live in Bedfordshire, where members of the family served in Parliament and were large landowners. The Spencer family continued to hold its land at Cople, Bedfordshire, until the nineteenth century. "The Spencers' Cople estates," according to the Bedfordshire County Council, "were bought by Francis Brace for the Dowager Duchess of Marlborough, and the manor still was known as Rowlands when part of the Duke of Bedford’s estate at the start of the 19th century." References External links Deed to Col. Nicholas Spencer and Lt. Col. John Washington, Mount Vernon, George Washington as an Inventor and Promoter of the Useful Arts, Joseph Meredith Toner, Washington Patent Centennial Celebration 1891, D. C., Gedney & Roberts Co., 1892 George Washington's