George Washington died much as he lived, stoic, dignified, controlled to the very end. True to form, his last moments, much like his life, saw him surrounded by slaves. At daybreak on the day he died – Saturday, 14 December 1799 – Caroline, a housemaid, bustled into his room to make a fire. Three other slaves fetched the physicians, who ministered to the dying General. Washingtonʼs body servant, twenty-four-year-old Christopher, otherwise known as Christopher Sheels, attended his master throughout the long day of his last illness. Indeed, in the afternoon Washington motioned Christopher to take a seat by his bedside as he had been standing throughout his vigil. At the moment of death, blacks outnumbered whites in the room. Caroline, Charlotte, a seamstress, and Molly, a domestic, were all standing near the door, and Christopher was by the bed, while only three whites – Dr. James Craik, his primary physician and old friend; Tobias Lear, his secretary; and Martha Washington, his wife – were present. At Marthaʼs behest, Christopher aroused Lear from his grief by asking him to take care of the Generalʼs keys and other personal items which the body servant had taken out of the dead manʼs pockets. On the day after Washingtonʼs death, Frank Lee, the familyʼs mulatto butler, Christopher, and Marcus, another house servant, received new shoes so that they would look presentable at the funeral.