Captain Berry's Will
Debauchery, Miscegenation, & Family Strife
Among 18th Century Gentry

charge generally as much as he thought proper.” . . . do you think Mr. William Berry or yourself at the time of making the will now exhibited was most under the influence or operation of strong liquor? Answers, “When I first entered the room, I considered myself the soberest of the two, and at the time when Captn Berry requested me to leave the bitch to his sister, I could not help being surprised to find him so far gone in a short time, but after this I cannot with any degree of precision tell which of us reached the gold we were both bound to, or in other words, which of us got right drunk soonest, or whether Capt. Berry got to the height of intoxication at all while the will was about, altho’ he did & believes Wm Berry did also.” If Mr. Berry, according to your conception, seemed in the situation you have before described at the time of writing & executing the will now exhibited, why did the Deponent write and subscribe as a witness? Answers, because he was not sober himself.

. . . Have you not seen many men above the age of twenty-one years who were neither idiots, madmen, or lunatics, or their senses impaired by sickness or old age, who did not possess as much understanding as Mr. Berry did at the time of making and executing the will? Answers, he has. Do you think that Capt. Wm Berry at the time of writing & executing the will now exhibited had an understanding & capacity equal to that which in the common course of life men in general possess? Answers, “he had not above one half of his own usual understanding.” The preceding question being repeated, he answers, “Wm Berry being so much superior in point of understanding to a great part of mankind, he would have been able to express himself upon most common subjects with more show of judgment & understanding than a great many of the common part of mankind would if sober.”

Was he in a situation to act as rationally as men in general would on such occasions? Answers, he thinks he was not. Do you think that men in general could have overreached Mr. Berry in a bargain or contract respecting his property . . . ?

Source: Prince George’s County Register of Wills (Orphans’ Court Proceedings) 1777-1790, f. 107, MSA C 1275-1