Henry Daingerfield (1800-1866)

He was a shipping merchant and a director of the Marine Insurance Company and the Bank of the Potomac. He was a close friend of General Robert E. Lee, a member of the council of Alexandria, the founder of Springfield, Virginia, and the proprietor Daingerfield Island. In 1833, he paid $6,250 for Thomas Swann's townhouse (see images) in Alexandria at 706 Prince Street on the corner of Columbus Street, giving it its present Second Empire style. The house remained in the Daingerfield family until 1899, during which time a third floor and a grand ballroom were added. By the time of his death in 1866, he had acquired landholdings in Virginia and Maryland worth $180,000. He was married three times and had four children (listed) who lived to adulthood, but tragically both his sons shot themselves in the family home in Alexandria.