[52] _Life of George Mason_, by Kate Mason Rowland.
It is thus so many of the beautiful modern estates between Leesburg and the Limestone Branch trace their title back to the Mason family. Mrs. Ann Thomson Mason died on the 13th November, 1762, "leaving a reputation among her connections and neighbours for great prudence and business capacity, united to the charms of an amiable, womanly, character." Her Rector, friend and relative, the Rev. John Moncure, described her as "a good woman, a great woman, and a lovely woman."[53]
Though she planted the Mason line in Loudoun, she herself does not appear ever to have lived in that rough and for those days remote frontier country. The actual seating of her line on her large purchase was left to her son Thomson who, after going to England to acquire his training in law and being admitted to the Middle Temple on the 14th August, 1751, as its records show, returned to Virginia, practiced law at Dumfries, became, perhaps, the most eminent lawyer of his time at the Virginia Bar and vigourously aided the American Revolution. He either had improved and extended the first Raspberry Plain home or, as Lancaster says, built a new one for he deeded the existing structure with the supporting land to his son Stevens Thomson Mason, confirming the grant in his will, together with the plate and furniture then in the dwelling; which indicates a more impressive home than the first building.
Thomson Mason died at Raspberry Plain on the 26th February, 1785, and was there buried; but the first mansion and burial place were not where the imposing modern house of the same name now stands but rather much to the north, near the fine spring and branch for a long time included in the present Selma lands, for the latter estate was, of course, at that time and long afterward but another part of the extensive Mason holdings. It is of interest to note that this original Raspberry Plain holding was never acquired by Francis Aubrey nor was it part of Mrs. Ann Thomson Mason's purchase. On the contrary, it comprised a small grant, stated to be 322 acres, made by the Proprietor to one Joseph Dixon, a blacksmith, by patent dated the 2nd July, 1731.[54] Dixon, in turn, sold it to Aeneas Campbell by deed dated the 15th July, 1754, for a consideration nominally stated as "five shillings"--the old-time equivalent of our "One Dollar and other good and valuable considerations"--and Campbell was living there when commissioned the first sheriff of Loudoun in 1757. In the deed to him the plantation is described as being "On the branches of Limestone run called and known by the name of raspberry plain" and the grant goes on to give the exact location by metes and bounds. It apparently had been more carefully surveyed and found to have more area than first believed, for it is further described as containing "393 acres as appears by a survey thereof" and the grant specifically includes "all houses, buildings, orchards, ways, waters, water-courses," etc. Therefore Dixon may be credited with having built the first Raspberry Plain house, a matter long in doubt locally.[55] The estate was subsequently sold by Campbell and Lydia his wife to Thomson Mason, by deed dated the 15th day of May, 1760, for 500 pounds current money of Virginia.