Peter Vivian Daniel was born on April 24, 1784, at Crow’s Nest, a family estate near the mouth of Potomac Creek in Stafford County. He was the son of Travers Daniel, a prominent planter, and Frances Moncure Daniel. He almost always signed his name with a middle initial, and although relatives and namesakes used the spelling Vivian, there are indications, including a surviving calling card, that he himself may have preferred Vyvian. Among the many family members whom Daniel influenced later in life were two grandnephews, the reformer and writer Moncure Conway and the journalist and diplomat John M. Daniel. Educated by private tutors, Daniel briefly attended the College of New Jersey (later Princeton University), where he joined the Cliosophic Society, many of whose members went on to distinction in politics and law. From 1805 to 1807 he studied law in Richmond with Edmund Randolph, a former governor and U.S. attorney general. On April 21, 1810, Daniel married Randolph’s daughter, Lucy Nelson Randolph. They had two daughters and one son, Peter Vivian Daniel, who became president of the Richmond, Fredericksburg, and Potomac Railroad Company. A nephew, Raleigh Travers Daniel, also lived with him, studied law under his direction, and became a member of the Council of State during the 1840s and attorney general of Virginia after the American Civil War (1861–1865).