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George Washington

“Father of His Country,” “The Sage of Mount Vernon,” “The Foundingest Father of them all” … Martha Washington called him “Her Old Man.”

On April 30, 1789, George Washington, standing on the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York, took his oath of office as the first President of the United States.  He wrote James Madison,

“As the first of every thing, in our situation will serve to establish a Precedent, it is devoutly wished on my part, that these precedents may be fixed on true principles.”

Born in 1732 into a Virginia planter family, he learned the morals, manners and body of knowledge requisite for an 18th century Virginia gentleman.

The unexpected death of their father, when George Washington was eleven, prevented him from receiving a classical, Latin-based education at Appleby School in England. Instead, private tutors and possibly a local school in Fredericksburg provided the young man with the only formal instruction he would receive.

Throughout his life, George Washington felt keenly embarrassed by his lack of a formal education, privately admitting that he was “conscious of a defective education,” and for good reason.

The majority of the founders were college-educated gentleman who had spent years reading law and studying the classics. Washington was one of the few in his generation who rose to leadership without these advantages.

In addition to reading, writing, and basic legal forms, Washington studied geometry and trigonometry – in preparation for his first career as a surveyor – and manners – which would shape his character and conduct for the rest of his life. 

The printed word, as much as the trials of battle, forged George Washington the soldier and was central to his efforts to create disciplined, effective armies.

The war stories told by his half-brother, Lawrence Washington, an officer in the Virginia militia likely ignited Washington’s interest in a military career, but printed histories may have also inspired him.

He pursued two intertwined interests: military arts and western expansion.

In 1747, Washington executed his first practice surveys, and in 1749 he secured the lucrative office of county surveyor in Culpeper County, Virginia.  At 16 he helped survey Shenandoah lands for Thomas, Lord Fairfax.

Commissioned a lieutenant colonel in 1754, he fought the first skirmishes of what grew into the French and Indian War. The next year, as an aide to Gen. Edward Braddock, he escaped injury although four bullets ripped his coat and two horses were shot from under him.

In March 1755, Washington rejoined the British Army, this time as an unpaid aide-de-camp to General Edward Braddock. However, he was still seen as a second-rate aide and Braddock did not listen to colonists despite their experiences. The result was a disaster.

After years of frustration, Washington resigned from the British Army for good. Continuing to serve with his men was clearly his preference, but he could no longer do so.

From 1759 to the outbreak of the American Revolution, Washington managed his lands around Mount Vernon and served in the Virginia House of Burgesses.

In both the French and Indian War and the American Revolution, George Washington faced the frustrating task of transforming liberty-loving colonists into disciplined soldiers.

Officers were often as unfamiliar with the basic commands as their troops, and Washington urged them to read military manuals. One Hessian soldier recalled with surprise the books found in the captured bags of American officers: “This was a true indication that the officers of this army studied the art of war while in camp.”

Married to a widow, Martha Dandridge Custis, he devoted himself to a busy and happy life. But like his fellow planters, Washington felt himself exploited by British merchants and hampered by British regulations. As the quarrel with the mother country grew acute, he moderately but firmly voiced his resistance to the restrictions.

Washington knew British control extend too far within the government as well. As the British Parliament continued to tax the colonies his anger grew.

The first time George Washington ran for public office, he lost.  Despite the loss, Washington decided to run again for the House of Burgesses. It seems that by November 1757, some already knew Washington’s intentions to run in Frederick County.

The last session of the House of Burgesses Washington attended was in May 1774. During the session burgesses called for a day of “fasting, Humiliation and prayer,” to show support to those being punished by Parliament for the Boston Tea Party.

British Governor Dunmore promptly dissolved the House of Burgesses and did not recall it until June 1775.

When the Second Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia in May 1775, Congress created the Continental Army on June 14, 1775, and John Adams nominated George Washington to serve as the army’s Commander-in- Chief.

On July 3, 1775, at Cambridge, Massachusetts, he took command of his ill-trained troops and embarked upon a war that was to last six grueling years.

Despite having little practical experience in managing large, conventional armies, Washington proved to be a capable and resilient leader of the American military forces during the Revolutionary War.

While he lost more battles than he won, Washington employed a winning strategy that included victories at the Battle of Trenton in 1776 and Yorktown in 1781.

First President of the United States

Washington longed to retire to his fields at Mount Vernon. But he soon realized that the Nation under its Articles of Confederation was not functioning well, so he became a prime mover in the steps leading to the Constitutional Convention at Philadelphia in 1787.

When the new Constitution was ratified, the Electoral College unanimously elected Washington President.

He did not infringe upon the policy making powers that he felt the Constitution gave Congress. But the determination of foreign policy became principally a Presidential concern.

When the French Revolution led to a major war between France and England, Washington refused to accept entirely the recommendations of either his Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, who was pro-French, or his Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, who was pro-British. Rather, he insisted upon a neutral course until the United States could grow stronger.

He retired at the end of his second term.  In his 1796 Farewell Address, Washington’s principal concern was for the safety of the eight-year-old Constitution. He believed that the stability of the Republic was threatened by the forces of geographical sectionalism, political factionalism, and interference by foreign powers in the nation’s domestic affairs.

White House

George Washington, selected the site for the White House in 1791, but he never lived in it. The following year, the cornerstone was laid and a design submitted by Irish-born architect James Hoban was chosen. After eight years of construction, President John Adams (the 2nd US President) and his wife Abigail moved into the still-unfinished residence.

George Washington’s Mount Vernon mansion is ten times the size of the average home in colonial Virginia.  Mount Vernon was the home of George Washington.

Washington enjoyed less than three years of retirement at Mount Vernon; he died of a throat infection December 14, 1799. For months the Nation mourned him.  (White House)

Click the following link to a general summary about George Washington:

Click to access George-Washington.pdf

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Yorktown – Articles of Capitulation

After a series of reverses and the depletion of his forces’ strength, the British commander in the southern colonies, General Lord Cornwallis, moved his army from Wilmington, North Carolina, eastward to Petersburg, Virginia, on the Atlantic coast, in May 1781.

Cornwallis had about 7,500 men and was confronted in the region by only about 4,500 American troops under the marquis de Lafayette, General Anthony Wayne, and Frederick William, Freiherr (baron) von Steuben.

In order to maintain his seaborne lines of communication with the main British army of General Henry Clinton in New York City, Cornwallis then retreated through Virginia, first to Richmond, next to Williamsburg, and finally, near the end of July, to Yorktown and the adjacent promontory of Gloucester, both of which he proceeded to fortify.

The American commander in chief, General George Washington, ordered Lafayette to block Cornwallis’s possible escape from Yorktown by land.

In the meantime Washington’s 2,500 Continental troops in New York were joined by 4,000 French troops under the comte de Rochambeau.

This combined allied force left a screen of troops facing Clinton’s forces in New York while the main Franco-American force, beginning on August 21, undertook a rapid march southward to the head of Chesapeake Bay, where it linked up with a French fleet of 24 ships under the comte de Grasse.  This fleet had arrived from the West Indies and was maintaining a sea blockade of Cornwallis’s army.

Cornwallis’s army waited in vain for rescue or reinforcements from the British navy while de Grasse’s fleet transported Washington’s troops southward to Williamsburg, Virginia, whence they joined Lafayette’s forces in the siege of Yorktown. Washington was thus vindicated in his hopes of entrapping Cornwallis on the Yorktown Peninsula.

Meanwhile, a smaller British fleet under Admiral Thomas Graves was unable to counter French naval superiority at the Battle of Virginia Capes and felt forced to return to New York.  A British rescue fleet, two-thirds the size of the French, set out for Virginia on October 17 with some 7,000 British troops, but it was too late.

Throughout early October Washington’s 14,000 Franco-American troops steadily overcame the British army’s fortified positions at Yorktown. Surrounded, outgunned, and running low on food, Cornwallis surrendered his entire army on October 19 (though, either ill – as he claimed – or simply humiliated, Cornwallis did not participate in the actual surrender, having delegated that task to Brig. Gen. Charles O’Hara).

The total number of British prisoners taken was about 8,000, along with about 240 guns. Casualties on both sides were relatively light. The victory at Yorktown ended fighting in the Revolution and virtually assured success to the American cause.  (Britannica)

On October 19, 1781, the British and Hessian forces under the command of Lord Charles Cornwallis surrendered to the French and American forces at Yorktown, Virginia.

The parties then entered into an agreement – Articles of Capitulation – that were the surrender of Cornwallis’s British army. The 14 articles directed the surrender from the disposition of the troops, artillery, and arms, to even the surrender ceremony itself.

The articles directed where the troops, now prisoners of war, were to be sent. The soldiers were marched off to camps in Frederick, Maryland, and Winchester, Virginia. One field officer for every 50 men was allowed to reside near their respective regiments to witness their treatment and deliver clothing and other necessaries to the soldiers at the camps.

All other officers were paroled and allowed to go to Europe, New York, or any other American post then in possession of the British forces, on the condition they would no longer fight until properly exchanged.

Another article provided for the care of the sick and wounded prisoners. Proper hospitals would be furnished, with patients attended by their surgeons on parole. Medicine and supplies were to be provided by the American hospitals, the British stores in both York and Gloucester, and passports would be issued to procure further supplies from New York if necessary.

The third article referred to the surrender ceremony and contained the provision that deprived the British of the honors war. Customary honors allowed the surrendering troops to march out of their works with their regimental flags flying and playing an enemy’s tune in honor of the victor.

George Washington was not going to allow these honors, instead he stated, “The same honors will be granted to the surrendering army as granted to the garrison of Charlestown”.

In May, 1780, an American army was captured at Charleston, South Carolina and not given the honors of war, therefore, in retaliation, the British would not be granted them at Yorktown.

The troops, the article read, were to “…march out…with shouldered arms, colors cased, and drums beating a British or German march. They are then to ground their arms and return to their encampment, where they will remain until they are dispatched to the places of their destination…”

By the afternoon of October 19th, 1781, both commanders had signed the Articles of Capitulation, and the defeated British army was marching out from Yorktown to lay down their arms, ending the last major battle of the American Revolution. (NPS)

Click the following link to a general summary about Yorktown – Articles of Capitulation:

Click to access Yorktown-Articles-of-Capitulation.pdf

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Conway Cabal

The Battle of Saratoga fought in the fall of 1777; it proved to be a turning point in the American struggle for independence.  Saratoga was unquestionably the greatest victory yet won by the Continental Army in terms of prisoners and captured arms and equipment. Nearly 6,000 enemy soldiers were taken, along with 42 cannon and massive quantities of stores. (Army-mil)

Following the American victory, morale among American troops was high. With General John Burgoyne’s surrender of his army to General Horatio Gates, the Americans scored a decisive victory that finally persuaded the French to sign a treaty allying with the United States against Britain, France’s traditional enemy.

The entrance of France into the war, along with its financial and military support, in particular its navy, was in the end crucial to Washington’s victory at the Battle of Yorktown in October 1781, which effectively ended the war.

It also had a direct impact on the career of General George Washington.  Without the victory at Saratoga, American forces would likely not have received critical assistance from the French, and faith in the war effort would have been weakened.

But the victory of General Gates at Saratoga also led to a serious but ultimately unsuccessful effort to replace Washington with Gates as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army. (Mount Vernon)

The cabal …

A ‘Cabal’ is the “contrived schemes of a group of persons secretly united in a plot (as to overturn a government).”  (Merriam-Webster Dictionary)

The Conway Cabal refers to a loosely organized attempt by a group of military officers and members of Congress to remove General George Washington from command of the Continental Army and replace him with Major General Horatio Gates.

The supposed leader of this movement was Brigadier General Thomas Conway, an Irish member of the French army who commanded a brigade in Washington’s army.

Conway was critical of Washington’s performance in the Battle of Brandywine and boastful about his own feats at the same engagement. Shortly after Brandywine, Conway wrote Congress requesting a promotion to the rank of major general. Washington protested Conway’s promotion and was irritated by the request, believing it would have disastrous effects on the morale of more senior officers.

In October 1777, Conway wrote a letter to encourage Gates’ ambitions. 

Washington learned the details of the letter from a drunken James Wilkinson, Gates’ aide-de-camp. In response, Washington informed Conway that he was aware of the contents of the letter, to which Conway replied that he never penned the phrase “weak general.” Conway added that he believed Washington was influenced by men not equal to him in experience.

On November 14, Conway offered his resignation to Congress. However, instead of accepting the resignation Congress promoted Conway to the newly created position of Inspector General and to the rank of Major General.

In addition, a Board of War was created to oversee Washington after some members of Congress, including Samuel Adams, Thomas Mifflin, and Richard Henry Lee, began to question whether Washington could lead the Americans to victory.

Conway served with Washington at Valley Forge, and reported to the Board of War, which appointed Gates as its president on November 27, 1777.

In response to these developments, Washington distanced himself from Conway. Nonetheless, Washington maintained that his personal dislike for Conway never interfered with their professional relationship.

One object of the scheme was to detach the Marquis de Lafayette from Washington, to whom he was devotedly attached, and bring him into the interests of the cabal.

For this purpose he was to have the command of the expedition; an appointment which it was thought would tempt his military ambition. Conway was to be second in command, and it was trusted that his address and superior intelligence would virtually make him the leader.

The cabal, however, had overshot their mark. Lafayette, who was aware of their intrigues, was so disgusted by the want of deference and respect to the commander-in-chief evinced in the whole proceeding, that he would at once have declined the appointment, had not Washington himself advised him strongly to accept it. (Life of George Washington)

As winter wore on, the so-called cabal dissolved, bringing disgrace to and ending the careers of several of its leaders. Washington’s authority was strengthened, as loyal supporters rallied to defend and exalt the commander in chief.  (Valley Forge, NPS)

Click the following link to a general summary about the Conway Cabal:

Click to access Conway-Cabal.pdf

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Plot to Kill George Washington

On March 11, 1776, from his headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts, overseeing the siege of Boston, General George Washington issued a General Order to Colonels or Commanding Officers of regiments of the Continental Army.

Washington’s order directed these officers to select four men from each regiment who would form his personal guard.

General Washington had a clear idea of the type of men he was seeking and the qualifications were laid out in the General Order.

Captain Caleb Gibbs, an adjutant of the 14th Massachusetts Continental Regiment, was selected by General Washington to command the new unit, promoted to the rank of Major, and given the title Captain Commandant. The task fell to Gibbs to organize the new unit, whose motto was “Conquer or Die.”

The explicit mission of the new group was “to protect General Washington, the army’s cash and official papers.” Among Gibbs’ immediate staff officers was Lieutenant George Lewis, a nephew of General Washington.

The official designation of the new unit was “His Excellency’s Guard,” or the “General’s Guard.” Enlisted soldiers referred to the unit as “The Life Guards,” “The Washington Life Guards,” or “Washington’s Body Guard.” General Washington usually referred to the unit as “My Guards,” while Gibbs signed dispatches and unit correspondence “Commandant C-in-C, Guards.”

Within two months of the Lifeguards’ formation, several enlisted men and Non-Commissioned Officers were at the center of what became known as the Hickey mutiny.  (Mount Vernon)

A group of New York Tories had established a secret organization whose possible goal was to assassinate General Washington while he was encamped with units of the Continental Army on Manhattan Island.  (NPR)

The New York Provincial Congress had established the Committee on Conspiracies, a top-secret team of civilians with a mission to gather information about the enemy and detect and thwart the enemy’s intelligence operations. (Smithsonian)

As the plot against Washington got bigger, people started to talk, and this little committee – led by lawyer and Continental Congress delegate John Jay – wound up bringing the whole thing down. It was the beginning of America’s counterintelligence efforts.

At the start of the Revolutionary War, the governor [appointed by the royal government] and the mayor of New York, both British loyalists, successfully turned some of Washington’s personal guards against him. They were ready to strike, but Washington found out. (Smithsonian)

In June 1776, General Washington ordered the arrest of David Mathews, the Loyalist mayor of New York City, for conspiring in support of British plans to invade the city and strike the Continental Army there.

It was later learned that Mathews was also involved in a devious plot against Washington, along with  William Tryon, the British-appointed governor of New York.

The conspirators aimed to capture or assassinate Washington using traitors in his “Life Guard,” the detachment of soldiers responsible for the general’s safety.

They were foiled by the Committee for Detecting and Defeating Conspiracies, led by  John Jay, who would later gain fame as a Founder, diplomat, and jurist.

Thomas Hickey, the Continental soldier at the center of the plot, was a favorite of Washington.

An Irishman and British Army deserter, Hickey joined the colonial militia in Connecticut and was later handpicked by Washington to join his elite Life Guard.

Hickey proved a disappointment and was later jailed on suspicion of counterfeiting. While detained, he confided to fellow prisoners that he was turning his back on the cause of independence and actively recruiting others to support the British.

Hickey was court-martialed for his role in the plot against Washington, and pleaded innocent to charges of “exciting and joining in a mutiny and sedition,” and “treacherously corresponding with, enlisting among, and receiving pay from the enemies of the United Colonies.”

Hickey was found guilty on June 26, 1776.

By Washington’s orders, all soldiers who were not on duty at the time were present at the execution. Washington later wrote in a letter to the Continental Congress, “I am hopeful this example will produce many salutary consequences and deter others from entering into the like traitorous practices.”

Mere days before the passage of the Declaration of Independence, 20,000 spectators gathered in a field where Manhattan’s modern-day Chinatown lies.

All together, soldiers and citizens alike, they amassed the largest crowd to watch a public execution in the colonies at the time.

Although he was the only one executed, Hickey, it turns out, was part of a much larger scheme, one concocted by British loyalists to assassinate Washington, who at the time was commander-in-chief of the Continental Army.  (Smithsonian)

Hickey was the first individual to be executed for treason against what would become the United States.

The assassination plot is ‘hidden history.’ When the British were coming, the last thing Washington wanted to say was, “Hey, everyone, my own men just turned on me.” (Smithsonian)

Click the following link to a general summary about the Plot to Kill George Washington:

Click to access Plot-to-Kill-George-Washington.pdf

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Three Contemporary Leaders

While not the three amigos, these were three concurrent warriors and leaders of their respective parts of the planet – Kamehameha, Washington and Napoleon.

Each came into prominence through war and each left a mark in history in civil governance.

Kamehameha I (ca. 1758 – May 8, 1819)

Kamehameha was initially known as Paiʻea, which means “hard-shelled crab;” Kamehameha means “The Lonely One.”

Raised in the royal court of his uncle, Kalaniʻōpuʻu, Kamehameha achieved prominence in 1782, upon Kalaniʻōpuʻu’s death.

While the kingship was inherited by Kalaniʻōpuʻu’s son Kiwalaʻo, Kamehameha was given the prominent position of guardianship of the Hawaiian god of war, Kūkaʻilimoku.

In 1785, Kamehameha married Ka‘ahumanu, the daughter of one of his most trusted advisors. In 1790, he attained control of Hawai‘i Island, then he successfully invaded the Islands of Maui, Lāna‘i, Moloka‘i and O‘ahu, by 1795.

Ultimately, in 1810, Kauai‘i’s Kaumuali‘i decided to peacefully yield and unite with Kamehameha and join the rest of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi.

Kamehameha instituted the Kānāwai Māmalahoe, the Law of the Splintered Paddle. The law, “Let every elderly person, woman and child lie by the roadside in safety,” is enshrined in the state constitution, Article 9, Section 10, and has become a model for modern human rights law regarding the treatment of civilians and other non-combatants.

George Washington (February 22, 1732 – December 14, 1799)

The first president of the United States, George Washington, serving from 1789 to 1797, is often referred to as the Father of Our Country.

He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783.

After victory had been finalized in 1783, Washington resigned rather than seize power, proving his opposition to dictatorship and his commitment to the emerging American political ideology of republicanism. Washington was elected as the first president in 1789, and re-elected 1792.

Dissatisfied with the weaknesses of Articles of Confederation, in 1787, Washington presided over the Constitutional Convention that drafted the United States Constitution.

Napoleon Bonaparte (August 15, 1769 – May 5, 1821)

Napoleon was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.

As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815. He is remembered for his role in the wars led against France by a series of coalitions, the so-called Napoleonic Wars.

His legal reform, the Napoleonic Code (with enhanced civil rights, property rights and class privileges were extinguished,) has been a major influence on many civil law jurisdictions worldwide.

After a streak of victories, France secured a dominant position in continental Europe and Napoleon maintained the French sphere of influence through the formation of extensive alliances. Ultimately, in June 1815, Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo; he spent the last six years of his life in confinement by the British.

I find it interesting to see what these three notable leaders were doing at the same time in disparate and unconnected parts of the world.

I don’t know about you, but I am curious and fascinated in looking at similar timeframes and comparing histories of different parts of the world.

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