If I had the talents for it, I have not leisure to turn my thoughts to Commentaries [on the Revolutionary War]. A consciousness of a defective education, and a certainty of the want of time, unfit me for such an undertaking.42
Unfortunately, Humphreys did not finish the task before his death. Yet, of the several chapters he wrote, some of them have been found recently and have been used in our study of Washington.
Meanwhile, Washington perhaps had a little fear about even Humphreys’ undertaking such a task, because he did not want to be unduly praised. The retiring president wrote his French friend, Marquis de Chastellux:
Humphreys (who has been some weeks at Mount Vernon) confirm’d me in the sentiment by giving a most flattering account of the whole performance: he has also put into my hands the translation of that part in which you say such, and so many hand some things of me; that (altho’ no sceptic on ordinary occasions) I may perhaps be allowed to doubt whether your friendship and partiality have not, in this one instance, acquired an ascendency over your cooler judgment.43
A significant aspect of this letter is Washington’s parenthetical aside: “altho’ no sceptic on ordinary occasions.” His temperament was not normally marked by doubt. Although not a skeptic, and thus not of a temperament that would dispose him to philosophical doubt and unbelief, this does not mean that Washington was a stoic who could not laugh or enjoy the humor of life.
SENSE OF HUMOR
George Washington is often portrayed as if he did not have a sense of humor but that too is inaccurate. As Zall says:
Just as credible, because evident also in his writings, Washington’s stony countenance could dissolve before “an unaffected sally of wit.” Congress excused its failure to provide funds because treasurer Robert Morris had his hands full. Washington replied that he wised Morris had his pockets full. When Mrs. Washington chided him for saying grace before dinner with a clergyman at the table, Washington pardoned himself: “The reverend gentleman will at least be assured that at Mount Vernon we are not entirely graceless.44
And Zall writes further:
Natural versus contrived wit bubbles up in writing meant for his eyes only. . . .His diary has such entries as the one recording a Sunday service in York, Pennsylvania. The town lacked an Episcopalian preacher, so Washington attended a Pennsylvania Dutch Reformed church. Since the service was in German and he had understood not a word, he reassured the diary, he had not been converted.45
Occasionally Washington even indulged in a bit of sarcasm in the privacy of his diary. He once commented on two sermons he heard while traveling, “I attended Morning & evening Service, and heard very lame discourses from a Mr. Pond.”46 He also critiqued the meager refreshments and decorations of a ball in Alexandria. His diary dubbed it the “bread and butter ball.”47 Zall notes another example of such sarcastic humor, this time aimed at himself:
Private correspondence also reveals the Washington wit. Former neighbor Eliza Power writes from Philadelphia that the desk he had left behind had a secret drawer containing love letters. He replied that if she had found warmth in those letters, she must have set them afire.48
More than a century before Mark Twain quipped “the reports of my death are greatly exaggerated,” Washington noted that the word of his death was premature. After a battle during the French and Indian War, where Washington survived a massacre, he wrote his brother, John Augustine, July 18, 1755:
Dear Brother, As I have heard, since my arrival at this place, a circumstantial account of my death and dying speech, I take this early opportunity of contradicting the first, and of assuring you, that I have not as yet composed the latter.49
Washington’s humor could express itself with playful parody of religious themes50 or in simply giving a description of his daily life.51
DEEP PASSIONS UNDER DISCIPLINED CONTROL
Zall writes of an incident after the War where Washington allowed his normally well-concealed emotions to be visible to his brothers-in-arms. At the war’s end, he bid farewell to officers in New York. Impulsively, he embraced each one by rank, from rotund Henry Knox on down, while “tears of deep sensibility filled every eye.”52
An emotional man at bottom, Washington, the seemingly frosty hero, was capable of the grand, dramatic gesture. His farewell to these officers, on December 4, 1783, at Fraunces’ Tavern in New York, was a scene out of a classic play. Standing before the men he had commanded for eight perilous and finally triumphant years, his customary self-control deserted him. Tears filled his eyes as he stood up, filled a glass with a shaking hand, and said in a trembling voice: “I cannot come to each of you to take my leave, but shall be obliged if you will each come and shake me by the hand.” Silently they lined up and shook his hand. Then he returned home to Mount Vernon, journeying through communities that moved him deeply with their outpourings of homage, determined to retire from public life. He had started his military career more than thirty years back, and now that he had won independence for his country the American Cincinnatus, as the newspapers and the orators called him, felt that he merited retirement to the plow. He was only fifty-one and, as he wrote to his friend Lafayette, his sole desire was to be a private citizen, sitting under his “own vine and fig-tree” and “move gently down the stream of life until I sleep with my fathers.”53
The most open expression of Washington’s deep emotions appeared in his General Orders of April 18, 1783, when he publicly declared the ending of hostilities:
...Although the proclamation before alluded to, extends only to the prohibition of hostilities and not to the annunciation of a general peace, yet it must afford the most rational and sincere satisfaction to every benevolent mind, as it puts a period to a long and doubtful contest, stops the effusion of human blood, opens the prospect to a more splendid scene, and like another morning star, promises the approach of a brighter day than hath hitherto illuminated the Western Hemisphere; on such a happy day, a day which is the harbinger of Peace, a day which compleats the eighth year of the war, it would be ingratitude not to rejoice! it would be insensibility not to participate in the general felicity.
The Commander in Chief far from endeavouring to stifle the feelings of Joy in his own bosom, offers his most cordial Congratulations on the occasion to all the Officers of every denomination, to all the Troops of the United States in General, and in particular to those gallant and persevering men who had resolved to defend the rights of their invaded country so long as the war should continue. For these are the men who ought to be considered as the pride and boast of the American Army; And, who crowned with well earned laurels, may soon withdraw from the field of Glory, to the more tranquil walks of civil life.
While the General recollects the almost infinite variety of Scenes thro which we have passed, with a mixture of pleasure, astonishment, and gratitude; While he contemplates the prospects before us with rapture; he can not help wishing that all the brave men (of whatever condition they may be) who have shared in the toils and dangers of effecting this glorious revolution, of rescuing Millions from the hand of oppression, and of laying the foundation of a great Empire, might be impressed with a proper idea of the [dignifyed] part they have been called to act (under the Smiles of providence) on the stage of human affairs: for, happy, thrice happy shall they be pronounced hereafter, who have contributed any thing, who have performed the meanest office in erecting this [steubendous] fabrick of Freedom and Empire on the broad basis of [Indipendency] who have assisted in protecting the rights of humane nature and establishing an Asylum for the poor and oppressed of all nations and religions. The glorius task for which we first fleu to Arms being thus accomplished, the liberties of our Country being fully acknowledged, and firmly secured by the smiles of heaven, on the purity of our cause, and the honest exertions of a feeble people (determined to be free) against a powerful Nation (disposed to oppress them) and the Character of those who have persevered, through every extremity of hardship; suffering and danger being immortalized by the illustrious appellation of the patriot Army: Nothing now remains but for the actors of this mighty Scene to preserve a perfect, unvarying, consistency of character through the very last act;54
And so the very next day, April 19th, “At noon the proclamation of Congress for a cessation of hostilities was proclaimed at the door of the New Building, followed by three huzzas; after which a prayer was made by the Reverend Mr. Ganno, and an anthem (Independence, from Billings,) was performed by vocal and instrumental music.”55
Because Washington understood the power of human passions he could write: “We must take the passions of men as nature has given them, and those principles as a guide, which are generally the rule of action.”56 He ably answered the passions of his distressed and weary officers as they wrestled with the emotions of a military confrontation with Congress.57
HIS EFFORTS TO CONTROL HIS POWERFUL ANGER58
To put the word “rapture” and George Washington in the same sentence seems nearly impossible. But still waters run deep, and sometimes they burst forth with tsunami-like force. Washington biographer, John Ferling noted, “Gilbert Stuart, an artist whose livelihood depended in part on his ability to capture the true essence of his subjects, believed Washington’s ‘features were indicative of the strongest and most ungovernable passions. Had he been born in the forests,’ Stuart added, ‘he would have been the fiercest man among the savages.’”59 Zall writes,
His dignity and self-esteem were such that to a superficial observer he appeared to be cold. Actually he was emotional, tender, and capable of outbursts of violence. An iron discipline, which he imposed upon himself all his life, kept a leash on his passions. “All the muscles of his face,” Captain George Mercer, a fellow-soldier, wrote of him “[are] under perfect control, though flexible and expressive of deep feeling when moved by emotion.” His infrequent outburst of anger were legendary. On the occasions when his rigid self-control broke under stress, he was, according to a contemporary, “most tremendous in his wrath.”60
The explosion of joy at the ending of hostilities mentioned above, near the end of the war, reveals Washington’s powerful inner passions as well as his ongoing efforts to control them. But so do his infrequent explosions of anger. The fact that George Washington was “tremendous in his wrath” was confirmed by various associates. Lafayette’s recollection of Washington’s response to General Lee’s violation of his orders at the Battle of Monmouth is a case in point.61 A fellow Virginian, General Lee, disobeyed orders and called for a retreat, for which he was court-martialed. Lee remained a bitter critic of Washington to his death.62
Washington’s signature evolved through the years.
Other occasions are worthy of note. Zall writes of an incident where President Washington had been criticized in several newspapers hostile to the cause. Thomas Jefferson related, “The presdt . . . got into one of those passions when he cannot command himself, ran on much on the personal abuse which had been bestowed on him, defied any man on earth to produce one single act of his since he had been in the govmt which was not done in the purest motives, that he had never repented but once the having slipped the moment of resigning his office, and that was every moment since, that by god he had rather be on his farm than be made emperor of the world, and yet they were charging him with wanting to be a king.”63 Further, the criticism of an old friend, Edmund Randolph, in print, tested Washington’s temper: “The president entered the parlor, his face ‘dark and lowering.’ Someone asked if he had read Randolph’s pamphlet, Vindication (1795). ‘I have,’ said Washington, ‘and, by the eternal God, he is the damnedest liar on the face of the earth!’ he exclaimed as he slammed his fist down upon the table.”64
A similar passionate outburst of exasperation and anger occurred when Washington was president in 1791, and quietly received word at dinner of St. Clair’s defeat by the Indians. According to Tobias Lear, Washington’s personal assistant, the emotionally intense episode happened after all the guests, as well as Mrs. Washington, had left the room. He relates,
The General now walked backward and forward slowly for some minutes without speaking. Then he sat down on a sofa by the fire, telling Mr. Lear to sit down. To this moment there had been no change in his manner since his interruption at table. Mr. Lear now perceived emotion. This rising in him, he broke out suddenly: “It’s all over—St. Clair’s defeated, routed; the officers nearly all killed, the men by wholesale; the rout complete—too shocking to think of— and a surprise into the bargain!” He uttered all this with great vehemence, then he paused, got up from the sofa and walked about the room several times, agitated, but saying nothing. Near the door he stopped short and stood still for a few seconds, when his wrath became terrible. “Yes,” he burst forth, “Here, on this very spot, I took leave of him: I wished him success and honor. ‘You have your instruction,’ I said, ‘from the Secretary of War; I had a strict eye to them, and will add but one word—BEWARE OF A SURPRISE! I repeat it, BEWARE OF A SURPRISE; you know how the Indians fight us.’ He went off with that as my last solemn warning thrown into his ears. And yet! To suffer that army to be cut to pieces, hacked, butchered, tomahawked, by a surprise—the very thing I guarded him against! O God, O God, he’s worse than a murderer! How can he answer it to his country? The blood of the slain is upon him—the curse of the widows and orphans—the curse of Heaven!”65
A TENDER-HEARTED FRIEND
As a young man, George Washington expressed his joy in friendship and admitted to the power of passion. Both of these occurred in an early letter describing a teenage romance, and his “chaste” struggles to control his “passion.” Writing to “dear friend Robin” between 1749-1750 he divulges:
As it’s the greatest mark of friendship and esteem Absent Friends can shew each other in Writing and often communicating their thoughts to his fellow Companions makes me endeavor to signalize myself in acquainting you from time to time and at all times my situation and employments of Life and could wish you would take half the Pains of contriving me a letter by any opportunity as you may be well assured of its meeting with a very welcome reception. My place of Residence is at present at His Lordship’s [Fairfax]
This painting by John Ward Dunsmore illustrates good friends Washington and Lafayette reviewing the encampment at Valley Forge
where I might, was my heart disengaged, pass my time very pleasantly as there’s a very agreeable Young Lady Lives in the same house [Mary Cary]. But as that’s only adding Fuel to fire, it makes me the more uneasy, for by often, and unavoidably, being in Company with her revives my former Passion for your Low Land Beauty; whereas, was I to live more retired from young Women, I might in some measure alleviate my sorrows, by burying that chaste and troublesome passion in the grave of oblivion or eternal forgetfulness, for as I am very well assured, that’s the only antidote or remedy that I shall be relieved by or only recess that can administer any cure or help to me, as I am well convinced, was I ever to attempt anything, I should only get a denial which would be only adding grief to uneasiness.66
Friendships mattered to Washington. His inner self was reserved for those who were closest to him. These individuals sometimes received very striking personal revelations in his letters. Moreover, to be his friend was to experience sincere affection, a warm welcome and a hearty embrace. But to become Washington’s friend was no easy matter. This seems to reflect his classic “Rules of Civility” number fifty-six that speaks of exercising great care in choosing friends: “Associate yourself with men of good quality, if you esteem your own reputation; for it is better to be alone than in bad company.” How to choose a friend was one of the matters of wisdom he sought to impart to his young namesake and adopted grandson, George Washington Parke Custis. Writing from Philadelphia on November 28, 1796, he counseled,
