Washington, George

I

Introduction

Washington, George (1732-1799), commander in chief of the Continental army during the American War of Independence, and later the first President of the United States. He symbolized qualities of discipline, aristocratic duty, military orthodoxy, and persistence in adversity that his contemporaries particularly valued as marks of mature political leadership.

Washington was born on February 22, 1732, in Westmoreland County, Virginia, the eldest son of Augustine Washington, a Virginia planter, and Mary Ball Washington. Although Washington had little or no formal schooling, his early notebooks indicate that he read in geography, military history, agriculture, deportment, and composition and that he showed some aptitude in surveying and simple mathematics. In later life he developed a style of speech and writing that, although not always polished, was marked by clarity and force. Tall, strong, and fond of action, he was a superb horseman and enjoyed the robust sports and social occasions of the Virginia planter society. At the age of 16 he was invited to join a party to survey lands owned by the Fairfax family (to which he was related by marriage) west of the Blue Ridge Mountains. His journey led him to take a lifelong interest in the development of western lands. In the summer of 1749 he was appointed official surveyor for Culpeper County, and during the next two years he made many surveys for landowners on the Virginia frontier. In 1753 he was appointed adjutant of one of the districts into which Virginia was divided, with the rank of major.

II

Early Military Experience

Washington played an important role in the struggles preceding the outbreak of the French and Indian War. He was chosen by Lieutenant-Governor Robert Dinwiddie of Virginia to deliver an ultimatum calling on French forces to cease their encroachment in the Ohio River valley. The young messenger was also instructed to observe the strength of French forces, the location of their forts, and the routes by which they might be reinforced from Canada. After successfully completing this mission, Washington, then a lieutenant colonel, was ordered to lead a militia force for the protection of workers who were building a fort at the Forks of the Ohio River. Having learned that the French had ousted the work party and renamed the site Fort Duquesne, he entrenched his forces at a camp named Fort Necessity and awaited reinforcements. A successful French assault obliged him to accept articles of surrender, and he departed with the remnants of his company.

Washington resigned his commission in 1754, but in May 1755 he began service as a volunteer aide-de-camp to the British general Edward Braddock, who had been sent to Virginia with a force of British regulars. A few kilometres from Fort Duquesne, Braddock's men were ambushed by a band of French soldiers and Native Americans. Braddock was mortally wounded, and Washington, who behaved gallantly during the conflict, narrowly escaped death. In August 1755 he was appointed (with the rank of colonel) to command the Virginia regiment, charged with the defence of the long western frontier of the colony. War between France and Britain was officially declared in May 1756, and while the principal struggle moved to other areas, Washington succeeded in keeping the Virginia frontier relatively safe.

III

The American War of Independence

After the death of his elder half-brother Lawrence, Washington inherited the plantation known as Mount Vernon. A spectacular rise in the price of tobacco during the 1730s and 1740s, combined with his marriage in 1759 to Martha Custis, a young widow with a large estate, made him one of the wealthiest men in Virginia. Elected to the House of Burgesses in 1758, he served conscientiously but without special distinction for 17 years. He also gained political and administrative experience as justice of the peace for Fairfax County.

Like other Virginia planters, Washington became alarmed by the measures of the British Crown and Parliament to tax the colonies in the 1760s and early 1770s. In July 1774 he presided over a meeting in Alexandria that adopted the Fairfax Resolves, calling for the establishment and enforcement of a stringent boycott on British imports prior to similar action by the First Continental Congress. Together with his service in the House of Burgesses, his public response to unpopular British policies won Washington election as a Virginia delegate to the First Continental Congress in September and October 1774 and to the Second Continental Congress in 1775.

A

The Opening Campaigns of the War

When fighting broke out between Massachusetts and the British in 1775, Congress named Washington commander of its newly created Continental army, hoping thus to promote unity between New England and Virginia. He took command of the makeshift force besieging the British in Boston in mid-July, and when the enemy evacuated the city in March 1776, he moved his army to New York. Defeated there in August by General William Howe, he withdrew from Manhattan to establish a new defensive line north of New York. In November he retreated across the Hudson River into New Jersey, and a month later crossed the Delaware to safety in Pennsylvania.

Although demoralized by Howe's easy capture of New York and northern New Jersey, Washington spotted the points where the British were overextended. Recrossing the icy Delaware on the night of December 25, 1776, he captured Trenton in a surprise attack the following morning, and on January 3, 1777, he defeated British troops at Princeton. These two engagements restored patriot morale, and by spring Washington had 8,000 new recruits. Impressed by such tenacity, Howe delayed moving against Washington until late August, when he landed an army at the head of Chesapeake Bay. Wanting to fight, Washington tried unsuccessfully to block Howe's advance towards Philadelphia at the Battle of Brandywine Creek in September. Following the British occupation of the city, he fought a battle with them at Germantown, but their superior numbers forced him to retreat. Washington and his men spent the following winter at Valley Forge, west of Philadelphia. During these months, when his fortunes seemed to have reached their lowest point, he thwarted a plan by his enemies in Congress and the army to have him removed as commander in chief.

In June 1778, after France's entry into the war on the American side, the new British commander, Sir Henry Clinton, evacuated Philadelphia and marched overland to New York; Washington attacked him at Monmouth, New Jersey, but was again repulsed. Washington blamed the defeat on General Charles Lee's insubordination during the battle—the climax of a long-brewing rivalry between the two men.