VIKING
An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
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Copyright © 2020 by Alexis Coe
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ISBN 9780735224100 (hardcover)
ISBN 9780735224124 (ebook)
Manicule illustrations by Daniel Lagin
pid_prh_5.5.0_c0_r0
For Anthony, the only man for the job
Contents
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION
EPIGRAPH
TIMELINE
PREFACE
You Never Forget Your First—But You Do Misremember Him
INTRODUCTION
The Thigh Men of Dad History
PART I
Reluctant Rebel
CHAPTER 1
His Mother’s Son
CHAPTER 2
“Pleases My Taste”
CHAPTER 3
“The World on Fire”
CHAPTER 4
“Blow Out My Brains”
CHAPTER 5
The Widow Custis
CHAPTER 6
“I Cannot Speak Plainer”
CHAPTER 7
“What Manner of Man I Am”
CHAPTER 8
“The Shackles of Slavery”
PART II
General George Washington’s American Revolution— Off the Battlefield
CHAPTER 9
Hardball with the Howe Brothers
CHAPTER 10
The Court of Public Opinion
CHAPTER 11
George Washington, Agent 711
CHAPTER 12
Eight Years Away
CHAPTER 13
“From Whence No Traveller Returns”
PART III
Mr. President
CHAPTER 14
Unretirement
CHAPTER 15
The Presidency; or, “The Place of His Execution”
CHAPTER 16
Infant Nation
CHAPTER 17
“Political Suicide”
CHAPTER 18
Farewell to “Cunning, Ambitious, and Unprincipled Men”
PART IV
“I Die Hard”
CHAPTER 19
Final Retirement
CHAPTER 20
“’Tis Well”
Epilogue
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
NOTES
INDEX
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
—JOHN MARSHALL,
CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT (1784)
“All the land knew him and loved him for gallantry and brave capacity; he carried himself like a prince.”
—WOODROW WILSON,
28TH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, GEORGE WASHINGTON (1896)
“I heard that motherfucker had like thirty goddamn dicks.”
—BRAD NEELY,
COMIC BOOK ARTIST, YOUTUBE VIDEO (2009)
“Next to Washington, they all look small.”
—KING GEORGE
IN LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA’S HAMILTON (2015)
GEORGE WASHINGTON AT A GLANCE
(1732–1799)
JOBS
Surveyor
Virginia militia colonel (British Army)
Member of the Virginia House of Burgesses
Gentleman farmer
Commander in chief of the Continental Army
President of the Constitutional Convention
First president of the United States
Land developer
TITLES
Master
His Excellency
General
Mr. President
GREATEST HITS
Raised, trained, and led a militia against the greatest superpower in the world
Refused payment for leading the army
Gave up power after winning the American Revolution
First president, and set precedents by adding hallmarks that weren’t in the Constitution, like a cabinet and term limits
Declined to run for a third term
Paved a road to freedom for his slaves in his will
PETTIEST ACTS
Took two impoverished girls to court for stealing from his clothes while he swam
Named a dog Cornwallis after the British general he defeated in the Revolutionary War
RELIGION
“Warm Deist”
Believed in an afterlife
Christian (liberal Anglican/Episcopalian)
Attended services of many denominations
Supported freedom of conscience, including for non-Christians
Corresponded with leaders and practitioners of various denominations, from Jews to Quakers
FATHER OF
No one (biologically)
The United States of America
Two stepchildren
Two step-grandchildren
The American Foxhound
LIKES
The circus
Being home
Dancing
Dogs
Donkeys
Mules
Exotic animals
Fishing
Horseback riding
Horticulture
Hunting
Reading books and newspapers
Theater
DISLIKES
Idle chatter
Sitting for portraits
Inherited titles
Wasted opportunity
Procrastination
Slapstick humor
Political parties
CLOSEST FRIENDS
John Augustine Washington
George William Fairfax
Dr. James Craik
Martha Washington
Tobias Lear
Marquis de Lafayette
Elizabeth Powel
FRENEMIES
Thomas Jefferson
James Madison
James Monroe
Edmund Randolph
Thomas Paine
GREATEST ADVERSARIES
King George III of England
Charles Lee
Horatio Gates
Thomas Conway
INNOVATED/IMPROVED
A sixteen-sided barn
Crop rotation
North Ame
rican animals and husbandry
FAVORITE FOOD & DRINK
Hoecakes swimming in butter and honey
Any kind of fish
Tea
Hot chocolate
Madeira
FAVORITE WRITERS
William Shakespeare
Joseph Addison
Humphrey Bland
Henry Fielding
Tobias Smollett
Jethro Tull
Arthur Young
LIES WE BELIEVE ABOUT THE MAN WHO COULD NOT TELL THEM
LIE
TRUTH
1
He was an unparalleled military leader.
He lost more battles than he won. See Part II.
2
He had wooden teeth.
It was a lot worse, as you’ll see in the Preface.
3
He grew weed.
He grew hemp, which was used for making rope, sail canvas, and thread for clothing, not getting high.
4
He wore a wig.
That would have been a lot easier. He had his hair gathered, fluffed, curled, and, before his reddish-brown hair turned gray, powdered white.
5
He kneeled to pray at Valley Forge.
One of Parson Weems’s many tall tales. See the Preface.
6
He skipped a silver dollar all the way across the Potomac River.
Impossible! It’s a mile wide.
7
He was a Republican.
He was a Federalist, but so disliked political parties that he did not publicize it.
8
He was the first president to live in the White House.
Washington helped choose the site of the White House, but John Adams was the first president to live there.
9
He’s buried beneath the U.S. Capitol.
He’s buried at Mount Vernon, his Virginia plantation.
10
He could not tell a lie.
He could, and did—especially during the Revolution in order to mislead the British.
DISEASES SURVIVED
The greatest threats to Washington’s life were armed men and deadly diseases. In the eighteenth century, physicians and healers knew almost nothing about sources of contagion or effective treatments for illness or infection, and they subjected their patients to “remedies” that strike us today as either bogus or barbaric. Even the mildest of diseases could prove fatal, yet Washington managed to survive them time and again. He outlived all the men in his family (many of whom were likely felled by tuberculosis) and was often one of the last ones standing after any outbreak.
AGE
DISEASE
SYMPTOMS
TREATMENTS
15
Black canker (diphtheria)
Chills, fever, bluish skin, foul-smelling discharge, difficulty breathing, and gray coating on the throat
Prayer
17,
21,
30,
39,
52,
66
River fever
(malaria)
Fever, sweating, vomiting, diarrhea, bloody stool, and rectal abscesses
Diluted barley water, flax tea, watery gruel; “The Waters,” which he obtained after a difficult trip to Warm Springs, Virginia; calomel, an all-purpose purgative made of mercury chlorine (long-term effects included inflammation of the gums and loosening of the teeth); bloodletting to “evacuate the poisonous matter;” Peruvian bark and a cathartic (laxative)
19
Smallpox
Raging fever, unquenchable thirst, excruciating headache and backache, red sores, rash, pustules, and scabs (which left pockmarks and permanent scars on his face)
Cold compresses, laudanum (opium), ointment
19,
35
Consumption
(tuberculosis)
According to Washington, a “violent pleurise which has reduced me very low”
Ipecac (an emetic to cause vomiting), rest, and fresh air
23, 33, 35,
39
Bloody flux (dysentery) and consumption
The usual symptoms of each, but the combined effect was so severe that doctors and family feared he would not survive.
Ipecac, bloodletting
44
Cheek erosion from gum abscess
Exactly what it sounds like.
Draining
47
Quinsy
(tonsillitis)
Fever, throat pain
Draining
57,
59
Carbuncle
Red, swollen, painful boils under the skin
Draining
58
Pneumonia
Fever, swelling, nausea, vomiting
Bloodletting
67
Epiglottitis (fatal)
Swelling of the throat, fever, difficulty swallowing and breathing
Bloodletting
ALL THE PRESIDENT’S ANIMALS
Sweetlips. Madame Moose. True Love. For a man known for his serious (if not grave) disposition, George Washington gave his dogs fairly ridiculous names. But they were just one of many types of animals at Mount Vernon that entertained and fed the family.
BEES
In 1787, Washington noted that three hundred nails were given to indentured English joiner Matthew Baldridge to “make a bee house.” The bees were likely an attempt to support his considerable honey habit; he liked his morning hoecakes swimming in it.
BISON
Washington spent years trying to get bison. “I am very anxious to raise a Breed of them,” he wrote to his overseer in 1775. He’d seen them on the frontier and asked around, but they weren’t common. He finally succeeded in acquiring them later in life, but it’s unclear how long the animals survived.
DOGS
Every morning, Washington visited his dogs in their kennel, which had a fresh spring running through it; every evening, he came back to say goodnight. He is known for developing the American Foxhound, which he loved to hunt with, but he also kept terriers, coach dogs, and Newfoundlands. They appear in
letters and can be seen in the background of family portraits. In one missive from 1798, a former employee asks Washington to “inform your Lady that our little Slut died in the Straw,” which the editors of his paper understand to be “one of a number of hints . . . that Mrs. Washington was particularly fond of dogs.”1
CATS
The Washingtons were clearly dog people, but cat bones have been found in slave quarters at Mount Vernon, suggesting the animals were kept as pets, most likely for rodent control.
CATTLE
Washington had more than three hundred cattle branded with his initials. Oxen were used on the farms for plowing, and cows provided the family with meat, milk, butter, cheese, and cream.
FOWL
Washington raised chickens, geese, turkeys, and ducks, most of them after Martha and her children arrived at Mount Vernon. They provided eggs, feathers, and meat. Martha had several pet birds, and at least one parrot. Every December, the Washingtons ate turkey in their Yorkshire Christmas pie. There is also evidence that their slaves raised chickens and ducks and hunted wild turkeys.
HOGS
Washington’s hogs ran wild, foraging for food until it came time for fattening; in November, Mount Vernon slaves would catch the hogs and pen them until the end of the year. After that, they were served up as bacon, chitterlings, ham, and salted pork.
HORSES
According to Thomas Jefferson, Washington was “the best horseman of the age and the most graceful.” He began riding in his youth and continued throughout his time as a surveyor, soldier, farmer, general, and president. He rode two of his favorite horses, Nelson and Blueskin, during the Revolution, and his horse Prescott, who was described as “purely white, and sixteen hands high,” during his presidency. Washington also raced horses, including an Arabian stallion named Mongolia.