WASHINGTON

AND THE

AMERICAN REPUBLIC

Portrait of Washington (After Stuart)

WASHINGTON

AND THE

AMERICAN REPUBLIC.

BY

Benson J. Lossing,

AUTHOR OF “PICTORIAL HISTORY OF THE CIVIL WAR,” “FIELD-BOOK OF THE
REVOLUTION,” “FIELD-BOOK OF THE WAR OF 1812,” ETC. ETC.

VOLUME III.

NEW YORK:
VIRTUE & YORSTON,
12 Dey Street.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by Virtue &
Yorston, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.

Washington at Valley Forge

Transcriber's Note: The caret (^) has been used to mark subscript in the text version. A Table of Contents has been added. Obvious printer errors, including punctuation, have been corrected. All other inconsistencies have been left as they were in the original.

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS IN VOL. III.

  • Portrait of Washington (After Stuart)[Frontispiece]
  • Washington at Valley Forge[Vignette Title]
  • Washington's Headquarters Near Newburg[7]
  • Entrance of the American Army into New York, November 25, 1783[33]
  • Washington Presiding in the Convention, 1787[63]
  • Portraits of Rufus King, John Dickinson, Gouverneur Morris, Oliver Ellsworth, and John Rutledge[64]
  • Washington Entering Trenton[87]
  • Reception of President Washington at New York, April 23, 1789[89]
  • Portraits of Commanders Hopkins, Talbot, Paul Jones, Dale, and Barry[295]
  • Portrait of John Adams[472]

WASHINGTON.

CHAPTER I.

[TOP]

washington receives cheering news from greene—siege of fort ninety-six—success of partisan corps elsewhere—capture of augusta by the americans—rawdon approaches ninety-six—greene abandons the siege—rawdon retires to orangeburg followed by greene—greene encamps on the high hills of santee—stewart and cruger at orangeburg—rawdon goes to england—battle at eutaw springs—the upper country in possession of the americans—services of marion and other partisans—british confined to the seaboard—death of john parke custis—washington adopts his children—washington co-operates with congress—joins the army on the hudson—discontents in the army—proposition to make washington king—his rebuke—peace movements—washington's caution—junction of the french and american armies—evacuation of savannah and charleston.

1781

We have observed, that with the capture of Cornwallis and his army, the War for Independence was virtually ended, but that some blood flowed afterward, and that hostile forces were arrayed against each other for several months longer, before the two nations agreed to fight no more. Let us take a brief survey of events, from the siege of Yorktown until the declaration of peace, and the departure of the last British troops from our shores.

On the evening of the ninth of October, just as Lincoln, having completed the first parallel before Yorktown, ordered a battery to open upon the British works, Washington received encouraging intelligence from General Greene in the far South. Greene was then encamped upon the High Hills of Santee, having, a little more than a week previous to the date of his letter, been engaged in a bloody battle with the enemy at Eutaw Springs.

In a former chapter we left Greene on his march to attack Fort Ninety-Six, situated in Abbeville district in South Carolina, within about six miles of the Saluda river. It was then garrisoned by five hundred and fifty loyalists, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Cruger, of New York. Sumter having cut off all communication between Camden and Ninety-Six, Cruger had not received Rawdon's orders to join Brown at Augusta, but remained, and was using every endeavor to strengthen his works.

Greene arrived before Ninety-Six on the twenty-second of May, with less than a thousand regulars and a few raw militia. Kosciuszko, the brave Pole, was his chief engineer, and under his direction the Americans commenced making regular approaches, by parallels, for the works were too strong to be taken by assault. For almost a month the work went on, enlivened by an occasional sortie and skirmish. Then news came that Lord Rawdon was approaching with a strong force to the relief of Cruger. Greene's troops were full of spirit, and were anxious to storm the works before his lordship's arrival. Consent was given by the commander, and on the eighteenth an assault was made, and a bloody contest ensued. The Americans were repulsed, and on the following day Greene raised the siege and retreated across the Saluda. Rawdon pursued him a short distance, and, having accomplished the object of his errand, wheeled, and marched toward Orangeburg.

While the siege of Ninety-Six was in progress, partisan corps were elsewhere successful. Lee captured Fort Galphin, twelve miles below Augusta, and then sent an officer to the latter post to demand its surrender from Brown. The summons was disregarded, and Lee, Pickens, and Clarke, commenced a siege. It lasted several days, and on the fifth of June, the fort and its dependencies at Augusta were surrendered to the republicans. Lee and Pickens then joined Greene at Ninety-Six, and with him retreated beyond the Saluda.

And now Greene and Rawdon changed their relative positions, the former becoming the pursuer of the latter, in his march toward Orangeburg. Finding Rawdon strongly entrenched there, Greene deemed it prudent not to attack him; and the sickly season approaching, he crossed the Congaree with his little army, and encamped upon the High Hills of Santee, below Camden, where pure air and water might be found in abundance.

Considering the post at Ninety-Six quite untenable, Rawdon ordered Lieutenant-Colonel Cruger to abandon it and join him at Orangeburg. There Rawdon was met by Lieutenant-Colonel Stewart, who had come up from Charleston with an Irish regiment. As Greene had gone into summer-quarters apparently, and the American partisans were just then quiet, his lordship left all his forces in charge of Stewart, went down to Charleston, and embarked for Europe to seek the restoration of his health.

Soon after encamping on the High Hills of Santee, Greene detached Sumter with about a thousand light troops to scour the lower country and beat up the British posts in the vicinity of Charleston. His assistants were those bold partisans, Lee, Marion, Horry, the Hamptons, and other brave republican leaders, with troops accustomed to the swamps and sandy lowlands. These performed excellent service in preparing the way for the expulsion of the enemy from the interior of South Carolina.

Early in August Greene was reinforced by North Carolina troops, under General Sumner; and toward the close of the month, he broke up his encampment, crossed the Wateree, and marched upon Orangeburg. Stewart, who had been joined by Cruger, immediately retreated to Eutaw Springs, near the southwest bank of the Santee, and there encamped. Greene followed, and on the morning of the eighth of September, a very severe battle commenced. The British were finally expelled from the camp, leaving their tents standing, and almost everything but their arms behind them.

Greene's troops, unmindful of their commander's orders, had spread themselves through the abandoned camp to plunder, eat, and drink, when the enemy unexpectedly and suddenly renewed the battle. After a bloody conflict of four hours the Americans were compelled to give way. “It was by far the most obstinate fight I ever saw,” Greene wrote to Washington. Stewart feeling insecure, for the American partisan legions were hovering around him, retreated toward Charleston that night.

On the morning of the ninth Greene advanced and took possession of the battle-field, and sent detachments in pursuit of Stewart. A victory was claimed by both parties. Washington seemed to consider it as such for Greene. “Fortune,” he said, in a letter to him, “must have been coy indeed, had she not yielded at last to so persevering a pursuer as you have been.” Yet there was no victory in the case. The advantage evidently lay with the Americans. The contest had been a most sanguinary one. The loss of the Americans in killed, wounded, and missing, was five hundred and fifty-five; that of the British six hundred and ninety-three. The bravery, skill, and caution of Greene, and the general good conduct of his troops, were applauded by the whole country. Congress ordered a gold medal to be struck in commemoration of the event, and presented to Greene. A British standard captured on that occasion was also presented to him.

Many of his troops being sick, Greene again retired to the High Hills of Santee, where he remained until the middle of November. There, on the thirtieth of October, he was informed of the glorious events at Yorktown, and the day was made jubilant with the rejoicings of the army.

The whole upper country of the Carolinas and Georgia was now in possession of the republicans. Nothing remained to be done, but to drive in the British outposts, and hem them within the narrow precincts of their lines at Charleston and Savannah. Marion, Sumter, Lee, and other partisans, performed this service effectually.

Greene finally crossed the Congaree and moved with his army to the vicinity of Charleston. The object of his campaign was accomplished. He had driven the enemy to the margin of the sea, and he was prepared to keep them there. Marion and his men lingered around the headwaters of the Cooper river to watch their movements, and to prevent their incursions beyond Charleston. St. Clair had come down from Yorktown, and had driven the British from Wilmington. Governor Rutledge had called the legislators of South Carolina together at Jacksonboro', to re-establish civil government in that state, and Greene's army lay as a guard between them and the enemy at Charleston. In that city and Savannah only, did the British have a foothold south of the Delaware at the close of 1781; and Wayne, with vigilant eye and supple limb, lay not far from the latter place, closely watching the British there. The war was virtually at an end in the South.

Let us turn to the consideration of Washington's movements after the capitulation at Yorktown.

In the midst of the rejoicings because of the great victory, Washington's heart was made sad by domestic affliction. His stepson, John Parke Custis, who had followed him to the field as his aid-de-camp, sickened before the close of the siege. Anxious to participate in the pleasures of the victory, he remained in camp until the completion of the surrender, when he retired to Eltham, the seat of Colonel Bassett, who had married Mrs. Washington's sister. His malady (camp-fever) had increased, and Washington sent Doctor Craik with him. A courier was also despatched to Mount Vernon for his wife and mother; and on the fifth of November, having arranged all public business at Yorktown, Washington set out for Eltham. He arrived there, as he wrote to Lafayette, “time enough to see poor Mr. Custis breathe his last.”

The grief of Washington was very great, and he wept bitterly. He had watched over that young man from his earliest childhood with paternal affection and solicitude; and with pride he had seen him take public position as a member of the Virginia assembly. Now, at the age of twenty-eight years, he was taken from him. The mother was almost unconsolable, and the young wife was sorely smitten by the bereavement. Washington's heart deeply sympathized with them, and there, in the death-chamber, he formally adopted the two younger children of Mrs. Custis, who thenceforth became members of his family. These were Eleanor Parke Custis, who married Lawrence Lewis, the favorite nephew of Washington, and George Washington Parke Custis, who lived until the autumn of 1857.

Washington proceeded directly from Eltham to Mount Vernon, only halting at Fredericksburg to see his mother, and join in some public ceremonials there, in honor of himself and the French officers. But he sought not the quiet of his home for purposes of repose, for he was not to be seduced into the practices engendered by a fancied security because of the late brilliant victory. On the contrary, his apprehensions were painfully awakened to the danger which the prevalence of such confidence might occasion, and he wrote to General Greene, saying:—

“I shall remain but a few days here, and shall proceed to Philadelphia, where I shall attempt to stimulate Congress to the best improvement of our late success, by taking the most vigorous and effectual measures to be ready for an early and decisive campaign, the next year. My greatest fear is, that Congress, viewing this stroke in too important a point of light, may think our work too nearly closed, and will fall into a state of languor and relaxation. To prevent this error, I will employ every means in my power, and if unhappily we sink into that fatal mistake no part of the blame shall be mine.”

A little later he wrote to Greene from Philadelphia, saying: “I am apprehensive that the states, elated by the late success, and taking it for granted that Great Britain will no longer support so losing a contest, will relax in their preparations for the next campaign. I am detained here by Congress to assist in the arrangements for the next year; and I shall not fail, in conjunction with the financier, the minister of foreign affairs, and the secretary at war, who are all most heartily well-disposed, to impress upon Congress, and get them to impress upon the respective states, the necessity of the most vigorous exertions.”

Washington's Headquarters Near Newburg

Washington had been received in Philadelphia with distinguished honors, at the close of November. With his usual energy and industry, he pressed forward military arrangements for the campaign of 1782, and by his continual importunities, he awakened Congress to the importance of being prepared for another year of active duty in the field. On the tenth of December that body, by resolution, made a requisition of men and money from the southern states, and the resolve was warmly seconded by Washington, in letters to the respective governors of those states. Franklin, at the same time, was using the most strenuous exertions in France to procure more aid from that power; and when intelligence of the capitulation of Yorktown reached the French court, Vergennes promised a loan of six millions to the United States.

Washington remained four months in Philadelphia, and then joined the army near Newburg, on the Hudson. The allied forces had been dissolved. The troops under the Marquis St. Simon had sailed from the Chesapeake in De Grasse's fleet early in November; the French troops, under Rochambeau, remained in Virginia; the remainder of the American army, after St. Clair's force was detached to the South, proceeded northward, under the command of Lincoln, and took post on the Hudson and in the Jerseys, so as to be ready to operate against New York in the spring; and Lafayette, perceiving no probability of active service immediately, obtained leave of absence from the Congress, and returned to France to visit his family.

We have already noticed the proceedings in the British house of commons on the subject of peace with the Americans. Early in May, 1782, Sir Guy Carleton arrived in New York as the successor of Sir Henry Clinton in the chief command of the British forces; and in a letter dated the seventh of that month, he informed Washington that he and Admiral Digby were joint commissioners to make arrangements for a truce or peace. Even this friendly approach of British officials did not make Washington any the less vigilant and active, and he continued his preparations for further hostilities, with all the means in his power.

With the dawning of the day of peace great discontents in the army were developed. It prevailed equally among officers and private soldiers, and originated in the destitute condition of the troops at that time, and the conviction that the army would be disbanded without provision being made for the liquidation of the claims upon the government for the pay of arrearages, and the promised half-pay of the officers for a term of years after the conclusion of the war. The prospect was, indeed, gloomy. For a long time the public treasury had been empty; and thousands of the soldiers, many of them invalids, made so by their hard service for their country, would be compelled to seek a livelihood in the midst of the desolation which war had produced. In this state of things, and with such prospects, many sighed for a change. They lost faith in the republican form of government, as they saw it in its practical workings under the Articles of Confederation, and they earnestly desired something stronger—perhaps an elective or constitutional monarchy.

Washington had perceived these growing discontents with anxiety, and was urging Congress to do something to allay them, when he received a letter from Colonel Lewis Nicola, a veteran and well-bred officer of the Pennsylvania line, which filled him with the greatest apprehensions. In it Nicola, no doubt, spoke the sentiments of a great many of his fellow-officers and soldiers at that time. He attributed all current evils, and those in anticipation, to the existing form of government, and then urged the necessity and expediency of adopting a mixed one like that of England. Having fortified his position by argument, Nicola added:—

“In this case it will, I believe, be uncontroverted, that the same abilities which have led us through difficulties apparently unsurmountable by human power to victory and glory—those qualities, that have merited and obtained the universal esteem and veneration of an army—would be most likely to conduct and direct us in the smoother paths of peace. Some people have so connected the ideas of tyranny and monarchy as to find it very difficult to separate them. It may, therefore, be requisite to give the head of such a constitution as I propose some title apparently more moderate; but, if all other things were once adjusted, I believe strong arguments might be produced for admitting the title of king, which I conceive would be attended with some national advantage.”

How little did even Nicola, who was very intimate with Washington, comprehend the true character of his disinterested patriotism in all its breadth and depth! The commander-in-chief perceived that Nicola was only the organ of a dangerous military faction, whose object was to create a new government through the active energies of the army, and to place their present leader at the head. He sympathized with the army in its distresses, but this movement met with his severest rebuke.

“Sir,” said Washington, in a responsive letter to Nicola, “With a mixture of great surprise and astonishment, I have read with attention the sentiments you have submitted to my perusal. Be assured, sir, no occurrence in the course of this war has given me more painful sensations than your information of there being such ideas existing in the army as you have expressed, and which I must view with abhorrence and reprehend with severity. For the present, the communication of them will rest in my own bosom, unless some further agitation of the matter shall make a disclosure necessary. I am much at a loss to conceive what part of my conduct could have given encouragement to an address which to me seems big with the greatest mischiefs that can befall my country. If I am not deceived in the knowledge of myself, you could not have found a person to whom your schemes are more disagreeable. At the same time, in justice to my own feelings, I must add, that no man possesses a more serious wish to see ample justice done to the army than I do; and, as far as my power and influence, in a constitutional way, extend, they shall be employed to the utmost of my abilities to effect it, should there be any occasion. Let me conjure you, then, if you have any regard for your country, concern for yourself or posterity, or respect for me, to banish these thoughts from your mind, and never communicate, as from yourself or any one else, a sentiment of the like nature. I am, etc.”

1782

This stern rebuke at once silenced the faction, and checked all further movement in the direction of king-making. How brightly did the patriotism of Washington shine out in this affair! At the head of a victorious army; beloved and venerated by it and by the people; with personal influence unbounded, and with power in possession for consummating almost any political scheme not apparently derogatory to good government, he receives from an officer whom he greatly esteems, and who speaks for himself and others, an offer of the sceptre of supreme rule and the crown of royalty! What a bribe! Yet he does not hesitate for a moment; he does not stop to revolve in his mind any ideas of advantage in the proposed scheme, but at once rebukes the author sternly but kindly, and impresses his signet of strongest disapprobation upon the proposal. History can not present a parallel.

The summer of 1782 passed away without much apparent progress being made toward a definite and permanent arrangement for peace. At the beginning of August, Carleton and Digby wrote a joint letter to Washington, informing him that they had good authority for saying, that negotiations for peace had been commenced at Paris, by commissioners, and that the British representatives in that conference, would first propose the independence of the United States as a basis. But Washington, taught by past experience, was still doubtful of the reality of all these professions. “Jealousy and precaution,” he said, “at least can do no harm. Too much confidence and supineness may be pernicious in the extreme.”

No wonder he still doubted. The British government had not yet made any offer for a general cessation of hostilities. The Americans had allies whose interests must be consulted. Hostilities might cease in the United States, according to recent enactments of Parliament, but the very forces then on our shores, might be sent to make war upon the French dominions in the West Indies. The public faith required that the interests of France should be considered in the negotiations for peace; and until a cessation of general hostilities should be officially proclaimed by Great Britain, Washington resolved to be prepared for a renewal of the war.

Thus viewing affairs, the commander-in-chief advised Rochambeau, who was then (August, 1782) at Baltimore, to march his troops to the banks of the Hudson, and form a junction with the American army. This was accomplished at the middle of September, the first division of the French army crossing the Hudson at King's ferry on the fifteenth. The American forces were at Verplanck's Point, opposite, to receive them, all arranged in their best attire, their tents decked with evergreens, and their bands playing French marches.

In the meantime British troops had been leaving the southern shores of the United States, and others were preparing to depart. They evacuated Savannah on the eleventh of July, and sailed for New York, when the “keys of the city of Savannah” were delivered to Major Jackson, by a committee of British officers, under the direction of General Wayne. On the same day the American army, led by Wayne, entered the city, and royal authority in every form ceased for ever in Georgia.

General Leslie, the British commander at Charleston, was not in a condition to leave on account of a want of provisions. When he was apprized of the proceedings in Parliament in favor of peace, he proposed to General Greene a cessation of hostilities. Like a true soldier, Greene took no such responsibility, but referred the whole matter to Congress, while relaxing not one whit of his vigilance. Leslie then asked permission to purchase supplies for his army, that he might evacuate Charleston. The wary Greene refused to allow it, for in so doing he might be nourishing a viper that would sting him.

Leslie then resorted to force to obtain supplies; and late in August he sent an expedition up the Combahee for the purpose. General Gist, with some Maryland troops, was there to oppose him, and the British were compelled to retreat to Charleston. In the skirmish that ensued, the noble Colonel John Laurens, who had volunteered in the service, was killed. He was mourned by all as a great public loss; and his was about the last blood that flowed in the War for Independence.[1]

On the fourteenth of December following, the British evacuated Charleston, and on the ensuing day the Americans, under General Greene, marched into the city and took possession. He and his army were greeted as deliverers. From the windows, balconies, and housetops, handkerchiefs waved, and the mingled voices of women and children shouted, “God bless you, gentlemen! Welcome! Welcome!” That evening the last hostile sail was seen beyond Charleston bar, as a white speck upon the horizon. At the close of the year only New York city was held in possession by British troops.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] John Laurens was a son of Henry Laurens, president of the continental Congress in 1777. He joined the army early in 1777, and was wounded in the battle of Germantown. He continued in the army (with the exception of a few months), under the immediate command of Washington, until after the surrender of Cornwallis, in which event he was a conspicuous participant as one of the commissioners appointed to arrange the terms. Early in 1781, he was sent on a special mission to France to solicit a loan of money and to procure arms. He was successful, and on his return received the thanks of Congress. Within three days after his arrival in Philadelphia, he had settled all matters with Congress, and departed for the army in the South under Greene. There he did good service, until his death, on the Combahee, on the twenty-seventh of August, 1782, when he was but twenty-nine years of age. Washington, who made him his aid, loved him as a child. He declared that he could discover no fault in him, unless it was intrepidity, bordering on rashness. “Poor Laurens,” wrote Greene, “has fallen in a paltry little skirmish. You knew his temper, and I predicted his fate. The love of military glory made him seek it upon occasions unworthy his rank. The state will feel his loss.” He was buried upon the plantation of Mrs. Stock, in whose family he spent the evening previous to his death in cheerful conversation. A small enclosure, without a stone, marks his grave.

CHAPTER II.

[TOP]

death of joseph huddy—retaliation resolved upon—case of captain asgill—peace proceedings in the british parliament—preliminary treaty negotiated and signed at paris—discontents in the army—memorial of officers sent to congress—inflammatory address circulated in camp—meeting of officers called—washington determines to control the matter—the meeting and its results—washington's address—its effects—patriotic resolutions—intelligence of peace received by washington—its proclamation to the army—justice to the soldiers—furloughs freely granted—virtual dissolution of the army—conference between washington and carleton—departure of lafayette—cincinnati society—address to governors of states—mutiny of pennsylvania troops—congress adjourns to princeton—washington's tour to the north—invited to princeton—a bronze statue of washington voted by congress.

A very painful affair occupied the attention of Washington in the autumn of 1782, when his judgment and his sympathies were placed in opposition. In the neighborhood of Freehold, in New Jersey, lurked a band of marauding tories, known as Pine Robbers. One of these named Philip White, notorious for his depredations, had been caught by the New Jersey people, and killed while attempting to escape, when being conducted to Monmouth jail. His partisans in New York vowed revenge. Captain Huddy, a warm whig, then in confinement in New York, was taken by a party of loyalists under Captain Lippincott, to the Jersey shore, near Sandy Hook, and hanged. Upon Huddy's breast the infamous Lippincott placed a label, on which, after avowing that the act was one of vengeance, he placed the words in large letters—

“UP GOES HUDDY FOR PHILIP WHITE.”

From the neighboring country went forth a strong cry for retaliation. Washington submitted the case to a board of general officers, when it was agreed that Lippincott should be demanded as a murderer, for execution, and if Sir Henry Clinton would not give him up, retaliation should be exercised upon some British officer in the possession of the Americans.

Sir Henry refused. At the same time the Congress, by resolution, approved Washington's course, and he proceeded to select a British officer for execution, by lot, from among prisoners at Lancaster, Pennsylvania. It fell upon Captain Asgill, a young man nineteen years of age, an officer of the guards, and only son and heir of Sir Charles Asgill. Efforts were immediately set on foot to save Asgill. For a long time the matter remained in suspense, but Washington, firm in his purpose, was deaf to all entreaty. Lippincott was tried by a court-martial, and acquitted, it appearing that he was acting under the verbal orders of Governor Franklin, who was at the head of the board of associated loyalists. General Carleton, meanwhile, had succeeded Sir Henry Clinton in command at New York. He condemned the proceedings in the case of Huddy, and broke up the board of loyalists. Thus, in time, the most prominent features of the case became changed.

Meanwhile Lady Asgill had written a most pathetic letter to the Count de Vergennes, the French minister, imploring him to intercede on behalf of her son. Vergennes, at the request of the king and queen, to whom he showed the letter, wrote to Washington, soliciting the liberation of young Asgill. The count's letter was referred to Congress. That body had already admitted the prisoner to parole; and to the great relief of Washington, he received orders from Congress, early in November, to set Captain Asgill at liberty.

The case of Asgill excited Washington's deepest sympathies. He was an amiable and honorable young man. “I felt for him,” wrote the commander-in-chief, “on many accounts; and not the least, when viewing him as a man of honor and sentiment, I considered how unfortunate it was for him that a wretch who possessed neither, should be the means of causing him a single pang or a disagreeable sensation.”

On the twenty-fifth of July, 1782, the British Parliament passed a bill to enable the king to consent to the independence of the United States, and the monarch signed it, though with reluctance. Richard Oswald was immediately appointed, with full powers, to negotiate a treaty of peace with the new republic, on the basis of its independence. The American ministers abroad, Franklin, Adams, and Jay, were constituted commissioners for the United States, to treat for peace, and on the thirtieth of November, preliminary articles were signed by them respectively at Paris. Henry Laurens, who had arrived at Paris, from London, while the negotiations were in progress, had joined the American commissioners, and he also signed the treaty.

Washington, meanwhile, had been anxiously preparing the way for the anticipated disbanding of the army. Congress, through utter inability, had done really nothing to allay the discontents in the army; and the commander-in-chief was fearful, that during the idle hours of a winter encampment, those discontents would assume the form of absolute mutiny. He drew his forces to his former encampment, near Newburg, and there calmly awaited the issue of events.

Almost daily there were bold conferences of officers and soldiers in the camp, when the prospects of the future were discussed, sometimes angrily, and always warmly. Finally, in December, 1782, the officers, in behalf of the army, sent a committee with a memorial to the Congress, in which they represented the real hardships of their condition, and proposed that a specific sum should be granted them for the money actually due them, and as a commutation for the half-pay of the officers. This memorial elicited a long and warm debate in Congress, its character and its propositions being viewed differently by different minds. The entire winter passed away, and nothing satisfactory was done in the supreme legislature for the suffering soldier.

1783

At length forbearance appeared to many as no longer a virtue, and some officers resolved not to wait for justice in idle expectation of its appearance from the halls of legislation. A plan was arranged among a few, “for assembling the officers, not in mass, but by representation; and for passing a series of resolutions, which, in the hands of their committee, and of their auxiliaries in Congress, would form a new and powerful lever” of operations. Major John Armstrong, a young officer six-and-twenty years of age, and aid-de-camp of Gates, was chosen to write an address to the army, suitable to the subject, and this, with an anonymous notification of a meeting of officers, was circulated privately on the tenth of March, 1783.[2]

That address exhibited superior talent in the writer, and its tone was calculated to make a deep impression upon the minds of the malcontents. After preparing their feelings for a relinquishment of faith in the justice of their country, which had been already much weakened by real and fancied injuries, he remarked:—

“Faith has its limits as well as temper, and there are points beyond which neither can be stretched without sinking into cowardice or plunging into credulity. This, my friends, I conceive to be your situation; hurried to the verge of both, another step would ruin you forever. To be tame and unprovoked, when injuries press hard upon you, is more than weakness; but to look up for kinder usage, without one manly effort of your own, would fix your character, and show the world how richly you deserved the chains you broke.” He then took a review of the past and present—their wrongs and their complaints—their petitions and the denials of redress—and then said: “If this, then, be your treatment while the swords you wear are necessary for the defense of America, what have you to expect from peace, when your voice shall sink, and your strength dissipate by division; when these very swords, the instruments and companions of your glory, shall be taken from your sides, and no remaining mark of military distinction left but wants, infirmities, and scars? Can you, then, consent to be the only sufferers by the Revolution, and, retiring from the field, grow old in poverty, wretchedness, and contempt? Can you consent to wade through the vile mire of dependency, and owe the miserable remnant of that life to charity, which has hitherto been spent in honor? If you can, go, and carry the jest of tories and the scorn of whigs; the ridicule, and, what is worse, the pity of the world! Go, starve, and be forgotten.”

The writer now changed from appeal to advice. “I would advise you, therefore,” he said, “to come to some final opinion upon what you can bear and what you will suffer. If your determination be in proportion to your wrongs, carry your appeal from the justice to the fears of government. Change the milk-and-water style of your last memorial; assume a bolder tone, decent, but lively, spirited, and determined; and suspect the man who would advise to more moderation and longer forbearance. Let two or three men who can feel as well as write, be appointed to draw up your last remonstrance—for I would no longer give it the suing, soft, unsuccessful epithet of memorial.” He advised them to talk boldly to Congress, and to warn that body that the slightest mark of indignity from them now would operate like the grave, to part them and the army for ever; “that in any political event, the army has its alternative. If peace, that nothing shall separate you from your arms but death; if war, that, courting the auspices, and inviting the direction of your illustrious leader, you will retire to some unsettled country, smile in your turn, and 'mock when their fear cometh on.' Let it represent also, that should they comply with the request of your late memorial, it would make you more happy and them more reputable.”

Copies of these papers were placed in the hands of the commander-in-chief on the day when they were circulated, and with consummate sagacity and profound political wisdom, he resolved to guide and control the proceedings in a friendly manner at the meeting of officers, rather than to check them by authority. In general orders the next morning, he referred to the anonymous papers, as disorderly, and utterly disapproved of by the commander-in-chief. At the same time he requested that the general and field officers, with one officer of each company, and a proper representation of the staff of the army, should assemble at a place designated, at twelve o'clock on Saturday, the fifteenth, for the purpose of hearing the report of the committee of the army to Congress. With masterly skill he requested the senior officer (General Gates, whom he suspected, and doubtless with justice, of being the chief actor in the drama) to preside at the meeting.

When this order appeared, Armstrong prepared and issued another address, more subdued in tone, but so adroitly worded, as to convey the idea that Washington approved of the scheme, the time of the meeting only being changed. This interpretation Washington frustrated, by private conversation with the principal officers, in whose good sense and integrity he had confidence. The minds of these he impressed with a sense of the danger that must attend any rash act at such a crisis; and he inculcated moderation and forbearance. He thus prepared the best men in camp to deliberate at the coming conference, without passion or prejudice.

The meeting was held pursuant to the order of Washington. There was a full attendance of officers, and Gates presided. There was a raised platform at one end of the room in which the meeting was held, on which Gates and others sat. Upon this Washington took a seat, and when the meeting was called to order, he advanced upon the platform, while the most solemn silence prevailed in the assembly, and read an address which he had prepared for the occasion. It was compact in thought, dignified and patriotic in expression, and mild in language, yet severe in implication.[3]

When he had concluded the reading, Washington retired without uttering a word, leaving the officers to deliberate without restraint. The address had a most powerful and salutary effect. The conference was brief. They did not deliberate long, but proceeded to pass resolutions offered by Knox, and seconded by Putnam, by unanimous vote, thanking the commander-in-chief for the course he had pursued; expressing their unabated attachment to his person and their country; declaring their unshaken confidence in the good faith of Congress, and their determination to bear with patience their grievances, until, in due time, they should be redressed. Gates, as president of the meeting, signed the address, and on the eighteenth, Washington, in general orders, expressed his satisfaction.

Thus was frustrated, by the sagacity, prudence, and wisdom of Washington, the most dangerous scheme by which the liberties of America were put in jeopardy, next to the treason of Arnold. It had no wicked features in common with that treason, but its practical effects, if carried out, might have been almost equally disastrous.

To the president of Congress Washington wrote, when he transmitted to that body an account of the affair just narrated:—

“The result of the proceedings of the grand convention of officers, which I have the honor of sending to your excellency, for the inspection of Congress, will, I flatter myself, be considered as the last glorious proof of patriotism which could have been given by men who aspired to the distinction of a patriot army; and will not only confirm their claim to the justice, but will increase their title to the gratitude of their country.”

The excitement caused by these events had scarcely died away, when intelligence of the signing of the preliminary treaty of peace reached the commander-in-chief. That intelligence came to him in despatches from Robert L. Livingston, the secretary for foreign affairs, and also in a letter from Alexander Hamilton, and other New York delegates in Congress. It had been sent to them in the French ship, Triomphe, despatched for the purpose by Count de Estiang, at the request of Lafayette. Washington immediately wrote to Governor Clinton, saying:—

“I take the first moment of forwarding to your excellency the despatches from the secretary of foreign affairs, which accompany this. They contain, I presume, all the intelligence respecting peace, on which great and glorious event, permit me to congratulate you with the greatest sincerity.” Upon the envelope, bearing the superscription of this letter, Washington wrote, in a bold hand, and with a broad dash under it—Peace.

On the nineteenth of April, the seventh anniversary of the earlier bloodshedding in the War for Independence, at Lexington and Concord, the intelligence of peace was officially proclaimed to the army in general orders. “The generous task,” Washington said, “for which we first flew to arms, being accomplished; the liberties of our country being fully acknowledged, and firmly secured, and the characters 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 pursue a perfect, unvarying consistency of character through the very last act; to close the drama with applause, and to retire from the military theatre with the same approbation of angels and men, which has crowned all their former virtuous actions.”

Ever mindful of the interests of his soldiers, Washington had procured the passage of a resolution in Congress, that the services of the men engaged in the war, did not expire until the definitive treaty of peace should be ratified, but that the commander-in-chief might grant furloughs according to his own judgment, and permit the men to take their arms home with them. Washington used this prerogative freely, but judiciously, and, by degrees, the continental army was virtually disbanded, except a small force at headquarters; for those dismissed on furlough were never called back to service. “Once at home,” says Irving, “they sank into domestic-life; their weapons were hung over their fireplaces—military trophies of the Revolution, to be prized by future generations.”

On the sixth of May Washington held a personal conference with Sir Guy Carleton, at Tappan, in relation to the transfer of certain posts in the United States occupied by British troops, and other arrangements; and two days afterward, Egbert Benson, William S. Smith, and Daniel Parker, were appointed commissioners on the part of the Americans, to inspect and superintend the embarkation of the tories, who were about to leave for Nova Scotia, with their property. Several thousands of these unfortunate people left New York for that far-east country, where, one of them observed, were “nine months of winter, and three months of cold weather every year.”

In view of the approaching dissolution of the army, and their final separation, the officers in camp, most of whom had worked shoulder to shoulder in the eight years struggle, yearned for some bond of association, whereby they should continue to be like brothers, not only in the memory of the past, but in personal intercourse, and friendly association. The idea of a society to be formed of all the officers of the Revolution, American and foreign, was conceived by the large-hearted Knox, and on the thirteenth of May, at the quarters of the Baron Steuben, a committee that had been appointed for the purpose, submitted a plan to a meeting of officers. It was adopted, and an association called the Society of the Cincinnati, was formed. That name was adopted, because, like the noble Roman, Lucius Quintius Cincinnatus, they were about to return to private life and their several employments, after serving the public.

The chief objects of the society were to promote cordial friendship and indissoluble union among themselves; to commemorate by frequent re-unions the great struggle they had just passed through; to use their best endeavors for the promotion of human liberty; to cherish good feeling between the respective states; and to extend benevolent aid to those of the society whose circumstances might require it. They formed a general society, and elected Washington the president, and Knox the secretary. The former held his office until his death, and was succeeded by General Alexander Hamilton. For greater convenience, state societies were organized, which were auxiliary to the parent society. To perpetuate the association, it was provided in the constitution, that the eldest male descendant of an original member should be entitled to membership on the decease of such member, “in failure thereof, the collateral branches, who may be judged worthy of becoming its supporters and members.” During the remainder of his life, Washington manifested a great interest in this society, and the re-unions were seasons of real enjoyment for the members.[4]

On the eighth of June Washington addressed a circular letter to the governors of all the states, on the subject of the disbanding of the army. It was a most able paper, evidently prepared with care after much thought, and presenting, for the consideration of his countrymen, topics and opinions of the greatest importance. With admirable skill he drew a picture of the enviable condition and position of the United States, and their citizens, and then remarked:—

"Such is our situation, and such our prospects; but notwithstanding the cup of blessing is thus reached out to us—notwithstanding happiness is ours, if we have a disposition to seize the occasion and make it our own; yet it appears to me there is an option still left to the United States of America, whether they will be respectable and prosperous, or contemptible and miserable as a nation. This is the time of their political probation; this is the moment when the eyes of the whole world are turned upon them; this is the time to establish or ruin their national character for ever; this is the favorable moment to give such a tone to the federal government as will enable it to answer the ends of its institution; or this may be the ill-fated moment for relaxing the powers of the Union, annihilating the cement of the confederation, and exposing us to become the sport of European politics, which may play one state against another, to prevent their growing importance, and to serve their own interested purposes. For, according to the system of policy the states shall adopt at this moment, they will stand or fall; and by their confirmation or lapse, it is yet to be decided whether the Revolution must ultimately be considered as a blessing or a curse; a blessing or a curse not to the present age alone, for with our fate will the destiny of unborn millions be involved.

“With this conviction of the importance of the present crisis, silence in me would be a crime. I will therefore speak to your excellency the language of freedom and sincerity, without disguise. I am aware, however, those who differ from me in political sentiments may perhaps remark, I am stepping out of the proper line of my duty; and they may possibly ascribe to arrogance or ostentation, what I know is alone the result of the purest intention; but the rectitude of my own heart, which disdains such unworthy motives—the part I have hitherto acted in life—the determination I have formed of not taking any share in public business hereafter—the ardent desire I feel and shall continue to manifest, of quietly enjoying in private life, after all the toils of war, the benefits of a wise and liberal government, will, I flatter myself, sooner or later convince my countrymen, that I could have no sinister views in delivering, with so little reserve, the opinions contained in this address.

“There are four things which I humbly conceive are essential to the well-being, I may even venture to say, to the existence of the United States, as an independent power.

“1st. An indissoluble union of the states under one federal head.

“2dly. A sacred regard to public justice.

“3dly. The adoption of a proper peace establishment. And,

“4thly. The prevalence of that pacific and friendly disposition among the people of the United States, which will induce them to forget their local prejudices and politics, to make those mutual concessions which are requisite to the general prosperity, and in some instances to sacrifice their individual advantages to the interest of the community.

“These are the pillars on which the glorious fabric of our independence and national character must be supported. Liberty is the basis, and whoever would dare to sap the foundation, or overturn the structure, under whatever specious pretext he may attempt it, will merit the bitterest execration and the severest punishment which can be inflicted by his injured country.”

With close and admirable logic he expatiated upon these four heads; and with the earnestness of most profound conviction, he urged the importance of union, and the vesting of the federal Congress with greater power. He then made a warm and generous plea for the army, while treating upon the subject of public justice. Concerning proposed half-pay and commutation, he observed:—

“As to the idea, which I am informed has, in some instances, prevailed, that the half-pay and commutation are to be regarded merely in the odious light of a pension, it ought to be exploded for ever; that provision should be viewed, as it really was, a reasonable compensation offered by Congress, at a time when they had nothing else to give to officers of the army, for services then to be performed: it was the only means to prevent a total dereliction of the service; it was a part of their hire. I may be allowed to say, it was the price of their blood, and of your independency; it is, therefore, more than a common debt, it is a debt of honor; it can never be considered as a pension or gratuity, nor cancelled until it is fairly discharged.”

After giving a sufficient apology for treating upon political topics, he concluded by saying:—

“I have thus freely declared what I wished to make known, before I surrendered up my public trust to those who committed it to me. The task is now accomplished. I now bid adieu to your excellency, as the chief magistrate of your state, at the same time I bid a last farewell to the cares of office and all the employments of public life.”

But, six long months of official labor, with all the anxieties and cares incident thereto, were before the commander-in-chief. Even at the very moment when he was sending forth his address, and making a noble plea to his country for justice to the army, a part of that army was bringing dishonor upon the whole, by mutinous proceedings. About eighty newly-recruited soldiers of the Pennsylvania line, stationed at Lancaster, marched in a body to Philadelphia, where they were joined by about two hundred from the barracks in that city. The whole body then proceeded, with drum and fife, and fixed bayonets, to the statehouse, where the Pennsylvania legislature and the continental Congress were in session, with the avowed purpose of demanding a redress of specified grievances from the state authorities. They placed a guard at every door, and sent a message in to the president and council, threatening them with violence if their demands were not complied with in the course of twenty minutes. The Congress, feeling themselves outraged, and doubting the strength of the local government to protect them against any armed mob that might choose to assail them, sent a courier to Washington with information of these proceedings, and then adjourned to meet at Princeton, in New Jersey. This event occurred on the twenty-first of June, and the Congress reassembled at Princeton on the thirtieth.

Washington received information of the mutiny on the twenty-fourth, and immediately detached General Howe, with fifteen hundred men to quell the insurrection and punish the leaders. At the same time he wrote a letter to the president of Congress, in which he expressed his sorrow and indignation that a mob of men, “contemptible in number, and equally so in point of service, and not worthy to be called soldiers,” should have so insulted the “sovereign authority of the United States.” He then vindicated the rest of the army upon whom the act might cast dishonor. But the mutiny was quelled before Howe reached Philadelphia, and bloodshed was prevented.

While waiting, “with little business and less command,” for the definitive treaty, Washington made a tour northward from Newburg, of about seven hundred and fifty miles. Governor Clinton accompanied him. They set out on the seventeenth of July, ascended the Hudson to Albany, visited the places made memorable by Burgoyne's defeat, passed down Lake George in light boats, and over to Ticonderoga, from the foot of that beautiful sheet of water. They returned by nearly the same route to Schenectady, and then went up the Mohawk as far as Fort Schuyler (now Rome); thence to Wood creek, a tributary of Oneida lake, by which there was a water-communication with Lake Ontario, at Oswego, and then traversed the country between the Mohawk and Otsego lake. They were absent nineteen days, and performed a greater part of the journey on horseback, much of it through an unbroken wilderness.

To the Chevalier de Chastellux, Washington wrote in October, respecting this tour:—

“Prompted by these actual observations I could not help taking a more extensive view of the vast inland navigation of the United States, from maps and the information of others; and could not but be struck with the immense extent and importance of it, and with the goodness of that Providence, which has dealt its favors to us with so profuse a hand. Would to God we may have wisdom enough to improve them. I shall not rest contented till I have explored the western country, and traversed those lines, or great part of them, which have given bounds to a new empire.”

Over all that region where then the primeval forest stood, the hand of industry has spread the varied beauties and blessing of cultivation; and where the solitary Indian then prowled with his rifle or arrow, in search of game for his appetite, a busy population, inhabiting cities and villages, and thousands of pleasant cottages or stately mansions, now dwell.

On his return to headquarters, Washington found a resolution of the Congress, calling him to Princeton, where that body was in session. The chief object was to have him near them for consultation and aid in the several arrangements for peace. The Congress engaged a house, suitably furnished, for his use, at Rocky Hill, a few miles distant, and he set out for Princeton on the eighteenth of August, leaving General Knox in command at Newburg. On the twenty-sixth he had a formal public audience with Congress, when that body presented a most affectionate address to him, in which they said:—

“It has been the particular happiness of the United States, that during a war so long, so dangerous, and so important, Providence has been graciously pleased to preserve the life of a general, who has merited and possessed the uninterrupted confidence and affection of his fellow-citizens. In other nations, many have performed eminent services, for which they have deserved the thanks of the public. But to you, sir, peculiar praise is due. Your services have been essential in acquiring and establishing the freedom and independence of your country. They deserve the grateful acknowledgments of a free and independent nation.”

This honorable reception was grateful to the feelings of Washington, for, next to the approval of his God and his conscience, he coveted that of his country. Congress had already voted him a rarer honor, an honor such as the senate of old Rome was fond of conferring upon the heroes of the commonwealth. On the seventh of August they had—

“Resolved (unanimously, ten states being present), That an equestrian statue of General Washington be erected at the place where the residence of Congress shall be established,” and a committee appointed for the purpose reported a plan for a pedestal to support the statue, with historical basso relievos upon it, and an appropriate inscription. But this statue, like many other monumental testimonials, ordered by the old Congress, was never made. Washington submitted to the unpleasant operation of having a plaster-cast taken from his face, to be sent to the sculptor in Europe who should be employed to execute the statue; but the cast was broken, and as he would not submit to the manipulations again, the effort was abandoned.

On the third of September the definitive treaty for peace was signed at Paris, and by a proclamation dated the eighteenth day of October, 1783, all officers and soldiers of the continental army, absent on furlough, were discharged from further service; and all others who had engaged to serve during the war, were to be discharged from and after the third of November.

On the second of November, Washington, yet at Rocky Hill, issued his last general orders, in which he addressed his soldiers as a father speaking to his children, and bade them an affectionate farewell.[5]

He then waited quietly for the British to evacuate New York city, that he might go thither with a few troops that would remain in camp under Knox, take formal possession, and then hasten to the seat of Congress and resign his commission of commander-in-chief of the American armies into their hands.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] The following is a copy of the notification: “A meeting of the field-officers is requested at the public building on Tuesday next at eleven o'clock. A commissioned officer from each company is expected, and a delegate from the medical staff. The object of this convention is to consider the late letter of our representatives in Philadelphia, and what measures (if any) should be adopted to obtain that redress of grievances which they seem to have solicited in vain.”

[3] The following is a copy of the address:—"GENTLEMEN: By an anonymous summons, an attempt has been made to convene you together; how inconsistent with the rules of propriety, how unmilitary, and how subversive of all order and discipline, let the good sense of the army decide. In the moment of this summons, another anonymous production was sent into circulation, addressed more to the feelings and passions than to the reason and judgment of the army. The author of the piece is entitled to much credit for the goodness of his pen, and I could wish he had as much credit for the rectitude of his heart; for, as men see through different optics, and are induced by the reflecting faculties of the mind to use different means to attain the same end, the author of the address should have had more charity than to mark for suspicion the man who should recommend moderation and longer forbearance; or, in other words, who should not think as he thinks, and act as he advises.”

When Washington had concluded this paragraph, he paused, took out his spectacles, begged the indulgence of the audience while he put them on, and observed, “You see I have grown gray in your service, and am now growing blind.” The effect was electrical, and many an eye was moistened by tears called forth by the incident. He then proceeded:—

“But he had another plan in view, in which candor and liberality of sentiment, regard to justice, and love of country have no part; and he was right to insinuate the darkest suspicion to effect the blackest design. That the address is drawn with great art, and is designed to answer the most insidious purposes; that it is calculated to impress the mind with an idea of premeditated injustice in the sovereign power of the United States, and rouse all those resentments which must unavoidably flow from such a belief; that the secret mover of this scheme, whoever he may be, intended to take advantage of the passions while they were warmed by the recollection of past distresses, without giving time for cool, deliberate thinking, and that composure of mind which is so necessary to give dignity and stability to measures, is rendered too obvious, by the mode of conducting the business, to need other proofs than a reference to the proceedings.

“Thus much, gentlemen, I have thought it incumbent on me to observe to you, to show upon what principles I opposed the irregular and hasty meeting which was proposed to be held on Tuesday last, and not because I wanted a disposition to give you every opportunity, consistent with your own honor and the dignity of the army, to make known your grievances. If my conduct heretofore has not evinced to you that I have been a faithful friend to the army, my declaration of it at this time would be equally unavailing and improper. But, as I was among the first who embarked in the cause of our common country; as I have never left your side one moment, but when called from you on public duty; as I have been the constant companion and witness of your distresses, and not among the last to feel and acknowledge your merits; as I have ever considered my own military reputation as inseparably connected with that of the army; as my heart has ever expanded with joy when I have heard its praises, and my indignation has arisen when the mouth of detraction has been opened against it, it can scarcely be supposed, at this last stage of the war, that I am indifferent to its interests. But how are they to be promoted? The way is plain, says the anonymous addresser. 'If war continues, remove into the unsettled country; there establish yourselves, and leave an ungrateful country to defend itself.' But who are they to defend? Our wives, our children, our farms, and other property which we leave behind us? or, in this state of hostile separation, are we to take the two first (the latter can not be removed) to perish in a wilderness, with hunger, cold, and nakedness?

“'If peace takes place, never sheathe your swords,' says he, 'until you have obtained full and ample justice.' This dreadful alternative of either deserting our country in the extremest hour of her distress, or turning our arms against it—which is the apparent object—unless Congress can be compelled into instant compliance, has something so shocking in it, that humanity revolts at the idea. My God! what can this writer have in view by recommending such measures? Can he be a friend to the army? Can he be a friend to this country? Rather, is he not an insidious foe? some emissary, perhaps, from New York, plotting the ruin of both, by sowing the seeds of discord and separation between the civil and military powers of the continent? And what a compliment does he pay to our understandings, when he recommends measures, in either alternative, impracticable in their nature?

“But, here, gentlemen, I will drop the curtain, because it would be as imprudent in me to assign my reasons for this opinion, as it would be insulting to your conception to suppose you stood in need of them. A moment's reflection will convince every dispassionate mind of the physical impossibility of carrying either proposal into execution. There might, gentlemen, be an impropriety in my taking notice, in this address to you, of an anonymous production; but the manner in which that performance has been introduced to the army, the effect it was intended to have, together with some other circumstances, will amply justify my observations on the tendency of that writing.

“With respect to the advice given by the author, to suspect the man who shall recommend moderate measures and longer forbearance, I spurn it, as every man, who regards that liberty and reveres that justice for which we contend, undoubtedly must; for, if men are to be precluded from offering their sentiments on a matter which may involve the most serious and alarming consequences that can invite the consideration of mankind, reason is of no use to us. The freedom of speech may be taken away, and dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep, to the slaughter. I can not, in justice to my own belief, and what I have great reason to conceive is the intention of Congress, conclude this address, without giving it as my decided opinion that that honorable body entertains exalted sentiments of the services of the army, and, from a full conviction of its merits and sufferings, will do it complete justice; that their endeavors to discover and establish funds for this purpose have been unwearied, and will not cease till they have succeeded, I have not a doubt. But, like all other large bodies, where there is a variety of different interests to reconcile, their determinations are slow. Why, then, should we distrust them, and, in consequence of that distrust, adopt measures which may cast a shade over that glory which has been so justly acquired, and tarnish the reputation of an army which is celebrated through all Europe for its fortitude and patriotism? And for what is this done? To bring the object we seek nearer? No; most certainly, in my opinion, it will cast it at a greater distance. For myself (and I take no merit in giving the assurance, being induced to it from principles of gratitude, veracity, and justice, a grateful sense of the confidence you have ever placed in me), a recollection of the cheerful assistance and prompt obedience I have experienced from you under every vicissitude of fortune, and the sincere affection I feel for an army I have so long had the honor to command, will oblige me to declare, in this public and solemn manner, that in the attainment of complete justice for all your toils and dangers, and in the gratification of every wish, so far as may be done consistently with the great duty I owe my country; and those powers we are bound to respect, you may freely command my services to the utmost extent of my abilities.

“While I give you these assurances, and pledge myself in the most unequivocal manner to exert whatever ability I am possessed of in your favor, let me entreat you, gentlemen, on your part, not to take any measures, which, viewed in the calm light of reason, will lessen the dignity and sully the glory you have hitherto maintained. Let me request you to rely on the plighted faith of your country, and place a full confidence in the purity of the intentions of Congress, that, previous to your dissolution as an army, they will cause all your accounts to be fairly liquidated, as directed in the resolutions which were published to you two days ago, and that they will adopt the most effectual measures in their power to render ample justice to you for your faithful and meritorious services. And let me conjure you, in the name of our common country, as you value your own sacred honor, as you respect the rights of humanity, and as you regard the military and national character of America, to express your utmost horror and detestation of the man who wishes, under any specious pretenses, to overturn the liberties of our country, and who wickedly attempts to open the flood-gates of civil discord, and deluge our rising empire in blood.

“By thus determining and thus acting, you will pursue the plain and direct road to the attainment of your wishes; you will defeat the insidious designs of your enemies, who are compelled to resort from open force to secret artifice; you will give one more distinguished proof of unexampled patriotism and patient virtue rising superior to the pressure of the most complicated sufferings; and you will, by the dignity of your conduct, afford occasion for posterity to say, when speaking of the glorious example you have exhibited to mankind, 'Had this day been wanting, the world had never seen the last stage of perfection to which human nature is capable of attaining.'”—Journals of Congress, viii 180-183.

[4] A full account of this society, with drawings of the orders worn by the members, and the certificate of membership, may be found in the first volume of Lossing's Field-Book of the Revolution.

[5] The following is a copy of Washington's last general order:—

“Rocky Hill, near Princeton, November 2, 1783.

“The United States in Congress assembled, after giving the most honorable testimony to the merits of the federal armies, and presenting them with the thanks of their country, for their long, eminent, and faithful service, having thought proper, by their proclamation bearing date the sixteenth of October last, to discharge such part of the troops as were engaged for the war, and to permit the officers on furlough to retire from service, from and after to-morrow, which proclamation having been communicated in the public papers for the information and government of all concerned; it only remains for the commander-in-chief to address himself once more, and that for the last time, to the armies of the United States (however widely dispersed individuals who compose them may be), and to bid them an affectionate, a long farewell.

“But before the commander-in-chief takes his final leave of those he holds most dear, he wishes to indulge himself a few moments in calling to mind a slight review of the past: he will then take the liberty of exploring, with his military friends, their future prospects; of advising the general line of conduct which in his opinion ought to be pursued; and he will conclude the address by expressing the obligations he feels himself under for the spirited and able assistance he has experienced from them in the performance of an arduous office.

“A contemplation of the complete attainment (at a period earlier than could have been expected) of the object for which we contended against so formidable a power, can not but inspire us with astonishment and gratitude. The disadvantageous circumstances on our part, under which the war was undertaken, can never be forgotten. The singular interpositions of Providence in our feeble condition, were such as could scarcely escape the attention of the most unobserving; while the unparalleled perseverance of the armies of the United States, through almost every possible suffering and discouragement, for the space of eight long years, was little short of a standing miracle.

“It is not the meaning, nor within the compass of this address, to detail the hardships peculiarly incident to our service, or to describe the distresses which in several instances have resulted from the extremes of hunger and nakedness, combined with the rigors of an inclement season: nor is it necessary to dwell on the dark side of our past affairs. Every American officer and soldier must now console himself for any unpleasant circumstances which may have occurred, by a recollection of the uncommon scenes in which he has been called to act no inglorious part, and the astonishing events of which he has been a witness—events which have seldom, if ever before, taken place on the stage of human action, nor can they probably ever happen again. For who has before seen a disciplined army formed at once from such raw materials? Who that was not a witness could imagine that the most violent local prejudices would cease so soon; and that men who came from different parts of the continent, strongly disposed by the habits of education to despise and quarrel with each other, would instantly become but one patriotic band of brothers? Or who that was not on the spot, can trace the steps by which such a wonderful Revolution has been effected, and such a glorious period put to all our warlike toils?

“It is universally acknowledged that the enlarged prospects of happiness, opened by the confirmation of our independence and sovereignty, almost exceed the power of description; and shall not the brave men who have contributed so essentially to these inestimable acquisitions, retiring victorious from the field of war to the field of agriculture, participate in all the blessings which have been obtained? In such a republic, who will exclude them from the rights of citizens, and the fruits of their labors? In such a country, so happily circumstanced, the pursuits of commerce and the cultivation of the soil will unfold to industry the certain road to competence. To those hardy soldiers who are actuated by the spirit of adventure, the fisheries will afford ample and profitable employment; and the extensive and fertile regions of the West will yield a most happy asylum for those who, fond of domestic enjoyment, are seeking personal independence. Nor is it possible to conceive that any one of the United States will prefer a national bankruptcy, and dissolution of the Union, to a compliance with the requisitions of Congress, and the payment of its just debts; so that the officers and soldiers may expect considerable assistance, in recommencing their civil operations, from the sums due to them from the public, which must and will most inevitably be paid.

“In order to effect this desirable purpose, and to remove the prejudices which may have taken possession of the minds of any of the good people of the states, it is earnestly recommended to all the troops that, with strong attachments to the Union, they should carry with them into civil society the most conciliating dispositions; and that they should prove themselves not less virtuous and useful as citizens than they have been persevering and victorious as soldiers. What though there should be some envious individuals who are unwilling to pay the debt the public has contracted, or to yield the tribute due to merit; yet let such unworthy treatment produce no invective, or any instance of intemperate conduct; let it be remembered that the unbiassed voice of the free citizens of the United States has promised the just reward, and given the merited applause; let it be known and remembered that the reputation of the federal armies is established beyond the reach of malevolence; and let a consciousness of their achievements and fame still excite the men who composed them to honorable actions, under the persuasion that the private virtues of economy, prudence, and industry, will not be less amiable in civil life than the more splendid qualities of valor, perseverance, and enterprise, were in the field. Every one may rest assured that much, very much of the future happiness of the officers and men, will depend upon the wise and manly conduct which shall be adopted by them when they are mingled with the great body of the community. And, although the general has so frequently given it as his opinion, in the most public and explicit manner, that unless the principles of the federal government were properly supported, and the powers of the Union increased, the honor, dignity, and justice of the nation would be lost for ever; yet he can not help repeating on this occasion so interesting a sentiment, and leaving it as his last injunction to every officer and every soldier who may view the subject in the same serious point of light, to add his best endeavors to those of his worthy fellow-citizens, toward effecting these great and valuable purposes, on which our very existence as a nation so materially depends.

“The commander-in-chief conceives little is now wanting to enable the soldier to change the military character into that of a citizen, but that steady and decent tenor of behavior which has generally distinguished not only the army under his immediate command, but the different detachments and separate armies, through the course of the war. From their good sense and prudence he anticipates the happiest consequences: and while he congratulates them on the glorious occasion which renders their services in the field no longer necessary, he wishes to express the strong obligations he feels himself under for the assistance he has received from every class, and in every instance. He presents his thanks, in the most serious and affectionate manner, to the general officers, as well for their counsel on many interesting occasions as for their ardor in promoting the success of the plans he had adopted; to the commandants of regiments and corps, and to the officers, for their zeal and attention in carrying his orders promptly into execution; to the staff, for their alacrity and exactness in performing the duties of their several departments, and to the non-commissioned officers and private soldiers for their extraordinary patience in suffering as well as their invincible fortitude in action. To various branches of the army the general takes this last and solemn opportunity of professing his inviolable attachment and friendship. He wishes more than bare profession were in his power; that he was really able to be useful to them all in future life. He flatters himself, however, they will do him the justice to believe that, whatever could with propriety be attempted by him, has been done. And being now to conclude these his last public orders, to take his ultimate leave, in a short time, of the military character, and to bid a final adieu to the armies he has so long had the honor to command, he can only again offer, in their behalf, his recommendations to their grateful country, and his prayers to the God of armies. May ample justice be done them here, and may the choicest of Heaven's favors, both here and hereafter, attend those who, under the Divine auspices, have secured innumerable blessings for others! With these wishes, and this benediction, the commander-in-chief is about to retire from service. The curtain of separation will soon be drawn, and the military scene to him will be closed for ever.”

CHAPTER III.

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british troops leave the city of new york—american troops and civil authorities enter and take possession—the british and american troops contrasted—parting scene between washington and his officers—washington settles his accounts with the united states—journey to annapolis—complimentary dinner and ball there—washington resigns his commission—his retirement to private life at mount vernon—letters to his friends on the subject—washington's dreams of quiet life.

It was late in November, 1783, before the British troops were prepared to leave New York, so large was the number of persons, and so great was the quantity of goods to be first conveyed away. At length Sir Guy Carleton gave Washington notice when he would be ready to surrender the city. Governor Clinton summoned the members of the state council to convene at Eastchester on the twenty-first of November, to prepare for the re-establishment of civil government in New York city and its vicinity, and a detachment of troops came down from West Point to be ready to take possession of the posts about to be evacuated by the British.

Carleton appointed the twenty-fifth of November as the day for the evacuation, and before that time the British troops were drawn in from the surrounding posts. On the morning of the twenty-fifth Washington and Governor Clinton were at Harlem, with the detachment from West Point, under General Knox; and during the morning they all moved toward the city, and halted at the Bowery. The troops were composed of light-dragoons, light-infantry, and artillery, and were accompanied by the civil officers of the state.

Between twelve and one o'clock the British troops were embarked. The fleet immediately weighed anchor, and with a favoring breeze sailed out the Narrows. The American troops and the civil authorities then marched in and took formal possession. Washington and Clinton, with their respective suites, led the procession, escorted by a troop of Westchester cavalry. Then followed the lieutenant-governor and members of the council, General Knox and the officers of the army, the speaker of the assembly, and a large procession of citizens on horseback and on foot.

Entrance of the American Army into New York,
November 25, 1873.

The evacuation of the British, and the entrance of the Americans, produced in the inhabitants mingled feelings of joy and sadness. The whigs greatly rejoiced at their deliverance, while the families of loyalists were saddened by the change. There was a marked contrast between the troops that left and the troops that came. “We had been accustomed for a long time to military display in all the finish and finery of garrison life,” said an American lady to Mr. Irving; “the troops just leaving us were as if equipped for show, and with their scarlet uniforms and burnished arms, made a brilliant display; the troops that marched in, on the contrary, were ill-clad and weather-beaten, and made a forlorn appearance; but they were our troops, and as I looked at them and thought upon all they had done and suffered for us, my heart and my eyes were full, and I admired and gloried in them the more, because they were weather-beaten and forlorn.”[6]

But joy was the predominant feeling, and on that night the city was a scene of public festivity, and demonstrations of unbounded pleasure. The governor gave a feast, and splendid fireworks illuminated the town.

On the fourth of December Washington was prepared for a journey to Annapolis, where the Congress was in session, to resign his commission into their hands. A handsome barge was made ready to convey him from the Whitehall ferry to Paulus's Hook (now Jersey City), and lay at the stairs, ready manned at twelve o'clock. Meanwhile Washington and his officers had assembled in the parlor of Fraunce's tavern, near by, to take a final leave of each other. Marshall has left on record, a brief but touching narrative of the scene. As the commander-in-chief entered the room, and found himself in the midst of his officers—his old companions-in-arms, many of whom had shared with him the fortunes of war from its earliest stages—his tender feelings were too powerful for concealment, and defied his usual self-command. Filling a glass of wine, and taking it in his hand, he turned upon his friends a sad but benignant countenance, and said:—

“With a heart full of love and gratitude, I now take leave of you, most devoutly wishing that your latter days may be as prosperous and happy, as your former ones have been glorious and honorable.” After lifting the wine to his lips, and drinking a farewell benediction, he added, while his voice trembled with emotion:—

“I can not come to each of you to take my leave, but shall be obliged if each of you will come and take me by the hand.” General Knox being nearest, first turned to him. Washington, incapable of utterance, grasped his hand in silence, and embraced him affectionately, while his eyes were suffused with tears. In the same affectionate manner, every officer took leave of him. Not a word was spoken. Feeling held speech in abeyance. The tear of manly sensibility was in every eye, and in dignified silence they all followed their beloved chief as he left the room, passed through a corps of light-infantry, and walked to Whitehall to embark. Having entered the barge, he turned to the tearful friends upon the wharf, and waving his hat, bade them a silent adieu. They stood and watched the barge until it was hidden from their view by an angle of the battery, when, in silent and solemn procession, they all returned to the place where they had assembled.

Washington stopped a few days in Philadelphia, where he adjusted his accounts with the comptroller of the treasury. These were all in perfect order, from the beginning of the war until the moment of settlement, on the thirteenth of December. They were entirely in his own hand-waiting. The gross amount was almost seventy-five thousand dollars, in which were included moneys expended for secret service and in various incidental charges. For his own services he would receive nothing.

Washington's journey from New York to Annapolis, in Maryland, was one continued ovation. The people everywhere received him with enthusiasm; and public meetings, legislative assemblies, and learned and religious institutions, greeted him with addresses. He arrived at Annapolis on Friday, the nineteenth of December, where he was joined by Mrs. Washington and many warm personal friends. On the following day he addressed a note to the Congress, inquiring when, and in what manner it would be proper to offer his resignation; and on Monday he was present at a dinner ordered by that body. In the evening he attended a grand ball given in his honor.

On Tuesday, the twenty-third, Washington wrote to the Baron Steuben—“This is the last letter I shall write while I continue in the service of my country. The hour of my resignation is fixed at twelve to-day; after which I shall become a private citizen on the banks of the Potomac.”

At the hour named the chief was before the assembled Congress, of whom General Thomas Mifflin was president. The hall was filled with public functionaries and military officers, accompanied by ladies; and in the gallery was Mrs. Washington and many more ladies than were on the floor below.

Washington was conducted to the hall by Secretary Thomson, when the president said, “The United States in Congress assembled, are prepared to receive your communication.” Washington then arose, and in a dignified manner, and clear, rich voice, said:—

“Mr. President: The great events on which my resignation depended, having at length taken place, I now have the honor of offering my sincere congratulations to Congress, and of presenting myself before them, to surrender into their hands the trust committed to me, and to claim the indulgence of retiring from the service of my country. Happy in the confirmation of our independence and sovereignty, and pleased with the opportunity afforded the United States of becoming a respectable nation, I resign with satisfaction the appointment I accepted with diffidence; a diffidence in my abilities to accomplish so arduous a task, which, however, was superseded by a confidence in the rectitude of our cause, the support of the supreme power of the Union, and the patronage of Heaven. The successful termination of the war has verified the most sanguine expectations; and my gratitude for the interposition of Providence, and the assistance I have received from my countrymen, increases with every review of the momentous contest. While I repeat my obligations to the army in general, I should do injustice to my own feelings not to acknowledge in this place the peculiar services and distinguished merits of the gentlemen who have been attached to my person during the war. It was impossible the choice of confidential officers to compose my family should have been more fortunate. Permit me, sir, to recommend in particular those who have continued in the service to the present moment, as worthy of the favorable notice and patronage of Congress. I consider it as an indispensable duty to close this last act of my official life by commending the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty God, and those who have the superintendence of them to his holy keeping. Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the great theatre of action, and bidding an affectionate farewell to this august body, under whose orders I have so long acted, I here offer my commission, and take my leave of all the employments of public life.”

President Mifflin replied: “Sir—The United States, in Congress assembled, receive with emotions too affecting for utterance, the solemn resignation of the authorities under which you have led their troops with success through a perilous and a doubtful war. Called upon by your country to defend its invaded rights, you accepted the sacred charge, before it had formed alliances, and while it was without funds or a government to support you. You have conducted the great military contest with wisdom and fortitude, invariably regarding the rights of the civil power, through all disasters and changes. You have, by the love and confidence of your fellow-citizens, enabled them to display their martial genius, and transmit their fame to posterity. You have persevered, until these United States, aided by a magnanimous king and nation, have been enabled, under a just Providence, to close the war in freedom, safety, and independence; in which happy event we sincerely join you in congratulations. Having defended the standard of liberty in this new world; having taught a lesson useful to those who inflict and to those who feel oppression, you retire from the great theatre of action with the blessings of your fellow-citizens. But the glory of your virtues will not terminate with your military command; it will continue to animate remotest ages. We feel with you our obligations to the army in general, and will particularly charge ourselves with the interests of those confidential officers who have attended your person to this affecting moment. We join you in commending the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty God, beseeching him to dispose the hearts and minds of its citizens to improve the opportunity afforded them of becoming a happy and respectable nation. And for you, we address to him our earnest prayers that a life so beloved may be fostered with all his care; that your days may be as happy as they have been illustrious; and that he will finally give you that reward which this world can not give.”

Washington, now a private citizen, hastened to his beloved home on the Potomac, accompanied on the way by many friends, among whom was Colonel Walker, one the aids of the Baron Steuben. By his hand, he sent a letter to Governor George Clinton—the first that he wrote after his retirement from office—in which he said: “The scene is at last closed. I am now a private citizen on the banks of the Potomac. I feel myself eased of a load of public care. I hope to spend the remainder of my days in cultivating the affections of good men, and in the practice of the domestic virtues.”

It was on Christmas eve when Washington reached Mount Vernon. It must have been a happy and a merry Christmas in that beautiful home, for the toils and dangers of war were over, peace was smiling upon all the land, and the people were free and independent. The enjoyment of his home, under these circumstances, was an exquisite one to the retired soldier; and in his letters to his friends he gives frequent and touching evidence of his happiness in private life. To Lafayette he wrote on the first of February:—

“At length, my dear marquis, I am become a private citizen on the banks of the Potomac, and under the shadow of my own vine and my own fig-tree, free from the bustle of a camp, and the busy scenes of public life. I am solacing myself with those tranquil enjoyments, of which the soldier, who is ever in pursuit of fame, the statesman, whose watchful days and sleepless nights are spent in devising schemes to promote the welfare of his own, perhaps the ruin of other countries, as if this globe was insufficient for us all, and the courtier, who is always watching the countenance of his prince, in hopes of catching a gracious smile, can have very little conception. I have not only retired from all public employments, but I am retiring within myself, and shall be able to view the solitary walk, and tread the paths of private life, with a heartfelt satisfaction. Envious of none, I am determined to be pleased with all; and this my dear friend, being the order of my march, I will move gently down the stream of life, until I sleep with my fathers.”

A little later he wrote to Madam Lafayette, saying:—

“Freed from the clangor of arms and the bustle of a camp, from the cares of public employment and the responsibility of office, I am now enjoying domestic ease under the shadow of my own vine and my own fig-tree; and in a small villa, with the implements of husbandry and lambkins around me, I expect to glide gently down the stream of life, till I am entombed in the mansion of my fathers.

“Come, then, let me entreat you, and call my cottage your home; for your own doors do not open to you with more readiness than mine would. You will see the plain manner in which we live, and meet with rustic civility; and you shall taste the simplicity of rural life. It will diversify the scene, and may give you a higher relish for the gayeties of the court, when you return to Versailles. In these wishes and most respectful compliments, Mrs. Washington joins me.”

Notwithstanding Washington's retirement was so perfect as to amount to positive isolation for a month or more, on account of the effects of an intensely severe winter, which closed almost every avenue to Mount Vernon, and suspended even neighborly intercourse, he found it extremely difficult to divest himself of the habits of the camp. “Strange as it may seem,” he wrote to General Knox on the twentieth of February, “it is nevertheless true, that it was not till lately I could get the better of my usual custom of ruminating, as soon as I waked in the morning, on the business of the ensuing day; and of my surprise at finding, after revolving many things in my mind, that I was no longer a public man, nor had anything to do with public transactions.

“I feel now, however, as I conceive a wearied traveller must do, who, after treading many a painful step with a heavy burthen on his shoulders, is eased of the latter, having reached the haven to which all the former were directed; and from his house-top is looking back, and tracing with an eager eye the meanders by which he escaped the quicksands and mires which lay in his way; and into which none but the all-powerful Guide and Dispenser of human events could have prevented his falling.”

Surely, if ever a man had cause for serenity of mind while taking a retrospect of his public and private life, it was George Washington. From his youth he had walked in the path of truth and rectitude, and throughout his long public career of about thirty years, at the time of his retirement from the army, not a stain of dishonor—not even the suspicion of a stain—had ever been seen upon his character. His moral escutcheon was bright, his conscience was unqualifiedly approving, his country loved him above all her sons. With a sincere desire to spend the remainder of his days as a simple farmer upon the Potomac, without the ambition of being famous, or the expectation of being again called into public life, he resumed his old domestic habits, and prepared for the enjoyment of the evening of his days undisturbed by the turmoils of society around him.

“My manner of living is plain,” he wrote to a friend, “and I do not mean to be put out by it. A glass of wine and a bit of mutton are always ready, and such as will be content to partake of them, are always welcome. Those who expect more will be disappointed.”

But Washington's modest dream of quietude and simplicity of life in his home at Mount Vernon was not realized.

FOOTNOTES:

[6] Life of Washington, iv. 440.

CHAPTER IV.

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washington's private affairs—improvements commenced—remuneration for services declined—visitors flock to mount vernon—tour to the ohio—indian sachem and his prophecy—washington's interest in internal improvements—his letter to governor harrison—action of the virginia legislature—formation of companies—washington declines receiving a donation of stock for his own benefit—disposition of it—distinguished visitors at mount vernon—washington's correspondence burdensome—mr. lear—artists and literary men—pine and houdon at mount vernon—agricultural pursuits and improvements—washington's domestic life after the war.

Washington took a careful survey of all his affairs, on retiring from the public service, and perceived that much was to be done to retrieve losses, and to make his estate an agreeable home, and suitable to his position in life. The mansion, two stories in height, with only four rooms on a floor, was too small to accommodate the visitors who he well knew, might be expected at Mount Vernon, and he had already determined to commence its enlargement with the opening of the spring, as well as the adornment of the grounds around it, and the improvement of his farms. To do this required a large outlay of time and money; and, notwithstanding Washington had an ample fortune for a private gentleman of moderate tastes, he perceived the necessity of practising economy. His private affairs had become somewhat deranged, and his fortune diminished during the war; and he knew that the current expenses of his household must thereafter be materially increased.

At this juncture, when economy appeared so necessary, his consistency as a servant of the public without pecuniary reward, was tested. The temptation came in the specious form of a proposed testimonial of public gratitude for his services, and was so delicately presented to his mind, as almost to leave a doubt of its real purpose. It originated with the supreme executive council of Pennsylvania, who, a few days before Washington resigned his commission at Annapolis, remarked as follows in their instructions to the delegates in Congress from that state:—

“Though his excellency, General Washington, proposes in a short time to retire, yet his illustrious actions and virtues render his character so splendid and venerable, that, it is highly probable, the admiration and esteem of the world may make his life in a very considerable degree public, as numbers will be desirous of seeing the great and good man, who has so eminently contributed to the happiness of a nation. His very services to his country, may, therefore, subject him to expenses, unless he permits her gratitude to interpose.

“We are perfectly acquainted with the disinterestedness and generosity of his soul. He thinks himself amply rewarded for all his labors and cares, by the love and prosperity of his fellow-citizens. It is true, no rewards they can bestow can be equal to his merits. But they ought not to suffer those merits to be burdensome to him. We are convinced that the people of Pennsylvania would regret such a consequence.

“We are aware of the delicacy with which this subject must be treated. But relying upon the good sense of Congress, we wish it may engage their early attention.”

President Mifflin forwarded a copy of these instructions to Washington, because it was thought advisable not to lay them before Congress without his knowledge and approbation. True to the consistency of his character, Washington promptly declined the intended favor. “I can not but feel,” he said, in reply to Mifflin, “the greatest obligations to the supreme executive council of Pennsylvania. But as my sentiments on the subject of their instructions have been long and well known to the public, I need not repeat them to your excellency on the present occasion.” All proceedings on the subject were accordingly stopped.

1784

With the opening of the spring of 1784, numerous visitors began to make their way to Mount Vernon. Many of them were officers, and some of them poor soldiers of the war just closed, who went to pay the homage of their affections to the general under whom they had so long served with delight. Others were persons of distinction, from the various states and from abroad; and others went there out of mere curiosity, to see the great man of the nation in his retirement. Every one received the attentions of a generous hospitality from the master; and in these offices he was nobly seconded by Mrs. Washington, whose cheerful good sense and excellent management, made her home a delightful spot for all who entered it.

Of all the visitors who came to Mount Vernon during that first year of Washington's retirement, none was more cordially welcomed than Lafayette, who landed in New York early in August, and reached Mount Vernon on the seventeenth of the same month. He remained there twelve days, during which time the mansion was crowded with guests who came to meet the great friend of America; and when he departed for Baltimore, quite a large cavalcade of gentlemen accompanied him far on his way.

In September, Washington made quite an extensive tour westward, over the Alleghany mountains, to visit his lands on the Ohio and Great Kanawha rivers. He was accompanied by Doctor Craik, his old companion-in-arms in the French and Indian war, and who had accompanied him to the same region in 1770. They travelled in true soldier style—tent, pack-horses, and a few supplies, relying for their food chiefly upon their guns and fishing-tackle.

Owing to accounts of discontents and irritation among the Indian tribes, Washington did not think it prudent to descend the Ohio, and they proceeded no farther West than the Monongahela, which river they ascended, and then went southward through the wilderness, until they reached the Shenandoah valley, near Staunton. They returned to Mount Vernon on the fourth of October, having travelled on horseback, in the course of forty-four days, six hundred and eighty miles.

It was during their first tour, according to the late Mr. Custis, that Washington was visited by a venerable Indian sachem, who regarded him with the utmost reverence, as a God-protected hero. He would neither eat, drink, nor smoke with Washington; and finally, when a fire was kindled, he arose and addressed him through Nicholson, an interpreter, in the following terms:—

“I am a chief, and the ruler over many tribes; my influence extends to the waters of the great lakes, and to the far, blue mountains. I have travelled a long and weary path, that I might see the young warrior of the great battle. It was on the day, when the white man's blood, mixed with the streams of our forest, that I first beheld this chief; I called to my young men, and said, mark yon tall and daring warrior, he is not of the red-coat tribe—he hath an Indian's wisdom, and his warriors fight as we do—himself is alone exposed. Quick, let your aim be certain, and he dies. Our rifles were levelled, rifles which, but for him, knew not how to miss. It was all in vain, for a power mightier far than we, shielded him from harm. He can not die in battle. I am old, and soon shall be gathered to the great council-fire of my fathers, in the land of shades; but ere I go, there is a something, bids me speak, in the voice of prophecy. Listen! The Great Spirit protects that man, and guides his destinies—he will become the chief of nations, and a people yet unborn, will hail him as the founder of a mighty empire!”

This prophetic speech made a deep impression upon the companions of Washington; and always afterward, on the field of battle, Doctor Craik remembered it, and was fully persuaded that his friend would come out of the storm of conflict unharmed. And so he did. It is a singular fact, that Washington never received the slightest wound in battle.

Washington took an active interest in all that concerned the development of the internal resources of the country; and one of the objects of his tour westward in 1784, was the observation of the courses, and the character of the streams flowing into the Ohio; the distance of their navigable parts to those of the rivers east of the mountains, and the distance of the portage between them. He had conceived the idea that a communication, by canals, might be formed between the Potomac and James rivers, and the waters of the Ohio, and thence to the great chain of northern lakes. This idea had assumed the tangible shape of a well-matured scheme of internal improvement, and he had attempted to form a company for the purpose, when the kindling of the War for Independence put a stop to every enterprise of that kind.

Washington now desired to awaken new interest in the matter, and in a long and able letter to Benjamin Harrison, then governor of Virginia, written in October, 1784, he set forth the advantages to be expected by such a system of inland navigation. This letter was “one of the ablest, most sagacious, and most important productions of his pen,” says Mr. Sparks, “presenting first a clear statement of the question, and showing the practicability of facilitating the intercourse of trade between the East and the West, by improving and extending the water communications.”[7]

Washington then proceeded, by a train of admirable arguments and illustrations, to explain the commercial and political value of such a measure, in giving strength to the union of the states, and promoting the prosperity of the country, by multiplying the resources of trade.

“I need not remark to you, sir,” he said, “that the flanks and rear of the United States are possessed by other powers, and formidable ones too; nor how necessary it is to apply the cement of interest to bind all parts of the Union together by indissoluble bonds, especially that part of it which lies immediately west of us, with the middle states. For what ties, let me ask, should we have upon those people? How entirely unconnected with them shall we be, and what troubles may we not apprehend, if the Spaniards on their right, and Great Britain on their left, instead of throwing stumbling-blocks in their way, as they now do, should hold out lures for their trade and alliance? What, when they get strength, which will be sooner than most people conceive (from the emigration of foreigners, who will have no particular predilection toward us, as well as from the removal of our own citizens), will be the consequence of their having formed close connections with both or either of those powers, in a commercial way? It needs not, in my opinion, the gift of prophecy to foretell.

“The western states (I speak now from my own observation) stand, as it were, upon a pivot. The touch of a feather would turn them any way. They have looked down the Mississippi, until the Spaniards, very impolitically, I think for themselves, threw difficulties in their way; and they looked that way for no other reason, than because they could glide gently down the stream, without considering, perhaps, the difficulties of the voyage back again, and the time necessary to perform it in; and because they have no other means of coming to us but by long land transportations and unimproved roads. These causes have hitherto checked the industry of the present settlers; for, except the demand for provisions, occasioned by the increase of population, and a little flour, which the necessities of the Spaniards compel them to buy, they have no incitements to labor. But smooth the road, and make easy the way for them, and then see what an influx of articles will be poured upon us; how amazingly our exports will be increased by them, and how amply we shall be compensated for any trouble and expense we may encounter to effect it.

“A combination of circumstances makes the present conjuncture more favorable for Virginia, than for any other state in the Union, to fix these matters. The jealous and untoward disposition of the Spaniards on the one hand, and the private views of some individuals, coinciding with the general policy of the court of Great Britain on the other, to retain as long as possible the posts of Detroit, Niagara, and Oswego (which, though done under the letter of the treaty, is certainly an infraction of the spirit of it, and injurious to the Union), may be improved to the greatest advantage by this state, if she would open the avenues to the trade of that country, and embrace the present moment to establish it. It only wants a beginning. The western inhabitants would do their part toward its execution. Weak as they are, they would meet us at least halfway, rather than to be driven into the arms of foreigners, or to be made dependent upon them; which would eventually either bring on a separation of them from us, or a war between the United States and one or the other of those powers, most probably with the Spaniards.”

Washington's letter had a powerful effect upon the public mind. Governor Harrison laid it before the Virginia legislature, and that body received it with the greatest favor. Thus encouraged in his scheme, Washington hastened to Richmond to give his personal attention to the matter; and on the morning after his arrival (November sixteenth) he was waited upon by a committee of the assembly, with Patrick Henry at their head, who, in the name of the body whom they represented, testified their reverence for his character and affection for his person.

The Virginia assembly proceeded to appoint a commission to make the requisite surveys, and Washington returned to Mount Vernon, accompanied by Lafayette, whom he had met in Richmond. The marquis remained there a few days, and then departed for the seaboard, never to visit the United States again, until he became an old man, and the republic he had assisted in founding, had grown fifty years older.

Washington's scheme for internal improvements occupied much of his attention, and he corresponded largely upon the subject. His plan, at first, contemplated more especially the interests of Virginia and Maryland, but it expanded in his mind so as to embrace the whole Union. In a letter written on the fourteenth of December, to Richard Henry Lee, then recently elected president of Congress, he urged the necessity of action by that body, and suggested that the western waters should be explored, the navigation of them fully ascertained, accurately laid down, and a perfect map made of the country; that in the sale of public lands, the United States should make a reservation of all mines, minerals, and salt-springs, for special sale; and that a medium price should be adopted for the western lands, sufficient to prevent a monopoly, but not to discourage actual settlers. He wished to discountenance the land-jobbers and “roaming speculators,” who were disquieting the Indians, and to encourage the useful citizen. He perceived the necessity of doing something to regulate the matter, for, he said, “the spirit of emigration is great. The people have got impatient, and, though you can not stop the road, it is yet in your power to mark the way. It is easier to prevent than to remedy an evil.”

Late in December, Washington was invited to Annapolis by the Virginia assembly, to assist in arranging matters with the assembly of Maryland, respecting his scheme for uniting the Potomac and James rivers, with those of the West. He attended the conference, and chiefly through his exertions two companies were formed for the purpose, under the auspices of the respective governments, and he was appointed president of both. They were called respectively, the Potomac Company, and the James River Company. Thus it will be seen, that during the first year after the close of the Revolution, Washington set in motion that vast scheme of internal improvements, which has had a powerful and salutary influence upon the destinies of our country.

Again Washington's consistency was put to the test. Grateful for his past services, and conscious of the advantages to the Virginia commonwealth, of the great scheme of improvement which he had now set in motion, they, by unanimous vote, offered to present to him fifty shares in the Potomac Company, valued at ten thousand dollars, and one hundred shares in the James River Company, valued at twenty-five thousand dollars. Aware of his resolution not to receive any pecuniary gift from the public, the legislature, in the preamble to the resolution, said:—

“It is the desire of the representatives of this commonwealth to embrace every suitable occasion of testifying their sense of the unexampled merits of George Washington toward his country; and it is their wish in particular, that those great works for its improvement, which, both as springing from the liberty which he has been so instrumental in establishing, and as encouraged by his patronage, will be durable monuments of his glory, may be made monuments also of the gratitude of his country.”

This mark of his countrymen's appreciation, was, of course, gratifying to Washington, but again, true to his convictions and his vows, he declined to receive the donation for his own benefit; but, as a matter of expediency, he offered to accept the shares, provided the legislature would allow him to appropriate them to the use of some object of a public nature. The assembly cheerfully acceded to his proposition. As the encouragement of education was a subject in which he felt deeply interested, he made over the shares of the James River Company to an institution in Rockbridge county, called Liberty Hall Academy, and those of the Potomac Company he bequeathed in perpetuity for the endowment of a university in the District of Columbia, under the auspices of the general government. Liberty Hall afterward became the flourishing Washington College, but the national university has never been established.

Other examples of Washington's interest in educational institutions, are on record. He cheerfully accepted the chancellorship of William and Mary college at Williamsburg; during many years he gave two hundred and fifty dollars annually for the instruction of poor children in Alexandria; and by his will he left four thousand dollars, the net income of which was to be used for the same object. “Other examples,” says Sparks, after enumerating these and other benevolent acts of the great and good man, “might be cited; and from his cautious habit of concealing from the world his deeds of charity, it may be presumed many others are unknown, in which his heart and his hand were open to the relief of indigent merit.”

We have observed that Washington's dreams of repose at Mount Vernon were not realized. Visitors from the old and the new world constantly increased, and among them came that champion of liberty, Catharine Macaulay Graham, whose pen had done noble service in the cause of human rights. She came with her husband, and professed to have crossed the Atlantic for the sole purpose of testifying, in person, her respect and admiration for the character and deeds of Washington. “A visit from a lady so celebrated in the literary world,” he wrote to Knox, “can not but be very flattering to me.”

His correspondence increased so rapidly, that it soon began to be burdensome. To Richard Henry Lee he wrote in February, 1785, when transmitting to him a mass of papers which he had received from the pious Countess of Huntington, explaining her scheme for Christianizing the American Indians: “Many mistakingly think that I am retired to ease, and to that kind of tranquillity which would grow tiresome for want of employment; but at no period of my life, not in the eight years I served the public, have I been obliged to write so much myself, as I have done since my retirement. Was this confined to friendly communication, and to my own business, it would be equally pleasing and trifling; but I have a thousand references to old matters, with which I ought not to be troubled, but which, nevertheless, must receive some answer.”

1785

In a letter to General Knox he amplified this topic a little, saying: “It is not the letters from my friends which give me trouble, or add aught to my perplexity. It is reference to old matters with which I have nothing to do; applications which oftentimes can not be complied with; inquiries which would require the pen of a historian to satisfy; letters of compliment, as unmeaning, perhaps, as they are troublesome, but which must be attended to; and the common-place business, which employs my pen and my time, often disagreeably. Indeed, these, with company, deprive me of exercise, and unless I can obtain relief, must be productive of disagreeable consequences.”

For more than two years after the war, Washington kept neither clerk nor secretary. At length the labor became insupportable, and through the kind offices of General Lincoln, he procured the services of Tobias Lear, a talented young gentleman of New Hampshire, who had recently left Harvard college with honor. Mr. Lear took a social position at Mount Vernon, as one of the family at table and among the guests, and became greatly beloved by Washington. He remained there several years, accompanied the general to New York when he went there to take the chair of chief magistrate of the nation, and continued in his family until after the seat of government was removed to Philadelphia. He was again a resident at Mount Vernon, after the death of his wife, and was present when the master of the mansion died. Mr. Lear relieved Washington of much of the drudgery of the pen, and also took charge of the instruction of his adopted children, Master and Miss Custis.

Washington was also annoyed by the applications of artists and literary men, the former for him to give them sittings for his portrait, and the latter for materials for either his biography, or a general history of the Revolution. He positively refused compliance with the latter request, but occasionally indulged the former. At the solicitation of Francis Hopkinson, he sat to Robert Edge Pine, a diminutive Englishman and excellent artist. Pine was a warm republican, and came to America to collect portraits of distinguished persons for the purpose of painting a series of pictures illustrative of the War for Independence.

Soon after Pine left Mount Vernon, Houdon, the eminent French portrait-sculptor was there, at the request of the legislature of Virginia, who had ordered a statue of Washington to be executed for the statehouse at Richmond. For such a purpose, and under such auspices, Washington was willing to submit to the manipulations of art, even those so unpleasant as the moulding of the face in plaster, and he wrote to Houdon, on his arrival in New York: “It will give me pleasure, sir, to welcome you to the seat of my retirement; and whatever I have, or can procure, that is necessary to your purpose, or convenient and agreeable to your wishes, you must freely command, as inclination to oblige you will be among the last things in which I shall be found deficient, either on your arrival or during your stay.”

Houdon made a plaster-mould from Washington's face, modelled a complete head and bust in clay, made a cast from that, took the latter to France, and from it executed the statue now in the capitol at Richmond. He made careful measurements of Washington's figure, and in Paris, Gouverneur Morris stood for it.

During nearly all of the year 1785, Washington was engaged much of the time in the ornamentation of the grounds around the mansion he had greatly enlarged, and in the improvement of his farms. The relief from the pen afforded him by Mr. Lear, gave him time for pursuits of this nature, which he so much loved, and his diary abounds with brief records of his planting of trees and sowing of seeds. His Mount Vernon estate was divided into five farms, and several hundred acres of woodland. The mansion-house farm was his great care and delight, yet he managed the other four with skill and prudence. On them he had over fifty draught-horses, a dozen mules, more than three hundred head of black cattle, three hundred and sixty sheep, and a large number of swine that ran wild in the woods.

He was fond of improvements of every kind. The king of Spain hearing that he was anxious to procure the best breed of asses in Europe, for the propagation of mules on his estate, sent him a magnificent jack and two jennies. With this jack, and another sent to him by Lafayette, at about the same time, he raised some noble mules from his coach-mares. In a few years the Mount Vernon estate became stocked with a very superior breed, some of them rising to the height of sixteen hands.

From Arthur Young, an English agriculturist, Washington received many precious seeds, improved implements, and good advice in the laying out and management of farms. His early life habits were resumed—his early rising, his frugal breakfast, his ride over his estate, and his exact method in everything. He loved amusements still, but of a more quiet kind than those of his younger days. The pleasures of the chase were relinquished. His kennel was broken up, and his hounds, some of them a present from Lafayette, were given away.

Washington was a most cheerful, companionable man at home, yet always dignified. “General Washington is, I believe,” said Mr. Lear, after two years residence in his family, “almost the only man of an exalted character, who does not lose some part of his respectability by an intimate acquaintance. I have never found a single thing that could lessen my respect for him. A complete knowledge of his honesty, uprightness, and candor in all his private transactions, has sometimes led me to think him more than a man.”

In his family he was peculiarly kind and affectionate. Between himself and Mrs. Washington the most perfect harmony existed. In all his intercourse with his wife, he was most considerate. Mrs. Lewis (Nelly Custis) said she had often seen Mrs. Washington, when she had something to communicate, or a request to make, at a moment when the general's mind was entirely abstracted from the present, seize him by the button to command his attention, when he would look down upon her with a most benignant smile, and, become at once attentive to her wishes, which were never slighted.

Thus, in the management of his estate, the entertainment of his guests, correspondence with his friends at home and abroad, and the contemplation of years of peaceful life that lay before him, Washington's hours glided away for a season. Meanwhile the political horizon of his country began to darken, and omens of a fearful storm appeared. The people looked to their ancient pilot for help, and at the hour when he was dreaming most sweetly of domestic quiet, they called him to take the helm, for the ship of state was in danger. He was soon at the post of responsibility, upon the turbulent sea of political life.

FOOTNOTES:

[7] Life of Washington, page 379.

CHAPTER V.

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jealousies of the states—weakness of congress—views of washington and his compatriots—washington's letter to james warren on the confederation—conference at mount vernon—washington suggests a national commercial convention—hamilton's views of the confederation—the continentalist—hamilton recommends a general convention of states to amend the confederation—seconded by the new york legislature—letter of jay to washington—washington's reply—an impending crisis—washington's second letter to jay—washington's influence in his retirement—convention at annapolis a failure—another recommended—washington appointed a delegate from virginia—he hesitates—congress recommends a convention—washington accepts the appointment and proceeds to philadelphia.

We have had occasion, from time to time, to notice the jealousies of individual states toward the continental Congress during the war, and the consequent weakness of that body, as an executive of the will of the people, at times when strength and energetic action were most needed.

It was with great difficulty that the states were brought to agree to the Articles of Confederation, and nothing but the pressure of a common danger, which required unity of action, could have induced them to surrender even so much of their individual sovereignty as those articles required. When, therefore, the common danger had passed, and the people felt security in the pursuits of peace, sectional and provincial pride began to operate powerfully in dissolving the union of the states. The Congress, doubtful of their power, and but little relied upon by the great mass of the people as an instrument for the promotion of national prosperity, were incompetent to execute treaties, to regulate commerce, or to provide for the payment of debts contracted for the confederation, amounting in the aggregate, foreign and domestic, to a little more than forty millions of dollars. And that body itself was often distracted by party dissentions, and rendered powerless to exercise even its acknowledged authority, through disagreement.

To Washington and other sagacious minds, the Articles of Confederation had been regarded as essentially defective as a system of government, long before the war had ceased. They perceived the necessity for a greater centralization of power in the general government; and that necessity became painfully apparent when peace came, and the people of the several states found themselves in the condition of independent sovereignty. The system of credit for the extinction of the national debt, and to provide for the national expenditures, devised by the Congress, was tardily accepted by most of the states, and utterly neglected by others. Local interests and prejudices were consulted instead of the national welfare; treaty stipulations were disregarded, and the confederation became, in many respects, a dead letter.

“The confederation appears to me,” Washington wrote to James Warren, in October, 1785, “to be little more than a shadow without the substance, and Congress a nugatory body, their ordinances being little attended to. To me it is a solecism in politics, indeed, it is one of the most extraordinary things in nature, that we should confederate as a nation, and yet be afraid to give the rulers of that nation (who are the creatures of our own making, appointed for a limited and short duration, and who are amenable for every action, and may be recalled at any moment, and are subject to all the evils which they may be instrumental in producing) sufficient powers to order and direct the affairs of the same. By such policy as this the wheels of government are clogged, and our brightest prospects, and that high expectation which was entertained of us by the wondering world, are turned into astonishment; and, from the high ground on which we stood, we are descending into the vale of confusion and darkness.

“That we have it in our power to become one of the most respectable nations upon earth, admits, in my humble opinion, of no doubt, if we would but pursue a wise, just, and liberal policy toward one another, and keep good faith with the rest of the world. That our resources are ample and increasing, none can deny; but while they are grudgingly applied, or not applied at all, we give a vital stab to public faith, and shall sink, in the eyes of Europe, into contempt.

“It has long been a speculative question among philosophers and wise men, whether foreign commerce is of real advantage to any country; that is, whether the luxury, effeminacy, and corruptions, which are introduced along with it, are counterbalanced by the convenience and wealth which it brings. But the decision of this question is of very little importance to us. We have abundant reason to be convinced, that the spirit of trade which pervades these states, is not to be restrained. It behooves us, then, to establish just principles; and this can not, any more than other matters of national concerns, be done by thirteen heads differently constructed and organized. The necessity, therefore, of a controlling power is obvious; and why it should be withheld is beyond my comprehension.”

A little earlier than this, Washington had been engaged in grave discussions at Mount Vernon, with commissioners who had been appointed by the assemblies of Virginia and Maryland, to form a compact in relation to the navigation of the Potomac and Pocomoke rivers, and a part of Chesapeake bay. During the conference he suggested the idea of a conjunction of the several states in arrangements of a commercial nature, over which the Congress, under the Articles of Confederation, had no control. In this suggestion lay the kernel of future most important action, which finally led to the great result of a convention of the states, the abandonment of the old confederation, and the adoption of the Federal Constitution.

But earlier far than this, one of the most extraordinary young men of the last century—indeed, of any century—had, with wonderful sagacity, perceived the evils that would naturally be developed by a weak central government, and had pleaded eloquently with the people to give the Congress more power. That young man was Alexander Hamilton, who, as early as 1781, put forth his views on the subject in a series of papers, under the title of The Continentalist. He was then only twenty-four years of age, yet no man in the country appeared to have clearer views of what constituted true national policy, than he. Indeed, he spoke with the wisdom of a statesman of threescore years; and with Washington and others he deeply lamented the mischievous effects of the practical influence of the doctrine of state rights in its ultra phases. “An extreme jealousy of power,” he said, “is the attendant of all popular revolutions, and has seldom been without its evils. It is to this source we are to trace many of the fatal mistakes which have so deeply endangered the common cause; particularly that defect—a want of power in Congress.”

The Continentalist was published in the New York Packet, printed at Fishkill, in Duchess county, and the series were devoted chiefly to a discussion of the defects of the confederation. They excited great local and general interest; and finally Hamilton succeeded in having the subject of a general convention brought before the New York legislature, in 1782, while in session at Poughkeepsie. The idea Was a popular one with them, and on Sunday, the twenty-first of July, 1782, that body passed a series of resolutions, in the last of which it was remarked, “that it is essential to the common welfare, that there should be as soon as possible, a conference of the whole on the subject, and that it would be advisable for this purpose to propose to Congress to recommend, and to each state to adopt, the measure of assembling a GENERAL CONVENTION OF THE STATES, specially authorized to revise and amend the CONFEDERATION, reserving the right to the respective legislatures to ratify their determination.”

1786

This recommendation was pondered in other states, but the public authorities were not ready to adopt it. At length the suggestion of Washington, concerning a general commercial convention, was acted upon by the Virginia legislature. That action drew a letter from John Jay to Washington, in March, 1786, in which he said:—

“Experience has pointed out errors in our national government which call for correction, and which threaten to blast the fruit we expected from our tree of liberty. The correction proposed by Virginia may do some good, and would, perhaps, do more if it comprehended more objects. An opinion begins to prevail that a general convention for revising the Articles of Confederation would be expedient. Whether the people are yet ripe for such a measure, or whether the system proposed to be attained by it is only to be expected from calamity and commotion, is difficult to ascertain. I think we are in a delicate situation, and a variety of considerations and circumstances give me uneasiness.”

To this Washington responded in May, saying: “I coincide perfectly in sentiment with you, my dear sir, that there are errors in our national government which call for correction; loudly, I would add; but I shall find myself happily mistaken, if the remedies are at hand. We are certainly in a delicate situation; but my fear is, that the people are not yet sufficiently misled to retract from error. To be plain, I think there is more wickedness than ignorance mixed in our councils. Under this impression I scarcely know what opinion to entertain of a general convention. That it is necessary to revise and amend the Articles of Confederation, I entertain no doubt; but what may be the consequences of such an attempt, is doubtful. Yet something must be done, or the fabric must fall, for it certainly is tottering.”

It was the general impression, at that time, that an alarming crisis in public affairs was at hand, and during the whole summer of 1786, Washington was in constant correspondence with leading minds in different parts of the country. To Jay he again wrote in August, saying:—

“I do not conceive we can long exist as a nation, without having lodged somewhere a power, which will pervade the whole Union in as energetic a manner as the authority of the state governments extends over the several states. To be fearful of investing Congress with powers, constituted as that body is, appears to me the very climax of popular absurdity and madness. Could Congress exert them for the detriment of the public, without injuring themselves in an equal or greater proportion? Are not their interests inseparably connected with those of their constituents? By the rotation of appointment, must they not mingle frequently with the mass of citizens? Is it not rather to be apprehended, if they were possessed of the powers before described, that the individual members would be induced to use them, on many occasions, very timidly and inefficaciously, for fear of losing their popularity and future election? We must take human nature as we find it. Perfection falls not to the share of mortals.

“Many are of opinion, that Congress have too frequently made use of the suppliant, humble tone of requisition in application to the states, when they had a right to assert their imperial dignity and command obedience. Be that as it may, requisitions are a perfect nullity when thirteen sovereign, independent, disunited states, are in the habit of discussing and refusing compliance with them at their option. Requisitions are actually little better than a jest and a by-word throughout the land. If you tell the legislatures they have violated the treaty of peace, and invaded the prerogatives of the confederacy, they will laugh in your face. What then is to be done? They can not go on in the same train for ever. It is much to be feared, as you observe, that the better kind of people, being disgusted with the circumstances, will have their minds prepared for any revolution whatever.... I am told that even respectable characters speak of a monarchical form of government without horror. From thinking proceeds speaking; thence to acting is often but a single step. But how irrevocable and tremendous! What a triumph to our enemies to verify their predictions!... Would to God that wise measures may be taken in time to avert the consequences we have but too much reason to apprehend.

“Retired as I am from the world,” he continued, “I frankly acknowledge I can not feel myself an unconcerned spectator. Yet, having happily assisted in bringing the ship into port, and having been fairly discharged, it is not my business to embark again on a sea of troubles. Nor could it be expected that my sentiments and opinions could have much weight on the minds of my countrymen. They have been neglected, though given as a last legacy in the most solemn manner,” he said, referring to his circular to the governors of the states in the summer of 1783; “I had then, perhaps, some claim to public attention, I consider myself as having none at present.”

His sentiments and opinions did have great weight, and in his retirement at Mount Vernon, Washington exercised a most powerful influence. To the patriotic and thoughtful, his words were oracular, and the ear of the nation leaned in earnest silence toward Mount Vernon at that crisis, to catch the faintest whisper from the lips of the retired soldier, who was about to emerge as a sagacious statesman.

In September, 1786, commissioners met at Annapolis, at the suggestion of the legislature of Virginia, “to take into consideration the trade of the United States,” and “to report to the several states such an act relative to this great object, as, when unanimously ratified by them,” would enable “the United States in Congress assembled,” effectually to provide for such a uniform system in their commercial relations as might be necessary to their common interest and their social harmony.

Only five states (Virginia, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York) were represented in the convention. The deputies assembled on the eleventh, and appointed John Dickenson, of Pennsylvania, chairman. A committee was appointed to prepare a draft of a report to be made to the legislatures of the several states there represented. That committee reported on the fourteenth, when, as a majority of the states were not represented in the convention, it was thought advisable to postpone further action. They adjourned, after recommending to the several states the appointment of deputies to meet in convention for a similar purpose, in May following. They also prepared a letter to Congress, to accompany a copy of the report to the several states represented, in which the defects of the Articles of Confederation were set forth.

When the Virginia assembly met, they resolved to appoint seven delegates to represent that state in the proposed convention, and placed Washington's name at the head of the list of deputies selected. The appointment was made by the unanimous voice of the assembly, and the fact was first communicated to him by Mr. Madison. Washington was embarrassed. He heartily approved of the measure, and was willing to leave the retirement of private life for a season, to serve his country in a dark and critical hour; but he could not do so at that time, without being obnoxious to the charge of inconsistency, and of disrespect to a class of his fellow-citizens, who, above all others, he most loved.

“I presume you have heard, sir,” he said to Madison, “that I was first appointed, and have since been re-chosen, president of the society of the Cincinnati; and you may have understood, also, that the triennial general meeting of this body is to be held in Philadelphia the first Monday in May next. Some particular reasons, combining with the peculiar situation of my private concerns, the necessity of paying attention to them, a wish for retirement and relaxation from public cares, and rheumatic pains which I begin to feel very sensibly, induced me to address a circular letter to each state society, informing them of my intention not to be at the next meeting, and of my desire not to be re-chosen president.”

Under these circumstances, and as the convention was to assemble at the same place and at about the same time, he felt that he ought to decline serving, for he could not appear there without giving offence to the members of the society. They might, with reason, have grounds for suspecting his sincerity, or even of his having deserted the officers who had so nobly supported him during the war for independence. He, therefore, in reply to the governor's official notification of his appointment, expressed a wish that some other gentleman should be substituted for himself.

Washington did not absolutely refuse to serve, and Governor Randolph suggested that perhaps before the time for the assembling of the convention the objections in his mind might be removed. His name was therefore continued at the head of the Virginia convention.

Time moved on, and the subject of the convention of the states occupied a large place in the public mind. Washington received many letters. Some of these from his warm, personal friends expressed doubts of the propriety of his attending the convention, and others advised against it. Some thought that, as it did not originate with the supreme legislature, acting under the articles of confederation which that convention was called to revise, it would be illegal; and those who were very tender of Washington's character, and had doubts concerning the results of such convention, advised against his going, as his brilliant reputation might suffer, should the whole affair prove abortive; while others, having heard insinuations that the opposers of the convention were monarchists, advised his going, to show that he favored it, and to give the weight of his name to a really republican movement in which the best interests of his country were involved.

Circumstances did finally occur which removed all objections from Washington's mind. The Congress legalized the convention by a resolution which declared it expedient, and fixing the day for its meeting. That day was the second Monday in May, and was chosen in reference to the general meeting of the society of the Cincinnati, which was to take place a week earlier, that, thereby, Washington might be allowed to meet with his brothers of the fraternity if he chose. Another circumstance was the insinuation just alluded to, that the opponents of the convention were monarchists, who were willing to have the difficulties and dangers of the country increase, under the weak control of the confederation, until republicanism should become hateful to the people; and a third circumstance was a dangerous insurrection in Massachusetts which had grown out of efforts to enforce federal laws. Washington was unwilling to be classed among the opponents of the convention, or to remain inactive, while violence was assuming to defy all law, and when an era of anarchy in his country seemed about to dawn. Added to these considerations, and the sanction of the convention by law, his friends, whose minds had been changed in the course of a few months, now urged him, by every consideration of patriotism, to come forth from his retirement, for the salvation of the country depended in a great measure upon his exertions. Washington no longer hesitated, and prepared to go to the convention at the head of the Virginia deputies.

He resolved not to go uninformed upon the great subject that would engage the attention of that body, and he commenced a course of preparation. “His knowledge of the institutions of his country and of its political forms,” says Sparks, “both in their general character and minute affiliated relations, gained by inquiry and long experience, was probably as complete as that of any other man. But he was not satisfied with this alone. He read the history and examined the principles of the ancient and modern confederacies. There is a paper in his handwriting which contains an abstract of each, and in which are noted, in a methodical order, their chief characteristics, the kinds of authority they possessed, their modes of operation, and their defects. The confederacies analyzed in this paper are the Lycian, Amphictyonic, Achæn, Helvetic, Belgic, and Germanic. He also read the standard works on general politics and the science of government, abridging parts of them, according to his usual practice, that he might impress the essential points more deeply on his mind.” He resolved to do all in his power, in that convention, to affect a radical cure of the political maladies with which his country was afflicted.

Washington set out from Mount Vernon on the ninth of May, in his carriage, for Philadelphia, to attend the convention. He arrived at Chester on the thirteenth, and was there met by General Mifflin (who was then the speaker of the Pennsylvania assembly), Generals Knox and Varnum, Colonels Humphreys and Meigs, and Majors Jackson and Nicholas, by whom he was escorted toward Philadelphia. At Gray's ferry, on the Schuylkill, a company of light-horse under Colonel Miles met and escorted him into the city, when the bells were rung in honor of his arrival. On the pressing invitation of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Morris, he took lodgings with them; and as soon as the dust of travel could be removed, he called upon Doctor Franklin, who was at that time president of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The following day was the time appointed for the assembling of the convention.

Washington Presiding in the Convention. 1787

CHAPTER VI.

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the convention of states—washington chosen president of the convention—randolph's speech and resolutions—number and names of delegates—notice of some of them—franklin in the convention of 1754—the leading speakers in the convention—position of the members in regard to precedents—synopsis of randolph's plan—pinckney's sketch—national and state-rights men—patterson's plan—virginia and new jersey plans—hamilton dissents from both—his character, speech, and scheme—all plans and amendments referred to a committee for revision—a constitution reported and adopted—critical periods in the convention—subjects for differences—washington's apprehensions and views—patriotism of hamilton—the constitution signed—remarks by washington and franklin—close of the convention.

1787

On Monday, the fourteenth day of May, 1787, those delegates to the convention called to revise the Articles of Confederation who were then in Philadelphia, assembled in the large room in the statehouse, since known as Independence hall; but it was not until Friday, the twenty-fifth, that seven states, the number required by Congress to form a quorum, were represented, and the convention was organized. On that day, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, and North and South Carolina, were represented by an aggregate number of twenty-seven delegates; and on the nomination of Robert Morris, in behalf of the state of Pennsylvania, Washington was, by unanimous vote, elected president of the convention. William Jackson was chosen secretary; and on Monday, the twenty-eighth, Edmund Randolph, of Virginia, at the request of his colleagues, opened the business of the convention by an elaborate speech, in which he showed the defects of the Articles of Confederation, illustrated their utter inadequacy to secure the peace and safety of the republic, and the absolute necessity of a more energetic government. When he closed his remarks, he offered for the consideration of the convention fifteen resolutions; not as a system of organic law, but as leading principles whereon to form a new government.

Very soon after the commencement of the session, eleven states were represented. New Hampshire sent delegates at the close of June, but the Rhode Island assembly refused to elect any. Some of the most influential men of that little commonwealth united in a letter to the convention, in which they expressed warm sympathy with the movement.

Sixty-one delegates had been appointed at the beginning of July, but only about fifty served in the convention.[8] These were among the most illustrious citizens of the republic, most of whom had been distinguished for worth of character, talents, and patriotism, during the late struggle for the independence of the colonies. Eighteen of them were at that time members of the continental Congress.

It is not proposed to consider in detail, nor even in a synoptical manner, the proceedings of that convention, which occupied several hours each day for four months. We will merely glance at the men and measures, contemplate the result, and leave the reader to seek, in special sources, for information concerning the important and interesting subject of the formation of our federal constitution.[9]

Portraits of Rufus King, John Dickinson,
Gouverneur Morris, Oliver Ellsworth, and John Rutledge

Next to Washington, the venerable Doctor Franklin, then a little over eighty-one years of age, was the most conspicuous member. Thirty-three years before, he had submitted to a convention of colonial delegates, held at Albany, a plan for a confederation, similar to our federal constitution, but it was not adopted. It satisfied neither the board of trade to whom it was submitted, nor the colonial assemblies who discussed it. “The assemblies did not adopt it,” he said, “as they all thought there was too much prerogative in it, and in England it was judged to have too much of the democratic.”

Dickinson, Johnson, and Rutledge, had been members of the stamp-act Congress in 1765. The first and last had been compatriots with Washington in the Congress of 1774, and Sherman, Livingston, Read, and Wythe, had shared the same honors. The two latter, with Franklin, Sherman, Gerry, Morris, Clymer, and Wilson, had signed the Declaration of Independence. Washington, Mifflin, Hamilton, and Cotesworth Pinckney, represented the continental army; and the younger members, who became prominent after the Declaration of Independence, were Hamilton, Madison, and Edmund Randolph. The latter was then governor of Virginia, having succeeded Patrick Henry.

The leading speakers in the long and warm debates elicited by the resolutions of Governor Randolph and others, were King, Gerry, and Gorham, of Massachusetts; Hamilton and Lansing, of New York; Ellsworth, Johnson, and Sherman, of Connecticut; Paterson, of New Jersey, who presented a scheme counter to that of Randolph; Franklin, Wilson, and Morris, of Pennsylvania; Dickinson, of Delaware; Martin, of Maryland; Randolph, Madison, and Mason, of Virginia; Williamson, of North Carolina; and the Pinckneys, of South Carolina. Such were the men with whom Washington was associated in the contrivance and construction of a new system of government.

“At that time,” says Curtis, “the world had witnessed no such spectacle as that of the deputies of a nation, chosen by the free action of great communities, and assembled for the purpose of thoroughly reforming its constitution, by the exercise and with the authority of the national will. All that had been done, both in ancient and in modern times, in forming, moulding, or modifying constitutions of government, bore little resemblance to the present undertaking of the states of America. Neither among the Greeks nor the Romans was there a precedent, and scarcely an analogy.”

The great political maxim established by the Revolution was the original residence of all human sovereignty in the people; and the statesmen in the federal convention had scarcely any precedent, in theory or practice, by which they might be governed in parcelling out so much of that sovereignty as the people of the several states should be willing to dismiss from their local political institutions, in making a strong and harmonious federal republic, that should be at the same time harmless toward reserved state-rights.

Randolph's resolutions proposed: First, To correct and enlarge the Articles of Confederation, so as to accomplish the original objects of common defence, security of liberty, and general welfare. Secondly, To make the right of suffrage in the national legislature proportioned to the quotas of contribution, or to the number of free inhabitants, as might seem best in different cases. Thirdly, To make the national legislature consist of two branches; the members of the first to be elected by the people of the several states at certain intervals for a specified term. They were to be of a prescribed age, entitled to liberal emolument for their public services, and to be ineligible to any office, state or federal, except such as pertained to the functions of that first branch, during their service; also to be ineligible to re-election until after a certain space of time succeeding their term of service. Fourthly, To have the members of the second branch elected by those of the first from among those who should be nominated by the state legislatures; to hold their offices “for a term sufficient to insure their independency;” to be liberally paid for their services, and to be subject to restrictions similar to those of the first. Fifthly, To have each branch invested with power to originate acts; to give the national legislature the right to legislate in all cases where the state governments might be incompetent, or in which the harmony of the confederation might be interrupted by the exercise of individual legislation; to negative all laws passed by the individual states that might contravene the articles of union; and to call forth the whole Union against any member of the confederation that should fail to fulfil its stipulated duty. Sixthly, To institute a national executive, to be chosen periodically, liberally remunerated, and to be ineligible to a second official term. Seventhly, To constitute the executive and a convenient number of the national judiciary a council of revision, who should have authority to examine every act of the national legislature before it should operate, and of every individual legislature before a negative thereon should be final, the dissent of said council amounting to a rejection unless such act be again passed, or that of such particular legislature should be again negatived by a specified number of members of each branch. Eighthly, To establish a national judiciary, the members of which should hold office during good behavior; and to define their duties, powers, privileges, and emoluments. Ninthly, To provide for the admission of new states into the Union. Tenthly, To guaranty a republican form of government to each state and territory. Eleventhly, To provide for a continuation of a Congress with its delegated powers, until a new constitution should be established. Twelfthly, To make provision for the amendment of the article of union whenever it should seem necessary, the assent thereto of the national legislature to be required. Thirteenthly, To require the legislative, executive, and judiciary powers within the several states to be bound by oath to support the Union. Fourteenthly, To submit the amendments made by the convention, after the approbation of the same by Congress, “to an assembly or assemblies of representatives, recommended by the several legislatures, to be expressly chosen by the people, to consider and decide thereon.”

Upon general principles, the scheme of Randolph, called the “Virginia plan,” was highly approved; but there were many zealous and pure-minded patriots in that convention, who regarded the preservation of state sovereignty, in all its integrity, as essential to the stability of the republic. Holding the “Virginia plan” to be an infringement upon the prerogatives of such sovereignty, they opposed it with vehemence. This plan and a sketch submitted by Charles Pinckney, which appears to have furnished the outline of the constitution as finally adopted, was referred to a committee.

The question arose at the beginning, and frequently recurred, “What limit has the convention in revising the Articles of Confederation? and has it power to prepare an entirely new system of government?” It was properly argued, that as a favorably-received resolution in Mr. Randolph's plan proposed to submit the matter finally to popular conventions in the several states, that question need not to be considered.

The debates were carried on warmly, day after day, in committee of the whole house, and the convention soon became divided into national and state-rights men, the representatives of six of the states being in favor of the broad national view, and five for the state-rights view.

Randolph's resolutions were taken up consecutively and debated for a fortnight, when, after many modifications, they were reported back to the house. Paterson, of New Jersey, then immediately brought forward a counter scheme, which was called the “New Jersey plan,” and embodied the peculiar views of the state-rights party. It proposed to preserve the continental Congress as the federal legislature, with additional power to levy duties on foreign importations; to impose stamp and postage taxes; to collect, without hinderance, requisitions not promptly met by the states; and to regulate commerce with foreign nations. It proposed a plural federal executive and a federal judiciary, and made acts of Congress and foreign treaties supreme laws.

Paterson's plan and Randolph's modified resolutions were referred to a new committee, and the whole question concerning a national government was again considered. Again debates ran high. In the course of these, Hamilton, who had come into the convention with more courage and fixed plan than any other member, avowed his dissent from both the schemes before the committee. He was listened to with the most profound respect; and gray-haired men, as they looked upon his delicate form and youthful features, were filled with wonder at the display of his great genius for political construction, his extensive knowledge of the means by which true conservative liberty might be secured, and his thorough comprehension of the wants and resources of his country. He had come into the convention fully prepared to propound a solution of the great questions which he knew would perplex the members; and at the close of an elaborate and in many respects most extraordinary speech, he offered a written sketch of a system, not, he said, for discussion in the committee, nor with the idea that the public mind was yet prepared for it, but as explanatory of his own views and introductory to some amendments he intended to propose. He then departed for New York, leaving his two colleagues, who took the state-rights view of the matter, to represent his state in the convention. They too soon left, and never returned.