by Ron Chernow
The reference to a “thousand tender passages” makes clear that Sally, not Martha, was the lady in question; George’s acquaintance with Martha was too brief to have packed in so many tender memories. He seemed to be saying that their love, defeated by the practical circumstances of life, was simply not meant to be. She was married to a rich man, and he was about to marry a rich woman, and George Washington, for all his high-flown rhetoric, was an eminently practical young man, not cut out for doomed, quixotic affairs. He ended the epistle with a frank admission of love: “You have drawn me, my dear Madam, or rather have I drawn myself, into an honest confession of a simple fact. Misconstrue not my meaning—’tis obvious—doubt it not, nor expose it. The world has no business to know the object of my love, declared in this manner to you, when I want to conceal it . . . I dare believe you are as happy as you say. I wish I was happy also. Mirth, good humor, ease of mind and—what else?—cannot fail to render you so and consummate your wishes.”24
This letter overturns the conventional image of a phlegmatic Washington and shows a much more passionate figure. It shocks as well because of his apparent betrayal of his friend and patron, George William Fairfax, and his fiancée, Martha. Any moral outrage must be tempered, however, by the overriding fact that George was honorably declaring an end to their amorous relationship on the eve of his marriage, which would call an irrevocable halt to such youthful folly. Sally Fairfax had always been somewhat coy and elusive with Washington, as evidenced by her recent discontinuance of their correspondence. Her coquetry, in the last analysis, was constrained by a self-protective instinct. She had also, as the letter makes clear, insisted that she was happy with her life. So why did Washington write such a daring letter? There is always the possibility that he was testing the waters with Sally one last time before he committed to marriage. Or perhaps, at the end, he wanted some final validation of his powerful longings for Sally, some recognition that she, too, had been deeply touched by taboo feelings. That he announced his love in such dramatic fashion confirms that he had never done so before and that he and Sally had left many things unsaid and probably undone. Whatever was the true situation, Sally must have recognized and treasured the frank admission of love, for she retained the letter until she died in 1811—a period of more than fifty years.
Although Sally’s response has been lost, we can surmise its contents from Washington’s September 25 reply. Apparently she either feigned ignorance of the mystery lady’s identity, or pretended it was Martha. Washington stood his ground. “Dear Madam, do we still misunderstand the true meaning of each other’s letters? I think it must appear so, tho[ugh] I would feign hope the contrary as I cannot speak plainer without. But I’ll say no more and leave you to guess the rest.”25 Washington knew that any greater candor could wreck two marriages. That Sally refused to credit his love or openly reciprocate it suggests that she was an artful woman who had enjoyed having her vanity stroked by a handsome younger man. This would have made Washington the more appreciative of Martha, who was practical, honest, and straightforward. The youthful infatuation prepared Washington for the deeper joys of marriage, although the beguiling image of Sally Fairfax persisted in his memory. She would always be mixed up with recollections of Belvoir and an idyllic, sunstruck period of his youth. The Sally Fairfax saga may well testify to Washington’s repressed romantic nature, buried beneath many layers of reserve. But it’s even more a stoic tale of self-denial, previewing the supreme command he would attain over his unruly emotions. Washington’s storied self-control was not something inherited but achieved by dint of hard work, making it all the more formidable an accomplishment.
In later years Washington liked to philosophize about love and marriage and became a veritable Polonius with young relatives as he peppered them with sage advice. In 1795 he received a letter from his adopted granddaughter, Eleanor Parke Custis, who had attended a Georgetown ball and boasted of her indifference to the advances of young men there. Washington warned her bluntly of the often-unstoppable force of passion. “Do not therefore boast too soon or too strongly of your insensibility . . . to its power. In the composition of the human frame, there is a good deal of inflammable matter [W apparently meant flammable], however dormant it may lie for a time and . . . when the torch is put to it, that which is within you may burst into a blaze.” Washington went on to say that this mighty blaze “ought to be under the guidance of reason, for although we cannot avoid first impressions, we may assuredly place them under guard.”26 The author of these lines seemed knowledgeable about ungovernable emotions and how to tame them.
Perhaps the best proof that the relationship between Washington and Sally Fairfax stayed deep but platonic is that the Washingtons remained intimate friends with George William and Sally Fairfax before the American Revolution and even traveled with them. In all likelihood, George confessed to Martha his longtime flirtation, which had cooled and receded to its proper place. The febrile yearnings of youth had made way for a more mature love. It speaks to the strength of the Washingtons’ marriage that they were never threatened by the close proximity of Sally Fairfax, who remained a welcome guest at Mount Vernon and no less a friend to Martha than to George. There is something admirably grown-up, sensitive, and dignified about the way these two couples handled a most delicate situation.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Darling of a Grateful Country
IN THE SPRING OF 1758 George Washington entertained one last forlorn hope of a brilliantly climactic military campaign in the Ohio Valley. He was about to tender his resignation when he heard reports in March that the Crown planned to send a fleet with seven thousand men to North America and contemplated another operation against Fort Duquesne. The new commander, Brigadier General John Forbes, was a veteran Scottish officer who took a decidedly low view of colonial officers, maligning them as a “bad collection of broken innkeepers, horse jockeys, and Indian traders.”1
Hoping to curry favor with Forbes, Washington wrote to Brigadier General John Stanwix and badgered him “to mention me in favorable terms to General Forbes,” but “not as a person who would depend upon him for further recommendation to military preferment, for I have long conquered all such expectancies . . . but as a person who would gladly be distinguished in some measure from the common run of provincial officers.”2 Perhaps a chastened Washington meant it when he now said that he expected no royal commission. Contrary to his bias against colonial soldiers, Forbes singled out Washington as “a good and knowing officer in the back countries.”3 To augment the chances for victory at the Forks of the Ohio, the Virginia assembly decided to raise a second regiment, doubling its armed force to two thousand men, with George Washington as the presiding senior officer.
In early July at Fort Cumberland, Washington showed how fighting in the hinterlands had tutored him in Indian-style warfare. When he ran short of uniforms, he outfitted both himself and his men in Indian hunting shirts and leggings, helping them to emulate the light, mobile style of their fleet-footed adversaries. While admitting to Forbes’s chief aide that it was “an unbecoming dress” for an officer, he argued that “soldiers in such a dress are better able to carry their provisions, are fitter for the active service we are engaged in, and less liable to sink under the fatigues of a long march.”4 Even though Washington won permission to assume Indian dress, he still acknowledged the incontestable superiority of Indian warriors: “I cannot conceive the best white men to be equal to them in the woods.”5
A victim of political wrangling in Williamsburg, Washington was eager to renew his bid for a seat from Frederick County in the House of Burgesses. He probably wished to erase the memory of his poor showing three years earlier and establish through public service his credentials as an aspiring gentleman. Learning from past mistakes, he gave plenty of notice for his candidacy this time and assembled a cadre of active, energetic friends who cheerfully drummed up support in Winchester in his absence. Nonetheless they pleaded with him to come and politick in person. His friend Co
lonel James Wood, the town’s leading citizen, warned that there was “no relying on the promises of the common herd . . . There are many of us embarked on the same cause with you and a disappointment will sit heavy on us.”6 Leaving no stone unturned, Robert Rutherford told Washington that they were encouraging voters “with the greatest ardor, even down to Will the hatter and his oily spouse.”7 Washington secured permission to travel to Winchester to campaign, then chose to stay with his troops. This may have been from a sense of duty or from fear that he would miss a victorious battle. Washington had also begun to intuit the subtle art of seeking power by refraining from too obvious a show of ambition.
On election day, July 24, 1758, the absentee candidate engaged in the popular, if technically illegal, custom of intoxicating local voters. His campaign forwarded him an expense account for thirty-four gallons of wine, three pints of brandy, thirteen gallons of beer, eight quarts of cider, and forty gallons of rum punch, costing the candidate a sizable thirty-nine pounds in Virginia currency. Accepting this expense, Washington hoped that his backers had plied all voters impartially with strong beverages: “My only fear is that you spent with too sparing a hand.”8
As voting for the two seats got under way in Washington’s absence, it was clear how much power the young war hero wielded in this rustic area. He profited from the fact that one candidate was Thomas Bryan Martin, the nephew of Thomas, Lord Fairfax, proprietor of the Northern Neck. Since each voter cast two votes, Washington and Martin formed a ticket against the incumbents, with the latter’s presence enlisting Fairfax support. Among those supporting Washington was Lord Fairfax himself, followed by a sterling list of local luminaries and his regimental surgeon, Dr. James Craik. Even George William Fairfax arrived in Winchester to endorse his wife’s faithful admirer. The final vote sharply reversed Washington’s crashing defeat of three years earlier as he garnered 309 of 397 votes cast and easily outpaced the other three candidates, including Thomas Bryan Martin, who, as runner-up with 240 votes, became the second burgess.
Washington’s vote-getting prowess was only magnified by having trounced his opponents in absentia. Robert Rutherford credited his victory to his fair treatment of his men and “ardent zeal for the common cause.”9 Colonel Wood was hoisted aloft and carried about the town amid boisterous huzzahs for Washington. In thanking friends for their support, Colonel Washington sounded openly jubilant: “If thanks flowing from a heart replete with joy and gratitude can in any measure compensate for the fatigue, anxiety and pain you had at my election, be assured you have them.”10 He instinctively struck a generous tone, stating that his best way of thanking voters was by “making their interests . . . my own and doing everything that lies in my little power for the honor and welfare of the county.”11 With a thoroughness that previewed bigger things to come, Washington filed away the poll sheet so that he could form his own alphabetized list, showing how each person had voted.
Even as he thrilled to this electoral victory, he was entangled in a bitter imbroglio over the optimal route for the march to Fort Duquesne, a seemingly minor tactical dispute with major political overtones. Washington wanted the Forbes expedition to follow the road Braddock had charted through the wilderness, not only because he himself had originally blazed the trail but because it passed through Virginia and would consolidate the colony’s commercial presence in the Ohio Country. Some assertive Philadelphians agitated for a road from Raystown, Pennsylvania, which would benefit their colony. After chatting with Colonel Henry Bouquet, an aide to General Forbes, Washington was aghast to discover that he favored the Pennsylvania road. “If Colo. Bouquet succeeds in this point with the general, all is lost! All is lost by Heavens!” Washington told Forbes’s secretary, Francis Halkett. 12 In resorting to hyperbole, Washington may have thought he was claiming the moral high ground, but Forbes saw only a self-serving maneuver by a bumptious young Virginian. “By a very unguarded letter of Col. Washington that accidentally fell into my hands,” Forbes told Bouquet, “I am now at the bottom of their scheme against this new [Pennsylvania] road, a scheme that I think was a shame for any officer to be concerned in.”13 At this stage of his life, Washington sometimes found it difficult to distinguish his own from the general interest. In selecting the Pennsylvania road, military historians have argued, Forbes may have selected the better route because it was shorter and bypassed treacherous water crossings. Conceding these advantages, an unyielding Washington countered that the Pennsylvania road had to span “monstrous mountains, covered with woods and rocks” and might not be finished before cold weather intervened.14
The willful Washington refused to let the matter drop. In late August he wrote a rude, hectoring letter to Bouquet, chiding him that, if only they had chosen Braddock’s Road, they would now be undisputed masters of the Ohio Country.15 Committing a mistake common among headstrong young people, Washington went behind his opponent’s back to someone even higher. He hadn’t yet acquired smooth political skills and could seem crudely insistent. With questionable judgment, he circumvented Forbes and Bouquet to lobby the new Virginia lieutenant governor, Francis Fauquier, who had replaced Dinwiddie. He also told Speaker Robinson that Forbes had squandered an egregious amount of time and money: “Will then our injured country pass by such abuses? I hope not. Rather let a full representation of the matter go to His Majesty. Let him know how grossly his [honor] and the public money has been prostituted.”16 All this heated rhetoric came from a man later renowned for his cool judgment. Perhaps, newly elected to the House of Burgesses, Washington felt entitled to issue blunt ultimatums to Williamsburg politicians. It should also be noted that his special pleading made him a folk hero in Virginia, where he was applauded for standing up for the colony’s interests by proselytizing for Braddock’s Road.
When General Forbes drew up plans for the assault on Fort Duquesne, he overcame his irritation with Washington and assigned him to lead one of three brigades spearheading the charge. The young Virginian was the only colonial officer thus honored. As he braced for a last chance to show his military mettle, Washington experienced one of the more harrowing moments in his career. The ghastly mishap began when scouts alerted Forbes to an enemy reconnaissance party, prowling the woods three miles away, who were seeking to grab livestock. To handle this threat, Forbes dispatched hundreds of Virginians under Lieutenant Colonel George Mercer. At camp, Washington heard distinct sounds of “hot firing,” indicating to him and Forbes that Mercer’s men were taking a terrible pounding from the enemy. Forbes sent Washington and several hundred men to relieve their fellow Virginians. They advanced through woods in a deepening twilight that was thickened by musket smoke, screening off any clear view of the fighting up ahead. Washington later insisted that he had sent a messenger to notify Mercer of his approach, lest his men be mistaken for the enemy.
No sooner did Washington’s men glimpse the soldiers ahead than they reeled under the impact of repeated rounds of gunfire and began to fire back. It turned out that Virginians were firing at Virginians. As Washington fathomed the full horror of this mistake, he unsheathed his sword and slashed at his men’s leveled muskets to stop their firing, but it was too late. The misadventure left behind staggering casualties: fourteen dead and twenty-six wounded. Even after the Revolutionary War, Washington said of this star-crossed episode that his life had been “in as much jeopardy as it had ever been before or since.”17
This was now the fourth time that Washington had traversed the path to the Forks of the Ohio, and each time his military aspirations had been foiled by unforeseen developments. For someone of Washington’s dogged nature, the frustration must have been mortifying. The French and Indian War had humbled him with cruel ironies and unexpected setbacks, leaving him more philosophic and reflective. As he wrote a few years later, “Human affairs are always checkered and vicissitudes in this life are rather to be expected than wondered at.”18
When the fall of Fort Duquesne finally came in late November 1758, it was almost anticlimactic. Forbes w
as about to defer the attack until the following spring when three prisoners disclosed that the French fort was now undermanned. An Indian scout then appeared and told of huge billows of smoke rising from the post. Forbes assembled 2,500 men to take the fort and gave Washington the “brevet,” or honorary rank, of brigadier general for the operation. When this huge force arrived on the scene on November 25, 1758, they found only the charred, smoldering remains of Fort Duquesne. Deserted by their Indian allies, the French had deemed the fort dangerously indefensible, blown it up, and fled by night down the Ohio River. Fort Pitt—the new name paid tribute to William Pitt—would arise on the flaming wreckage of Fort Duquesne. Colonel Bouquet gloated that one reason for the triumph was Forbes’s refusal to capitulate to Braddock’s Road, “which would have been our destruction.”19
The conquest rang down the curtain on Washington’s military tenure after five years of devoted service. With the safety of Virginia’s pioneers and traders temporarily assured, it was an auspicious moment for him to resign his commission and focus his energies on Martha Dandridge Custis and Mount Vernon. His upcoming marriage and service in the House of Burgesses offered a seamless transition into a promising new life. Health reasons also lay behind the resignation. Washington’s dysentery had apparently flared up again, because he described his health as “precarious” that December, having worsened “for many months before, occasioned by an inveterate disorder” in his bowels. 20