George Washington

by David O. Stewart

  Theft of the master’s food and goods was routine, although Washington tried to stop it. Traffic in goods stolen by slaves, according to one historian, was “extensive, relatively well organized, and carried on virtually with impunity.” Washington believed that his house staff siphoned off two glasses of wine for every one served to guests. He fulminated over theft on a building project: “I cannot conceive how it is possible that 6,000 twelve penny nails be used . . . but of one thing I have no great doubt and that is, if they can be applied to other uses, or converted into cash, rum, or other things, there will be no scruple in doing it.”27

  If a slave master grew sufficiently exasperated with a slave, the law gave him broad power to punish. For theft, a slave could be branded. Enslaved people found with a weapon could receive thirty-nine lashes. Because white slaveowners feared that slaves would poison their masters’ food, any slave who passed out medicine, even to another slave, could be hanged. Hanging also applied to an enslaved person who broke into a store, or to enslaved people assembled in a group of five or more for purposes of rebellion. A Frenchman entering Williamsburg in late May 1765 saw three Blacks hanging from the gallows for committing a robbery, their bodies dangling as a grisly reminder.28

  The slave master’s repertoire of punishments included disfigurement. If a slave gave false testimony, his ear could be nailed to a post for an hour, then cut off; then the other ear received the same treatment. On a complaint by George Mason, that punishment was applied to a slave accused of a second incident of hog-stealing. A prominent slaveowner whipped slaves for not reporting an illness, for wetting the bed, and for laziness. He forced a slave to drink a pint of urine for his offenses.29

  Washington’s overseers, with his knowledge, surely whipped slaves.30 Washington never shied from physical punishment of miscreants. As commander of the Virginia Regiment, he ordered many floggings and hanged at least two men.

  Yet intelligent slave masters recognized that their power to punish could become counterproductive. Punishing a malingering slave, Washington wrote, “often produces evils which are worse than the disease.” A slave could turn violently on an overseer, which could result in the slave’s execution—both bad outcomes for the owner. Alternatively, the angry slave might run away or recruit allies for a rising. On a large property like Mount Vernon, the enslaved far outnumbered their owners.31

  Plenty of Washington’s enslaved people ran off. By one count, forty-seven fled between 1760 and 1799, or more than one a year. Runaways did not always leave because of mistreatment, and not all sought permanent freedom. Some left to be closer to family at other plantations. Others remained nearby, taking a break from work while living on supplies smuggled from the plantation.32

  Washington had little patience for runaways, offering rewards for their capture.33 He deemed one slave named Tom to be so incorrigible that he shipped Tom to the West Indies for sale there, even though the man was a good worker and had been a foreman. Washington advised the ship captain “to keep him handcuffed till you get to sea.” He used the same method for disposing of Will Shag, who passed for free in Yorktown before recapture, then escaped twice more, once assaulting an overseer. Washington paid to ship Will to Santo Domingo. He sold off a slave carpenter after four escapes in five years.34

  Fear of slave rebellions haunted white Virginians. The militia’s principal duty was to stop uprisings. Virginia law forbade sending militia beyond the colony’s borders to ensure that they would be available to suppress rebellions. On holidays, when slaves had leisure time, militiamen attended church with weapons in hand, alert for any unrest.35

  Washington’s slave management should be understood in the time and place of his life. Most of the labor available to him was enslaved. His goal, as expressed many years later, was “getting work well done and quietly by negroes.”36 To do that, he employed the practices that were available. To later Americans, his world was built on appalling measures of repression: restraints, violence, and harsh deaths. To Washington, that was daily life.

  A person with emotional intelligence, like Washington, could not doubt the humanity of those he owned. They had families, dreams, and feelings, which he observed every day. He extended privileges to some slaves whose work impressed him. In 1768, he purchased two mixed-race brothers, Frank and Billy Lee, who became favorites. Frank served as waiter in the dining room, while Billy became his valet.

  Davy Gray, who came to Mount Vernon from a Custis estate, also advanced. By 1778, Davy was an overseer. The master gave Davy money, leather breeches, extra pork, and a house with a brick chimney. Davy, Washington wrote, “carries on his business as well as the white overseers, and with more quietness than any of them.” When Washington tried a new method of distributing cornmeal, the enslaved workers complained to Davy that they were hungry. When Davy pressed their case with the master, Washington abandoned the experiment.37

  But it was not until the Revolutionary War, when he had wider experience of the world, that Washington began to question slavery, to see it as not only inefficient but also immoral. Late in life, but with his characteristic tenacity, he would try to set an example for his countrymen by extricating himself from the slave system.

  Chapter 20

  The Backbencher Advances

  During his first seven years in the House of Burgesses, Washington was more engaged with life at Mount Vernon than with his public career, though that would change. He won reelection in 1761 and would do so two more times. His full legislative career spanned twenty-two sessions of the House of Burgesses, during which he attended deliberations for approximately sixty weeks when he was actively addressing public issues and mixing with Virginia’s leaders. Even when the House was adjourned, Washington had to keep abreast of events.

  The road to leadership in Virginia ran through the House of Burgesses. In Williamsburg’s intimate spaces, the burgesses took one another’s measure in committee meetings, in debates, over long dinners and through alcohol-soaked nights, at horse races and card games. They assessed who remained steady under stress, who could persuade others, who could distill a complex problem, who was self-interested, who foresaw consequences, who had a gift with words, who was devious, who did the work.

  Rising to a leadership position in the House was a challenge for Washington, a man of action with a breathy voice who was neither facile in debate nor confident in his learning. He was no overnight sensation but found his way slowly.

  Washington started by watching and listening. Voting on matters large and small, he could see how political opinions form and are led, how multiple views can be accommodated through bargaining and compromise, and the importance of striking at the right moment. He developed his own rhetorical style. He learned the nuts and bolts of writing laws. He served on key legislative committees, then chaired a few.

  At afternoon dinners, Washington built connections with high officials. Over one seven-year period, he dined on at least sixteen occasions with Virginia’s governor, twenty-six times with the House Speaker, sixteen times with the treasurer, and eleven times with the attorney general. Though he enjoyed card games and conversation, many evenings he remained in his room, working. Having leased out Martha’s town house (the one with six chimneys), he usually stayed at Mrs. Campbell’s inn on the Capitol’s west side, screened from the revelry at the twelve taverns on the other side. One contemporary left a scathing account of burgesses “regaling or gaming till 12 every night,” a regimen that left them “very unfit for business.” Washington, however, was not in Williamsburg for the nightlife.1

  The years on the back bench were humbling for a man accustomed to command. When he arrived, dozens of legislators were more eminent than he, more skilled in parliamentary maneuver, but Washington never ceased learning. In a lengthy apprenticeship, his stature grew and he absorbed lessons that would serve him well during more than two decades of national preeminence.2

  * * *

  On No
vember 10, 1759, Washington rose to deliver his maiden speech. With his height and natural dignity, he could command the chamber’s attention. He never spoke so long as to lose it.

  The matter was routine. A disabled soldier sought public assistance to support his wife and children. To review the petition, Speaker Robinson had appointed a committee of Washington and Francis Lightfoot Lee, one of six Lee brothers from Westmoreland County, all familiar to the Washingtons. On behalf of the committee, the new burgess advised his colleagues that the claim was truthful. He recommended a grant of £10, plus £5 in future years. His motion passed.3

  Four days later, the tall burgess for Frederick County reported on another soldier petition, one claiming back pay for eighteen months spent as a French prisoner. Washington recommended £32. His colleagues agreed. Washington served on another committee that reviewed a claim by a supplier to the Virginia Regiment, and participated in a ceremonial presentation to another soldier who had been imprisoned by the French. These modest legislative steps, reflecting his military experience, marked his beginning.4

  Washington’s next visible role came during a three-week session in October 1760. He carried a petition from former soldiers imprisoned by the French. Rather than continue to address such petitions piecemeal, the burgesses asked Governor Fauquier to award back pay to “all others who shall hereafter appear in the same circumstances.” Washington presented the request to the governor.5

  When the burgesses assembled in the following March, they knew that King George II’s death would prompt new elections. Expecting to face voters soon, many turned to matters of local importance. So did Washington. In the previous House session, Winchester residents had sought a law barring “hogs running at large.” Roaming pigs trampled property, broke into food stores, and defecated wherever they wished. When the hog-running petition returned in March 1761, the Committee on Propositions and Grievances, on which Washington sat, recommended rejection. Two weeks later, Washington presented the petition again and won its passage by the House, then carried it to the Executive Council. Alas, the council did not concur.6

  At that point, a higher power—likely Speaker Robinson—intervened. The bid to control Winchester’s swine rose from the ashes, repackaged with a new name and a new focus on public health: “A bill to preserve the water for the use of the inhabitants of the town of Winchester . . . by preventing hogs from running at large therein.” The new version of the bill, with its new title, went to a committee consisting of Washington and Edmund Pendleton, an adept lawyer and Robinson ally.

  Three days later, the water-quality legislation (formerly the hog-running bill) emerged in Pendleton’s capable hands. The House passed it. Washington again presented it to the Executive Council. This time all went well. The council embraced the rechristened measure and its new goal of water purity. The governor signed it on the session’s last day.7

  That was not Washington’s only legislative accomplishment for Frederick County that spring. He also won creation of a new town and authorization for a new ferry across the Potomac.8 He was acting like a man expecting an election challenge. Which he was.

  * * *

  Adam Stephen had been a friend. As a senior officer in the Virginia Regiment, Stephen defended Washington after the Fort Necessity debacle. Washington endorsed the Scot as his second-in-command. After Stephen succeeded Washington as commander, however, the friendship frayed. Questions circulated about Stephen’s honesty.9

  In 1761, Stephen was the senior officer at Fort Loudoun in Winchester, the position Washington had occupied during his 1758 election. Stephen used the political opportunities afforded by that position to campaign for the House of Burgesses. A month before the legislative session began, he was already said to be courting voters “incessantly . . . and with indefatigable pains.” Contrary to custom, Stephen made campaign promises, projecting business growth that would “diffuse gold and opulence through Frederick [County].” A Washington agent feared Stephen’s candidacy; he urged Washington to come and court the voters.10

  When the assembly adjourned, Washington headed west. He campaigned for himself and another Virginia Regiment veteran, George Mercer, who sought the seat being vacated by Lord Fairfax’s nephew. In early May, Washington canvassed voters at a cockfight and a wedding. He stopped by churches on Sunday mornings; on other days, he visited taverns. He paid for his brothers Jack and Sam to canvass for him, and reimbursed Mercer’s expenses too.11

  Washington betrayed his anxiety in a letter written three days before the election to the sheriff who would manage the poll, Van Swearingen. Washington enclosed a copy of a letter written by Stephen that supposedly disparaged the sheriff. Washington wrote that he had already “made a just and proper use” of the letter, adding, “I have the greatest reason to believe you can be no friend to a person of Colonel Stephen’s principles.”

  Then Washington flouted both Virginia statutes and rules of gentlemanly conduct. He insisted he would never ask the sheriff to favor him at the poll, then made precisely that request, observing that “could Mercer’s friends and mine be hurried in at the first of the Poll it might be an advantage.” Washington knew whereof he spoke. At the 1758 poll, the first ten men called to vote had been stout Washington loyalists, creating a bandwagon effect that drew later voters to Washington. With deep insincerity, Washington added that “as Sheriff I know you cannot appear in this, nor would I by any means have you do anything that can give so designing a man as Colo. Stevens the least trouble.” Washington’s meaning was clear.12

  On Election Day, Washington got what he had denied he was asking for. Of the first fourteen voters called by the sheriff, thirteen shouted their preference for Washington and Mercer. Indeed, the first six voters included Washington’s brothers and Mercer’s father. In the final tally, Washington led with 505 votes; Mercer followed with 400. Stephen trailed with 294. Washington had honored the first rule of politics: He won.13

  Stalking voters in Frederick County took a physical toll. For the next several months, Washington suffered with a “violent cold” and spells of fever. Though he was as strong as any man of his time, his illnesses are a reminder of how fragile health was in that pre-antibiotic era. He endured several lengthy afflictions that modern medicines likely would have dispatched easily.14 Despite a journey to Berkeley Springs for its supposedly healing mineral waters, six months after the poll Washington was still struggling to recover.15

  Even with his health dodgy, Washington had made important strides. Now a second-term burgess, he was no longer just an ex-soldier dabbling in politics. Within the House of Burgesses, he was not yet prominent; the hogs of Winchester had challenged his legislative skills. But, not yet thirty years old, he was making his way.

  * * *

  Over the next four years, the burgesses conducted eight sessions. Half were perfunctory, but the other four extended for periods ranging from three weeks to two months. Washington’s attendance at some sessions was interrupted by illness and plantation duties. He knew the House could proceed well enough without him. He continued to review soldier petitions for his colleagues and won creation of another new town. His brother Austin, only forty-two, died in May 1762, reinforcing the pattern of early death for Washington men—first his father, then Lawrence, now Austin.16

  Washington understood that he needed to move beyond his legislative apprenticeship. After four years in the House, he was ready to handle more than soldier petitions. His opportunity came after France, Spain, and Britain signed the Treaty of Paris in February 1763. News of the peace triggered jubilation in America. Not only soldiers had suffered in the long war. All colonists had endured inflation, trade restrictions, and higher taxes. With peace, Virginians expected prosperity, new western settlements, and lower taxes. Englishmen also anticipated reduced taxes and times of plenty. On neither side of the Atlantic did many think about where the money would come from to pay the war debts, nor were they concerned about what the
Indian tribes were thinking. Thus do troubles begin.17

  Washington, like most landowning Virginians, owed a lot of money. By 1761, his weak tobacco crops, combined with his splurges on British goods, plunged him nearly £2,000 into debt, which he secured by pledging cash belonging to his stepchildren. When his principal London agent urged him to pay up, Washington portrayed himself as “unlucky.” He grudgingly agreed to pay interest on the amount due. Despite his own debts, he still made loans to friends; a gentleman did not deny assistance to another gentleman.18

  Britain also was deep in the red. War spending had nearly doubled the nation’s debt; more than half the annual budget went to interest payments.19 The government resolved to reduce spending and increase revenues. The American frontier seemed a good place to scale back, beginning by cutting off gifts to the western tribes. That step quickly alienated tribes that were suffering from famine and epidemics and had grown accustomed to French generosity. Also, the Indians had long mistrusted the British hunger for land. The end of gifts was the final straw for several tribes. Through the summer of 1763, warrior bands again raided. In Frederick County, Washington found settlers once more fleeing east or huddling in the few forts still held by the British.20

  General Amherst, British commander in America, ordered a brutal response to what was named Pontiac’s Rebellion. “Destroy their huts and plantations,” read one order, “putting to death everyone of that nation that may fall into your hands.” Amherst wrote before another expedition, “I wish to hear of no prisoners.” By year’s end, the British had regained their forts, but they wanted peace, not more military expenses.21

  To secure that peace, King George III forbade further settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains. His Proclamation of 1763 infuriated Americans hoping to move west or (like Washington) to profit from frontier lands. Moreover, the ban could not be enforced. The colonial governments rarely knew where frontier settlers were and had no means of restraining them. Governor Fauquier warned that the proclamation would foster violence, not reduce it. The new policy struck directly at Washington and the first Virginia recruits in the war against France. Those veterans expected to divide 200,000 acres that Governor Dinwiddie had promised nine years before, but the king’s proclamation threw that promise into doubt.22