Washington - A Life Part 12

Adding grandeur to the west side was an octagonal cupola, surmounted by a weathervane, figured as the Dove of Peace, with a green olive branch in its black beak. It was a powerful statement from the former commander in chief, a silent prayer for peace. The gracious quality of Mount Vernon in the 1780s surely owed something to Was.h.i.+ngton's desire for a restful atmosphere after the backbreaking years of combat.

The man who won American independence nonetheless remained in thrall to British fas.h.i.+on. When he told Samuel Vaughan of his desire to redo the New Room in stucco, he added an anxious aside, as if seeking urgent confirmation-"which, if I understood you right, is the present taste in England." 6 6 On the slope between the piazza and the river, Was.h.i.+ngton laid out a deer park in the English style, with a mixed herd of English and American deer-an innovation that forced him to reduce hunting nearby, since foxhounds might have scared them away. He also tried to follow the English fas.h.i.+on of planting "live fences" or hedgerows instead of standard wooden fences. Along the sinuous drives, he laid out a formal English landscape, fragrant with groves, shrubs, and extensive pleasure gardens that invited strollers to enter and wander. His garrulous German gardener told anyone who cared to listen that he had served as gardener to the kings of Prussia and of England. Forming the ornamental centerpiece of the gardens was a handsome brick greenhouse with seven tall, narrow windows that spanned almost the entire wall. An uncommon structure in rural Virginia, this enclosure enabled Was.h.i.+ngton to grow palm trees and semitropical plants as well as lemons, limes, and oranges. In the surrounding meadows he selected trees with a discerning artistic eye, and in the springtime the estate was radiant with the bloom of peach, cherry, apple, apricot, lilac, and dogwood blossoms. On the slope between the piazza and the river, Was.h.i.+ngton laid out a deer park in the English style, with a mixed herd of English and American deer-an innovation that forced him to reduce hunting nearby, since foxhounds might have scared them away. He also tried to follow the English fas.h.i.+on of planting "live fences" or hedgerows instead of standard wooden fences. Along the sinuous drives, he laid out a formal English landscape, fragrant with groves, shrubs, and extensive pleasure gardens that invited strollers to enter and wander. His garrulous German gardener told anyone who cared to listen that he had served as gardener to the kings of Prussia and of England. Forming the ornamental centerpiece of the gardens was a handsome brick greenhouse with seven tall, narrow windows that spanned almost the entire wall. An uncommon structure in rural Virginia, this enclosure enabled Was.h.i.+ngton to grow palm trees and semitropical plants as well as lemons, limes, and oranges. In the surrounding meadows he selected trees with a discerning artistic eye, and in the springtime the estate was radiant with the bloom of peach, cherry, apple, apricot, lilac, and dogwood blossoms.

All this display impressed visitors, often wrongly, with the magnitude of the owner's wealth. When one English merchant toured Mount Vernon in 1785, he stumbled into this understandable error: Was.h.i.+ngton's "gardens and pleasure grounds . . . were very extensive . . . He is allowed to be one of the best informed as well as successful planters in America."7 Was.h.i.+ngton was indeed well informed, but his success was more problematic. The merchant would have been shocked to hear Was.h.i.+ngton grumble that year that "to be plain, my coffers are not overflowing with money." Was.h.i.+ngton was indeed well informed, but his success was more problematic. The merchant would have been shocked to hear Was.h.i.+ngton grumble that year that "to be plain, my coffers are not overflowing with money."8 Unable to curtail his free-handed spending and with his crops faring poorly, he started out 1786 with a paltry eighty-six pounds in cash. Unable to curtail his free-handed spending and with his crops faring poorly, he started out 1786 with a paltry eighty-six pounds in cash.

Although Was.h.i.+ngton delegated authority to managers and overseers, he never really developed a right-hand man or someone equivalent to him in power. Even after George Augustine Was.h.i.+ngton succeeded Lund, Was.h.i.+ngton kept a tightfisted grip on operations, monitoring them through weekly reports, a process so rigorous that some detected a military mentality at work. Senator William Maclay later wrote of Mount Vernon as regimented to the point of madness: "It is under different overseers. Who may be styled generals . . . The Friday of every week is appointed for the overseers, or we will say brigadier generals, to make up their returns. Not a day's work but is noted what, by whom, and where done; not a cow calves or ewe drops her lamb but is registered . . . Thus the etiquette and arrangement of an army is preserved on his farm."9 To repair his damaged finances, Was.h.i.+ngton set out for his western holdings in September 1784, hoping to retrieve lost rents. He was accompanied by Dr. Craik and his son, his nephew Bushrod Was.h.i.+ngton, and three slaves. He had never ceased to be a prophet of the pristine Ohio Country, declaring during the Revolution that there was "no finer country in the known world than is encircled by the Ohio, Mississippi, and Great Lakes."10 On the basis of prewar patents, Was.h.i.+ngton claimed thirty thousand western acres, with survey rights to an additional ten thousand. On an abstract level, Was.h.i.+ngton portrayed the western lands as a new American Eden, telling the Reverend John Witherspoon, a Presbyterian minister and president of the College of New Jersey, that "it would give me pleasure to see these lands seated by particular societies or religious sectaries with their pastors." On the basis of prewar patents, Was.h.i.+ngton claimed thirty thousand western acres, with survey rights to an additional ten thousand. On an abstract level, Was.h.i.+ngton portrayed the western lands as a new American Eden, telling the Reverend John Witherspoon, a Presbyterian minister and president of the College of New Jersey, that "it would give me pleasure to see these lands seated by particular societies or religious sectaries with their pastors."11 When it came to his actual behavior as a landlord, however, Was.h.i.+ngton never ascended to these giddy rhetorical heights and could sound like a downright skinflint. When it came to his actual behavior as a landlord, however, Was.h.i.+ngton never ascended to these giddy rhetorical heights and could sound like a downright skinflint.

The early postwar years witnessed a mad and often lawless scramble for western lands, and many settlers had little regard for eastern landlords who claimed their property. Throughout the Revolution Was.h.i.+ngton received reports of squatters occupying his land while legitimate tenants fell behind on payments. At first, inclining toward leniency, he said that those squatters who improved the land should be allowed to stay at reasonable rents. Giving them the benefit of the doubt, he said they might have inadvertently settled the land without realizing it was his. By the summer of 1784, however, he had lost all patience. Western rents had become his main source of revenue, and he decided to take matters into his own hands by personally dunning recalcitrant tenants. Less than a year after laying down his commission at Annapolis, the American Cincinnatus, badly strapped for cash, was reduced to a bill collector.

For this rugged journey across the Appalachian Mountains, Was.h.i.+ngton loaded up the horses with a large tent, camp utensils, a boat, medicine, and hooks and lines for fis.h.i.+ng. He retraced the footsteps of earlier journeys into the western country, a landscape rife with youthful memories, including the march with Braddock's army. Still a fearless traveler, he didn't shrink from roughing it-at one campsite he slept under nothing but his cloak in a torrential downpour-but his diaries contain more references to fatigue than in earlier years as well as to rain running in rivulets down the trails.

A man of strongly fixed enthusiasms, Was.h.i.+ngton was also bent on reviving his long-standing but stalled project of improving the Potomac River navigation. He was still bedazzled by the vision of a watery gateway to the Ohio Valley that ran right by his home. When he arrived at Berkeley Springs, he came under the sway of a gifted inventor endowed with glib patter, James Rumsey, who had devised a mechanical boat that could churn upstream against the current. Always open to innovation, Was.h.i.+ngton was beguiled by Rumsey's craft. Spying a way to promote Potomac traffic, he did more than pay lip service to this device: he issued a written endors.e.m.e.nt for Rumsey, vouching that he had actually seen his ungainly invention move upstream against the current.

When Was.h.i.+ngton stopped at his property at Great Meadows, scene of the Fort Necessity debacle, he made no reference in his diary to its b.l.o.o.d.y history. As before the war, he scrutinized the western frontier with the coolly appraising eyes of a landlord. He seemed exclusively concerned with the meadow's commercial value, commenting that it would make "a very good stand for a tavern. Much hay may be cut here when the ground is laid down in gra.s.s and the upland, east of the meadow, is good for grain."12 Unsentimental about property, he ordered his local agent to rent the tract "for the most you can get for the term of ten years." Unsentimental about property, he ordered his local agent to rent the tract "for the most you can get for the term of ten years."13 In this wilderness area, Was.h.i.+ngton's fame counted for little and even exposed him to heightened danger. Protecting it as their rightful territory, Indians had engaged in violent confrontations with settlers on the northwest side of the Ohio River. Congress had banned settlers from this region, but speculators were still drawn by visions of colossal land grabs. "Men in these times talk with as much facility of fifty, a hundred, and even 500,000 acres as a gentleman formerly would do of 1,000 acres," noted Was.h.i.+ngton, who sounded sympathetic to Indian grievances. 14 14 Upon hearing stories of murdered settlers, he canceled a scheduled trip down the Ohio. "Had you proceeded on your tour down the river," one adviser told him, "I believe it would have been attended with the most dreadful consequences." The Indians had seized General James Wilkinson under the mistaken impression that he was Was.h.i.+ngton, and only with "much difficulty of persuasion and gifts" had he escaped. Upon hearing stories of murdered settlers, he canceled a scheduled trip down the Ohio. "Had you proceeded on your tour down the river," one adviser told him, "I believe it would have been attended with the most dreadful consequences." The Indians had seized General James Wilkinson under the mistaken impression that he was Was.h.i.+ngton, and only with "much difficulty of persuasion and gifts" had he escaped.15 To Was.h.i.+ngton's consternation, the violent clashes with Indians prevented him from visiting his extensive bounty lands on the Ohio and Great Kanawha rivers-lots measured not in feet but in miles-which were being brazenly offered for sale by speculators as far away as Europe. To Was.h.i.+ngton's consternation, the violent clashes with Indians prevented him from visiting his extensive bounty lands on the Ohio and Great Kanawha rivers-lots measured not in feet but in miles-which were being brazenly offered for sale by speculators as far away as Europe.

On September 14 Was.h.i.+ngton had his first encounter with the families that had allegedly invaded his property Millers Run (not far from today's Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, southwest of Pittsburgh). While Was.h.i.+ngton's deputy, William Crawford, had surveyed the property as early as 1771, squatters contended that they had come upon an empty tract and occupied it before the patent was granted. If Was.h.i.+ngton expected special deference in these remote mountain hollows, he quickly learned otherwise. On the frontier, he did not enjoy the veneration he did back east, a rowdy new democratic culture having taken root.

As he bargained with poor, defiant settlers, members of a dissenting Presbyterian sect, Was.h.i.+ngton sounded a different note from his rhapsodic speech to John Witherspoon about seeding the West with religious sects or from his grandiloquent boast to Lafayette that Congress had "opened the fertile plains of the Ohio to the poor, the needy, and the oppressed of the earth."16 After his first meeting with the Reed family, Was.h.i.+ngton noted sarcastically their effort "to discover all the flaws they could in my deed and to establish a fair and upright intention in themselves." After his first meeting with the Reed family, Was.h.i.+ngton noted sarcastically their effort "to discover all the flaws they could in my deed and to establish a fair and upright intention in themselves."17 At their next meeting the tone turned even more confrontational. To settle the controversy, the Reeds offered to buy the land but balked at the steep price quoted by Was.h.i.+ngton. The standoff ended acrimoniously; the family decided to sue him, and Was.h.i.+ngton threatened to evict them. Reed family legend contended that a tetchy Was.h.i.+ngton responded "with dignity and some warmth, a.s.serting that they had been forewarned by his agent, and the nature of his claim fully made known; that there could be no doubt of its validity, and rising from his seat and holding a red silk handkerchief by one corner, he said, 'Gentlemen, I will have this land just as surely as I now have this handkerchief.'" At their next meeting the tone turned even more confrontational. To settle the controversy, the Reeds offered to buy the land but balked at the steep price quoted by Was.h.i.+ngton. The standoff ended acrimoniously; the family decided to sue him, and Was.h.i.+ngton threatened to evict them. Reed family legend contended that a tetchy Was.h.i.+ngton responded "with dignity and some warmth, a.s.serting that they had been forewarned by his agent, and the nature of his claim fully made known; that there could be no doubt of its validity, and rising from his seat and holding a red silk handkerchief by one corner, he said, 'Gentlemen, I will have this land just as surely as I now have this handkerchief.'"18 The lawsuit wound bitterly through the courts for two years before Was.h.i.+ngton emerged victorious. Conciliatory in victory, he permitted the squatters to lease the property instead of evicting them. The lawsuit wound bitterly through the courts for two years before Was.h.i.+ngton emerged victorious. Conciliatory in victory, he permitted the squatters to lease the property instead of evicting them.

By October 4 Was.h.i.+ngton had completed his 680-mile trip, which proved his last visit to the Ohio Country. While the dispiriting journey had failed to satisfy his economic objectives, it sharpened his views of policies needed to develop the region. He saw how fickle were the loyalties of the western settlers and how easily they might be lured someday by a designing foreign power. Since Spain had obstructed American commerce on the Mississippi River, Was.h.i.+ngton thought the United States could cement its grip on these inhabitants by offering them navigable waterways to the eastern seaboard, preferably through Virginia, creating "a smooth way for the produce of that country to pa.s.s to our markets before the trade may get into another channel."19 He believed that "commercial connections, of all others, are most difficult to dissolve," which foreshadowed his faith as president in enduring commercial rather than political ties with other countries . He believed that "commercial connections, of all others, are most difficult to dissolve," which foreshadowed his faith as president in enduring commercial rather than political ties with other countries .20 He also feared that thirteen squabbling states would be powerless to act in a timely fas.h.i.+on as the world was being swiftly reshaped on the western frontier. He also feared that thirteen squabbling states would be powerless to act in a timely fas.h.i.+on as the world was being swiftly reshaped on the western frontier.

FAR MORE GRATIFYING TO WAs.h.i.+NGTON than bullying hardscrabble farmers was his attempt to modernize postwar agriculture at Mount Vernon. He found farming congenial to his temperament and talked about it with undisguised relish, but he sometimes sounded more like a yeoman farmer, toiling by the sweat of his brow, than the master of a vast slave plantation. In 1788 he wrote that "the life of a husbandman, of all others, is the most delectable . . . To see plants rise from the earth and flourish by the superior skill and bounty of the laborer fills a contemplative mind with ideas which are more easy to be conceived than expressed."21 Many dinner guests noted that Was.h.i.+ngton's flagging attention perked up whenever agriculture was discussed. Farming was a safe topic for him, deflecting conversation from political controversy, but it also ranked as a genuine pa.s.sion. "Indeed, I am told that he feels more animation and throws off more of his natural phlegm when conversing on that topic than on any other," a young British diplomat later noted. Many dinner guests noted that Was.h.i.+ngton's flagging attention perked up whenever agriculture was discussed. Farming was a safe topic for him, deflecting conversation from political controversy, but it also ranked as a genuine pa.s.sion. "Indeed, I am told that he feels more animation and throws off more of his natural phlegm when conversing on that topic than on any other," a young British diplomat later noted.22 Was.h.i.+ngton liked to affect a patrician tone about farming, as if it were merely an amusing pastime, but his livelihood depended upon it. His fascination with scientific agriculture was spurred initially by an urgent practical need: to figure out what to do with soil depleted by tobacco cultivation. He believed devoutly that American agriculture had to change and looked toward England as the model to emulate. "It may not in this place be amiss to observe to you that I still decline the growth of tobacco," he wrote to George William Fairfax in 1785, "and to add that it is my intention to raise as little Indian corn as may be. In a word, that I am desirous of entering upon a compleat course of husbandry as practiced in the best farming counties of England."23 A curious boast coming from George Was.h.i.+ngton. With a genuine yearning for agricultural reform, he experimented with different seeds, grafted fruit trees, tested grapes for a homegrown Virginia wine, and collected cuttings from friends. Not to be outdone by Jefferson, he also devised a new agricultural plow that could seed and harrow fields at the same time. This was the golden age of amateur gentlemen scientists, and when Was.h.i.+ngton wanted to learn whether spermaceti candles or tallow candles were cheaper, he set up an experiment, recorded how long it took each type to burn, then computed that spermaceti candles were more than twice as expensive as tallow. A curious boast coming from George Was.h.i.+ngton. With a genuine yearning for agricultural reform, he experimented with different seeds, grafted fruit trees, tested grapes for a homegrown Virginia wine, and collected cuttings from friends. Not to be outdone by Jefferson, he also devised a new agricultural plow that could seed and harrow fields at the same time. This was the golden age of amateur gentlemen scientists, and when Was.h.i.+ngton wanted to learn whether spermaceti candles or tallow candles were cheaper, he set up an experiment, recorded how long it took each type to burn, then computed that spermaceti candles were more than twice as expensive as tallow.

During the 1780s, with agricultural prices depressed, Was.h.i.+ngton found it hard to make any headway as a farmer. In November 1785 he told George William Fairfax that he never viewed his plantations "without seeing something which makes me regret having [continued] so long in the ruinous mode of farming which we are in."24 The following year, perplexed by what to do, he launched an important correspondence with a renowned English agronomist, Arthur Young, who sent him his four-volume The following year, perplexed by what to do, he launched an important correspondence with a renowned English agronomist, Arthur Young, who sent him his four-volume Annals of Agriculture Annals of Agriculture. Candid about his own inadequacies as a farmer, Was.h.i.+ngton asked for advice about more than just the ruinous practices and backward farm implements at Mount Vernon. Rather, he saw the agricultural system of the whole country as bogged down in outdated methods and was especially critical of Virginia planters who exhausted their soil with endless rounds of tobacco, Indian corn, and wheat. Deciding to conserve his soil through crop rotation, Was.h.i.+ngton ordered a variety of new seeds from Young-including cabbage, turnips, rye, and hop clover-and under Young's tutelage eventually planted sixty different crops at Mount Vernon. A severe drought and a boll weevil infestation drastically cut his wheat yield in 1787. Nonetheless, determined to rotate his crops, he had by 1789 planted wheat, barley, oats, rye, clover, timothy, buckwheat, Indian corn, pumpkins, potatoes, turnips, peas, and flax. As president, he lent the prestige of his office to espousing a national board of agriculture that could diffuse scientific information to farmers.

In 1788 Was.h.i.+ngton commenced work on a two-story brick and timber barn, a hundred feet long, which would be "the largest and most convenient one in this country," as he bragged.25 This ma.s.sive construction project taxed the resources of Mount Vernon, where all 40,000 bricks were made; more than 35,000 board feet of pine planks and 100,000 juniper s.h.i.+ngles were bought ready-made. Was.h.i.+ngton intended to store his grain and other crops in this commodious structure. "The barn is so well planned that a man can fill the racks with hay or potatoes easily and without any danger," noted Brissot de Warville, who appreciated the novelty of both barn and barnyard, which "were innovations in Virginia, where they have no barns and do not store fodder for cattle." This ma.s.sive construction project taxed the resources of Mount Vernon, where all 40,000 bricks were made; more than 35,000 board feet of pine planks and 100,000 juniper s.h.i.+ngles were bought ready-made. Was.h.i.+ngton intended to store his grain and other crops in this commodious structure. "The barn is so well planned that a man can fill the racks with hay or potatoes easily and without any danger," noted Brissot de Warville, who appreciated the novelty of both barn and barnyard, which "were innovations in Virginia, where they have no barns and do not store fodder for cattle."26 Starting in 1792, Was.h.i.+ngton also erected a specialized sixteen-sided barn for thres.h.i.+ng wheat. As horses circled around the barn at a trot, trampling the wheat, the grain fell cleanly between gaps in the wooden floorboards to a granary on the lower level. Starting in 1792, Was.h.i.+ngton also erected a specialized sixteen-sided barn for thres.h.i.+ng wheat. As horses circled around the barn at a trot, trampling the wheat, the grain fell cleanly between gaps in the wooden floorboards to a granary on the lower level.

Always musing about the future of American agriculture, Was.h.i.+ngton introduced ingenious innovations at a merchant gristmill that he had first installed at his Dogue Run farm in the early 1770s. He recruited a Delaware inventor, Oliver Evans, who had figured out a way to automate all the mill elements through gears and conveyor belts. Powered by a sixteen-foot waterwheel, the mill hoisted the grain by buckets, ground it, then spread the high-quality flour to cool before it was poured into barrels for export. The sheer variety of business activities at Mount Vernon would make President Was.h.i.+ngton as receptive to the manufacturing visions of an Alexander Hamilton as to the agrarian dreams of a Thomas Jefferson.

Perhaps nothing better ill.u.s.trated Was.h.i.+ngton's pioneering farm work than his development of the American mule, a hardy animal representing a cross between a male donkey (also called a jack) and a female horse. Mules were less fragile than horses but more docile than donkeys and cheap to maintain. Before Was.h.i.+ngton championed these creatures, they had hardly existed in the country. He started breeding them when he received a gray jack from the king of Spain called Royal Gift and a black jack called Knight of Malta from Lafayette. Royal Gift was big and lumbering but lacking in animal spark, whereas Knight of Malta was small but l.u.s.ty. Was.h.i.+ngton cunningly bred the two animals and ended up with a jack known as Compound that merged the size of Royal Gift with the feisty nature of Knight of Malta. After some early difficulties, the resulting donkeys settled down and performed their duties, producing fifty-seven mules at Mount Vernon by century's end and enabling Was.h.i.+ngton to realize his hope to "secure a race of extraordinary goodness that will stock the country."27 In addition to his better-known t.i.tle of Father of His Country, Was.h.i.+ngton is also revered in certain circles as the Father of the American Mule. In addition to his better-known t.i.tle of Father of His Country, Was.h.i.+ngton is also revered in certain circles as the Father of the American Mule.

CHAPTER FORTY.

Devil's Bargain FOR ALL THE TALK of agricultural modernity at Mount Vernon, there was something unreal about the entire topic for a plantation economy premised on that most antiquated and repressive of systems: slavery. As the most glaring negation of the American Revolution's ideals, slavery was bound to ignite controversy after the war. All the talk of liberty clashed with the reality of widespread bondage. Slavery posed the supreme challenge to the ideas that Was.h.i.+ngton had imbibed during the war and tested the p.r.o.nouncements about peace and understanding that permeated his postwar correspondence. For the Marquis de Lafayette, the notion that an independent America would tolerate slavery was more than a contradiction in terms: it was anathema to everything he believed. As he told British abolitionist Thomas Clarkson, "I would never have drawn my sword in the cause of America if I could have conceived that thereby I was founding a land of slavery."1 So profoundly in earnest was Lafayette that Clarkson called him "as uncompromising an enemy of the slave trade and slavery as any man I ever knew." So profoundly in earnest was Lafayette that Clarkson called him "as uncompromising an enemy of the slave trade and slavery as any man I ever knew."2 As early as February 5, 1783, Lafayette made it overwhelmingly clear in a letter to Was.h.i.+ngton that his idol couldn't evade this touchy subject: "Permit me to propose a plan to you which might become greatly beneficial to the black part of mankind. Let us unite in purchasing a small estate where we may try the experiment to free the Negroes and use them only as tenants."3 As he pointed out, Was.h.i.+ngton's sterling reputation could make this revolutionary act "general practice" in the United States. As he pointed out, Was.h.i.+ngton's sterling reputation could make this revolutionary act "general practice" in the United States.4 As impulsive as Was.h.i.+ngton was cautious, Lafayette gloried in his iconoclasm. "If it be a wild scheme," he maintained, "I had rather be mad that way than to be thought wise on the other tack." As impulsive as Was.h.i.+ngton was cautious, Lafayette gloried in his iconoclasm. "If it be a wild scheme," he maintained, "I had rather be mad that way than to be thought wise on the other tack."5 Lafayette's abolitionism may have been influenced by his wartime a.s.sociation with James Armistead, a slave who served under him in Virginia and operated as a valuable spy, infiltrating the British lines under the guise of being an escaped slave. Lafayette's abolitionism may have been influenced by his wartime a.s.sociation with James Armistead, a slave who served under him in Virginia and operated as a valuable spy, infiltrating the British lines under the guise of being an escaped slave.

When Was.h.i.+ngton received Lafayette's letter, the war was winding down and he was dwelling on his impaired finances. His economic well-being depended on slavery, so that whatever his theoretical sympathy with Lafayette's idea, he could not have been thrilled by the timing. Not wanting to disillusion his wors.h.i.+pful protege, he replied the way a fond father might write to an ardent but impractical son: "The scheme, my dear Marq[ui]s, which you propose as a precedent to encourage the emanc.i.p.ation of the black people of this country . . . is a striking evidence of the benevolence of your heart. I shall be happy to join you in so laudable a work, but will defer going into detail of the business till I have the pleasure of seeing you."6 This was Was.h.i.+ngton's canny way of crediting Lafayette's n.o.ble project while also sidestepping any specific commitment to it. This was Was.h.i.+ngton's canny way of crediting Lafayette's n.o.ble project while also sidestepping any specific commitment to it.

At his home in Paris, Lafayette flaunted his ties to the American Revolution, posting a portrait of Was.h.i.+ngton and American flags on the walls. His infatuation did not cool with time. He seemed to live in an eternal, high-flown rapture with Was.h.i.+ngton and wrote to him in language that was almost ecstatic. In one letter he labeled Was.h.i.+ngton "the savior of his country, the benefactor of mankind, the protecting angel of liberty, the pride of America, and the admiration of the two hemispheres"-all in a single sentence.7 After the war Was.h.i.+ngton was powerfully tempted to go to Paris, especially when a French n.o.bleman a.s.sured him that King Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette had "expressed their desire to be acquainted with the circ.u.mstances of a life which has so much contributed to the liberty of your country." After the war Was.h.i.+ngton was powerfully tempted to go to Paris, especially when a French n.o.bleman a.s.sured him that King Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette had "expressed their desire to be acquainted with the circ.u.mstances of a life which has so much contributed to the liberty of your country."8 Was.h.i.+ngton felt the full force of this royal favor, which he labeled "one of the most flattering incidents" of his life. Was.h.i.+ngton felt the full force of this royal favor, which he labeled "one of the most flattering incidents" of his life.9 When Lafayette pleaded with him to visit France, Was.h.i.+ngton had to rule it out because of his financial plight and because Martha was "too far advanced in life and is too much immersed in the care of her little progeny to cross the Atlantic." Writing like a pious hermit instead of a world-renowned general, Was.h.i.+ngton urged Lafayette and his wife to travel to Mount Vernon "and call my cottage your home . . . You will see the plain manner in which we live and meet the rustic civility. And you shall taste the simplicity of rural life." When Lafayette pleaded with him to visit France, Was.h.i.+ngton had to rule it out because of his financial plight and because Martha was "too far advanced in life and is too much immersed in the care of her little progeny to cross the Atlantic." Writing like a pious hermit instead of a world-renowned general, Was.h.i.+ngton urged Lafayette and his wife to travel to Mount Vernon "and call my cottage your home . . . You will see the plain manner in which we live and meet the rustic civility. And you shall taste the simplicity of rural life."10 Nothing could stop Lafayette's triumphant return to America. While projecting a trip there in the spring of 1783, he wrote to Was.h.i.+ngton in a typical burst of enthusiasm, "Happy, ten times happy will I be in embracing my dear general, my father, my best friend."11 Not until the following March did Lafayette a.s.sure Was.h.i.+ngton that, before the summer was out, "you will see a vessel coming up [the] Potomac, and out of that vessel will your friend jump with a panting heart and all the feelings of perfect happiness." Not until the following March did Lafayette a.s.sure Was.h.i.+ngton that, before the summer was out, "you will see a vessel coming up [the] Potomac, and out of that vessel will your friend jump with a panting heart and all the feelings of perfect happiness."12 Was.h.i.+ngton responded with grat.i.tude to the buckets of Gallic charm that Lafayette poured over his head at every turn. Was.h.i.+ngton responded with grat.i.tude to the buckets of Gallic charm that Lafayette poured over his head at every turn.

Upon arriving at Mount Vernon in August 1784, Lafayette was delighted to find a group portrait of himself and his family in an honored place in the parlor. He bore a cherished gift from Paris, a Masonic ap.r.o.n that Adrienne had embroidered for the general. Lafayette was instantly entranced by Nelly and Washy. "The general has adopted them and loves them deeply," he told his wife. "It was quite funny when I arrived to see the curious looks on those two small faces who had heard nothing but talk of me the entire day and wanted to see if I looked like my portrait."13 Finding Was.h.i.+ngton busy but relaxed, Lafayette delighted in his company and treasured their dinner conversations, when they swapped wartime anecdotes. Was.h.i.+ngton guided him around the grounds and quizzed him about European flowers that might flourish there. All the while the vexed question of slavery hung heavily in the air. Earlier in the summer, during William Gordon's two-week stay, Was.h.i.+ngton had admitted to a desire to be rid of his slaves and mentioned Lafayette's abolitionist plans. "I should rejoice beyond measure could your joint counsels and influence produce it," Gordon responded, "and thereby give the finis.h.i.+ng stroke and the last polish to your political characters."14 Unfortunately, we don't know the specifics of the conversation between Was.h.i.+ngton and Lafayette about slavery. When Lafayette encountered James Madison, the former said he was now gripped by three obsessions: the French-American alliance, the unity of the thirteen states, and "the manumission of the slaves." Unfortunately, we don't know the specifics of the conversation between Was.h.i.+ngton and Lafayette about slavery. When Lafayette encountered James Madison, the former said he was now gripped by three obsessions: the French-American alliance, the unity of the thirteen states, and "the manumission of the slaves."15 Madison, a large slave owner, wrote to Jefferson, another large slave owner, that Lafayette's position on slavery "does him real honor, as it is a proof of his humanity." Madison, a large slave owner, wrote to Jefferson, another large slave owner, that Lafayette's position on slavery "does him real honor, as it is a proof of his humanity."16 After the Revolution it was unquestionably fas.h.i.+onable to utter such high-minded sentiments, but talk was cheap and direct action was quite another matter. After the Revolution it was unquestionably fas.h.i.+onable to utter such high-minded sentiments, but talk was cheap and direct action was quite another matter.

While in Richmond, Lafayette had a consequential encounter with James Armistead, the handsome, round-faced slave who had gallantly a.s.sisted him during the war. To help him sue for his freedom, Lafayette furnished him with an affidavit that testified to his valor: "His intelligence from the enemy's camp were industriously collected and most faithfully delivered."17 Not only did Armistead win his freedom and a pension from the legislature (which also compensated his master), but he changed his name in grat.i.tude to James Armistead Lafayette. Not only did Armistead win his freedom and a pension from the legislature (which also compensated his master), but he changed his name in grat.i.tude to James Armistead Lafayette.

Since Lafayette was slated to return to France in December, Was.h.i.+ngton, in a loving gesture, volunteered to escort him to his s.h.i.+p in New York-the first time he had ventured out of state since the war. When they reached Annapolis, however, the two men found themselves trapped in such a tedious round of receptions that Was.h.i.+ngton dreaded the ovations yet to come in Philadelphia and New York. So one day in early December, Was.h.i.+ngton and Lafayette gave each other an affectionate farewell hug and climbed into their respective carriages. Afterward, in an affecting letter that showed his powerful, if often suppressed, need for intimacy and how he equated Lafayette with his own lost youth, Was.h.i.+ngton told Lafayette of his turbulent emotions at their parting: In the moment of our separation upon the road, as I traveled and every hour since, I felt all that love, respect, and attachment for you with which length of years, close connection, and your merits have inspired me. I often asked myself, as our carriages distended, whether that was the last sight I ever should have of you? And tho[ugh] I wished to say no, my fears answered yes. I called to mind the days of my youth and found they had long since fled to return no more; that I was now descending the hill I had been 52 years climbing; and that tho[ugh] I was blessed with a good const.i.tution, I was of a short-lived family and might soon expect to be entombed in the dreary mansions of my father's. These things darkened the shades and gave a gloom to the picture, consequently to my prospects of seeing you again. But I will not repine-I have had my day.18 One of Was.h.i.+ngton's premonitions in these melancholy musings proved correct: he never set eyes on Lafayette again.

Back in France, Lafayette showered Was.h.i.+ngton with gifts, including seven hounds sent in the custody of John Quincy Adams. He also sent along French pheasants and nightingales, which Was.h.i.+ngton had never seen before. All the while, Lafayette perfected his manumission scheme and acted on it the next year with breathtaking speed. He bought a large sugar plantation in Cayenne (French Guiana), on the South American coast, which came with nearly seventy slaves. He promptly began to educate and emanc.i.p.ate them, paying wages to those old enough to work, providing schooling for the children, and banning the sale of human beings. To make this scheme self-perpetuating, Lafayette instructed his agent to keep on adding more lands and freeing more slaves.

In congratulating him, Was.h.i.+ngton displayed enormous admiration while again shrinking from any firm commitment to a comparable project: "The benevolence of your heart, my dear Marquis, is so conspicuous upon all occasions that I never wonder at any fresh proofs of it. But your late purchase of an estate in the colony of Cayenne, with a view of emanc.i.p.ating the slaves on it, is a generous and n.o.ble proof of your humanity. Would to G.o.d a like spirit would diffuse itself generally into the minds of the people of this country, but I despair of seeing it."19 To set the slaves "afloat" abruptly, he feared, would "be productive of much inconvenience and mischief, but by degrees it certainly might, and a.s.suredly ought to be effected and that, too, by legislative authority." To set the slaves "afloat" abruptly, he feared, would "be productive of much inconvenience and mischief, but by degrees it certainly might, and a.s.suredly ought to be effected and that, too, by legislative authority."20 The news of Lafayette's feat came as Was.h.i.+ngton was being prodded to take a public stand on abolis.h.i.+ng slavery. Before the war it had required an act of the royal governor and his council to free a slave. Then in 1782 a new law gave masters permission to free their own slaves, and hundreds manumitted at least a few. Influenced by the Revolution, antislavery societies sprang up across Virginia. In 1785 the Virginia legislature debated whether freed slaves should be permitted to stay in the state-something that might give their enslaved brethren seditious ideas-and abolitionist pet.i.tions were introduced. Was.h.i.+ngton became the target of a subtle but persistent campaign by abolitionists to enlist him in their cause. When Elkanah Watson visited Mount Vernon in January 1785, he bore books on emanc.i.p.ation written by British abolitionist Granville Sharpe, founder of the African colony of Sierra Leone. And then there were people such as Robert Pleasants, a Virginia Quaker who liberated seventy-eight of his slaves and proclaimed that Was.h.i.+ngton's failure to follow suit would leave an everlasting stain on his reputation.

That May, Thomas c.o.ke and Francis Asbury, two eminent Methodist ministers, brought to Mount Vernon an emanc.i.p.ation pet.i.tion that they planned to introduce in the Virginia legislature. Although Was.h.i.+ngton refrained from signing it, he voiced "his opinion against slavery," Asbury recorded in his diary, and promised to write a letter supporting the measure if it ever came to a vote.21 This typified Was.h.i.+ngton's ambivalent approach to slavery in the 1780s: he privately made no secret of his disdain for the inst.i.tution, but neither did he have the courage to broadcast his views or act on them publicly. After endorsing abolition, he shunted direct action onto other shoulders. Amid a blistering debate, the c.o.ke-Asbury pet.i.tion failed in the Virginia House of Delegates that November, with Madison reporting to Was.h.i.+ngton, "A motion was made to throw it under the table, which was treated with as much indignation on one side, as the pet.i.tion itself was on the other." This typified Was.h.i.+ngton's ambivalent approach to slavery in the 1780s: he privately made no secret of his disdain for the inst.i.tution, but neither did he have the courage to broadcast his views or act on them publicly. After endorsing abolition, he shunted direct action onto other shoulders. Amid a blistering debate, the c.o.ke-Asbury pet.i.tion failed in the Virginia House of Delegates that November, with Madison reporting to Was.h.i.+ngton, "A motion was made to throw it under the table, which was treated with as much indignation on one side, as the pet.i.tion itself was on the other."22 Such fierce emotions must have given pause to Was.h.i.+ngton, if he harbored any unspoken thoughts about a future return to the political arena. Such fierce emotions must have given pause to Was.h.i.+ngton, if he harbored any unspoken thoughts about a future return to the political arena.

Was.h.i.+ngton's quandary over slavery was thrown into high relief by a visit on April 9, 1786, from a local slave owner, Philip Dalby, who had recently traveled to Philadelphia with his slave, a mulatto waiter named Frank. After Frank was spirited away by a team of Quaker abolitionists, Dalby filed suit in the Pennsylvania a.s.sembly and, to drum up support, placed a shrill ad in the Alexandria newspaper, warning planters about the "insidious" work of Philadelphia Quakers.23 Incensed over the incident, Was.h.i.+ngton dashed off a strongly worded letter to his Philadelphia friend Robert Morris that expressed no sympathy for the Quakers, decrying instead their "acts of tyranny and oppression." Incensed over the incident, Was.h.i.+ngton dashed off a strongly worded letter to his Philadelphia friend Robert Morris that expressed no sympathy for the Quakers, decrying instead their "acts of tyranny and oppression."24 Unless these practices ceased, he warned, "none of those whose Unless these practices ceased, he warned, "none of those whose misfortune misfortune it is to have slaves as attendants will visit the city if they can possibly avoid it, because by so doing they hazard their property or they must be at the expense . . . of providing servants of another description for the trip." it is to have slaves as attendants will visit the city if they can possibly avoid it, because by so doing they hazard their property or they must be at the expense . . . of providing servants of another description for the trip."25 This wasn't the only time Was.h.i.+ngton talked of slavery as a curse visited This wasn't the only time Was.h.i.+ngton talked of slavery as a curse visited on on him rather than a system of privilege enforced him rather than a system of privilege enforced by by him. him.

At this point in the letter, Was.h.i.+ngton suddenly remembered that he opposed slavery and had to justify his righteous indignation about the Quaker actions: "I hope it will not be conceived from these observations that it is my wish to hold the unhappy people who are the subject of this letter in slavery. I can only say that there is not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do to see a plan adopted for the abolition of it [slavery], but there is only one proper and effectual mode by which it can be accomplished, and that by legislative authority. And this, as far as my suffrage will go, shall never be wanting."26 Of course, Was.h.i.+ngton lacked a vote in the state legislature and took refuge in a position that was largely symbolic. The idea that abolition could be deferred to some future date when it would be carried out by cleanly incremental legislative steps was a common fantasy among the founders, since it s.h.i.+fted the burden onto later generations. It was especially attractive to Was.h.i.+ngton, the country's foremost apostle of unity, who knew that slavery was potentially the country's most divisive issue. Of course, Was.h.i.+ngton lacked a vote in the state legislature and took refuge in a position that was largely symbolic. The idea that abolition could be deferred to some future date when it would be carried out by cleanly incremental legislative steps was a common fantasy among the founders, since it s.h.i.+fted the burden onto later generations. It was especially attractive to Was.h.i.+ngton, the country's foremost apostle of unity, who knew that slavery was potentially the country's most divisive issue.

Historians often quote a September 1786 letter from Was.h.i.+ngton to John Francis Mercer as signaling a major forward stride in his thinking on slavery: "I never mean (unless some particular circ.u.mstance should compel me to it) to possess another slave by purchase, it being among my first wishes to see some plan adopted by the legislature by which slavery in this country may be abolished by slow, sure, and imperceptible degrees."27 But this n.o.ble statement then took a harsh turn. Was.h.i.+ngton mentioned being hard pressed by two debts-to retire one of which, "if there is no other resource, I must sell land or Negroes to discharge." But this n.o.ble statement then took a harsh turn. Was.h.i.+ngton mentioned being hard pressed by two debts-to retire one of which, "if there is no other resource, I must sell land or Negroes to discharge."28 In other words, in a pinch, Was.h.i.+ngton would trade slaves to settle debts. Clearly, the abolition of slavery would have exacted too steep an economic price for Was.h.i.+ngton to contemplate serious action. A month later Was.h.i.+ngton made a comment that narrowed the scope of his possible action: "It is well known that the expensive mansion in which I am, as it were, involuntarily compelled to live will admit of no diminution of my income." In other words, in a pinch, Was.h.i.+ngton would trade slaves to settle debts. Clearly, the abolition of slavery would have exacted too steep an economic price for Was.h.i.+ngton to contemplate serious action. A month later Was.h.i.+ngton made a comment that narrowed the scope of his possible action: "It is well known that the expensive mansion in which I am, as it were, involuntarily compelled to live will admit of no diminution of my income."29 In other words, for all his rhetorical objections to slavery, Was.h.i.+ngton found it impossible to wean himself away from the income it produced. Habituated to profligate spending and a baronial lifestyle, he was in no position to act forcefully on his principled opposition to slavery until the very end of his life. In other words, for all his rhetorical objections to slavery, Was.h.i.+ngton found it impossible to wean himself away from the income it produced. Habituated to profligate spending and a baronial lifestyle, he was in no position to act forcefully on his principled opposition to slavery until the very end of his life.

It has long been debated whether Was.h.i.+ngton's growing aversion to slavery resulted from moral scruples or from a sense that slavery was a bad economic bargain, in which masters paid more for slaves' upkeep than they reaped in profit from their labor. The latter problem weighed on him in the mid-1780s, when the failure of his corn crop, the princ.i.p.al food for his slaves, slashed the profitability of his operations. Though he probably never read it, Was.h.i.+ngton would have agreed with Adam Smith's theory in The Wealth of Nations The Wealth of Nations (1776) that slavery was a backward system because workers lacked economic incentives to improve performance. Slavery grew especially inefficient for Was.h.i.+ngton after he switched from labor-intensive tobacco cultivation to grain production, leaving him with surplus hands. In February 1786 he sat down in his study to tote up the number of slaves at his five farms and came up with a figure of 216. He must have been alarmed to discover that the number of slave children had risen to a startling 92, or nearly half the slaves, a figure that guaranteed that his slave population would burgeon from natural increase. (1776) that slavery was a backward system because workers lacked economic incentives to improve performance. Slavery grew especially inefficient for Was.h.i.+ngton after he switched from labor-intensive tobacco cultivation to grain production, leaving him with surplus hands. In February 1786 he sat down in his study to tote up the number of slaves at his five farms and came up with a figure of 216. He must have been alarmed to discover that the number of slave children had risen to a startling 92, or nearly half the slaves, a figure that guaranteed that his slave population would burgeon from natural increase.

Whenever Was.h.i.+ngton discussed slavery with other planters, the inefficiency of the system dominated discussion, whereas with Lafayette, Was.h.i.+ngton sounded as if he were motivated purely by humanitarian concerns. Writing to Mercer in late 1786, he indicated that he felt burdened by more slaves than he could profitably employ: "For this species of property, I have no predilection nor any urgent call, being already overstocked with some kind of it."30 He haggled with Mercer over settling money owed to him and expressed his willingness to take six male slaves in exchange for three hundred pounds of debt. Mercer evidently declined, because Was.h.i.+ngton replied, "I am perfectly satisfied with your determination respecting the Negroes. The money will be infinitely more agreeable to me than property of that sort." He haggled with Mercer over settling money owed to him and expressed his willingness to take six male slaves in exchange for three hundred pounds of debt. Mercer evidently declined, because Was.h.i.+ngton replied, "I am perfectly satisfied with your determination respecting the Negroes. The money will be infinitely more agreeable to me than property of that sort."31 Writing to Henry Lee, Jr., on February 4, 1787, Was.h.i.+ngton again announced that he was "in a great degree principled against increasing my number of slaves"; then in the next breath, he told Lee to buy him a slave, a bricklayer, whose sale was advertised in the newspaper. Writing to Henry Lee, Jr., on February 4, 1787, Was.h.i.+ngton again announced that he was "in a great degree principled against increasing my number of slaves"; then in the next breath, he told Lee to buy him a slave, a bricklayer, whose sale was advertised in the newspaper.32 Was.h.i.+ngton declared he would drop the deal if the slave had a family and refused to be separated. In 1788 Was.h.i.+ngton accepted another thirty-three slaves at Mount Vernon in settlement of a debt related to the estate of Martha's brother Bartholomew Dandridge. Was.h.i.+ngton declared he would drop the deal if the slave had a family and refused to be separated. In 1788 Was.h.i.+ngton accepted another thirty-three slaves at Mount Vernon in settlement of a debt related to the estate of Martha's brother Bartholomew Dandridge.

In charting Was.h.i.+ngton's conflicting statements about slavery after the Revolution, one begins to sense that he had developed a split personality on the issue. On the one hand, his views still reflected his acquisitive prewar personality that had few, if any, ethical qualms about slavery. His business behavior had always been his least attractive side, showing the imprint of early hards.h.i.+p. On the other hand, another part of his personality reflected the countless years of conversations with Lafayette, Laurens, Hamilton, and other young aides inflamed by Revolutionary ideals, when he was headquartered in the North and uprooted from the southern plantation culture. With a politician's instinct, Was.h.i.+ngton spoke to different people in different voices. When addressing other Virginia planters, he spoke in the cold, hard voice of practicality, whereas when dealing with Revolutionary comrades, he blossomed into an altruist.

Nothing better ill.u.s.trated his humanitarian views on slavery than a famous statement he made to David Humphreys, the young New England poet who resided at Mount Vernon while working on his authorized biography. At some point in 1788 or early 1789, Was.h.i.+ngton made an eloquent, if self-serving, statement-Humphreys may have prettied it up-expressing qualms about slavery and the paternalistic compromises he had forged over the issue: "The unfortunate condition of the persons whose labor in part I employed has been the only unavoidable subject of regret. To make the adults among them as easy and as comfortable in their circ.u.mstances as their actual state of ignorance and improvidence would admit, and to lay a foundation to prepare the rising generation for a destiny different from that in which they were born, afforded some satisfaction to my mind and could not, I hoped, be displeasing to the justice of the Creator."33 The pa.s.sage makes plain that guilt tugged at Was.h.i.+ngton's mind as he struggled to square slavery with his religious beliefs. The question remains: Did he really make life for the adult slaves "as easy and as comfortable" as possible and prepare the slave children for a different destiny? The pa.s.sage makes plain that guilt tugged at Was.h.i.+ngton's mind as he struggled to square slavery with his religious beliefs. The question remains: Did he really make life for the adult slaves "as easy and as comfortable" as possible and prepare the slave children for a different destiny?

Whether from genuine concern or from patent self-interest, Was.h.i.+ngton prided himself on his treatment of his slaves: "It has always been my aim to feed and clothe [the slaves] well and be careful of them in sickness."34 While we have no proof that Was.h.i.+ngton wished to educate his slaves, we do know that Lund Was.h.i.+ngton's wife, Elizabeth, a devout woman, taught slaves to read and distributed Bibles among them-an activity that would have been considered taboo on many plantations. There is no proof that Was.h.i.+ngton took s.e.xual advantage of his slaves, although one French visitor noted that many house servants were mulattoes, "some of whom have kinky hair still but skin as light as ours." While we have no proof that Was.h.i.+ngton wished to educate his slaves, we do know that Lund Was.h.i.+ngton's wife, Elizabeth, a devout woman, taught slaves to read and distributed Bibles among them-an activity that would have been considered taboo on many plantations. There is no proof that Was.h.i.+ngton took s.e.xual advantage of his slaves, although one French visitor noted that many house servants were mulattoes, "some of whom have kinky hair still but skin as light as ours."35 In recent years a controversy has raged as to whether Was.h.i.+ngton might have fathered a mulatto slave named West Ford, who was born in the immediate aftermath of the Revolutionary War and bore a vague resemblance to the Was.h.i.+ngton clan. The controversy first surfaced in 1940 but gained a new lease on life in 1998, when DNA tests strongly pointed to Thomas Jefferson as having had children with his slave Sally Hemings. This dramatic discovery lent fresh credence to the oral history of mixed-race families that claimed direct descent from America's slaveholding founders.

The son of a slave named Venus, West Ford was owned by Was.h.i.+ngton's brother Jack and his wife, Hannah, and grew up on their plantation, Bushfield, in Westmoreland County. When Hannah died around 1801, she singled out West Ford as the only slave to receive his freedom when he reached twenty-one. Ford's privileged status was further confirmed when Jack and Hannah's son Bushrod, who would inherit Mount Vernon, gave him 160 acres adjoining the estate. Beyond such undeniable evidence of partiality, legend pa.s.sed down through two branches of Ford descendants that Venus had identified George Was.h.i.+ngton as the little boy's father and that he had attended church with Was.h.i.+ngton and even gone hunting and riding with him.

While historians have learned not to repudiate such stories with knee-jerk rigidity, George Was.h.i.+ngton's paternity of West Ford seems highly doubtful. The notion that he might have met and impregnated Venus during a trip that her mistress, Hannah, made to Mount Vernon seems unlikely. (Was.h.i.+ngton didn't visit Bushfield during the years in question.) Where the Sally Hemings affair was exposed during Jefferson's lifetime and her son Madison later published a memoir about it, the West Ford story slumbered suspiciously for a century and a half. With Mount Vernon invaded by visitors after the Revolutionary War, Was.h.i.+ngton constantly regretted his lack of privacy, and he would not likely have gambled his vaunted, hard-earned reputation by sleeping with a visiting slave. There is also the problem that Was.h.i.+ngton was likely sterile, although the problem with having children may have come from Martha. Perhaps the most compelling evidence against Was.h.i.+ngton being West Ford's father is that, in this abundantly doc.u.mented life, not a single contemporary ever alluded to his having this mulatto child around him. Nor is there a single reference to Venus or West Ford in his voluminous papers. By contrast, one notes how frequently the ubiquitous Billy Lee pops up in Was.h.i.+ngton's papers or in contemporary accounts. Had the decorous Was.h.i.+ngton fathered West Ford, he most certainly would not have flaunted this lapse by taking him to church or riding to hounds with him. It is also hard to believe that Was.h.i.+ngton's malicious political enemies during his presidency would not have dredged up this damaging episode to discredit him. The most likely explanation of West Ford's singular status is that he was sired by Jack Was.h.i.+ngton or one of his three sons, Bushrod, Corbin, or William Augustine.

Was.h.i.+ngton's most commendable side was the respect he accorded to slave marriages, which enjoyed no standing under Virginia law. In April 1787, needing a bricklayer, he bought a slave named Neptune from a John Lawson. When Neptune showed up at Mount Vernon, Was.h.i.+ngton was dismayed to learn that he was distraught at being separated from his wife. Was.h.i.+ngton at once informed Lawson that he was "unwilling to hurt the feelings of anyone. I shall therefore, if agreeable to you, keep him a while to see if I can reconcile him to the separation (seeing her now and then), in which case I will purchase him; if not, I will send him back."36 Taking matters into his own hands, Neptune escaped from Mount Vernon and returned to Lawson's plantation and a reunion with his wife. Interestingly enough, Neptune wasn't punished for this misbehavior and agreed to a compromise whereby he was hired out to Was.h.i.+ngton on a monthly basis. Taking matters into his own hands, Neptune escaped from Mount Vernon and returned to Lawson's plantation and a reunion with his wife. Interestingly enough, Neptune wasn't punished for this misbehavior and agreed to a compromise whereby he was hired out to Was.h.i.+ngton on a monthly basis.

The most striking case of Was.h.i.+ngton's respect for the inner life of slaves was his constant solicitude for Billy Lee, whom he endowed with the fancy t.i.tle "Valet de Chambre" after the war.37 Lee may be the dark-skinned slave standing off in the shadows of Edward Savage's famous painting Lee may be the dark-skinned slave standing off in the shadows of Edward Savage's famous painting The Was.h.i.+ngton Family, The Was.h.i.+ngton Family, completed during the 1790s. In the group portrait, Was.h.i.+ngton sits at a table with Martha, unfurling a map of the new federal city of Was.h.i.+ngton, while Nelly and Washy stand beside them. Off to the right, the nameless slave is a dignified presence in a gray jacket with one hand thrust into a red waistcoat, his black hair falling straight over his collar. If Lee is the slave depicted, it would certainly attest to his special place in the Was.h.i.+ngton household. completed during the 1790s. In the group portrait, Was.h.i.+ngton sits at a table with Martha, unfurling a map of the new federal city of Was.h.i.+ngton, while Nelly and Washy stand beside them. Off to the right, the nameless slave is a dignified presence in a gray jacket with one hand thrust into a red waistcoat, his black hair falling straight over his collar. If Lee is the slave depicted, it would certainly attest to his special place in the Was.h.i.+ngton household.

During the war Lee had entered into a romantic liaison with Margaret Thomas, a free black or mulatto cook on Was.h.i.+ngton's staff, and they considered themselves married. Six months after returning to Mount Vernon, Lee sank into a funk because of his separation from Thomas, who resided in Philadelphia. Under prodding from Lee, Was.h.i.+ngton agreed to reunite them. The all-powerful Was.h.i.+ngton didn't care for Thomas but submitted to the pleas of the one slave he found it hard to deny. Contacting his Philadelphia friend Clement Biddle, he laid out the situation, explaining that Margaret Thomas had been "in an infirm state of health for some time and I had conceived that the connection between them had ceased, but I am mistaken. They are both applying to me to get her here, and tho[ugh] I never wished to see her more, yet I cannot refuse his request (if it can be complied with on reasonable terms) as he has lived with me so long and followed my fortunes through the war with fidelity."38 Was.h.i.+ngton asked Biddle to track down Thomas, then living with a free black couple, Isaac and Hannah Sills, who also worked as cooks in Philadelphia. Biddle was instructed to pay Thomas's pa.s.sage to Virginia by coach or s.h.i.+p. We don't know what happened to Margaret Thomas, and no evidence exists that she ever made it to Mount Vernon. Without question, a free black or mulatto woman would have dreaded traveling alone to a slave state such as Virginia, even under the auspices of George Was.h.i.+ngton. At the very least, as a Mount Vernon cook, she would have been forced to live and work with slaves, while retaining the rights of a free person-hardly a comfortable situation for all involved. One wonders exactly how Was.h.i.+ngton planned to negotiate this delicate situation. Did he expect Billy Lee to continue as a slave while married to a resident cook and free woman? And how would the other Mount Vernon slaves have reacted to the subversive presence of a free woman of color, wedded to Was.h.i.+ngton's favorite slave? Was.h.i.+ngton asked Biddle to track down Thomas, then living with a free black couple, Isaac and Hannah Sills, who also worked as cooks in Philadelphia. Biddle was instructed to pay Thomas's pa.s.sage to Virginia by coach or s.h.i.+p. We don't know what happened to Margaret Thomas, and no evidence exists that she ever made it to Mount Vernon. Without question, a free black or mulatto woman would have dreaded traveling alone to a slave state such as Virginia, even under the auspices of George Was.h.i.+ngton. At the very least, as a Mount Vernon cook, she would have been forced to live and work with slaves, while retaining the rights of a free person-hardly a comfortable situation for all involved. One wonders exactly how Was.h.i.+ngton planned to negotiate this delicate situation. Did he expect Billy Lee to continue as a slave while married to a resident cook and free woman? And how would the other Mount Vernon slaves have reacted to the subversive presence of a free woman of color, wedded to Was.h.i.+ngton's favorite slave?

What we do know is that, by the standards of master-slave relations.h.i.+ps, Was.h.i.+ngton remained uncommonly attentive toward Billy Lee. In April 1785 he was surveying land with Lee, who was carrying one of the chains when he slipped and broke his knee, an injury so severe that Was.h.i.+ngton had to order a sled to transport him home. Three years later Lee tripped again and broke the second knee, turning him into a cripple. We know that Lee had an alcohol problem, but we don't know whether it was the cause or an effect of these injuries. When two broken knees left Lee incapacitated, Was.h.i.+ngt