The Founders at Home: The Building of America, 1735-1817

by Myron Magnet

  71Wood, op. cit., p. 54.

  72RHL to Arthur Lee, 24 February 1775 (RHL Let., I:130–31).

  73Wood, op. cit., pp. 53, 55.

  74RHL to Patrick Henry, 20 April 1776 (RHL Let., I:176–79).

  75Richard H. Lee, op. cit., I:168–69.

  76McGaughy, op. cit., pp. 121, 123–24.

  77RHL to Thomas Jefferson, 21 July 1776 (RHL Let., I:210).

  78A. R. Riggs, The Nine Lives of Arthur Lee, Virginia Patriot (Williamsburg: Virginia Independence Bicentennial Commission, 1976), pp. 12–14, 25.

  79Ibid., pp. 17, 21.

  80Ibid., pp. 22, 25.

  81Colbourn, op. cit., p. 230.

  82Henry, Lord Brougham, Historical Sketches of Statesmen Who Flourished in the Time of George III (London: Richard Griffin, 1858), I:431.

  83Caroline Robbins, The Eighteenth Century Commonwealthman (New York: Atheneum, 1968), p. 322; John Wilkes, The North Briton, Number 45, 23 April 1763; John Wilkes, An Essay on Woman, 1755.

  84Riggs, op. cit., pp. 34–35, 26–27, 33.

  85Colbourn, op. cit., pp. 229–30.

  86Bernard Bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution, enlarged edition (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967), pp. 110–12, 120.

  87Riggs, op. cit., pp. 29–30, 32, 35–36, 41–42, 45–46; Ketchum, op. cit., p. 325.

  88Riggs, op. cit., pp. 36, 45, 43.

  89Ibid., pp. 48–49.

  90Nagel, op. cit., p. 105; Riggs, op. cit., p. 51.

  91Riggs, op. cit., p. 52; Nagel, op. cit., pp. 107–8.

  92Riggs, op. cit., p. 55; Nagel, op. cit., p. 107; Alan Taylor, Writing Early American History (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005), p. 173.

  93Barbara W. Tuchman, The First Salute: A View of the American Revolution (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988), p. 84.

  94Riggs, op. cit., pp. 52, 54–56, 58; Nagel, op. cit., p. 105.

  95RHL to Samuel Adams, 23 November 1777 (RHL Let., I:355); Riggs, op. cit., pp. 58–60, 63; McGaughy, op. cit., pp. 132–34.

  96George III to Lord North, 3 March 1781 (Francis Wharton, ed., The Revolutionary Diplomatic Correspondence of the United States [Washington: Government Printing Office, 1889], I, 568); James West Davidson and Mark Lytle, After the Fact: The Art of Historical Detection (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1992), pp. xxvii–xxxv.

  97Riggs, op. cit., pp. 60–61, 69–70, 64.

  98Nagel, op. cit., pp. 110–11; McGaughy, op. cit., p. 115; RHL to General Washington, 22 October 1775 (RHL Let., I:152); Marine Committee to Silas Deane, 7 November 1775 (RHL Let., I:154–55); RHL to Thomas Ludwell Lee, 28 May 1776 (RHL Let., I:196); RHL to George Washington, 27 February 1777 (RHL Let., I:266); RHL to General Washington, 20 November 1777 (RHL Let., I:351–52); RHL to Arthur Lee, 20 April 1777 (RHL Let., I:279); RHL to Mrs. [Catharine] Macaulay, 29 November 1775 (RHL Let., I:161–62).

  99Committee of Secret Correspondence to Commissioners in France, 17 February 1777 (RHL Let., I:258–59; RHL to General Lee, 11 May 1776 (RHL Let., I:189–90); RHL to Samuel Adams, 1 March 1778 (RHL Let., I:391); RHL to the Governor of Virginia, 7 April 1777 (RHL Let., I:260).

  100Virginia Delegates in Congress to George Pyncheon and John Bradford, 16 October 1777 (RHL Let., I:332).

  101Nagel, op. cit., pp. 102–4.

  102RHL to Patrick Henry, 8 October 1777 (RHL Let., I:325).

  103RHL to John Adams, 8 October 1779 (RHL Let., II:155–56).

  104RHL to William Lee, 12 July 1772 (RHL Let., I:71); RHL to Arthur Lee, 20 April 1777 (RHL Let., I:280).

  105Nagel, op. cit., pp. 130–32.

  106McGaughy, op. cit., pp. 176–79; Nagel, op. cit., p. 136.

  107Nagel, op. cit., p. 132.

  108McGaughy, op. cit., p. 176; RHL to General Washington, 11 October 1787 (Richard H. Lee, op. cit., II:76).

  109Nagel., op. cit., pp. 135–36.

  110RHL to Governor Randolph, 16 October 1787 (Richard H. Lee, op. cit., II:78).

  111RHL to Samuel Adams, 5 October 1787 (Richard H. Lee, op. cit., II:74–75).

  112Nagel, op. cit., p. 137.

  113Ibid., p. 140.

  114McGaughy, op. cit., p. 231.

  115Charles Royster, Light-Horse Harry Lee and the Legacy of the American Revolution (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1994), pp. 14, 21, 25, 62; Nagel, op. cit., p. 161.

  116Royster, op. cit., pp. 13, 17–19, 21–24, 37, 54.

  117Henry Lee, The Revolutionary War Memoirs of General Henry Lee (reprint of Memoirs of the War in the Southern Department of the United States, 1869 edition), Robert E. Lee, ed. (New York: Da Capo, 1998), p. 108.

  118Royster, op. cit., pp. 40, 41, 43.

  119Ibid., pp. 48, 40–41; Nagel, op. cit., p. 162.

  120Royster, op. cit., pp. 40–41, 48–49.

  121Ibid., p. 57; Nagel, op. cit., p. 164.

  122Nagel, op. cit., pp. 164–65.

  123Ibid., pp. 151, 52–54; Royster, op. cit., p. 57.

  124Royster, op. cit., pp. 71–72, 74, 76, 173.

  125Ibid., pp. 14, 92, 106, 130, 126.

  126Ibid., pp. 72–73, 172–73.

  127Ibid., pp. 173–77.

  128Nagel, op. cit., p. 165.

  129Ibid., pp. 179, 195.

  130Ibid., pp. 174, 178, 181, 166; Royster, op. cit., pp. 177, 179.

  131Royster, op. cit., pp. 181–84.

  132Ibid., p. 231; Nagel, op. cit., p. 197.

  133Royster, op. cit., pp. 231, 227.

  134Ibid., p. 156.

  135Ibid., pp. 157–59, 161, 26–27.

  136Ibid., pp. 162–63.

  137Ibid., pp. 163–64.

  138Ibid., pp. 167, 232–34, 241–44, 3–4, 6–7; Nagel, op. cit., p. 184.

  139Nagel, op. cit., pp. 54–56.

  140Ibid., pp. 206–7.

  141Ibid., pp. 207–9, 212, 215, 229.

  142Ibid., pp. 273–74, 284, 287–300.

  143Robert E. Lee to Mary Lee, 25 December 1861 (Robert E. Lee, Recollections and Letters of Robert E. Lee [New York: Doubleday, Page, 1905], p. 59).

  CHAPTER 3: George Washington: In Pursuit of Fame

  1Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography, Russel B. Nye, ed. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1958), p. 1.

  2Ron Chernow, Washington: A Life (New York: Penguin, 2010), pp. 4–5, 7–8, 10; George Washington (GW) to David Humphreys, 25 July 1785, in George Washington, Writings, John Rhodehamel, ed. (Library of America, 1997 [LoA]), p. 580.

  3GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington, October 1786 (LoA, p. 610).

  4Nathaniel Hervey, The Memory of Washington (Boston and Cambridge: James Munroe, 1852), p. 23.

  5Washington Irving, Life of George Washington, in Works of Washington Irving (New York: P. F. Collier, 1897), XV, 142.

  6Chernow, op. cit., pp. 157–58, 396–97.

  7GW to Mary Ball Washington, 15 February 1787 (LoA, pp. 637–38).

  8Chernow, op. cit., pp. 423, 588–89.

  9Ibid., pp. 9, 15–16; LoA, p. 1055.

  10Chernow, op. cit., pp. 15–17, 422; LoA, p. 1094.

  11GW to George William Fairfax, 27 February 1785 (LoA, p. 574).

  12Chernow, op. cit., p. 13.

  13Rules of Civility & Decent Behaviour in Company and Conversation (LoA, pp. 3–5, 9–10, 1094).

  14GW, Design for a Coat, c. 1749–50 (LoA, p. 17).

  15GW to John Augustine Washington, 28 May 1755 (LoA, p. 52).

  16Chernow, op. cit., pp. 17–19.

  17GW, A Journal of my Journey over the Mountains began Fryday the 11th, of March 1747/8 (LoA, pp. 11–14, 16).

  18Chernow, op. cit., pp. 22–23; James Thomas Flexner, George Washington: The Forge of Experience (Boston: Little, Brown, 1965), p. 7; LoA, p. 1056.

  19GW to Charles Lawrence, 26 April 1763 (LoA, p. 107); GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 18 May 1754 (LoA, p. 41); Chernow, op. cit., pp. 29–30.

  20Thomas Jefferson to Dr. Walter Jones, 2 January 1814, in Thomas Jefferson, Writings, Merrill D. Peterson, ed. (Library of America, 1984), p. 1319
.

  21Chernow, op. cit., pp. 31–32; LoA, p. 1095.

  22GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington, October 1786 (LoA, p. 611).

  23GW, Journey to the French Commandant, 16–17 January 1764 (LoA, pp. 17–20); Flexner, op. cit., p. 60.

  24GW, Journey to the French Commandant (LoA, pp. 20–22); GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, p. 611); Chernow, op. cit., p. 34.

  25GW, Journey to the French Commandant (LoA, pp. 22–24, 26).

  26Ibid., LoA, pp. 28–32.

  27Le Gardeur de Saint Pierre de Repentigny, Commander of the French Forces on the Ohio, to Governor Dinwiddie of Virginia, 15 December 1753 in GW, Diary of George Washington from 1789 to 1791 (New York: C. B. Richardson, 1860), IV:247.

  28GW, Journey to the French Commandant (LoA, pp. 32–34); Chernow, op. cit., pp. 36, 32, 38.

  29Paul Johnson, A History of the American People (New York: HarperCollins, 1997), p. 124.

  30Chernow, op. cit., pp. 40–41; GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, pp. 611–12).

  31GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 29 May 1754 (LoA, pp. 43–44), 1096; Flexner, op. cit., p. 89.

  32GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 29 May 1754 (LoA, pp. 44–47).

  33GW to John Augustine Washington, 31 May 1754 (LoA, pp. 48, 1096).

  34GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, pp. 612–13); Chernow, op. cit., pp. 46–49.

  35Chernow, op. cit., p. 50.

  36GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 18 May 1754 (LoA, p. 39).

  37GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 29 May 1754 (LoA, pp. 40–43).

  38GW to William Fitzhugh, 15 November 1754 (LoA, p. 49).

  39GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, p. 614).

  40Chernow, op. cit., p. 53.

  41Franklin, op. cit., pp. 130–31.

  42GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, pp. 614–15); Chernow, op. cit., p. 57.

  43GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, p. 615); GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 18 July 1755 (LoA, pp. 58–60).

  44Chernow, op. cit., p. 61.

  45GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, pp. 615–17); GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 18 July 1755 (LoA, p. 59); Franklin, op. cit., p. 132; Chernow, op. cit., p. 60.

  46GW to Bushrod Washington, 9 November 1787 (LoA, p. 662).

  47GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, p. 617).

  48Franklin, op. cit., p. 132.

  49Chernow, op. cit., pp. 63–64, 69; GW to Richard Washington, 15 April 1757 (LoA, p. 88).

  50GW to Christopher Gist, 10 October 1755 (LoA, p. 62); GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 22 April 1756 (LoA, pp. 74–75).

  51Franklin, op. cit., pp. 120–21; GW to Robert Hunter Morris, 9 April 1756 (LoA, p. 72).

  52GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 11 October 1755 (LoA, pp. 63–64).

  53GW to John Stanwix, 15 July 1757 (LoA, p. 90).

  54GW, General Orders, 1 January 1776 (LoA, p. 197).

  55Arthur O. Lovejoy, Reflections on Human Nature (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1961), pp. 157, 179, 218–19.

  56GW to John Stanwix, 10 April 1758 (LoA. p. 93); GW to Benjamin Harrison (LoA, p. 330).

  57GW to Sarah Bache, 15 January 1781 (LoA, p. 413).

  58GW, General Orders, 1 January 1776 (LoA, p. 196).

  59Ibid.

  60GW to Robert Dinwiddie, 10 March 1757 (LoA, pp. 86–87).

  61GW, Comments on David Humphreys’ Biography of Washington (LoA, p. 619).

  62Chernow, op. cit., p. 91.

  63GW, Farewell Address to the Virginia Regiment (LoA, p. 99).

  64Richard Norton Smith, Patriarch: George Washington and the New American Nation (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1993), p. 173.

  65Chernow, op. cit., pp. 24–26, 52, 98, 78–79; Lease of Mount Vernon (Fairfax County Deed Book C, 17 December 1754), pp. 822–25, reprinted W. W. Abbot, ed., The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, vol. 1, 1748–August 1755 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1983), 232–34; Allan Greenberg, George Washington Architect (London: Andreas Papadakis, 1999), p. 7.

  66GW, General Orders, 6 October 1755 (LoA, p. 61).

  67Chernow, op. cit., p. 51.

  68GW to James McHenry, 27 January 1799 (LoA, pp. 1020–21).

  69Greenberg, op. cit., pp. 62–67; Chernow, op. cit., p. 76.

  70GW to Isaac Heard, 2 May 1792 (LoA, p. 802).

  71Chernow, op. cit., pp. 76, 140, 77; GW to Robert Cary & Co., 6 June 1768 (LoA, pp. 127–28); GW to Richard Washington, 15 July 1757 (LoA, p. 89).

  72GW to Robert Stewart, 27 April 1763 (LoA, p. 109).

  73Chernow, op. cit., p. 82; GW to Elizabeth Parke Custis, 14 September 1794 (LoA, pp. 881–82).

  74Chernow, op. cit., pp. 101, 218, 295.

  75GW to Martha Washington, 18 June 1775 (LoA, p. 168).

  76Chernow, op. cit., pp. 153–54; GW to Burwell Bassett, 20 June 1773 (LoA, p. 146).

  77Chernow, op. cit., pp. 421, 463–64.

  78GW to Eleanor Parke Custis, 16 January 1795 (LoA, p. 901).

  79GW to Sarah Cary Fairfax, 12 September 1758 (LoA, pp. 96–97).

  80Chernow, op. cit., p. 170.

  81Ibid., pp. 124–25, 141–42, 778.

  82Ibid., p. 119; GW to William Pearce, 18 December 1793 (LoA, p. 862).

  83GW, Reward for Runaway Slaves, 11 August 1791 (LoA, pp. 102–3); GW to Josiah Thompson, 2 July 1766 (LoA, p. 118).

  84Chernow, op. cit., pp. 114–15, 641.

  85GW to John Posey, 24 June 1767 (LoA, p. 121).

  86GW to William Crawford, September 1767 (LoA, pp. 125–26).

  87GW to Charles Washington, 31 January 1770 (LoA, pp. 134–37).

  88Chernow, op. cit., pp. 148–50.

  89GW to Thomas Johnson, 20 July 1770 (LoA, pp. 137–40).

  90Greenberg, op. cit., pp. 65–71, 34, 46–47.

  91Ibid., p. 67.

  92Ibid., pp. 26–27; see also Allan Greenberg, The Architecture of Democracy (New York: Rizzoli, 2006).

  93Chernow, op. cit., pp. 136–37; GW to Robert Cary & Co., 10 August 1764 (LoA, pp. 110–11).

  94GW to Robert Cary & Co., 20 September 1765 (LoA, pp. 113–17).

  95GW to George Mason, 5 April 179 (LoA, pp. 130–32).

  96Chernow, op. cit., pp. 144–47; LoA, p. 1060.

  97Chernow, op. cit., p. 165.

  98GW to George William Fairfax, 10 June 1774 (LoA, p. 150).

  99GW to Bryan Fairfax, 4 July 1774 (LoA, pp. 152–53).

  100Fairfax Resolves, 1–3, 6–7.

  101GW to Bryan Fairfax, 20 July 1774 (LoA, pp. 155–56).

  102GW to Bryan Fairfax, 24 August 1774 (LoA, p. 158).

  103Chernow, op. cit., pp. 170–71.

  104GW to Robert McKenzie, 9 October 1774 (LoA, p. 160).

  105Chernow, op. cit., pp. 174–75.

  106GW to George William Fairfax, 31 May 1775 (LoA, p. 164).

  107Chernow, op. cit., pp. 183, 186–87.

  108GW to Burwell Bassett, 19 June 1775 (LoA, pp. 169–70).

  109Lionel Trilling, Sincerity and Authenticity (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1971), p. 1.

  110GW to Martha Washington, 18 June 1775 (LoA, pp. 168–69).

  CHAPTER 4: General Washington

  1John Ferling, Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 53, 55, 58–59.

  2Ibid., p. 60.

  3GW to John Augustine Washington, 31 March 1776, in George Washington, Writings, John Rhodehamel, ed. (Library of America, 1997 [LoA]), p. 218.

  4GW to Joseph Reed, 10 February 1776 (LoA, p. 212).

  5GW to Joseph Reed, 14 January 1776 (LoA, p. 203).

  6Ron Chernow, Washington: A Life (New York: Penguin, 2010), pp. 211, 213.

  7GW to Joseph Reed, 1 February 1776 (LoA, p. 208).

  8GW to John Augustine Washington, 31 March 1776 (LoA, pp. 218–19).

>   9GW to Thomas Gage, 11 August 1775 (LoA, p. 181).

  10Chernow, op. cit., p. 201.

  11GW to Thomas Gage, 19 August 1775 (LoA, pp. 182–83).

  12Ferling, op. cit., p. 62.

  13Chernow, op. cit., pp. 239–41; GW to John Hancock, 14 July 1776 (LoA, p. 230).

  14Ibid., LoA, p. 230.

  15David Hackett Fischer, Washington’s Crossing (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), pp. 153, 218; Chernow, op. cit., pp. 223–24; Ferling, op. cit., pp. 102–4, 123.

  16Ferling, op. cit., pp. 104–5; Chernow, op. cit., pp. 224–26.

  17Ferling, op. cit., p. 106; Chernow, op. cit., pp. 226–27; GW to John Augustine Washington, 31 March 1776 (LoA, pp. 220–21); GW to John Hancock, 19 March 1776 (LoA, p. 217).

  18Chernow, op. cit., pp. 228–29; GW to Josiah Quincy, 24 March 1776, in John C. Fitzpatrick, ed., The Writings of George Washington (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1931–1944), IV:421–22; Cato, IV, iv, 48; Cf. GW to Benedict Arnold, 5 December 1775 (LoA, p. 192).

  19Fischer, op. cit., pp. 147–48, 81. Lee was no known relation to the Lees of Stratford Hall.

  20Ibid., pp. 67–74; Henry Lee, The Revolutionary War Memoirs of General Henry Lee (reprint of Memoirs of the War in the Southern Department of the United States, 1869 edition), Robert E. Lee, ed. (New York: Da Capo, 1998), pp. 109–11.

  21Ferling, op. cit., p. 122.

  22Thomas Paine, Common Sense and Other Political Writings, Nelson F. Adkins, ed. (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1953), pp. 7, 18, 27.

  23GW to Joseph Reed, 31 January 1776 (LoA, p. 206); GW to Joseph Reed, 10 February 1776 (LoA, pp. 213–14); GW, General Orders, 9 July 1776 (LoA, p. 228).

  24Chernow, op. cit., p. 231; GW to Adam Stephen, 20 July 1776 (LoA, p. 233); Fischer, op. cit., pp. 83–84.

  25Fischer, op. cit., pp. 89–91, 94–99; Chernow, op. cit., pp. 245–48; Ferling, op. cit., pp. 122, 135; Theodore P. Savas and J. David Dameron, A Guide to the Battles of the American Revolution (New York: Savas Beatie, 2010), pp. 55–60.

  26Chernow, op. cit., p. 249; Fischer, op. cit., pp. 99–100.

  27Fischer, op. cit., pp. 21–22, 25–29; Chernow, op. cit., pp. 333–34.

  28Chernow, op. cit., pp. 249–51; Fischer, op. cit., p. 101.

  29GW to John Augustine Washington, 22 September 1776 (LoA, p. 246); Chernow, op. cit., pp. 253–55; Savas and Dameron, op. cit., pp. 65–66; Ferling, op. cit., pp. 141–42.

  30Ferling, op. cit., pp. 144–45, 128–29; Fischer, op. cit., pp. 109–10.