Part 13

Of Washington’s general treatment of the serving class a few facts can be gleaned. He told one of his overseers, in reference to the sub-overseers, that “to treat them civilly is no more than what all men are entitled to, but my advice to you is, to keep them at a proper distance; for they will grow upon familiarity, in proportion as you will sink in authority if you do not.” To a housekeeper he promised “a warm, decent and comfortable room to herself, to lodge in, and will eat of the victuals of our Table, but not set at it, or at any time with us be her appearance what it may; for if this was once admitted no line satisfactory to either party, perhaps could be drawn thereafter.”

In visiting he feed liberally, good examples of which are given in the cash account of the visit to Boston in 1756, when he “Gave to Servants on ye Road 10/.” “By Cash Mr. Malbones servants £4.0.0.” “The Chambermaid £1.2.6.” When the wife of his old steward, Fraunces, came to need, he gave her “for Charity £1.17.6.” The majority will sympathize rather than disapprove of his opinion when he wrote, “Workmen in most Countries I believe are necessary plagues;—-in this where entreaties as well as money must be used to obtain their work and keep them to their duty they baffle all calculation in the accomplishment of any plan or repairs they are engaged in;—and require more attention to and looking after than can be well conceived.”

The overseers of his many plantations, and his “master” carpenters, millers, and gardeners, were quite as great trials as his slaves. First “young Stephens” gave him much trouble, which his diary reports in a number of sententious entries: “visited my Plantation. Severely reprimanded young Stephens for his Indolence, and his father for suffering it;” “forbid Stephens keeping any horses upon my expence;” “visited my quarters & ye Mill, according to custom found young Stephens absent;” “visited my Plantation and found to my great surprise Stephens constantly at work;” “rid out to my Plantn. and to my Carpenters. Found Richard Stephens hard at work with an ax—Very extraordinary this!”

Again he records, “Visited my Plantations—found Foster had been absent from his charge since the 28th ulto. Left orders for him to come immediately to me upon his return, and repremanded him severely.” Of another, Simpson, “I never hear … without a degree of warmth & vexation at his extreme stupidity,” and elsewhere he expresses his disgust at “that confounded fellow Simpson.” A third spent all the fall and half the winter in getting in his crop, and “if there was any way of making such a rascal as Garner pay for such conduct, no punishment would be too great for him. I suppose he never turned out of mornings until the sun had warmed the earth, and if he did not, the negros would not.” His chief overseer was directed to “Let Mr. Crow know that I view with a very evil eye the frequent reports made by him of sheep dying;… frequent natural deaths is a very strong evidence to my mind of the want of care or something worse.”

Curious distinctions were made oftentimes. Thus, in the contract with an overseer, one clause was inserted to the effect, “And whereas there are a number of whiskey stills very contiguous to the said Plantations, and many idle, drunken and dissolute People continually resorting to the same, priding themselves in debauching sober and well-inclined Persons, the said Edd Voilett doth promise as well for his own sake as his employers to avoid them as he ought.” To the contrary, in hiring a gardener, it was agreed as part of the compensation that the man should have “four dollars at Christmas, with which he may be drunk for four days and four nights; two dollars at Easter to effect the same purpose; two dollars at Whitsuntide to be drunk for two days; a dram in the morning, and a drink of grog at dinner at noon.”

With more true kindness Washington wrote to one of his underlings, “I was very glad to receive your letter of the 31st ultimo, because I was afraid, from the accounts given me of your spitting blood,… that you would hardly have been able to have written at all. And it is my request that you will not, by attempting more than you are able to undergo, with safety and convenience, injure yourself, and thereby render me a disservice…. I had rather therefore hear that you had nursed than exposed yourself. And the things which I sent from this place (I mean the wine, tea, coffee and sugar) and such other matters as you may lay in by the doctor’s direction for the use of the sick, I desire you will make use of as your own personal occasions may require.”

Of one Butler he had employed to overlook his gardeners, but who proved hopelessly unfit, Washington said, “sure I am, there is no obligation upon me to retain him from charitable motives; when he ought rather to be punished as an imposter: for he well knew the services he had to perform, and which he promised to fulfil with zeal, activity, and intelligence.” Yet when the man was discharged his employer gave him a “character:” “If his activity, spirit, and ability in the management of Negroes, were equal to his honesty, sobriety and industry, there would not be the least occasion for a change,” and Butler was paid his full wages, no deduction being made for lost time, “as I can better afford to be without the money than he can.”

Another thoroughly incompetent man was one employed to take charge of the negro carpenters, of whom his employer wrote, “I am apprehensive … that Green never will overcome his propensity to drink; that it is this which occasions his frequent sickness, absences from work and poverty. And I am convinced, moreover, that it answers no purpose to admonish him.” Yet, though “I am so well satisfied of Thomas Green’s unfitness to look after Carpenters,” for a time “the helpless situation in which you find his family, has prevailed on me to retain him,” and when he finally had to be discharged for drinking, Washington said, “Nothing but compassion for his helpless family, has hitherto induced me to keep him a moment in my service (so bad is the example he sets); but if he has no regard for them himself, it is not to be expected that I am to be a continual sufferer on this account for his misconduct.” His successor needed the house the family lived in, but Washington could not “bear the thought of adding to the distress I know they must be in, by turning them adrift;… It would be better therefore on all accounts if they were removed to some other place, even if I was to pay the rent, provided it was low, or make some allowance towards it.”

To many others, besides family, friends, and employees, Washington was charitable. From an early date his ledger contains frequent items covering gifts to the needy. To mention a tenth of them would take too much space, but a few typical entries are worth quoting:

“By Cash gave a Soldiers wife 5/;” “To a crippled man 5/;” “Gave a man who had his House Burnt £1.;” “By a begging woman /5;” “By Cash gave for the Sufferers at Boston by fire £12;” “By a wounded soldier 10/;” “Alexandria Academy, support of a teacher of Orphan children £50;” “By Charity to an invalid wounded Soldier who came from Redston with a petition for Charity 18/;” “Gave a poor man by the President’s order $2;” “Delivd to the President to send to two distress’d french women at Newcastle $25;” “Gave Pothe a poor old man by the President’s order $2;” “Gave a poor sailor by the Presdt order $1;” “Gave a poor blind man by the Presdt order $1.50;” “By Madame de Seguer a french Lady in distress gave her $50;” “By Subscription paid to Mr. Jas. Blythe towards erecting and Supporting an Academy in the State of Kentucky $100;” “By Subscription towards an Academy in the South Western Territory $100;” “By Charity sent Genl Charles Pinckney in Columbus Bank Notes, for the sufferers by the fire in Charleston So. Carolina $300;” “By Charity gave to the sufferers by fire in Geo. Town $10;” “By an annual Donation to the Academy at Alexandria pd. Dr. Cook $166.67;” “By Charity to the poor of Alexandria deld. to the revd. Dr. Muir $100.”

To an overseer he said, concerning a distant relative, “Mrs. Haney should endeavor to do what she can for herself—this is a duty incumbent on every one; but you must not let her suffer, as she has thrown herself upon me; your advances on this account will be allowed always, at settlement; and I agree readily to furnish her with provisions, and for the good character you give of her daughter make the latter a present in my name of a handsome but not costly gown, and other things which she may stand most in need of. You may charge me also with the worth of your tenement in which she is placed, and where perhaps it is better she should be than at a great distance from your attentions to her.”

After the terrible attack of fever in Philadelphia in 1793, Washington wrote to a clergyman of that city,—

“It has been my intention ever since my return to the city, to contribute my mite towards the relief of the most needy inhabitants of it. The pressure of public business hitherto has suspended, but not altered my resolution. I am at a loss, however, for whose benefit to apply the little I can give, and in whose hands to place it; whether for the use of the fatherless children and widows, made so by the late calamity, who may find it difficult, whilst provisions, wood, and other necessaries are so dear, to support themselves; or to other and better purposes, if any, I know not, and therefore have taken the liberty of asking your advice. I persuade myself justice will be done to my motives for giving you this trouble. To obtain information, and to render the little I can afford, without ostentation or mention of my name, are the sole objects of these inquiries. With great and sincere esteem and regard, I am, &c.”

His adopted grandson he advised to “never let an indigent person ask, without receiving something if you have the means; always recollecting in what light the widow’s mite was viewed.” And when he took command of the army in 1775, the relative who took charge of his affairs was told to “let the hospitality of the house, with respect to the poor, be kept up. Let no one go hungry away. If any of this kind of people should be in want of corn, supply their necessities, provided it does not encourage them in idleness; and I have no objection to your giving my money in charity, to the amount of forty or fifty pounds a year, when you think it well bestowed. What I mean by having no objection is, that it is my desire that it should be done. You are to consider, that neither myself nor wife is now in the way to do these good offices.”

VII SOCIAL LIFE

There can be no doubt that Washington, like the Virginian of his time, was pre-eminently social. It is true that late in life he complained, as already quoted, that his home had become a “well resorted tavern,” and that at his own table “I rarely miss seeing strange faces, come as they say out of respect for me. Pray, would not the word curiosity answer as well?” but even in writing this he added, “how different this from having a few social friends at a cheerful board!” When a surveyor he said that the greatest pleasure he could have would be to hear from or be with “my Intimate friends and acquaintances;” to one he wrote, “I hope you in particular will not Bauk me of what I so ardently wish for,” and he groaned over being “amongst a parcel of barbarians.” While in the Virginia regiment he complained of a system of rations which “deprived me of the pleasure of inviting an officer or friend, which to me would be more agreeable, than nick-nacks I shall meet with,” and when he was once refused leave of absence by the governor, he replied bitterly, “it was not to enjoy a party of pleasure I wanted a leave of absence; I have been indulged with few of these, winter or summer!” At Mount Vernon, if a day was spent without company the fact was almost always noted in his diary, and in a visit, too, he noted that he had “a very lonesome Evening at Colo Champe’s, not any Body favoring us with their Company but himself.”

The plantation system which prevented town life and put long distances between neighbors developed two forms of society. One of these was house parties, and probably nowhere else in the world was that form of hospitality so unstinted as in this colony. Any one of a certain social standing was privileged, even welcomed, to ride up to the seat of a planter, dismount, and thus become a guest, ceasing to be such only when he himself chose. Sometimes one family would go en masse many miles to stay a week with friends, and when they set out to return their hosts would journey with them and in turn become guests for a week. The second form of social life was called clubs. At all the cross-roads and court-houses there sprang up taverns or ordinaries, and in these the men of a neighborhood would gather, and over a bowl of punch or a bottle of wine, the expense of which they “clubbed” to share, would spend their evenings.

Into this life Washington entered eagerly. As a mere lad his ledger records expenditures: “By a club in Arrack at Mr. Gordon’s 2/6;” “Club of a bottle of Rhenish at Mitchells 1/3;” “To part of the club at Port Royal 1/;” “To Cash in part for a Bowl of fruit punch 1/7-1/2.” So, too, he was a visitor at this time at some of the great Virginian houses, as elsewhere noted. When he came into possession of Mount Vernon he offered the same unstinted welcome that he had met with, and even as a bachelor he writes of his “having much company,” and again of being occupied with “a good deal of Company.” In two months of 1768 Washington had company to dinner, or to spend the night, on twenty-nine days, and dined or visited away from home on seven; and this is typical.

Whenever, too, trips were made to Williamsburg, Annapolis, Philadelphia, or elsewhere, it was a rare occurrence when the various stages of the journey were not spent with friends, and in those cities he was dined and wined to a surfeit.

During the Revolution all of Washington’s aides and his secretary lived with him at head-quarters, and constituted what he always called “my family.” In addition, many others sat down at table,—those who came on business from a distance, as well as bidden guests,—-which frequently included ladies from the neighborhood, who must have been belles among the sixteen to twenty men who customarily sat down to dinner. “If … convenient and agreeable to you to take pot luck with me to-day,” the General wrote John Adams in 1776, “I shall be glad of your company.” Pot luck it was for commander-in-chief and staff. Mention has been made of how sometimes Washington slept on the ground, and even when under cover there was not occasionally much more comfort. Pickering relates that one night was passed in “Headquarters at Galloway’s, an old log house. The General lodged in a bed, and his family on the floor about him. We had plenty of sepawn and milk, and all were contented.”

Oftentimes there were difficulties in the hospitality. “I have been at my prest. quarters since the 1st day of Decr.,” Washington complained to the commissary-general, “and have not a Kitchen to cook a Dinner in, altho’ the Logs have been put together some considerable time by my own Guard. Nor is there a place at this moment in which a servant can lodge, with the smallest degree of comfort. Eighteen belonging to my family, and all Mrs. Ford’s, are crowded together in her Kitchen, and scarce one of them able to speak for the cold they have caught.” Pickering, in telling how he tried to secure lodgings away from head-quarters, gave for his reasons that “they are exceedingly pinched for room…. Had I conceived how much satisfaction, quiet and even leisure, I should have enjoyed at separate quarters, I would have taken them six months ago. For at head-quarters there is a continual throng, and my room, in particular, (when I was happy enough to get one,) was always crowded by all that came to headquarters on business, because there was no other for them, we having, for the most part, been in such small houses.”

There were other difficulties. “I cannot get as much cloth,” the general wrote, “as will make cloaths for my servants, notwithstanding one of them that attends my person and table is indecently and most shamefully naked.” One of his aides said to a correspondent, jocularly, “I take your Caution to me in Regard to my Health very kindly, but I assure you, you need be under no Apprehension of my losing it on the Score of Excess of living, that Vice is banished from this Army and the General’s Family in particular. We never sup, but go to bed and are early up.” “Only conceive,” Washington complained to Congress, “the mortification they (even the general officers) must suffer, when they cannot invite a French officer, a visiting friend, or a travelling acquaintance, to a better repast, than stinking whiskey (and not always that) and a bit of Beef without vegetables.”

At times, too, it was necessary to be an exemplar. “Our truly republican general,” said Laurens, “has declared to his officers that he will set the example of passing the winter in a hut himself,” and John Adams, in a time of famine, declared that “General Washington sets a fine example. He has banished wine from his table, and entertains his friends with rum and water.”

Whenever it was possible, however, there was company at head-quarters. “Since the General left Germantown in the middle of September last,” the General Orders once read, “he has been without his baggage, and on that account is unable to receive company in the manner he could wish. He nevertheless desires the Generals, Field Officers and Brigades Major of the day, to dine with him in future, at three o’clock in the afternoon.” Again the same vehicle informed the army that “the hurry of business often preventing particular invitations being given to officers to dine with the General; He presents his compliments to the Brigadiers and Field Officers of the day, and requests while the Camp continues settled in the City, they will favor him with their company to dinner, without further or special invitation.”

Mrs. Drinker, who went with a committee of women to camp at Valley Forge, has left a brief description of head-quarters hospitality: “Dinner was served, to which he invited us. There were 15 Officers, besides ye Gl. and his wife, Gen. Greene, and Gen. Lee. We had an elegant dinner, which was soon over, when we went out with ye Genls wife, up to her Chamber—and saw no more of him.” Claude Blanchard, too, describes a dinner, at which “there was twenty-five covers used by some officers of the army and a lady to whom the house belonged in which the general lodged. We dined under the tent. I was placed along side of the general. One of his aides-de-camp did the honors. The table was served in the American style and pretty abundantly; vegetables, roast beef, lamb, chickens, salad dressed with nothing but vinegar, green peas, puddings, and some pie, a kind of tart, greatly in use in England and among the Americans, all this being put upon the table at the same time. They gave us on the same plate beef, green peas, lamb, &c.”

Nor was the ménage of the General unequal to unexpected calls. Chastellux tells of his first arrival in camp and introduction to Washington: “He conducted me to his house, where I found the company still at table, although the dinner had been long over. He presented me to the Generals Knox, Waine, Howe, &c. and to his family, then composed of Colonels Hamilton and Tilgman, his Secretaries and his Aides de Camp, and of Major Gibbs, commander of his guards; for in England and America, the Aides de Camp, Adjutants and other officers attached to the General, form what is called his family. A fresh dinner was prepared for me and mine; and the present was prolonged to keep me company.” “At nine,” he elsewhere writes, “supper was served, and when the hour of bed-time came, I found that the chamber, to which the General conducted me was the very parlour I speak of, wherein he had made them place a camp-bed.” Of his hospitality Washington himself wrote,—

“I have asked Mrs. Cochran & Mrs. Livingston to dine with me to-morrow; but am I not in honor bound to apprize them of their fate? As I hate deception, even where the imagination only is concerned; I will. It is needless to premise, that my table is large enough to hold the ladies. Of this they had ocular proof yesterday. To say how it is usually covered, is rather more essential; and this shall be the purport of my Letter.

“Since our arrival at this happy spot, we have had a ham, (sometimes a shoulder) of Bacon, to grace the head of the Table; a piece of roast Beef adorns the foot; a dish of beans, or greens, (almost imperceptible,) decorates the center. When the cook has a mind to cut a figure, (which, I presume will be the case to-morrow) we have two Beef-steak pyes, or dishes of crabs, in addition, one on each side of the center dish, dividing the space & reducing the distance between dish & dish to about 6 feet, which without them would be near 12 feet apart. Of late he has had the surprising sagacity to discover, that apples will make pyes; and its a question, if, in the violence of his efforts, we do not get one of apples, instead of having both of Beef-steaks. If the ladies can put up with such entertainment, and will submit to partake of it in plates, once Tin but now Iron—(not become so by the labor of scouring), I shall be happy to see them.”