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George Washington

By: History.com Editors

Updated: September 9, 2024 | Original: October 29, 2009

George Washington (1732-99) was commander in chief of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War (1775-83) and served two terms as the first U.S. president, from 1789 to 1797. The son of a prosperous planter, Washington was raised in colonial Virginia. As a young man, he worked as a surveyor then fought in the French and Indian War (1754-63). 

During the American Revolution, he led the colonial forces to victory over the British and became a national hero. In 1787, he was elected president of the convention that wrote the U.S. Constitution. Two years later, Washington became America’s first president. Realizing that the way he handled the job would impact how future presidents approached the position, he handed down a legacy of strength, integrity and national purpose. Less than three years after leaving office, he died at his Virginia plantation, Mount Vernon, at age 67.

George Washington's Early Years

George Washington was born on February 22, 1732 , at his family’s plantation on Pope’s Creek in Westmoreland County, in the British colony of Virginia , to Augustine Washington (1694-1743) and his second wife, Mary Ball Washington (1708-89). George, the eldest of Augustine and Mary Washington’s six children, spent much of his childhood at Ferry Farm, a plantation near Fredericksburg, Virginia. After Washington’s father died when he was 11, it’s likely he helped his mother manage the plantation.

Did you know? At the time of his death in 1799, George Washington owned some 300 enslaved people. However, before his passing, he had become opposed to slavery, and in his will, he ordered that his enslaved workers be freed after his wife's death.

Few details about Washington’s early education are known, although children of prosperous families like his typically were taught at home by private tutors or attended private schools. It’s believed he finished his formal schooling at around age 15.

As a teenager, Washington, who had shown an aptitude for mathematics, became a successful surveyor. His surveying expeditions into the Virginia wilderness earned him enough money to begin acquiring land of his own.

In 1751, Washington made his only trip outside of America, when he traveled to Barbados with his older half-brother Lawrence Washington (1718-52), who was suffering from tuberculosis and hoped the warm climate would help him recuperate. Shortly after their arrival, George contracted smallpox. He survived, although the illness left him with permanent facial scars. In 1752, Lawrence, who had been educated in England and served as Washington’s mentor, died. Washington eventually inherited Lawrence’s estate, Mount Vernon , on the Potomac River near Alexandria, Virginia.

George Washington's Military Highlights: Timeline

• 1755 Virginia Colonel
• 1775 Commander-in-Chief
• 1775–1776 Siege of Boston
• 1776 Crossing the Delaware
• 1777 Battle of Princeton
• 1777–1778 Valley Forge
• 1781 Yorktown

George Washington, at age 23, becomes colonel of the Virginia regiment during the French and Indian War (1754–1763). He resigns from the colonial military in 1758 after failing to earn a commission in the royal British military—which he believes is a sign his military career is over. More

On June 15, 1775 , the Second Continental Congress appoints Washington as commander-in-chief of the newly-created Continental Army. On July 3, he takes formal command of the army in Massachusetts , where the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) is already underway. More

By the time Washington becomes commander-in-chief, colonial militiamen have already begun a siege of British-controlled Boston . The Siege of Boston lasts until March 17, 1776, when Washington’s fortifications force British troops to evacuate the city. More

On Christmas Day, Washington and his troops cross the Delaware River to surprise Hessian forces in Trenton, New Jersey . At the Battle of Trenton the next day , the Continental Army wins its first major victory in the Revolutionary War. More

Washington leads the Continental Army to victory against British troops near Princeton, New Jersey on January 3, 1777. Washington’s back-to-back successes at the Battle of Trenton and the Battle of Princeton improve army morale and reassert colonists’ control in New Jersey after a series of losses in New York . More

During a six-month encampment at Valley Forge , Pennsylvania , Washington and former Prussian military officer Friedrich Wilhelm Baron von Steuben train the Continental Army into a more efficient fighting force. This proves to be a major turning point in the war. More

On October 19, 1781, British General Lord Charles Cornwallis surrenders to Washington in Yorktown, Virginia, effectively ending the Revolutionary War. The Battle of Yorktown is the last major battle in the war, though the war formally ends on September 3, 1783 with the Treaty of Paris . More

An Officer and Gentleman Farmer

In December 1752, Washington, who had no previous military experience, was made a commander of the Virginia militia. He saw action in the French and Indian War and was eventually put in charge of all of Virginia’s militia forces. By 1759, Washington had resigned his commission, returned to Mount Vernon and was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses, where he served until 1774. In January 1759, he married Martha Dandridge Custis (1731-1802), a wealthy widow with two children. Washington became a devoted stepfather to her children; he and Martha Washington never had any offspring of their own.

In the ensuing years, Washington expanded Mount Vernon from 2,000 acres into an 8,000-acre property with five farms. He grew a variety of crops, including wheat and corn, bred mules and maintained fruit orchards and a successful fishery. He was deeply interested in farming and continually experimented with new crops and methods of land conservation.

George Washington During the American Revolution

Washington proved to be a better general than military strategist. His strength lay not in his genius on the battlefield but in his ability to keep the struggling colonial army together. His troops were poorly trained and lacked food, ammunition and other supplies (soldiers sometimes even went without shoes in winter). However, Washington was able to give them direction and motivation. His leadership during the winter of 1777-1778 at Valley Forge was a testament to his power to inspire his men to keep going.

By the late 1760s, Washington had experienced firsthand the effects of rising taxes imposed on American colonists by the British and came to believe that it was in the best interests of the colonists to declare independence from England. Washington served as a delegate to the First Continental Congress in 1774 in Philadelphia. By the time the Second Continental Congress convened a year later, the American Revolution had begun in earnest, and Washington was named commander in chief of the Continental Army.

Over the course of the grueling eight-year war, the colonial forces won few battles but consistently held their own against the British. In October 1781, with the aid of the French (who allied themselves with the colonists over their rivals the British), the Continental forces were able to capture British troops under General Charles Cornwallis (1738-1805) in the Battle of Yorktown . This action effectively ended the Revolutionary War and Washington was declared a national hero.

America’s First President

In 1783, with the signing of the Treaty of Paris between Great Britain and the U.S., Washington, believing he had done his duty, gave up his command of the army and returned to Mount Vernon, intent on resuming his life as a gentleman farmer and family man. However, in 1787, he was asked to attend the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia and head the committee to draft the new constitution . His impressive leadership there convinced the delegates that he was by far the most qualified man to become the nation’s first president.

At first, Washington balked. He wanted to, at last, return to a quiet life at home and leave governing the new nation to others. But public opinion was so strong that eventually he gave in. The first presidential election was held on January 7, 1789, and Washington won handily. John Adams (1735-1826), who received the second-largest number of votes, became the nation’s first vice president. The 57-year-old Washington was inaugurated on April 30, 1789, in New York City. Because Washington, D.C. , America’s future capital city wasn’t yet built, he lived in New York and Philadelphia. While in office, he signed a bill establishing a future, permanent U.S. capital along the Potomac River—the city later named Washington, D.C., in his honor.

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George Washington’s Accomplishments

The United States was a small nation when Washington took office, consisting of 11 states and approximately 4 million people, and there was no precedent for how the new president should conduct domestic or foreign business. Mindful that his actions would likely determine how future presidents were expected to govern, Washington worked hard to set an example of fairness, prudence and integrity. In foreign matters, he supported cordial relations with other countries but also favored a position of neutrality in foreign conflicts. Domestically, he nominated the first chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court , John Jay (1745-1829), signed a bill establishing the first national bank, the Bank of the United States , and set up his own presidential cabinet . 

His two most prominent cabinet appointees were Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) and Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804), two men who disagreed strongly on the role of the federal government. Hamilton favored a strong central government and was part of the Federalist Party , while Jefferson favored stronger states’ rights as part of the Democratic-Republican Party, the forerunner to the Democratic Party . Washington believed that divergent views were critical for the health of the new government, but he was distressed at what he saw as an emerging partisanship.

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The Founding Father left the presidency a healthy man, but then died from a sudden illness less than three years later.

George Washington’s presidency was marked by a series of firsts. He signed the first United States copyright law, protecting the copyrights of authors. He also signed the first Thanksgiving proclamation, making November 26 a national day of Thanksgiving for the end of the war for American independence and the successful ratification of the Constitution.

During Washington’s presidency, Congress passed the first federal revenue law, a tax on distilled spirits. In July 1794, farmers in Western Pennsylvania rebelled over the so-called “whiskey tax.” Washington called in over 12,000 militiamen to Pennsylvania to dissolve the Whiskey Rebellion in one of the first major tests of the authority of the national government.

Under Washington’s leadership, the states ratified the Bill of Rights , and five new states entered the union: North Carolina (1789), Rhode Island (1790), Vermont (1791), Kentucky (1792) and Tennessee (1796).

In his second term, Washington issued the proclamation of neutrality to avoid entering the 1793 war between Great Britain and France. But when French minister to the United States Edmond Charles Genet—known to history as “Citizen Genet”—toured the United States, he boldly flaunted the proclamation, attempting to set up American ports as French military bases and gain support for his cause in the Western United States. His meddling caused a stir between Federalists and Democratic-Republicans, widening the rift between parties and making consensus-building more difficult.

In 1795, Washington signed the “Treaty of Amity Commerce and Navigation, between His Britannic Majesty; and The United States of America,” or Jay’s Treaty , so-named for John Jay , who had negotiated it with the government of King George III . It helped the U.S. avoid war with Great Britain, but also rankled certain members of Congress back home and was fiercely opposed by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison . Internationally, it caused a stir among the French, who believed it violated previous treaties between the United States and France.

Washington’s administration signed two other influential international treaties. Pinckney’s Treaty of 1795, also known as the Treaty of San Lorenzo, established friendly relations between the United States and Spain, firming up borders between the U.S. and Spanish territories in North America and opening up the Mississippi to American traders. The Treaty of Tripoli, signed the following year, gave American ships access to Mediterranean shipping lanes in exchange for a yearly tribute to the Pasha of Tripoli.

George Washington’s Retirement to Mount Vernon and Death

In 1796, after two terms as president and declining to serve a third term, Washington finally retired. In Washington’s farewell address , he urged the new nation to maintain the highest standards domestically and to keep involvement with foreign powers to a minimum. The address is still read each February in the U.S. Senate to commemorate Washington’s birthday.

Washington returned to Mount Vernon and devoted his attentions to making the plantation as productive as it had been before he became president. More than four decades of public service had aged him, but he was still a commanding figure. In December 1799, he caught a cold after inspecting his properties in the rain. The cold developed into a throat infection and Washington died on the night of December 14, 1799, at the age of 67. He was entombed at Mount Vernon, which in 1960 was designated a national historic landmark.

Washington left one of the most enduring legacies of any American in history. Known as the “Father of His Country,” his face appears on the U.S. dollar bill and quarter, and dozens of U.S. schools, towns and counties, as well as the state of Washington and the nation’s capital city, are named for him.

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George Washington

George Washington, a Founding Father of the United States, led the Continental Army to victory in the Revolutionary War and was America’s first president.

(1732-1799)

Who Was George Washington?

George Washington was a Virginia plantation owner who served as a general and commander-in-chief of the colonial armies during the American Revolutionary War, and later became the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797.

Early Life and Family

Washington was born on February 22, 1732, in Westmoreland County, Virginia. He was the eldest of Augustine and Mary’s six children, all of whom survived into adulthood.

The family lived on Pope's Creek in Westmoreland County, Virginia. They were moderately prosperous members of Virginia's "middling class."

Washington could trace his family's presence in North America to his great-grandfather, John Washington, who migrated from England to Virginia. The family held some distinction in England and was granted land by Henry VIII .

But much of the family’s wealth in England was lost under the Puritan government of Oliver Cromwell . In 1657 Washington’s grandfather, Lawrence Washington, migrated to Virginia. Little information is available about the family in North America until Washington’s father, Augustine, was born in 1694.

Augustine Washington was an ambitious man who acquired land and enslaved people, built mills, and grew tobacco. For a time, he had an interest in opening iron mines. He married his first wife, Jane Butler, and they had three children. Jane died in 1729 and Augustine married Mary Ball in 1731.

Mount Vernon

In 1735, Augustine moved the family up the Potomac River to another Washington family home, Little Hunting Creek Plantation — later renamed Mount Vernon .

They moved again in 1738 to Ferry Farm on the Rappahannock River, opposite Fredericksburg, Virginia, where Washington spent much of his youth.

Childhood and Education

Little is known about Washington's childhood, which fostered many of the fables later biographers manufactured to fill in the gap. Among these are the stories that Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac and after chopping down his father's prize cherry tree, he openly confessed to the crime.

It is known that from age seven to 15, Washington was home-schooled and studied with the local church sexton and later a schoolmaster in practical math, geography, Latin and the English classics.

But much of the knowledge he would use the rest of his life was through his acquaintance with woodsmen and the plantation foreman. By his early teens, he had mastered growing tobacco, stock raising and surveying.

Washington’s father died when he was 11 and he became the ward of his half-brother, Lawrence, who gave him a good upbringing. Lawrence had inherited the family's Little Hunting Creek Plantation and married Anne Fairfax, the daughter of Colonel William Fairfax, patriarch of the well-to-do Fairfax family. Under her tutelage, Washington was schooled in the finer aspects of colonial culture.

In 1748, when he was 16, Washington traveled with a surveying party plotting land in Virginia’s western territory. The following year, aided by Lord Fairfax, Washington received an appointment as the official surveyor of Culpeper County.

For two years he was very busy surveying the land in Culpeper, Frederick and Augusta counties. The experience made him resourceful and toughened his body and mind. It also piqued his interest in western land holdings, an interest that endured throughout his life with speculative land purchases and a belief that the future of the nation lay in colonizing the West.

In July 1752, Washington's brother, Lawrence, died of tuberculosis, making him the heir apparent of the Washington lands. Lawrence’s only child, Sarah, died two months later and Washington became the head of one of Virginia's most prominent estates, Mount Vernon. He was 20 years old.

Throughout his life, he would hold farming as one of the most honorable professions and he was most proud of Mount Vernon. Washington would gradually increase his landholdings there to about 8,000 acres

Pre-Revolutionary Military Career

In the early 1750s, France and Britain were at peace. However, the French military had begun occupying much of the Ohio Valley, protecting the King's land interests, particularly fur trappers and French settlers. But the borderlands of this area were unclear and prone to dispute between the two countries.

Washington showed early signs of natural leadership and shortly after Lawrence's death, Virginia's Lieutenant Governor, Robert Dinwiddie, appointed Washington adjutant with a rank of major in the Virginia militia.

French and Indian War

On October 31, 1753, Dinwiddie sent Washington to Fort LeBoeuf, at what is now Waterford, Pennsylvania, to warn the French to remove themselves from land claimed by Britain. The French politely refused and Washington made a hasty ride back to Williamsburg, Virginia's colonial capital.

Dinwiddie sent Washington back with troops and they set up a post at Great Meadows. Washington's small force attacked a French post at Fort Duquesne, killing the commander, Coulon de Jumonville, and nine others and taking the rest prisoners. The French and Indian War had begun.

The French counterattacked and drove Washington and his men back to his post at Great Meadows (later named "Fort Necessity.") After a full day siege, Washington surrendered and was soon released and returned to Williamsburg, promising not to build another fort on the Ohio River.

Though a little embarrassed at being captured, he was grateful to receive the thanks from the House of Burgesses and see his name mentioned in the London gazettes.

Washington was given the honorary rank of colonel and joined British General Edward Braddock's army in Virginia in 1755. The British had devised a plan for a three-prong assault on French forces attacking Fort Duquesne, Fort Niagara and Crown Point.

During the encounter, the French and their Indian allies ambushed Braddock, who was mortally wounded. Washington escaped injury with four bullet holes in his cloak and two horses shot out from under him. Though he fought bravely, he could do little to turn back the rout and led the defeated army back to safety.

Commander of Virginia Troops

In August 1755, Washington was made commander of all Virginia troops at age 23. He was sent to the frontier to patrol and protect nearly 400 miles of border with some 700 ill-disciplined colonial troops and a Virginia colonial legislature unwilling to support him.

It was a frustrating assignment. His health failed in the closing months of 1757 and he was sent home with dysentery.

In 1758, Washington returned to duty on another expedition to capture Fort Duquesne. A friendly-fire incident took place, killing 14 and wounding 26 of Washington's men. However, the British were able to score a major victory, capturing Fort Duquesne and control of the Ohio Valley.

Washington retired from his Virginia regiment in December 1758. His experience during the war was generally frustrating, with key decisions made slowly, poor support from the colonial legislature and poorly trained recruits.

Washington applied for a commission with the British army but was turned down. In 1758, he resigned his commission and returned to Mount Vernon disillusioned. The same year, he entered politics and was elected to Virginia's House of Burgesses.

Martha Washington

A month after leaving the army, Washington married Martha Dandridge Custis, a widow, who was only a few months older than he. Martha brought to the marriage a considerable fortune: an 18,000-acre estate, from which Washington personally acquired 6,000 acres.

With this and land he was granted for his military service, Washington became one of the more wealthy landowners in Virginia. The marriage also brought Martha's two young children, John (Jacky) and Martha (Patsy), ages six and four, respectively.

Washington lavished great affection on both of them, and was heartbroken when Patsy died just before the Revolution. Jacky died during the Revolution, and Washington adopted two of his children.

Enslaved People

During his retirement from the Virginia militia until the start of the Revolution, Washington devoted himself to the care and development of his land holdings, attending the rotation of crops, managing livestock and keeping up with the latest scientific advances.

By the 1790s, Washington kept over 300 enslaved people at Mount Vernon. He was said to dislike the institution of slavery , but accepted the fact that it was legal.

Washington, in his will, made his displeasure with slavery known, as he ordered that all his enslaved people be granted their freedom upon the death of his wife Martha. (This act of generosity, however, applied to fewer than half of Mount Vernon's enslaved people: Those enslaved people owned by the Custis family were given to Martha’s grandchildren after her death.)

Washington loved the landed gentry's life of horseback riding, fox hunts, fishing and cotillions. He worked six days a week, often taking off his coat and performing manual labor with his workers. He was an innovative and responsible landowner, breeding cattle and horses and tending to his fruit orchards.

Much has been made of the fact that Washington used false teeth or dentures for most of his adult life. Indeed, Washington's correspondence to friends and family makes frequent references to aching teeth, inflamed gums and various dental woes.

Washington had one tooth pulled when he was just 24 years old, and by the time of his inauguration in 1789 he had just one natural tooth left. But his false teeth weren't made of wood, as some legends suggest.

Instead, Washington's false teeth were fashioned from human teeth — including teeth from enslaved people and his own pulled teeth — ivory, animal teeth and assorted metals.

Washington's dental problems, according to some historians, probably impacted the shape of his face and may have contributed to his quiet, somber demeanor: During the Constitutional Convention, Washington addressed the gathered dignitaries only once.

American Revolution

Though the British Proclamation Act of 1763 — prohibiting settlement beyond the Alleghenies — irritated Washington and he opposed the Stamp Act of 1765, he did not take a leading role in the growing colonial resistance against the British until the widespread protest of the Townshend Acts in 1767.

His letters of this period indicate he was totally opposed to the colonies declaring independence. However, by 1767, he wasn't opposed to resisting what he believed were fundamental violations by the Crown of the rights of Englishmen.

In 1769, Washington introduced a resolution to the House of Burgesses calling for Virginia to boycott British goods until the Acts were repealed.

After the passage of the Coercive Acts in 1774, Washington chaired a meeting in which the Fairfax Resolves were adopted, calling for the convening of the Continental Congress and the use of armed resistance as a last resort. He was selected as a delegate to the First Continental Congress in March 1775.

Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army

After the battles of Lexington and Concord in April 1775, the political dispute between Great Britain and her North American colonies escalated into an armed conflict. In May, Washington traveled to the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia dressed in a military uniform, indicating that he was prepared for war.

On June 15th, he was appointed Major General and Commander-in-Chief of the colonial forces against Great Britain. As was his custom, he did not seek out the office of commander, but he faced no serious competition.

Washington was the best choice for a number of reasons: he had the prestige, military experience and charisma for the job and he had been advising Congress for months.

Another factor was political: The Revolution had started in New England and at the time, they were the only colonies that had directly felt the brunt of British tyranny. Virginia was the largest British colony and New England needed Southern colonial support.

Political considerations and force of personality aside, Washington was not necessarily qualified to wage war on the world's most powerful nation. Washington's training and experience were primarily in frontier warfare involving small numbers of soldiers. He wasn't trained in the open-field style of battle practiced by the commanding British generals.

He also had no practical experience maneuvering large formations of infantry, commanding cavalry or artillery, or maintaining the flow of supplies for thousands of men in the field. But he was courageous and determined and smart enough to keep one step ahead of the enemy.

Washington and his small army did taste victory early in March 1776 by placing artillery above Boston, on Dorchester Heights, forcing the British to withdraw. Washington then moved his troops into New York City. But in June, a new British commander, Sir William Howe , arrived in the Colonies with the largest expeditionary force Britain had ever deployed to date.

Crossing the Delaware

In August 1776, the British army launched an attack and quickly took New York City in the largest battle of the war. Washington's army was routed and suffered the surrender of 2,800 men.

He ordered the remains of his army to retreat into Pennsylvania across the Delaware River. Confident the war would be over in a few months, General Howe wintered his troops at Trenton and Princeton, leaving Washington free to attack at the time and place of his choosing.

On Christmas night, 1776, Washington and his men returned across the Delaware River and attacked unsuspecting Hessian mercenaries at Trenton, forcing their surrender. A few days later, evading a force that had been sent to destroy his army, Washington attacked the British again, this time at Princeton, dealing them a humiliating loss.

Victories and Losses

General Howe's strategy was to capture colonial cities and stop the rebellion at key economic and political centers. He never abandoned the belief that once the Americans were deprived of their major cities, the rebellion would wither.

In the summer of 1777, he mounted an offensive against Philadelphia. Washington moved in his army to defend the city but was defeated at the Battle of Brandywine . Philadelphia fell two weeks later.

In the late summer of 1777, the British army sent a major force, under the command of John Burgoyne, south from Quebec to Saratoga, New York, to split the rebellion between New England and the southern colonies. But the strategy backfired, as Burgoyne became trapped by the American armies led by Horatio Gates and Benedict Arnold at the Battle of Saratoga .

Without support from Howe, who couldn't reach him in time, Burgoyne was forced to surrender his entire 6,200 man army. The victory was a major turning point in the war as it encouraged France to openly ally itself with the American cause for independence.

Through all of this, Washington discovered an important lesson: The political nature of war was just as important as the military one. Washington began to understand that military victories were as important as keeping the resistance alive.

Americans began to believe that they could meet their objective of independence without defeating the British army. Meanwhile, British General Howe clung to the strategy of capturing colonial cities in hopes of smothering the rebellion.

Howe didn't realize that capturing cities like Philadelphia and New York would not unseat colonial power. The Congress would just pack up and meet elsewhere.

Valley Forge

The darkest time for Washington and the Continental Army was during the winter of 1777 at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. The 11,000-man force went into winter quarters and over the next six months suffered thousands of deaths, mostly from disease. But the army emerged from the winter still intact and in relatively good order.

Realizing their strategy of capturing colonial cities had failed, the British command replaced General Howe with Sir Henry Clinton. The British army evacuated Philadelphia to return to New York City. Washington and his men delivered several quick blows to the moving army, attacking the British flank near Monmouth Courthouse. Though a tactical standoff, the encounter proved Washington's army capable of open field battle.

For the remainder of the war, Washington was content to keep the British confined to New York, although he never totally abandoned the idea of retaking the city. The alliance with France had brought a large French army and a navy fleet.

Washington and his French counterparts decided to let Clinton be and attack British General Charles Cornwallis at Yorktown, Virginia. Facing the combined French and Colonial armies and the French fleet of 29 warships at his back, Cornwallis held out as long as he could, but on October 19, 1781, he surrendered his forces.

Revolutionary War Victory

Washington had no way of knowing the Yorktown victory would bring the war to a close.

The British still had 26,000 troops occupying New York City, Charleston and Savannah, plus a large fleet of warships in the Colonies. By 1782, the French army and navy had departed, the Continental treasury was depleted, and most of his soldiers hadn’t been paid for several years.

A near-mutiny was avoided when Washington convinced Congress to grant a five-year bonus for soldiers in March 1783. By November of that year, the British had evacuated New York City and other cities and the war was essentially over.

The Americans had won their independence. Washington formally bade his troops farewell and on December 23, 1783, he resigned his commission as commander-in-chief of the army and returned to Mount Vernon.

For four years, Washington attempted to fulfill his dream of resuming life as a gentleman farmer and to give his much-neglected Mount Vernon plantation the care and attention it deserved.

The war had been costly to the Washington family with lands neglected, no exports of goods, and the depreciation of paper money. But Washington was able to repair his fortunes with a generous land grant from Congress for his military service and become profitable once again.

Constitutional Convention

In 1787, Washington was again called to the duty of his country. Since independence, the young republic had been struggling under the Articles of Confederation , a structure of government that centered power with the states.

But the states were not unified. They fought among themselves over boundaries and navigation rights and refused to contribute to paying off the nation's war debt. In some instances, state legislatures imposed tyrannical tax policies on their own citizens.

Washington was intensely dismayed at the state of affairs, but only slowly came to the realization that something should be done about it. Perhaps he wasn't sure the time was right so soon after the Revolution to be making major adjustments to the democratic experiment. Or perhaps because he hoped he would not be called upon to serve, he remained noncommittal.

But when Shays' Rebellion erupted in Massachusetts, Washington knew something needed to be done to improve the nation’s government. In 1786, Congress approved a convention to be held in Philadelphia to amend the Articles of Confederation.

At the Constitutional Convention , Washington was unanimously chosen as president. Washington, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton had come to the conclusion that it wasn't amendments that were needed, but a new constitution that would give the national government more authority.

In the end, the Convention produced a plan for government that not only would address the country's current problems, but would endure through time. After the convention adjourned, Washington's reputation and support for the new government were indispensable to the ratification of the new U.S. Constitution .

The opposition was strident, if not organized, with many of America's leading political figures — including Patrick Henry and Sam Adams — condemning the proposed government as a grab for power. Even in Washington's native Virginia, the Constitution was ratified by only one vote.

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George Washington: Presidency

Still hoping to retire to his beloved Mount Vernon, Washington was once again called upon to serve this country.

During the presidential election of 1789, he received a vote from every elector to the Electoral College, the only president in American history to be elected by unanimous approval. He took the oath of office at Federal Hall in New York City, the capital of the United States at the time.

As the first president, Washington was astutely aware that his presidency would set a precedent for all that would follow. He carefully attended to the responsibilities and duties of his office, remaining vigilant to not emulate any European royal court. To that end, he preferred the title "Mr. President," instead of more imposing names that were suggested.

At first he declined the $25,000 salary Congress offered the office of the presidency, for he was already wealthy and wanted to protect his image as a selfless public servant. However, Congress persuaded him to accept the compensation to avoid giving the impression that only wealthy men could serve as president.

Washington proved to be an able administrator. He surrounded himself with some of the most capable people in the country, appointing Hamilton as Secretary of the Treasury and Thomas Jefferson as Secretary of State. He delegated authority wisely and consulted regularly with his cabinet listening to their advice before making a decision.

Washington established broad-ranging presidential authority, but always with the highest integrity, exercising power with restraint and honesty. In doing so, he set a standard rarely met by his successors, but one that established an ideal by which all are judged.

READ MORE: How George Washington’s Personal and Physical Characteristics Helped Him Win the Presidency

Accomplishments

During his first term, Washington adopted a series of measures proposed by Treasury Secretary Hamilton to reduce the nation's debt and place its finances on sound footing.

His administration also established several peace treaties with Native American tribes and approved a bill establishing the nation's capital in a permanent district along the Potomac River.

Whiskey Rebellion

Then, in 1791, Washington signed a bill authorizing Congress to place a tax on distilled spirits, which stirred protests in rural areas of Pennsylvania.

Quickly, the protests turned into a full-scale defiance of federal law known as the Whiskey Rebellion . Washington invoked the Militia Act of 1792, summoning local militias from several states to put down the rebellion.

Washington personally took command, marching the troops into the areas of rebellion and demonstrating that the federal government would use force, when necessary, to enforce the law. This was also the only time a sitting U.S. president has led troops into battle.

In foreign affairs, Washington took a cautious approach, realizing that the weak young nation could not succumb to Europe's political intrigues. In 1793, France and Great Britain were once again at war.

At the urging of Hamilton, Washington disregarded the U.S. alliance with France and pursued a course of neutrality. In 1794, he sent John Jay to Britain to negotiate a treaty (known as the "Jay Treaty") to secure a peace with Britain and clear up some issues held over from the Revolutionary War.

The action infuriated Jefferson, who supported the French and felt that the U.S. needed to honor its treaty obligations. Washington was able to mobilize public support for the treaty, which proved decisive in securing ratification in the Senate.

Though controversial, the treaty proved beneficial to the United States by removing British forts along the western frontier, establishing a clear boundary between Canada and the United States, and most importantly, delaying a war with Britain and providing over a decade of prosperous trade and development the fledgling country so desperately needed.

Political Parties

All through his two terms as president, Washington was dismayed at the growing partisanship within the government and the nation. The power bestowed on the federal government by the Constitution made for important decisions, and people joined together to influence those decisions. The formation of political parties at first were influenced more by personality than by issues.

As Treasury secretary, Hamilton pushed for a strong national government and an economy built in industry. Secretary of State Jefferson desired to keep government small and center power more at the local level, where citizens' freedom could be better protected. He envisioned an economy based on farming.

Those who followed Hamilton's vision took the name Federalists and people who opposed those ideas and tended to lean toward Jefferson’s view began calling themselves Democratic-Republicans. Washington despised political partisanship, believing that ideological differences should never become institutionalized. He strongly felt that political leaders should be free to debate important issues without being bound by party loyalty.

However, Washington could do little to slow the development of political parties. The ideals promoted by Hamilton and Jefferson produced a two-party system that proved remarkably durable. These opposing viewpoints represented a continuation of the debate over the proper role of government, a debate that began with the conception of the Constitution and continues today.

Washington's administration was not without its critics who questioned what they saw as extravagant conventions in the office of the president. During his two terms, Washington rented the best houses available and was driven in a coach drawn by four horses, with outriders and lackeys in rich uniforms.

After being overwhelmed by callers, he announced that except for the scheduled weekly reception open to all, he would only see people by appointment. Washington entertained lavishly, but in private dinners and receptions at invitation only. He was, by some, accused of conducting himself like a king.

However, ever mindful his presidency would set the precedent for those to follow, he was careful to avoid the trappings of a monarchy. At public ceremonies, he did not appear in a military uniform or the monarchical robes. Instead, he dressed in a black velvet suit with gold buckles and powdered hair, as was the common custom. His reserved manner was more due to inherent reticence than any excessive sense of dignity.

Desiring to return to Mount Vernon and his farming, and feeling the decline of his physical powers with age, Washington refused to yield to the pressures to serve a third term, even though he would probably not have faced any opposition.

By doing this, he was again mindful of the precedent of being the "first president," and chose to establish a peaceful transition of government.

Farewell Address

In the last months of his presidency, Washington felt he needed to give his country one last measure of himself. With the help of Hamilton, he composed his Farewell Address to the American people, which urged his fellow citizens to cherish the Union and avoid partisanship and permanent foreign alliances.

In March 1797, he turned over the government to John Adams and returned to Mount Vernon, determined to live his last years as a simple gentleman farmer. His last official act was to pardon the participants in the Whiskey Rebellion.

Upon returning to Mount Vernon in the spring of 1797, Washington felt a reflective sense of relief and accomplishment. He had left the government in capable hands, at peace, its debts well-managed, and set on a course of prosperity.

He devoted much of his time to tending the farm's operations and management. Although he was perceived to be wealthy, his land holdings were only marginally profitable.

On a cold December day in 1799, Washington spent much of it inspecting the farm on horseback in a driving snowstorm. When he returned home, he hastily ate his supper in his wet clothes and then went to bed.

The next morning, on December 13, he awoke with a severe sore throat and became increasingly hoarse. He retired early, but awoke around 3 a.m. and told Martha that he felt very sick. The illness progressed until he died late in the evening of December 14, 1799.

The news of Washington's death at age 67 spread throughout the country, plunging the nation into a deep mourning. Many towns and cities held mock funerals and presented hundreds of eulogies to honor their fallen hero. When the news of this death reached Europe, the British fleet paid tribute to his memory, and Napoleon ordered ten days of mourning.

Washington could have been a king. Instead, he chose to be a citizen. He set many precedents for the national government and the presidency: The two-term limit in office, only broken once by Franklin D. Roosevelt , was later ensconced in the Constitution's 22nd Amendment.

He crystallized the power of the presidency as a part of the government’s three branches of government , able to exercise authority when necessary, but also accept the checks and balances of power inherent in the system.

He was not only considered a military and revolutionary hero, but a man of great personal integrity, with a deep sense of duty, honor and patriotism. For over 200 years, Washington has been acclaimed as indispensable to the success of the Revolution and the birth of the nation.

But his most important legacy may be that he insisted he was dispensable, asserting that the cause of liberty was larger than any single individual.

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QUICK FACTS

• Name: George Washington
• Birth Year: 1732
• Birth date: February 22, 1732
• Birth State: Virginia
• Birth City: Westmoreland County
• Birth Country: United States
• Gender: Male
• Best Known For: George Washington, a Founding Father of the United States, led the Continental Army to victory in the Revolutionary War and was America’s first president.
• U.S. Politics
• Astrological Sign: Pisces
• Death Year: 1799
• Death date: December 14, 1799
• Death State: Virginia
• Death City: Mount Vernon
• Death Country: United States

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CITATION INFORMATION

• Article Title: George Washington Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
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• Last Updated: September 11, 2020
• Original Published Date: April 3, 2014
• Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all.
• When we assumed the soldier, we did not lay aside the citizen.
• Be courteous to all, but intimate with few.
• [T]he preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.
• We should never despair, our situation before has been unpromising and has changed for the better, so I trust, it will again. If new difficulties arise, we must only put forth new exertions and proportion our efforts to the exigency of the times.
• There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation.
• [M]y movements to the chair of government will be accompanied by feelings not unlike those of a culprit who is going to the place of his execution.
• True friendship is a plant of slow growth, and must undergo and withstand the shocks of adversity before it is entitled to the appellation.
• Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.
• I heard the bullets whistle, and, believe me, there is something charming in the sound.
• Discipline is the soul of an army. It makes small numbers formidable; procures success to the weak, and esteem to all.
• The basis of our political Systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their Constitutions of Government. But the Constitution which at any time exists, 'till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole People, is sacredly obligatory upon all.
• I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is the best policy.
• The bosom of America is open to receive not only the opulent and respectable stranger, but the oppressed and persecuted of all nations and religions.

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George Washington

The 1st President of the United States

The biography for President Washington and past presidents is courtesy of the White House Historical Association.

On April 30, 1789, George Washington, standing on the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York, took his oath of office as the first President of the United States. “As the first of every thing, in our situation will serve to establish a Precedent,” he wrote James Madison, “it is devoutly wished on my part, that these precedents may be fixed on true principles.”

Born in 1732 into a Virginia planter family, he learned the morals, manners, and body of knowledge requisite for an 18th century Virginia gentleman.

He pursued two intertwined interests: military arts and western expansion. At 16 he helped survey Shenandoah lands for Thomas, Lord Fairfax. Commissioned a lieutenant colonel in 1754, he fought the first skirmishes of what grew into the French and Indian War. The next year, as an aide to Gen. Edward Braddock, he escaped injury although four bullets ripped his coat and two horses were shot from under him.

From 1759 to the outbreak of the American Revolution, Washington managed his lands around Mount Vernon and served in the Virginia House of Burgesses. Married to a widow, Martha Dandridge Custis, he devoted himself to a busy and happy life. But like his fellow planters, Washington felt himself exploited by British merchants and hampered by British regulations. As the quarrel with the mother country grew acute, he moderately but firmly voiced his resistance to the restrictions.

When the Second Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia in May 1775, Washington, one of the Virginia delegates, was elected Commander in Chief of the Continental Army. On July 3, 1775, at Cambridge, Massachusetts, he took command of his ill-trained troops and embarked upon a war that was to last six grueling years.

He realized early that the best strategy was to harass the British. He reported to Congress, “we should on all Occasions avoid a general Action, or put anything to the Risque, unless compelled by a necessity, into which we ought never to be drawn.” Ensuing battles saw him fall back slowly, then strike unexpectedly. Finally in 1781 with the aid of French allies–he forced the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.

Washington longed to retire to his fields at Mount Vernon. But he soon realized that the Nation under its Articles of Confederation was not functioning well, so he became a prime mover in the steps leading to the Constitutional Convention at Philadelphia in 1787. When the new Constitution was ratified, the Electoral College unanimously elected Washington President.

He did not infringe upon the policy making powers that he felt the Constitution gave Congress. But the determination of foreign policy became preponderantly a Presidential concern. When the French Revolution led to a major war between France and England, Washington refused to accept entirely the recommendations of either his Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, who was pro-French, or his Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, who was pro-British. Rather, he insisted upon a neutral course until the United States could grow stronger.

To his disappointment, two parties were developing by the end of his first term. Wearied of politics, feeling old, he retired at the end of his second. In his Farewell Address, he urged his countrymen to forswear excessive party spirit and geographical distinctions. In foreign affairs, he warned against long-term alliances.

Washington enjoyed less than three years of retirement at Mount Vernon, for he died of a throat infection December 14, 1799. For months the Nation mourned him.

Learn more about George Washington’s spouse, Martha Dandridge Custis Washington.

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George Washington

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George Washington (1732-1799) was an American military officer and statesman who led the Continental Army to victory during the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783) and served as the first president of the United States (1789-1797). Often regarded as the 'Father of His Country', Washington remains one of the most revered and iconic figures in US history.

George Washington was born at 10 am on 22 February 1732 at Pope's Creek plantation in Westmoreland County, Virginia. He was the first of six children born to Augustine Washington, a wealthy Virginian landowner, and his second wife Mary Ball Washington; George also had four older half-siblings from his father's first marriage. Little is known about George's childhood. His early years were mostly spent on the family property of Ferry Farm on the Rappahannock River, and he likely attended school in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where he excelled in the subjects of geometry, trigonometry, and mapmaking. When his father suddenly died in 1743, 11-year-old George inherited Ferry Farm as well as ten enslaved people. Too young to fend for himself, he went to live with his eldest half-brother, Lawrence Washington (b.1718), at Mount Vernon. George idolized Lawrence, who he came to regard as both a father figure and a best friend.

George's aptitude for mathematics led him to consider a career as a land surveyor, a respectable path to wealth and social advancement. In 1748, at the age of 16, he embarked on his first expedition into the Shenandoah Valley to survey the property of his influential neighbor, Thomas Fairfax. The next year, he earned his surveyor's license and, through Fairfax's patronage, was appointed surveyor for Culpeper County. Over the next three years, Washington completed 200 surveying expeditions and measured a total of 60,000 acres along Virginia's western frontier. But just as George's career was taking off, Lawrence came down with tuberculosis. In November 1751, he went to the Caribbean island of Barbados in the hopes that the tropical air would improve his condition. George accompanied him, and contracted a painful case of smallpox during his brief stay on the island. George soon recovered but Lawrence was not so lucky, as he died shortly after returning to Virginia in 1752. After his brother's death , George started leasing Mount Vernon from Lawrence's widow and became the legal owner of the property after her own death in 1761.

In 1753, George Washington reached the age of maturity, and was eager to find a way to make a name for himself. He would soon have an opportunity. The French had begun to construct forts on the forks of the Ohio River, fertile territory that had been claimed by Virginia. In November, Washington was sent as an envoy to demand that the French vacate the Ohio Country at once. On his journey into the west, he was joined by Christopher Gist, an experienced frontiersman and guide, and Tanacharison, a Mingo chieftain called the 'Half-King' by Virginians. It was Tanacharison who gave Washington the Seneca name of ' Conotocaurius ' or 'Devourer of Villages', in reference to Washington's great-grandfather, who had helped expel Native Americans from their lands in Virginia. The small party reached the French Fort LeBoeuf during a snowstorm; although they were received cordially by the fort's commander, Washington's demands were firmly rebuffed. Washington then embarked on his trek back to Virginia which included several perilous episodes. While crossing the icy Alleghany River in a raft, Washington fell overboard, and likely would have drowned had Gist not pulled him from the water.

French and Indian War

In April 1754, Washington was commissioned as a lieutenant colonel in the newly formed Virginia Regiment and was sent back to the Ohio Country, this time with a company of 159 men, to again demand that the French leave. He set up camp in a grassy field called Great Meadows, where he was informed by one of Tanacharison's scouts that a party of French soldiers was encamped nearby. Early in the morning of 28 May 1754, Washington and Tanacharison ambushed the French camp; in the short skirmish that followed, several French troops were killed, including their commander, Joseph Coulon de Jumonville. Washington immediately withdrew back to Great Meadows, where his men hastily constructed Fort Necessity. But when the French attacked on 3 July, the fort was unable to hold out; after eight hours of fighting, Washington agreed to surrender on the condition that his surviving men could return to Virginia. The incident greatly heightened tensions between Britain and France, helping to spark a global conflict, the Seven Years' War (1756-1763).

The next year, Brigadier General Edward Braddock landed in Virginia with two regiments of British regulars, tasked with capturing Fort Duquesne and forcing the French from the Ohio Country once and for all. When Braddock's Expedition set out in May 1755, Washington accompanied it as one of Braddock's aides-de-camp , but was forced to remain behind for much of the campaign on account of his dysentery. He was, however, with the army when it was ambushed by the French and their Indigenous allies on 9 July at the Battle of the Monongahela. Despite having two horses killed from under him, Washington managed to rally the panicked British army and help lead the retreat. Over 800 British and provincial soldiers had become casualties in the ambush including Braddock, who was mortally wounded. Over the next two years, Washington, now a full colonel in command of the Virginia Regiment, oversaw the defense of the colony's western frontier. In 1758, he joined the Forbes Expedition which succeeded in capturing Fort Duquesne without firing a shot. This campaign helped turn the tide of the French and Indian War, which ultimately resulted in a British victory in 1763.

Marriage & Plantation Life

Frustrated that his exploits had not won him a commission in the regular British army, Washington resigned from the Virginia Regiment and returned to Mount Vernon. He won election to the House of Burgesses in 1758 and, the following January, married the wealthy widow Martha Dandridge Custis. The marriage gave Washington control over the 18,000-acre Custis estate as well as 84 enslaved people, making him one of the most influential landowners in Virginia. He and Martha never had any children together; indeed, some scholars have speculated that Washington's 1751 bout with smallpox rendered him sterile. Instead, Washington treated Martha's children from her first marriage, John Parke Custis and Martha 'Patsy' Parke Custis, as if they were his own. Sadly, he would outlive them both; Patsy died of an epileptic seizure in 1773 at the age of 17, while John died of 'camp fever' in 1781 while serving at Yorktown. After their deaths, Washington found joy in raising John's children.

Washington spent the 1760s tending to his beloved home of Mount Vernon, where wheat and tobacco were grown and harvested by hundreds of slaves; over the course of Washington's lifetime, 577 enslaved people lived and worked at Mount Vernon. Although Washington was not considered a cruel slaveowner by the standards of the day, his slaves often had to subsist on insufficient rations, live in cramped, one-room dwellings, and exist perpetually under the supervision of Washington's overseers; Washington also had no qualms about whipping or selling enslaved people who tried to run away. Washington's views on the institution of slavery evolved over time and, by the advent of the Revolution, he found the practice to be abhorrent. Nevertheless, he did little to work toward the abolition of slavery and, indeed, continued to rent and purchase slaves until his death.

As Washington concerned himself with his life at Mount Vernon, tensions between Britain and the Thirteen Colonies were escalating. Disagreement over the colonists' rights and liberties – expressed over the constitutional authority of Parliament to issue tax policies like the Stamp Act and Townshend Acts , policies which the colonists had never consented to – led to riots and incidents of violence like the Boston Massacre (1770). Washington increasingly sided against Parliament; his status as one of Virginia's leading citizens automatically made him a leader in the colony's Whig, or Patriot, movement. In 1774, he attended the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia and helped train Virginia militias for potential conflict with British soldiers. When, on 19 April 1775, blood was spilled at the Battles of Lexington and Concord , Washington was prepared to fight for his homeland.

Commander-in-Chief

On 14 June 1775, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Continental Army and nominated Washington as its commander-in-chief; their decision was informed both by Washington's military experience and because they felt the southern colonies were more likely to rally behind one of their own. On 2 July, Washington rode into the army headquarters of Cambridge, Massachusetts, where the Continental Army was carrying out the Siege of Boston . Washington was dismayed to find that his new army was little more than a jumble of undisciplined colonial militias, and immediately went to work drilling the troops and enforcing strict discipline. In early 1776, he finally found an opportunity to win the siege, when Colonel Henry Knox arrived with heavy artillery captured from Fort Ticonderoga, which Washington positioned on the Dorchester Heights overlooking Boston. Rather than face an artillery bombardment, the British evacuated the city by sea on 17 March, and Boston fell back into American hands.

Washington then marched his army to New York City, which he correctly predicted would be the next target of the British. In July, as he was preparing the city's defenses, he received word that the Congress had declared the independence of the United States; on 9 July, Washington assembled his army and read the Declaration of Independence aloud to his cheering soldiers. Meanwhile, a British army of 32,000 men was gathering on nearby Staten Island. The British finally struck at the Battle of Long Island (27 August 1776), pushing Washington's men off their fortifications atop the Heights of Guan and inflicting over 2,000 American casualties. The British could have defeated the Continental Army there and then, had Washington not been able to successfully evacuate his troops from Long Island during the stormy night of 29-30 August. He was, however, forced to abandon New York City, which was occupied by the British on 15 September.

Over the next several weeks, Washington was chased through lower New York and New Jersey, fighting desperate actions at Harlem Heights (16 September), White Plains (28 October), and Fort Washington (16 November) as his army was whittled away by attrition. By mid-December, his army had been reduced to barely 3,000 men, and many assumed it would not survive the winter. But Washington had come to believe that the success of the entire Revolution depended on the survival of his army and was therefore determined to preserve it at all costs. This led him to adopt a Fabian strategy, whereby he would avoid pitched battles whenever possible, preferring to wear down the enemy with minor raids and scorched earth tactics. This did not mean Washington was a timid commander, however, as he constantly looked for opportunities to strike at the enemy when their guard was down. In one such instance, Washington crossed the icy Delaware River on the night of 25 December 1776, surprising and defeating a Hessian garrison at the Battle of Trenton the next morning. This and his follow up victory at the Battle of Princeton (3 January 1777) galvanized renewed support for the Revolution.

The next year, Washington marched into Pennsylvania to defend the US capital of Philadelphia. He lost two hard-fought actions at the Battle of Brandywine (11 September) and Battle of Germantown (4 October) and was unable to prevent the British from occupying Philadelphia in late September. But the loss of the capital did not have the adverse effect on American morale that the British had hoped for. In December, Washington moved his army to Valley Forge , where he spent the winter implementing vital supply reforms, inoculating his soldiers against smallpox, and fending off a political threat to his leadership known as the Conway Cabal . During this time, officers like Baron Friedrich von Steuben retrained the Continental Army into a more disciplined and effective fighting force. When the Continental Army marched out of Valley Forge in June 1778, it was eager to put its new skills to the test – at the Battle of Monmouth (28 June), the Continentals fought the British to a standstill in scorching summer heat. That same year, France entered the war as a US ally.

Washington then moved his army outside New York City, maintaining that approximate position for the next two years as the focus of the war shifted to the South. Washington dispatched his trusted general Nathanael Greene to lead the southern army, as he remained in the North to keep an eye on the sizable British presence on Manhattan. In autumn 1781, Washington finally led a combined Franco-American army south, to lay siege to a British army under Lord Charles Cornwallis , which was trapped in Yorktown, Virginia. Caught between Washington's army on land and the French navy at sea, Cornwallis had no choice but to surrender to Washington on 19 October 1781, ending the active phase of the war. Two years later, the Treaty of Paris of 1783 was finalized, and in November, the last British soldiers evacuated New York City.

Constitutional Crisis

In December 1783, Washington resigned as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army and returned to Mount Vernon, intending to retire to a life of gentleman farming. For the next several years, he oversaw his beloved plantation as national concern began to grow over the feebleness of the Articles of Confederation ; under the Articles, which kept the federal government weak to protect the sovereignty of the states, Congress was powerless to raise taxes or put down armed insurrections such as Shays' Rebellion (1786-87). Washington eventually concluded that the Articles would have to be totally replaced, and hesitantly agreed to serve as the president of the Constitutional Convention when it met in Philadelphia in May 1787.

The Convention produced a new framework of government, the United States Constitution, that was ratified by the necessary nine states by 1788. The new Constitution called for the election of a president to serve as the nation's chief executive; there was never any question that Washington was the man for the job, and indeed, no other candidate was seriously considered. In the US presidential election of 1789 , the electors unanimously voted him in as the first president, with John Adams elected vice president. Washington was inaugurated on 30 April 1789 at Federal Hall in New York City, burdened with defining the office of the presidency and guiding the fragile young republic through the tumultuous years to come.

During his two terms in office, Washington utilized the same caution that had served him so well on the battlefield. He refrained from adopting any title or official procedure that smacked of monarchy – preferring to go by the humble title of 'Mr. President' – and held himself aloof from the partisanship that was bubbling in his cabinet. In the first years of the Washington Administration, Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton proposed a controversial financial program that called for the federal government to assume state debts and for the establishment of a national bank. This plan was hotly opposed by Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson and his southern supporters. Hamilton and Jefferson frequently clashed in cabinet meetings until the Compromise of 1790, in which Jefferson agreed to support Hamilton's plan in return for the new Federal City – to be named in Washington's honor – to be built on the Potomac River. The partisan struggles were only beginning, however, and would escalate throughout the remainder of Washington's presidency and beyond.

In 1794, the Whiskey Rebellion broke out in western Pennsylvania, when farmers rose in revolt against a new liquor excise tax imposed by Hamilton. Washington, though initially reluctant to resort to military force, raised a 13,000-man federalized militia that suppressed the rebellion without having to fight a single battle. The incident strengthened the authority of the federal government. The Washington Administration also prosecuted the Northwest Indian War (1790-1795), which was fought between the US and a coalition of Native American nations for control of the Northwest Territory. General 'Mad' Anthony Wayne led US troops to victory at the Battle of Fallen Timbers, forcing the Native Americans to cede their claims in the territory to the US in the resultant Treaty of Greenville; the British, who had offered clandestine support to the natives, were also compelled to abandon their forts in the region.

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Much of Washington's second term was defined by the concurrent French Revolution (1789-1799), which was engulfing Europe in a total war. Although Jefferson and the emerging Democratic-Republican Party urged him to support Revolutionary France, Washington pursued a policy of neutrality and refused to get involved in the French Revolutionary Wars . Controversy over this decision was compounded by the Jay Treaty of 1794, which strengthened the United States' economic ties to Britain. Both of these issues provided fodder for the growing rivalry between the Democratic-Republicans and Hamilton's Federalist Party.

Retirement & Death

At the end of his second term, Washington decided not to stand for reelection; his refusal to seek a third term set a precedent followed by every subsequent US president except for Franklin D. Roosevelt. Washington gave his Farewell Address on 19 September 1796, in which he famously warned of the dangers of political parties. He left office when his term expired on 4 March 1797 and returned to Mount Vernon. On the evening of 12 December 1799, after a day spent in the rain, supervising farming activities on horseback, Washington returned to the house with a sore throat. He fell severely ill the next morning and was heavily bled four times by his doctors. He died at 10 pm on 14 December 1799, at the age of 67. His death was mourned both in the United States and across the Western world, where he was hailed as a champion of freedom and liberty.

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Bibliography

• Anderson, Fred. The War That Made America. Penguin Books, 2006.
• Boatner, Mark M. Cassell's Biographical Dictionary of the American War of Independence. London: Cassell, 1973., 1973.
• Chernow, Ron. Alexander Hamilton. Penguin Books, 2005.
• Fleming, Thomas . The Strategy of Victory. Hachette Audio, 2017.
• Freeman, Douglas Southall. Washington. Simon & Schuster, 1995.
• George Washington and Slavery , accessed 8 Aug 2024.
• George Washington Biography - Encyclopedia Britannica , accessed 8 Aug 2024.
• McCullough, David. 1776. Simon & Schuster, 2006.
• Middlekauff, Robert. The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763-1789. Oxford University Press, 2007.
• Wood, Gordon S. Empire of Liberty. Oxford University Press, 2009.

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George Washington

On February 22, 1732, George was born to Augustine and Mary Ball Washington. He spent most of his childhood at Ferry Farm on the Rappahannock River. All of the homes and plantations where Washington lived were maintained by enslaved labor. When George was eleven, his father died and he became a slave owner. As a result, George did not receive a formal education like his older half-brothers. Instead, he helped his mother on the farm and attended a local school in Fredericksburg. For the rest of his life, Washington supplemented his education with reading and self-guided study. At seventeen-years old, George used his family connections to secure appointment as the surveyor for Culpeper County. This position offered adventure, a steady income, and the opportunity to view and purchase unclaimed land. His surveying experience also instilled in George a firm conviction in the importance of westward expansion to the future of the colonies, and later the United States. In 1753, Lieutenant Governor of Virginia Robert Dinwiddie sent twenty-one-year-old Washington, now a Major in the Virginia Regiment, to deliver a message to the French, demanding they abandon the Ohio Valley. Washington later published his account of the trip, giving him an international reputation. A few months later, Washington again marched out west with 150 men to enforce Virginia’s claim. The mission ended in a humiliating surrender at Fort Necessity, followed by Washington’s resignation of his commission. Two years later, Washington again witnessed fighting in the Ohio Country, this time as an aide-de-camp in British General Edward Braddock’s official family. Braddock’s army suffered an overwhelming defeat near the Monongahela River, but Washington was commended for rallying the survivors in the face of chaos. On January 6, 1758, George married Martha Dandridge Custis, a beautiful and charming widow from Virginia. George acquired significant wealth and a partner for the next four decades through the marriage. Between 1759 and 1775, George served many terms in the Virginia House of Burgesses and devoted himself to improving farming practices at his plantation through the labor of the growing enslaved community. After supporting the colonies’ protests against British tax measures in the 1770s, Washington was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army by Congress in June 1775. For the next eight years, Washington remained with the army, only leaving camp to attend summons by Congress. Under Washington’s command, the Continental Army lost more battles than it won, constantly struggling to obtain the necessary food, supplies, and ammunition. But the army persisted—and the colonies’ fight for independence could not be extinguished. Washington also served a critical role ensuring that military power remained subordinate to civilian government. He never used his authority to challenge Congress and ended potential military coups within the army’s ranks. When the Treaty of Paris ended the Revolutionary War, Washington resigned his commission to Congress. Washington’s relinquishing of power was nearly unprecedented and made him an international hero. In 1787, Washington was again called to serve when Virginia appointed him as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention. The delegates crafted a Constitution that created a government with significantly more authority and centralized power. They hoped the new government would address the economic, diplomatic, and domestic calamities that had besieged the nation for over a decade under the Articles of Confederation. Unsurprisingly, the delegates trusted Washington with the presidency. To this day, he is the only president to be unanimously elected. On April 16, 1789, George Washington left his home at Mount Vernon to travel to New York City to be inaugurated as the first President of the United States. During Washington’s presidency, at least ten enslaved people worked at the president’s houses in New York City and Philadelphia: Ona, Hercules, Moll, Giles, Austin, Richmond, Paris, Joe, Christopher Sheels, and William Lee. They tended the horses and carriages in the stables, escorted Washington and his family when they left the house, cooked in the kitchen, did laundry, cleaned the home, cared for the Washingtons’ grandchildren, helped the Washingtons dress in the morning, greeted guests, and more. Click here to learn more about the enslaved household of President George Washington. During Washington’s presidency, he established countless precedents that guided his successors, including creating the president’s cabinet, asserting executive privilege, and using the veto for the first time. He also expanded executive authority over diplomatic and domestic issues, crafting foreign policy during the Neutrality Crisis in 1793 and subduing the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794. Perhaps most importantly, Washington again relinquished his power when he retired after two terms in office. This precedent was reinforced by Thomas Jefferson and followed by every successive president until Franklin D. Roosevelt. In 1951, the states ratified the 22 nd Amendment, which limits presidents to two terms in office. After retiring from public office, Washington returned to Mount Vernon for a few short years. On December 14, 1799, Washington died of a throat infection. His will included a provision to immediately free William Lee, his enslaved valet who served with him during the American Revolution. He also stipulated that the other 122 enslaved people owned by him receive their freedom upon Martha’s passing. While Washington was a slave owner for 56 years, he was the only Founding Father president to free all of the enslaved people he held in bondage.

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George Washington: Life in Brief

George Washington was born to Mary Ball and Augustine Washington on February 22, 1732. As the third son of a middling planter, George probably should have been relegated to a footnote in a history book. Instead, he became one of the greatest figures in American history.

A series of personal losses changed the course of George’s life. His father, Augustine, died when he was eleven years old, ending any hopes of higher education. Instead, Washington spent many of his formative years under the tutelage of Lawrence, his favorite older brother. He also learned the science of surveying and began a new career with the help of their neighbors, the wealthy and powerful Fairfax family. Lawrence’s death in 1752 again changed George’s plans. He leased Mount Vernon, a plantation in northern Virginia, from Lawrence’s widow and sought a military commission, just as Lawrence had done.

Washington served as the lieutenant colonel of the Virginia regiment and led several missions out west to the Ohio Valley. On his second mission west, he participated in the murder of French forces, including a reported ambassador. In retaliation, the French surrounded Washington’s forces at Fort Necessity and compelled an unequivocal surrender. Washington signed the articles of capitulation, not knowing that he was accepting full blame for an assassination. His mission marked the start of the Seven Years’ War.

Washington then joined General Edward Braddock’s official family as an aide-de-camp. In recognition of Washington’s extraordinary bravery during Braddock’s disastrous defeat at the Battle of the Monongahela in 1755, Lieutenant Governor Robert Dinwiddie appointed him as the commander of the Virginia Regiment. He served with distinction until the end of 1758.

In early 1759, George entered a new chapter in his life when he married Martha Custis, a wealthy widow, and won election to the Virginia House of Burgesses. George and Martha moved to Mount Vernon and embarked on an extensive expansion and renovation of the estate. Their life with her children from her previous marriage, John Parke Custis and Martha Parke Custis, was loving and warm.

Washington’s position in the House of Burgesses took on additional importance as relations between the colonies and Great Britain deteriorated after the end of the Seven Years’ War. The British government had incurred enormous debts fighting across the globe and faced high military costs defending the new territories in North America that it had received in the peace settlement. To defray these expenses, the British Parliament passed a series of new taxation measures on its colonies, which were still much lower than those paid by citizens in England. But many colonists protested that they had already contributed once to the war effort and should not be forced to pay again, especially since they had no input in the legislative process.

Washington supported the protest measures in the House of Burgesses, and in 1774, he accepted appointment as a Virginia delegate to the First Continental Congress, where he voted for non-importation measures, such as abstaining from purchasing British goods. The following year, he returned to the Second Continental Congress after British regulars and local militia forces clashed in Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts. He approved Congress’s decision to create an army in June 1775 and was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army.

For the next eight years, Washington led the army, only leaving headquarters to respond to Congress’s summons. He lost more battles than he won and at times had to hold the army together with sheer will, but ultimately emerged victorious in 1783 when the Treaty of Paris ended the Revolutionary War.

Washington’s success as a commander derived from three factors. First, he never challenged civilian authority. The new nation deeply distrusted military power, and his intentional self-subordination kept him in command. Second, the soldiers and officers adored him. The soldiers’ devotion to their commander was so apparent that some congressmen rued that it was not the Continental Army, it was George Washington’s army. Finally, Washington understood that if the army survived, so too would the cause for independence. He did not have to beat the British Army, he just had to avoid complete destruction.

At the end of the war, Washington returned his commission to the Confederation Congress and resumed life as a private citizen in Virginia. In an age of dictators and despots, his voluntarily surrender of power rippled around the globe and solidified his legend. Unsurprisingly, when the state leaders began discussing government reform a few years later, they knew Washington’s participation was essential for success.

In 1786, the Virginia legislature nominated a slate of delegates to represent the state at the Constitutional Convention. Washington’s close friend, Governor Edmund Randolph, ensured that George’s name was included. In May 1787, Washington set out for Philadelphia, where he served as the president of the convention. Once the convention agreed to a draft constitution, he then worked behind the scenes to ensure ratification. Washington believed the new constitution would resolve many of the problems that had plagued the Confederation Congress, but he also knew that if the states ratified the constitution, he would once again be dragged back into public service.

On June 21, 1788, New Hampshire became the ninth and requisite state to ratify the new Constitution of the United States, forcing each state to schedule elections for the new federal offices. Unsurprisingly, Washington was unanimously elected as the first president. He took the oath of office on April 30, 1789.

As the first president, Washington literally crafted the office from scratch, which was an accomplishment that cannot be overstated because every decision was an opportunity for failure. Instead, Washington set a model for restraint, prestige in office, and public service. As president, Washington also oversaw the establishment of the financial system, the restoration of the nation’s credit, the expansion of US territory (often at the expense of Native Americans), the negotiation of economic treaties with European empires, and the defense of executive authority over diplomatic and domestic affairs.

Washington set countless precedents, including the creation of the cabinet, executive privilege, state of the union addresses, and his retirement after two terms. On September 19, 1796, Washington published his Farewell Address announcing his retirement in a Philadelphia newspaper. He warned Americans to come together and reject partisan or foreign attempts to divide them, admonitions that retain their significance into the twenty-first century. He then willingly surrendered power once more.

When Washington left office, his contemporaries referred to him the father of the country. No other person could have held the Continental Army together for eight years, granted legitimacy to the Constitution Convention, or served as the first president. It is impossible to imagine the creation of the United States without him.

Yet, Washington’s life also embodies the complicated founding that shapes our society today. He owned hundreds of enslaved people and benefitted from their forced labor from the moment he was born to the day he died. His wealth, produced by slavery, made possible his decades of public service. Washington’s financial success, and that of the new nation, also depended on the violent seizure of extensive territory from Native American nations along the eastern seaboard to the Mississippi River. Washington’s life and service as the first president represents the irony contained in the nation’s founding. The United States was forged on the idea that “all men are created equal,” yet depended on the subjugation and exploitation of women and people of color.

Lindsay M. Chervinsky

Senior Fellow The Center for Presidential History Southern Methodist University

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George Washington Biography

George Washington, the first American general, president, and national hero was born in rural colonial Virginia on February 22, 1732. After the early death of his father, a young George Washington (only seven years old at the time) learned the ways of farming and planting as he became the primary owner of his family's plantation farm. He stayed at home throughout his early teenage years, helping his mother run the family's estate.

At the age of fifteen, George became a surveyor. He was able to land this prestigious job through vital connections that his older brother, Lawrence Washington, possessed. Lawrence Washington was close partners with the wealthy Colonel William Fairfax, a very wealthy Virginian politician and landholder. After receiving a good word from the influential Colonel Fairfax, George Washington not only became a successful surveyor, but also was placed in a position to gain land and political positions. Upon the death of his brother Lawrence, George achieved his first political position in Virginia's Northern District. Furthermore, Colonel Fairfax took the young Washington under his wing as a role model and a sort of surrogate father, fostering in the ambitious George Washington a yearning to also learn about the art of war.

Following a failed attempt to enter the British Royal Navy (thwarted, in part, by George's mother), Washington finally got his chance to serve in the militia. Much of the surveying work that George did was for the Ohio Company, operated by the Fairfax family. A dispute between France and Great Britain over western lands in the Ohio territory prompted Fairfax to send George Washington on a scouting expedition to the lands in question. His mission was to deliver notice to the encamped French forces that the land was claimed by the British. Straying from his original orders, the impulsive young commander led an attack on a French scouting party. Not only was this attack Washington's first taste of the battlefield, but also it was crucial in sparking the Seven Years War between the two main colonizers of North America: France and Britain.

Upon returning to Virginia, Washington joined the British imperial army, serving under General Braddock. It was during the Seven Year's War that Washington first achieved a hero's status on the battlefield during his mid-twenties. In one account, General Braddock and his army walked into a French and Indian ambush. As British officers rapidly fell in the battle, George Washington remained alive, surviving bullet holes in his jacket and horses being shot out from underneath him. He did his best to carry out the wounded General Braddock's orders for the remainder of the tragic battle. Although the battle was a horrific loss for the British forces, Washington returned to Virginia as a war hero. Although this status was not fully merited (due to Washington's significant lack of military knowledge), it helped to boost his popularity in the eyes of both the public and the prominent.

After the end of the Seven Years War, Washington returned to civilian life with his marriage to a wealthy Virginian widow named Martha Dandridge Custis. George's marriage to Martha united both of their already wealthy estates. Therefore, Washington spent much of his time after the war tending and expanding his vast estate. Moreover, the newly famous Washington re-entered politics as a representative in the Virginia House of Burgesses. However, life during this time of peace was short-lived as the pivotal encounters with the British at the battles of Lexington and Concord soon propelled the American colonies into the Revolutionary War against their mother country, Great Britain.

In June 1775, George Washington was appointed the Commander in Chief of the Continental Army. Washington's experience as the commander of the colonial forces was a mixture of success and failure, embarrassment and glory. One of his most significant losses was the capture and occupation of New York City by the British forces. The loss of this major colonial city greatly frustrated Washington, but every latter attempt he made to retake New York either failed or never materialized. On the other hand, his two small victories at Trenton, New Jersey and Princeton, New Jersey were crucial in both mending Washington's reputation as a war general and in boosting morale among the rebel colonial forces and civilians. After several other key victories with the aid of the colonies' foreign ally France, the British ended the Revolutionary War and relinquished their control of the American colonies with the signing of the Treaty of Paris at Yorktown, Virginia on September 3, 1783.

Following the conclusion of the American War for Independence, George Washington initially refused to become the national leader and instead returned again to civilian life in order to tend to his suffering estate. However, Washington did shortly accept the invitation to run for the office of the first President of the United States of America. At the age of fifty-seven, he became the only U.S. President to receive every vote from the Electoral College. George Washington served two terms as President, afterwards retiring for one last time to his home at Mount Vernon. The United State's first President, icon, and national hero died in his home on December 14, 1799. Nowadays George Washington is recognized as the most admired founding fathers of the United States of America, along with Thomas Jefferson , and Benjamin Franklin .

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President George Washington: Calm, Cool, and Collected Commander in Chief

Patient, modest, and deliberate: George Washington gave the United States the steady hand necessary to guide it through a revolutionary birth and its tumultuous early years.

"First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen.” That famous description of George Washington by his friend and fellow patriot Henry “Light Horse Harry” Lee is probably still the best summation of the man who, over a hard but resolute lifetime, became the savior of a war and the father of a country. Washington’s earliest ambitions, though, aimed more at the prosaic than the glorious. He probably imagined nothing better than following in the footsteps of his father, Augustine, who had been an ambitious Virginia planter and merchant. Augustine was hardly a major player in the hierarchical world of the aristocracy, but he was nonetheless a bona fide member of the gentry. George was the eldest son of Augustine’s second wife, Mary, who was not, and at no point aspired to be gentry.

Washington's War for Independence

When George was just 11, Augustine died, leaving his younger children in the hands of Mary, a domineering, pious, possibly pipe-smoking woman who ran her farm with a firm hand and read daily to her children from Contemplations Moral and Divine . Though George’s two older stepbrothers, then grown, had been sent to the fine schools required of the Virginia gentry, George had no resources for that, and Mary, in any case, had no interest in investing in her eldest son’s education. Indeed the two clashed their entire lives, and some biographers speculate that George modeled himself after everything that his mother was not.

Devoted to the Nation

Feb. 22, 1732 George Washington is born in a modest house at Popes Creek, Westmoreland County, Virginia. His father, Augustine, is a plantation owner who dies when George is 11.

June 15, 1775 Having served with distinction in the French and Indian War, Washington is appointed as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army that was created the day before.

Dec. 23, 1783 Washington resigns his commission as commander-in-chief, having transformed the Continental Army into an effective fighting force and led the troops to victory over the British.

Apr. 30, 1789 Despite not actively seeking the candidacy, Washington is unanimously elected as the first president of the United States under the Constitution. He serves two terms but refuses a third.

Dec. 14, 1799 Washington dies suddenly after contracting an acute infection while touring his estates in the winter. The nation goes into mourning. Foreign governments, including Britain, pay homage.

Apparently determined to better himself from a young age, George found mentors among the gentry and emulated their ways. He also copied by hand the Rules of Civility & Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation . These 110 rules had been conceived by French Jesuits as a teaching tool almost a century and a half before, dealing with everything from table manners to posture to facial expressions to gossip. Despite their stuffy formality, George seems to have internalized them because they echoed through his behavior for the rest of his life. As a young man, George impressed the colonial power-brokers of British Virginia, who made him a surveyor of western lands and an officer with the British during the French and Indian War. He first saw battle in his very early twenties, and he learned that he liked it. As far away as Britain, the young colonel’s calm and courage under fire was appreciated, with a London gazette running a line from one of his letters: “I have heard the bullets whistle; and believe me, there is something charming in the sound.”

Mount Vernon

But Washington had also experienced other aspects of war—the meddling of politicians and the disdain of the British for the American officers. By 1758 he was tired of it all. Resigning his commission, he enthusiastically took up the life of a Virginia planter.

Washington had been renting a family farm in Northern Virginia from the widow of his older half-brother Lawrence, who died in 1752. Following the death of his sister-in-law, Washington officially inherited Mount Vernon in 1761. Situated on the broad Potomac, Mount Vernon was one of the great loves of Washington’s life.

As he began ambitious improvements to the plantation, he became involved with a wealthy young widow, Martha Dandridge Custis. The two were soon married. Washington had been infatuated before, but Martha proved a perfect life partner and comfort to the reserved, driven, and often overburdened Washington.

Along with the wealth and social standing that Martha brought to the marriage, she also came with two young children, who Washington cherished as his own. He settled easily into the life of a respected planter and enjoyed days spent with his family, improving the farm, fishing, hunting (particularly fox hunting), riding, feasting, dancing, and generally reveling in the style of the Virginia aristocracy. He no doubt assumed he would end his days at Mount Vernon as a British citizen.

The Coming Revolution

That, of course, was not to be. Like his fellow Virginians in the House of Burgesses, Washington became increasingly disillusioned with George III and his colonial minions. At this time British America was composed of 13 disparate colonies ruled by 13 legislatures, each committed to its own culture, economy, and often religion.“Fire and water are not more heterogeneous than the different colonies of North America,” one British traveler had pronounced. Together, they were home to a million and a half people, the population doubling roughly every 20 years. They were Britons at heart, but of many varieties: long-established colonial families, recent immigrants, and indentured servants. Enslaved African-Americans lived throughout the colonies with large concentrations in the Chesapeake region and the South, where an aristocracy evolved because of their labor. Washington frankly aspired to become part of the elite and had speculated on wild land to the west. He saw his investment fade with the royal Proclamation of 1763, which banned westward migration in an attempt to fend off more Indian wars and control the cost of America to the Crown.

British War Debt

Washington fought in the French and Indian war which was part of the larger Seven Years’ War that raged across Europe from 1756-1763. Britain emerged from it with an empire greater than any the West had known since Rome. Its holdings in the New World, shown above, had more than doubled, but managing them proved an expensive business. To try and cover the costs, the British began to levy a series of taxes on the colonists that only added to the distress caused by a post-war bust in the economy. As the decade progressed, the loyal Britons of America, Washington among them, began to question their commitment to the motherland.

Yet through the 1760s, as he supported protests against British taxes, Washington also dined with the royal governor and assumed, as did most of his landed countrymen, that the British would be reasonable. By 1774 he had changed his mind.“The measures which [the British] administration hath for sometime been, and now are, most violently pursuing are repugnant to every principle of natural justice,” he wrote to a friend. In the course of a decade, Washington had become a full-throated patriot and one of Virginia’s seven elected delegates to the First Continental Congress. In August 1774, he left Mount Vernon for Philadelphia with fellow delegates Patrick Henry and Edmund Pendleton. Martha saw them off. “I hope you will stand firm,” she told Henry and Pendleton, adding, “I know George will.”

The six-foot-two-inch Washington had a way of affecting other men simply by his bearing, and the other delegates to Congress were duly impressed, seeing in him the reassuring promise of a true military commander. And that was clearly what Washington wanted them to see. He was not a fiery or inspired speaker nor was he an intellect, but he was confident that he could command men.

He got his chance a year later, when the Second Continental Congress appointed him commander-in-chief of the Continental Army. John Adams championed him for the position, and Abigail Adams described him in this way: “Dignity with ease and complacency—the gentleman and soldier look agreeably blended in him. Modesty marks every line and feature of his face.”

Pen Inspires the Sword

Thomas Paine was an admirer of Washington and spent the desperate autumn of 1776 as an aide-de-camp in the field. Though brave, Paine was no soldier. But his brief time with the army and Washington no doubt inspired him as he wrote the opening to his American Crisis—“These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country.” In late December 1776, with the revolution on the verge of collapse, enlistments about to expire, and “summer soldiers” waiting to depart, Washington ordered Paine’s essay read to his men. Two days later, their surprise attack on Trenton, New Jersey, revived the American taste for war and the commitment to fight on.

Certainly, Washington exuded modesty when he addressed Congress with what sounded like a protestation at his appointment, “I beg it may be remembered by every gentleman in the room, that I this day declare with the utmost sincerity, I do not think myself equal to the command I am honored with.” He may have been overwhelmed by the appointment, but he had also wanted it. And now, for better or worse, he had it.

Washington at War

In early July he arrived in Cambridge to meet his “army,” finding an obstreperous, disorganized gaggle of New England militiamen, most hardscrabble farmers and small-time merchants, holding the British army at bay in Boston. Washington was determined to impose the discipline of a true army on these “exceedingly dirty and nasty people.” He also sought to protect them from themselves, putting in place hygiene practices to ward against the diseases that plagued military camps. Despite his initial private disdain, he moved tirelessly and confidently among them, understanding, even if they did not, how precarious the American military was.

If that summer tested Washington, it was only a small taste of what was to come. By 1776 he and his men were in a struggle for survival, yielding battle after battle to the British in New York. By year’s end, Washington had lost more than half of what had been, at best, an army cobbled together. Congress had essentially turned its back on him, and his closest confidantes and officers had intrigued against him, complaining of his inability to lead.

In fact, he had been indecisive and overly deferential, and now his army was in danger of collapse, as enlistment periods ended and desertion grew. “No man, I believe, ever had a greater choice of difficulties and less means to extricate himself from them,” he wrote to his brother Jack in late autumn. Yet, in spite of his own despondency, Washington rallied, understanding that if he did not turn the tide somehow, the Revolution would be a short-lived disaster. And so on a bitter cold Christmas night, Washington famously led his broken, barefoot army from their winter camp at Valley Forge, crossing the Delaware River to attack Trenton, New Jersey. The American victory there was small but profound, reinvigorating Washington, his forces, and the patriotic cause—at least for a few months.

For the next four years, Washington battled on, carping at Congress to feed and supply his men, fending off attacks on his own leadership, and all the while keeping an eye firmly on the enemy. Gradually, he learned to fight the British more strategically, using local militia to harass them and avoiding “a general action” that would “put anything at Risque [sic].”

His men came to revere him for his courage, calm, determination, and, above all, for being at their side battle after battle, march after march, year after grueling year. The Philadelphia patriot Benjamin Rush once declared that Washington had “so much martial dignity in his deportment that you would distinguish him to be a general and a soldier from among 10,000 people. There is not a king in Europe that would not look like a valet de chambre by his side.”

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Peace at last.

By 1781 Washington’s resolve had triumphed over the British, and two years later America could officially claim her hard-won independence. By then Washington was more icon than man to most of the world. One Dutch merchant who caught sight of him as he rode through Philadelphia with a contingent of light cavalry, wrote to his wife, “I saw the greatest man who has ever appeared on the surface of this earth... I don’t know if, in our delight at seeing the hero, we were more surprised by his simple but grand air or by the kindness of the greatest and best of heroes.”

But the war had taken its toll. At 51 Washington was no longer the vigorous athletic man he had been. He wore crude, ill-fitting dentures of human teeth and ivory that hooked onto his one remaining tooth and made his gums ache. His great consolation was that he could at last settle down at Mount Vernon with his family and live out his days with his “mind... unbent,” gliding “down the stream of life till I come to that abyss from whence no traveler is permitted to return.”

And for just a few years Washington was indeed allowed the life of an unbent mind, reveling in his daily routine as a planter, coming up with strategies to improve the operations and production of Mount Vernon and his other nearby farms, neglected over the nine years of his absence. He and Martha also entertained an endless stream of visitors, many of them strangers who came to pay homage to America’s hero.

Washington and the Constitution

Having led the colonies to independence, Washington found himself again on the battlefront as the new nation began to form itself. It became obvious in the post-war years that the Articles of Confederation were no more than a toothless agreement between the states as conflicts erupted over trade, territory, waterways, and mutual protection. Washington tried to resolve one such dispute himself—over navigation rights to the Potomac. His talks, held at Mount Vernon in 1785, were a success and encouraged further cooperation among states. Four years later, Washington became the steadfast anchor around which endless arguments swirled about the nature and need for a new constitution (above). Though a Federalist with an eye to industry and infrastructure for a united country, Washington sat sphinxlike during the Philadelphia talks. These resulted in a constitution and a new role for Washington—not king, but president of the still fractious and embryonic United States.

Return to the Limelight

But Washington’s destiny was entwined with the new nation’s too completely to allow him escape. He watched its growing pains with the cautious eye of a concerned parent and, at the same time, he unobtrusively tended his own image, guarding it for posterity and holding himself in abeyance, in case he should be needed again. By 1787 he was back on the public stage and again on his way to Philadelphia, as he had been 40 years before, this time as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention. He was quickly elected its president and within two years president of the new nation. He expected “that at a convenient and an early period my services might be dispensed with and that I might be permitted once more to retire.” But the “early period” dragged into eight years, as the former patriots argued and debated among themselves over America’s character and future.

Finally, in 1796, Washington refused to continue into a third term. This granted him barely three years of his own happiness at Mount Vernon. In mid-December 1799, after spending a cold, wet day touring his farms on horseback, he began to suffer a sore throat but he kept to his routines. Two days later he was gone. In his farewell address to the nation, he had assured his fellow citizens that “I shall carry... with me to my grave... unceasing vows that heaven may continue to you the choicest tokens of its beneficence; that your union and brotherly affection may be perpetual; that the free Constitution, which is the work of your hands, may be sacredly maintained; that its administration in every department may be stamped with wisdom and virtue; that, in fine, the happiness of the people of these States, under the auspices of liberty, may be made complete.”

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George Washington | Biography

Who was george washington.

Owing to Washington’s military experiences and his unrelenting stance against the British, he was elected as the Commander-in-Chief on 16 June 1775. 

As the Commander-in-Chief, Washington led the Continental Army during America’s Revolutionary War against Britain between 1785 to 1783. The war resulted in the North American English colonies’ independence from Britain and the modern-day USA’s eventual formation.

Early Bio and Childhood

Military career.

Spurred by his late brother’s military service as adjutant general, he sought a commission with Virginia’s Lieutenant Governer. The governor appointed him Major and gave him command of one of the four militia districts in Virginia. 

In 1753, for one of his first war assignments, Washington was appointed as the special envoy to Fort LeBoeuf, now known as Waterford, Pennsylvania, to demand the French to leave the territory that the British had initially claimed. The French declined the orders, and thus, this event was to be the first among several critical moments in Washington’s war history. 

French And Indian War

Commanding the virginia militia.

In August 1955, Washington was  appointed  as the commander of the Virginia militia. He was tasked with patrolling and protecting a border of about 400 miles (643 km). 

Washington didn’t serve as the commander for very long as his health deteriorated at the end of 1757. He contracted dysentery and was sent home back for recovery. 

American Revolutionary War

George Washington didn’t initially support the idea of America’s independence from Britain. However, he changed his mind after Britain started imposing unreasonable taxes by making amendments in the law,  including the  Stamp Act 1765  and the   Townshend Acts 1767.

By 1767, Washington was a vocal critic of the growing oppression of American colonists by the crown. Later, in 1769, he filed a motion requesting Virginia to boycott Britain’s goods until they removed the earlier imposed taxes.

Washington was then promoted as the Commander-in-Chief and Major General of the rebel troops on 15 June 1775, nearly two months after the Battles of Lexington and Concord.

Moving Across Delaware

Valley forge.

A unanimous vote was passed, which elected George Washington to the United States’ first presidency on 30 April 1789. On the said day, Washington stood on Federal Hall’s balcony in Wall Street, New York, and swore in on his position.

But, in totality, George Washington was considered to have had two moderately successful Presidential terms. 

During his terms, he set back a war with Britain, established boundaries with Canada, and created an international trade environment.

Death & Legacy

Fact-checking and ethical concerns.

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George Washington Timeline

February 22, 1732.

Late 1752–53

May 28, 1754

January 6, 1759.

September 1774

April 30, 1789

December 14, 1799