ODDS AND ENDS
In an age when organized charity was almost unknown the burden of such
work fell mainly upon individuals. Being a man of great prominence and
known to be wealthy, the proprietor of Mount Vernon was the recipient of
many requests for assistance. Ministers wrote to beg money to rebuild
churches or to convert the heathen; old soldiers wrote to ask for money
to relieve family distresses or to use in business; from all classes and
sections poured in requests for aid, financial and otherwise.
It was inevitable that among these requests there should be some that
were unusual. Perhaps the most amusing that I have discovered is one
written by a young man named Thomas Bruff, from the Fountain Inn,
Georgetown. He states that this is his second letter, but I have not
found the first. In the letter we have he sets forth that he has lost
all his property and desires a loan of five hundred pounds. His need is
urgent, for he is engaged to a beautiful and "amiable" young lady,
possessed of an "Estate that will render me Independent. Whom I cannot
Marry in my present situation.... All my Happyness is now depending upon
your Goodness and without your kind assistance I must be forever
miserable--I should have never thought of making application to you for
this favor had it not been in Consequence of a vision by Night since my
Fathers Death who appeared to me in a Dream in my Misfortunes three
times in one Night telling me to make applycation to you for Money and
that you would relieve me from my distresses. He appeared the other
night again and asked me if I had obeyed his commands I informed him
that I had Wrote to you some time ago but had Received no answer nor no
information Relative to the Business he then observed that he expected
my letter had not come to hand and toald me to Write again I made some
Objections at first and toald him I thought it presumption in me to
trouble your Excellency again on the subject he then in a Rage drew his
Small Sword and toald me if I did not he would run me through. I
immediately in a fright consented."
One might suppose that so ingenious a request, picturing the deadly
danger in which a young man stood from the shade of his progenitor,
especially a young man who was thereby forced to keep a young lady
waiting, would have aroused Washington's most generous impulses and
caused him to send perhaps double the amount desired. Possibly he was
hard up at the time. At all events he indorsed the letter thus:
"Without date and without success."
Many times, however, our Farmer was open-handed to persons who had no
personal claim on him. For example, he loaned three hundred and two
pounds to his old comrade of the French War--Robert Stewart--the purpose
being to buy a commission in the British army. So far as I can discover
it was never repaid; in fact, I am not sure but that he intended it as a
gift. Another advance was that made to Charles L. Carter, probably the
young man who later married a daughter of Washington's sister, Betty
Lewis. Most of the story is told in the following extract from a letter
written by Carter from Fredericksburg, June 2, 1797:
"With diffidence I now address you in consequence of having failed after
my first voyage from China, to return the two hundred Dollars you
favored me with the Loan of. Be assured Dr. Sir that I left goods unsold
at the time of my Departure from Philadelphia on the second voyage, &
directed that the money arising therefrom should be paid to you, but the
integrity of my agent did not prove to be so uncorrupted as I had
flattered myself. I have, at this late period, sent by Mr. G. Tevis the
sum of two hundred Dollars with interest therefrom from the 15th of
March 1795 to the 1st June, 1797. That sum has laid the foundation of a
pretty fortune, for which I shall ever feel myself indebted to you."
He added that he had been refused the loan by a near relation before
Washington had so kindly obliged him and that his mother, who was
evidently acquainted with Washington, joined in hearty thanks for the
benefit received.
Washington had experienced enough instances of ingratitude to be much
pleased with the outcome of this affair. He replied in the kindest
terms, but declined to receive the interest, saying that he had not made
the loan as an investment and that he did not desire a profit from it.
Another recipient of Washington's bounty was his old neighbor, Captain
John Posey. Posey sold Washington not only his Ferry Farm but also his
claim to western lands. He became financially embarrassed, in fact,
ruined; his family was scattered, and he made frequent applications to
Washington for advice and assistance. Washington helped to educate a
son, St. Lawrence, who had been reduced to the hard expedient of tending
bar in a tavern, and he also kept a daughter, Milly, at Mount Vernon,
perhaps as a sort of companion to Mrs. Washington. The Captain
once wrote:
"I could [have] been able to [have] Satisfied all my old Arrears, some
months AGoe, by marrying [an] old widow woman in this County. She has
large soms [of] cash by her, and Prittey good Est.--She is as thick as
she is high---And gits drunk at Least three or foure [times] a
weak---which is Disagreable to me--has Viliant Sperrit when Drunk--its
been [a] great Dispute in my mind what to Doe,--I beleave I shu'd Run
all Resks--if my Last wife, had been [an] Even temper'd woman, but her
Sperrit, has Given me such [a] Shock--that I am afraid to Run the
Resk again."
Evidently the Captain did not find a way out of his troubles by the
matrimonial route, for somewhat later he was in jail at Queenstown,
presumably for debt, and we find in one of Washington's cash memorandum
books under date of October 15, 1773: "By Charity--given Captn. Posey,"
four pounds. One of the sons later settled in Indiana, and the "Pocket"
county is named after him.
Another boy toward whose education Washington contributed was the son of
Doctor James Craik--the boy being a namesake. Doctor Craik was one of
Washington's oldest and dearest friends. He was born in Scotland two
years before Washington saw the light at Wakefield, graduated from
Edinburgh University, practised medicine in the West Indies for a short
time and then came to Virginia. He was Washington's comrade in arms in
the Fort Necessity campaign, was subsequently surgeon general in the
Continental Army, and accompanied Washington to the Ohio both in 1770
and 1784. He married Mariane Ewell, a relative of Washington's mother,
and resided many years in Alexandria. He was a frequent visitor at Mount
Vernon both as a friend and in a professional capacity, and Washington
declared that he would rather trust him than a dozen other doctors. Few
men were so close to the great man as he, and he was one of the few who
in his letters ventured to tell chatty matters of gossip. Thus, in
August, 1791, he wrote a letter apropos of the bad health of George A.
Washington and added: "My daughter Nancy is there [Mt. Vernon] by way of
Amusement awhile. She begins to be tired of her Fathers house and I
believe intends taking an old Batchelor Mr. Hn. for a mate shortly."
Another young lady, Miss Muir, who had recently gone to Long Island for
the benefit of the sea baths was "pursued" by a Mr. Donaldson and the
latter now writes that "he shall bring back a wife with him." Craik was
a thorough believer in Washington's destiny, and in the dark days of the
Revolution would hearten up his comrades by the story of the Indian
chieftain met upon the Ohio in 1770 who had vainly tried to kill
Washington in the battle of the Monongahela and had finally desisted in
the belief that he was invulnerable.
To friends, family, church, education and strangers our Farmer was
open-handed beyond most men of his time. His manager had orders to fill
a corn-house every year for the sole use of the poor in the neighborhood
and this saved numbers of poor women and children from extreme want. He
also allowed the honest poor to make use of his fishing stations,
furnishing them with all necessary apparatus for taking herring, and if
they were unequal to the task of hauling the seine, assistance was
rendered them by the General's servants.
To Lund Washington he wrote from the camp at Cambridge: "Let the
hospitality of the house, with respect to the poor, be kept up. Let no
one go hungry away. If any of this kind of people should be in want of
corn, supply their necessaries, provided that it does not encourage them
to idleness; and I have no objection to you giving my money in charity
to the amount of forty or fifty pounds a year, when you think it well
bestowed. What I mean by having no objection is, that it is my desire it
should be done. You are to consider that neither _myself nor wife_ is
now in the way to do these good offices."
His relations with his own kindred were patriarchal in character. His
care of Mrs. Washington's children and grandchildren has already been
described. He gave a phaeton and money to the extent of two thousand
five hundred dollars to his mother and did not claim possession of some
of the land left him by his father's will. To his sister Betty Lewis he
gave a mule and many other presents, as well as employment to several of
her sons. He loaned his brother Samuel (five times married)
considerable sums, which he forgave in his will, spent "near five
thousand dollars" on the education of two of his sons, and cared for
several years for a daughter Harriot, notwithstanding the fact that she
had "no disposition ... to be careful of her cloaths." To his nephew,
Bushrod Washington, he gave money and helped him to obtain a legal
education, and he assisted another nephew, George A. Washington, and his
widow and children, in ways already mentioned. Over forty relatives were
remembered in his will, many of them in a most substantial manner.
In the matter of eating and drinking Washington was abstemious. For
breakfast he ordinarily had tea and Indian cakes with butter and perhaps
honey, of which he was very fond. His supper was equally light,
consisting of perhaps tea and toast, with wine, and he usually retired
promptly at nine o'clock. Dinner was the main meal of the day at Mount
Vernon, and was served punctually at two o'clock. One such meal is thus
described by a guest:
"He thanked us, desired us to be seated, and to excuse him a few
moments.... The President came and desired us to walk in to dinner and
directed us where to sit, (no grace was said).... The dinner was very
good, a small roasted pigg, boiled leg of lamb, roasted fowls, beef,
peas, lettice, cucumbers, artichokes, etc., puddings, tarts, etc. etc.
We were desired to call for what drink we chose. He took a glass of wine
with Mrs. Law first, which example was followed by Dr. Croker Crakes and
Mrs. Washington, myself and Mrs. Peters, Mr. Fayette and the young lady
whose name is Custis. When the cloth was taken away the President gave
'all our Friends.'"
The General ordinarily confined himself to a few courses and if offered
anything very rich would reply, "That is too good for me." He often
drank beer with the meal, with one or two glasses of wine and perhaps as
many more afterward, often eating nuts, another delicacy with him, as he
sipped the wine.
He was, in fact, no prohibitionist, but he was a strong believer in
temperance. He and the public men of his time, being aristocrats, were
wine drinkers and few of them were drunkards. The political revolution
of 1830, ushered in by Jackson, brought in a different type--Westerners
who drank whisky and brandy, with the result that drunkenness in public
station was much more common. Many of the Virginia gentlemen of
Washington's day spent a fourth or even a third of their income upon
their cellars. He was no exception to the rule, and from his papers we
discover many purchases of wine. One of the last bills of lading I have
noticed among his papers is a bill for "Two pipes of fine old London
particular Madeira Wine," shipped to him from the island of Madeira,
September 20, 1799. One wonders whether he got to toast "All our
Friends" out of it before he died.
[Illustration: One of Washington's Tavern Bills]
His sideboard and table were well equipped with glasses and silver wine
coolers of the most expensive construction. As in many other matters,
his inventive bent turned in this direction. Having noticed the
confusion that often arose from the passing of the bottles about the
table he designed when President a sort of silver caster capable of
holding four bottles. They were used with great success on state
occasions and were so convenient that other people adopted the
invention, so that wine _coasters_, after the Washington design, became
a part of the furniture of every fashionable sideboard.
To cool wine, meat and other articles, Washington early adopted the
practice of putting up ice, a thing then unusual. In January, 1785, he
prepared a dry well under the summer house and also one in his new
cellar and in due time had both filled. June fifth he "Opened the well
in my Cellar in which I had laid up a store of Ice, but there was not
the smallest particle remaining.--I then opened the other Repository
(call the dry Well) in which I found a large store." Later he erected an
ice house to the eastward of the flower garden.
His experience with the cellar well was hardly less successful than that
of his friend, James Madison, on a like occasion. Madison had an ice
house filled with ice, and a skeptical overseer wagered a turkey against
a mint julep that by the fourth of July the ice would all have
disappeared. The day came, they opened the house, and behold there was
enough ice for exactly _one_ julep! Truly a sad situation when there
were _two_ Virginia gentlemen.
Mention of Madison in this connection calls to mind the popular notion
that it was his wife Dolly who invented ice-cream. I believe that her
biographers claim for her the credit of the discovery. The rôle of the
iconoclast is a thankless one and I confess to a liking for Dolly, but I
have discovered in Washington's cash memorandum book under date of May
17, 1784, the entry: "By a Cream Machine for Ice," £1.13.4--that is an
ice-cream freezer. The immortal Dolly was then not quite twelve
years old.
Washington seems to have owned three coaches. The first he ordered in
London in 1758 in preparation for his marriage. It was to be
fashionable, genteel and of seasoned wood; the body preferably green,
with a light gilding on the mouldings, with other suitable ornaments
including the Washington arms. It was sent with high recommendations,
but proved to be of badly seasoned material, so that the panels shrunk
and slipped out of the mouldings within two months and split from end to
end, much to his disgust. Such a chariot was driven not with lines from
a driver's box, but by liveried postillions riding on horseback, one
horseman to each span.
The second coach he had made in Philadelphia in 1780 at a cost of two
hundred and ten pounds in specie. It was decidedly better built.
The last was a coach, called "the White Chariot," bought second hand
soon after he became President. It was built by Clarke, of Philadelphia,
and was a fine vehicle, with a cream-colored body and wheels, green
Venetian blinds and the Washington arms painted upon the doors. In this
coach, drawn by six horses, he drove out in state at Philadelphia and
rode to and from Mount Vernon, occasionally suffering an upset on the
wretched roads. It was strong and of good workmanship and its maker
heard with pride that it had made the long southern tour of 1791 without
starting a nail or a screw. This coach was purchased at the sale of the
General's effects by George Washington Parke Custis and later in a
curious manner fell into the possession of Bishop Meade, who ultimately
made it up into walking sticks, picture frames, snuff boxes and such
mementoes.
At Mount Vernon to-day the visitor is shown a coach which the official
Handbook states is vouched for as the original "White Chariot." In
reality it seems to be the coach once owned by the Powell family of
Philadelphia. It is said to have been built by the same maker and on the
same lines, and Washington may have ridden in it, but it never
belonged to him.
Most people think of Washington as a marble statue on a pedestal rather
than as a being of flesh and blood with human feelings, faults and
virtues. He was self-contained, he was not voluble, he had a sense of
personal dignity, but underneath he was not cold. He was really
hot-tempered and on a few well-authenticated occasions fell into
passions in which he used language that would have blistered the steel
sides of a dreadnaught. Yet he was kind-hearted, he pitied the weak and
sorrowful, and the list of his quiet benefactions would fill many pages
and cost him thousands of pounds. He was even full of sentiment in some
matters; on more than one occasion he provided positions that enabled
young friends or relatives to marry, and I shrewdly suspect that he
engineered matters so that the beloved Nelly Custis obtained a good
husband in the person of his nephew, Lawrence Lewis. I might say much
more tending to show his human qualities, but I shall add only this:
Having for many years studied his career from every imaginable point of
view, I give it as my deliberate opinion that perhaps no man ever lived
who was more considerate of the rights and feelings of others. Not even
Lincoln had a bigger heart.