When another army was to be raised for frontier service, the command was given to Washington, who stipulated for a voice in choosing his officers, a better system of military regulations, more promptness in paying the troops, and a thorough reform in the system of procuring supplies. All these were granted, with the addition of an aid-de-camp and secretary, to the young colonel of twenty-three. But he nevertheless had to encounter the evils of insubordination, inactivity, perverseness and disunion among the troops, with the further vexation of deficient support on the part of the government, while the terrors and real dangers and sufferings of the inhabitants of the outer settlements wrung his heart with anguish. In one of his many expostulatory letters to the timid and time-serving Governor Dinwiddie, his feelings burst their usual guarded bounds: "I am too little acquainted, sir, with pathetic language, to attempt a description of the people's distresses; but I have a generous soul, sensible of wrongs and swelling for redress. But what can I do? I see their situation, know their danger and participate in their sufferings, without having it in my power to give them further relief than uncertain promises. In short, I see inevitable destruction in so clear a light, that unless vigorous measures are taken by the Assembly, and speedy assistance sent from below, the poor inhabitants that are now in forts must unavoidably fall, while the remainder are flying before a barbarous foe. In fine, the melancholy situation of the people, the little prospect of assistance, the gross and scandalous abuse cast upon the officers in general, which reflects upon me in particular for suffering misconduct of such extraordinary kinds, and the distant prospect, if any, of gaining honor and reputation in the service, cause me to lament the hour that gave me a commission, and would induce me, at any other time than this of imminent danger, to resign, without one hesitating moment, a command from which I never expect to reap either honor or benefit; but, on the contrary, have almost an absolute certainty of incurring displeasure below, while the murder of helpless families may be laid to my account here. The supplicating tears of the women and moving petitions of the men melt me into such deadly sorrow, that I solemnly declare, if I know my own mind, I could offer myself a willing sacrifice to the butchering enemy, provided that would contribute to the people's ease."
Tomb of Washington's Mother.
This extract is given as being very characteristic; full of that fire whose volcanic intensity was so carefully covered under the snow of caution in after life; and also as a specimen of Washington's style of writing, clear, earnest, commanding and business-like, but deficient in all express graces, and valuable rather for substance than form. We see in his general tone of expression something of that resolute mother, who, when her son, already the first man in public estimation, urged her to make Mount Vernon her home for the rest of her days, tersely replied——"I thank you for your affectionate and dutiful offers, but my wants are few in this world, and I feel perfectly competent to take care of myself." Directness is the leading trait in the style of both mother and son; if either used circumlocution, it was rather through deliberateness than for diplomacy. Indeed, the alleged indebtedness of great sons to strong mothers, can hardly find a more prominent support than in this case. What a Roman pair they were! If her heart failed her a little, sometimes, as what mother's heart must not, in view of toils, sacrifices, and dangers like his; if she argued towards the softer side, how he answered her, appealing to her stronger self:
Mount Vernon, 14th Aug., 1755.
"Honored Madam,
"If it is in my power to avoid going to the Ohio again, I shall; but if the command is passed upon me by the general voice of the country, and offered upon such terms as cannot be objected against, it would reflect dishonor upon me to refuse it; and that, I am sure, must, or ought to, give you greater uneasiness than my going in an honorable command. Upon no other terms will I accept of it. At present I have no proposals made to me, nor have I advice of such an intention, except from private hands.
"I am, &c."
When the object for which he had undertaken the campaign—viz.: the undisturbed possession of the Ohio River—was accomplished, Washington resigned his commission, after five years of active and severe service, his health much broken and his private affairs not a little disordered. The resignation took effect in December, 1758, and in January, 1759, he was married, and, as he supposed, finally settled at Mount Vernon—or, as he expresses it in his quiet way—"Fixed at this seat, with an agreeable partner for life, I hope to find more happiness in retirement than I ever experienced amidst the wide and bustling world." And in liberal and elegant improvements, and the exercise of a generous hospitality, the young couple spent the following fifteen years; the husband attending to his duties as citizen and planter, with ample time and inclination for fox-hunting and duck-shooting, and the wife, a kind, comely, thrifty dame, looking well to the ways of her household, superintending fifteen domestic spinning-wheels, and presiding at a bountiful table, to the great satisfaction of her husband and his numerous guests. When the spirit of the people began to rise against the exactions of the mother country, Washington was among the foremost to sympathize with the feeling of indignation, and the desire to resist, peaceably, if possible, forcibly if necessary. Of this, his letters afford ample proof. When armed resistance was threatened, Washington was immediately thought of as the Virginia leader. When Congress began, in earnest, preparations for defence, Washington was chairman of all the committees on the state of the country. When the very delicate business of appointing a commander-in-chief of the American armies was under consideration, Washington was the man whose name was on every tongue, and who was unanimously chosen, and that by the direct instrumentality of a son of Massachusetts, though that noble State, having commenced the struggle, might well have claimed the honor of furnishing a leader for it. What generosity of patriotism there was, in the men of those days, and how a common indignation and a common danger seem to have raised them above the petty jealousies and heart-burnings that so disfigure public doings in time of peace and prosperity! How the greatness of the great man blazed forth on this new field! What an attitude he took before the country, when he said, on accepting the position, "I beg leave to assure the Congress that as no pecuniary consideration could have tempted me to accept this arduous employment, at the expense of my domestic ease and happiness, I do not wish to make any profit from it. I will keep an exact account of my expenses. These, I doubt not they will discharge, and that is all I desire." There was a natural, unconscious sovereignty in thus assuming to be the judge of what it might be proper to expend, in concerns the most momentous, extensive, and novel, as well as in taking the entire risk, both of payment and of public approbation,—in a direction in which he had already found the sensitiveness of the popular mind,—that equals any boldness of Napoleon's. We can hardly wonder that, in after times, common men instinctively desired and expected to make him a king.
The battle of Bunker Hill had taken place in the time that intervened between Washington's consent and the receipt of his commission, so that he set out for Cambridge, with no lingering doubt as to the nature, meaning, or result of the service in which he had pledged all. He writes to his brother, "I am embarked on a wide ocean, boundless in its prospect, and in which, perhaps, no safe harbor is to be found." His residence at Cambridge, a fine old mansion, still stands, and in worthy occupancy. Here it was that he undertook the intolerable duty of organizing a young army, without clothes, tents, ammunition, or money, with a rich, bitter and disciplined enemy in sight, and boiling blood on both sides. Here it was that General Gage, with whom he had fought, side by side, twenty years before, on the Monongahela, so exasperated him by insolent replies to his remonstrances against the cruel treatment of American prisoners, that he gave directions for retaliation upon any of the enemy that might fall into American hands.