USA > Pennsylvania > Pennsylvania in American history > Part 8
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The victory was won. The prisoners were hurried away to Virginia. But fortune does not extend her favors to any man for long. The career of Washington, like that of most men, was a series of successes and reverses.
"To all earthly men,
In spite of right and wrong and love and hate, One day shall come the turn of luckless fate."
It was rumored that Contrecœur was at Fort Duquesne with a force of one thousand French and many Indians, and the young colonel was in trouble. On May 31 he wrote, "We expect every hour to be attacked by a superior force." He threw up in-
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trenchments one hundred feet square and built a palisade with a trench outside, which, because there had been a scarcity of provisions, he called Fort Necessity. The site is along the bank of a little stream flowing through the centre of a meadow two hundred and fifty yards wide, set at a considerable elevation among the hills. All that remains now is a slight accumulation of earth where the lines of the fort ran and a large stone with a square hole cut in it for a corner post ; but what there is ought to be carefully preserved by the state. He received a reinforcement which increased his strength to three hundred men, and he talked about exerting "our noble courage with spirit." Later there came one hundred more men from South Carolina. He advanced thirteen miles further in the direction of Fort Duquesne, and then, learning that the French were strong in numbers and coming to meet him, he retreated, July I, to Fort Necessity. Thither he was followed by five hundred French and several hundred Indians. All through the day of July 3 the firing was kept up around the fort, those within being huddled together in danger and discom- fort, until twelve had been killed and forty-three
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wounded. The next morning, July 4,-at Phila- delphia, Vicksburg, and Gettysburg a fateful day in American history, Washington, having signed papers of capitulation, marched forth with his troops. He abandoned a large flag and surrendered the fort. He was permitted to take the military stores, except the artillery. He agreed to return the prisoners he had captured and sent to Virginia; but, worst of all, the papers he signed referred to " l'assassinat du Sieur de fumonville." Our historians have been prone to throw the blame for this language upon the imper- fect translation of Van Braam; but since the French " assassinat" and the English "assassination" are substantially the same word,-sufficient to attract the attention of the most unlearned,-the explana- tion fails to satisfy. The affair, as is apt to be the case when the foe gains the glory and the field, be- came the subject of much animadversion. Horace Walpole called him a "brave braggart." Dinwiddie reduced his rank to that of captain, and found reasons for declining to return the prisoners. There- upon Washington resigned from the service, went back to Mount Vernon, and his ambition to hold a commission in the English army was never gratified.
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The following year Braddock disembarked and encamped his army at Alexandria. Washington offered his services as an aide, and his experience with the French and the Indians and his knowledge of the country wherein the advance was to be made rendered them of the utmost value. It was the first army thoroughly drilled, equipped, and appointed he had ever seen. On that fatal battle-field near Pittsburg, now covered by the mills of the United States Steel Corporation (tempora mutantur et nos in illis mutamur), where Braddock was killed, where eight hundred and fifty-five French and Indians completely routed three thousand disciplined Eng- lish soldiers, he did doughty and valiant deeds. It has been described as "the most extraordinary vic- tory ever obtained and the furthest flight ever made;" but in the battle he had two horses killed under him, and out of it he came with four bullet holes through his coat. There are prophets among other peoples than Israel. Samuel Davies, on the 17th of August, 1755, preached a sermon at Han- over, in Virginia, wherein, with less plaint than Jeremiah and clearer vision than Isaiah, he ex- claimed, "That heroic youth, Colonel Washington,
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whom I cannot but hope Providence has hitherto preserved in so signal a manner for some important service to his country."
Fortune took another turn. For these two defeats there soon came compensation. With a regiment of Virginians, in 1758, he took part in the expedition of General John Forbes, whose bones now lie in Christ churchyard in Philadelphia, and at the head of his men and the army, on the 25th of November, marched into Fort Duquesne. The magazine had been exploded. The fort had been set on fire. The French had taken bateaux and departed. Their influence along the Ohio river had been broken. The Indians who had been their allies sought the favor of the English. And George Washington had completed the military training which was to fit him to become the successful leader in the eight years' struggle of the people of the American colonies for independence.
He resigned his commission and hastened to Virginia. Six weeks later-on the 6th of January, 1759-he married Martha Custis, a widow, who was the fortunate possessor of a hundred thousand dollars. He was elected to the House of Burgesses,
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and for the next fifteen years, in the quiet and re- tirement of Mount Vernon, lived a barren and uneventful life, with no ambition save the pleasure of accumulation; no exhilaration greater than the chase of the fox, and no anxiety except for the care of his herds of cattle. How bare and barren the life was can be seen from these extracts, showing with what his thoughts were occupied, covering a month in his manuscript journal for 1767:
" July :
" 14-Finish'd my wheat Harvest.
"16-began to cut my Timothy Meadow, which had stood too long.
"25-finish'd Ditto.
" 25-Sowed turnep seed from Colonel Fairfax's, in sheep pens, at the House.
"25-Sowed Winter do. from Colo. Lee's, in the neck.
" 27-began to sow wheat at the Mill with the early white Wheat, w'ch grew at Muddyhole.
"28-began to sow wheat at Muddyhole with the mixed wheat that grew there; also began to sow wheat at Doag Run, of the red chaff, from home; also sowed sum- mer Turnep below Garden.
"29-Sowed Colonel Fairfax's kind in flax ground joining sheep pens."
A new epoch dawned, and again George Wash- ington came to Pennsylvania. A crisis big with
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fatality and freighted with the hopes of the future was approaching. The Stamp Act had been passed, and after a storm of reprobation had been repealed ; non-importation resolutions had been promulgated from the Pennsylvania State-House, soon to be known as Independence Hall, ringing with a bell which is only torn from it by sacrilege; John Dick- inson had written those Farmer's Letters wherein was expounded the creed of the colonies; the tea ships had been driven from the Delaware river, and an act of Parliament had closed the port of Boston, when the first congress was called to meet in Car- penters' Hall, on Chestnut street below Fourth, in the city of Philadelphia, on September 5, 1774. Washington appeared as a delegate. What part he bore in its deliberation it is difficult to tell. But he wrote to a friend upon the subject of independence : " I am well satisfied that no such thing is desired by any thinking man in all North America." It was a time of stirring events and rapid movements, but men held fast to the old moorings so long as they could. A few months later the muskets began to rattle at Lexington, and on the 15th of June, 1775, the second continental congress, to which
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he was a delegate, assembled in the State-House. One of their first acts was to determine "that a general be appointed to command all the conti- nental forces raised or to be raised in the defense of American liberty," and by a unanimous vote, in that famed Pennsylvania hall, the heaviest responsi- bility which had ever fallen to the lot of an Amer- ican was imposed upon George Washington. The next day, in the same place, declaring, "I feel great distress from a consciousness that my abilities and military experience may not be equal to the extensive and important trust," and that " no pecuniary com- pensation could have tempted me to accept this arduous employment," declining the sum which had been fixed for his salary, with modest words and with a serious sense of the difficulties he was about to encounter, he assumed that responsibility and started forth, like Moses of old, to lead his people through the Red Sea of war and the wilder- ness of uncertainty and suffering. Unlike the prophet and law-giver of Israel, and unlike his own prototype, William of Orange, he was destined not only to see from afar, but to enter into the land of promise and safety. The war upon which he
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then embarked was to endure through eight weary years. Philadelphia was then not only the chief city of the colonies, the centre of science, art, literature, and population, but the seat of the revo- lutionary government and the place where the continental congresses held their sessions. It was believed by the revolutionists that the retention of the possession of the city was essential to the suc- cess of their cause. The royalists believed that if it could be captured the war would be speedily ter- minated and the rebellion end in an early dissolution. A few opening and indecisive contests of arms oc- curred in Massachusetts; but the struggle ere long drifted to the shores of the Delaware, and the con- tinental army never thereafter was further east than the Hudson. In the course of the war nine battles were fought by the army under the personal com- mand of Washington, and with the exception of Long Island, which was an unrelieved disaster, and Yorktown, where it was uncertain whether the laurels ought to cluster about the French fleet or the American land forces, all of them-Trenton, Princeton, Brandywine, Warren Tavern, German- town, White Marsh, and Monmouth-were conflicts
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the purpose of which was to control or defend, to secure or retain, the city of Philadelphia.
At Brandywine there was presented to him the great opportunity of his military career when the enemy, of their own motion, brought about the situation which it was the object of the tactics of Napoleon to secure, and divided their forces in front of him. At Warren Tavern his plans were thwarted and his opportunities and advantages lost through what the lawyer calls the act of God. At Trenton and Germantown he displayed not only the courage and resolution bred in his Saxon fibre, but that other quality, more often found in the Celt, " l'audace, toujours l'audace." At White Marsh he boldly ap- proached to within a few miles of the enemy, who then held the city, defeated attacks upon his right, left, and centre, compelling Howe to withdraw dis- comfited, and won, though with small loss, his greatest tactical success. The issues of the Revolu- tionary War were determined, however, not by the effective handling of large armies with consummate skill; not by the exercise of that military genius which enabled a Marlborough, a Frederick, or a Bonaparte to see just when and where to strike to
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the best advantage, but by that tireless tenacity of purpose which, through success or disaster, never flagged, and, whatever fate might have in store, refused to be overcome. All the poets who have sung their verse, all the historians who have written their books, whatever students may have investi- gated, and whatever orators may have spoken agree in the conclusion that such tenacity was best exem- plified at the close of a lost campaign, with a weak- ened and dwindling army, through the sufferings of a severe winter upon the hills of Valley Forge. Wherever the story is read, wherever the tale is told, the pluck and persistence amid misfortune and disheartening want exhibited at this Pennsylvania hamlet along the banks of the Schuylkill have come to be the type and symbol of the Revolutionary War and to represent the supreme effort and the unconquerable fortitude of the American soldier.
In a German almanac printed in the town of Lancaster in the latter part of the year 1778 Wash- ington was first called "the Father of his Country." It was at once a truthful and a prophetic designa- tion, in accord with passing and coming events, and soon accepted by all of the people. At the close of
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the war he returned to Mount Vernon, to his ne- groes, corn, wheat, and tobacco; to his horses and his hounds,-the latter a present from Lafayette ;- again became, in the language of the Rev. Thomas Coke, " quite the plain country gentleman," and, if we may rely upon the journal of John Hunter, he " sent the bottle about pretty freely after dinner" and "got quite merry."
The war would have been an utter failure if it had only resulted in the severance of the ties which connected us with Great Britain and if it had left the colonies discordant, jealous, and each pursuing its own selfish interests, under the ineffective gov- ernment established by the Articles of Confedera- tion. The work of destruction had been successful and complete, but the constructive and more diffi- cult task of welding the discordant elements into a vital and effective organism remained. All of the South American states succeeded in throwing off the control of Spain, and even Hayti became independ- ent ; but what gift to mankind has come of it? Upon the sea of human affairs a nation was to be launched, with the prospect of large proportions and unlimited growth, and again George Washington
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came to Pennsylvania. In the definite movement leading up to the formation of the government of the United States of America, as we know it to-day, no New England state had any participation. Dele- gates from New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia met at Annapolis, in the state of Maryland, on the 1 1th of September, 1786, and, after consultation, urged the necessity of a re- vision of the existing system, and recommended the calling of a convention, with sufficient power, to meet in Philadelphia on the second Monday of May in 1787. Emerson has well said that "all martyr- doms looked mean when they were suffered," and that "when the gods come among men they are not known." He might have added that the im- portance of the supreme events in the advancement of the human race has seldom been recognized by contemporaries. Even Shakespeare died without any conception of what he had achieved and with- out any foretaste of his future fame. At the State- House, on May 14, 1787, at the opening of the convention, delegates appeared only from Virginia and Pennsylvania. Eleven days later Washington was elected to preside by the votes of these states
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and those of Delaware and New Jersey, and at the end of two weeks no others were yet represented. What the members kept steadily in view throughout all of their deliberations, according to Washington, was "the consolidation of our Union." Of how they succeeded the world has no need to be told. From that box, drawn, as it were, by unwitting fish- ermen out of the sea of uncertainties and perplexi- ties, came forth a génie whose stride is from ocean to ocean; whose locks, shaken upon one side by Eurus, on the other by Zephyr, darken the skies; and whose voice is heard in far Cathay and beyond Ultima Thule. There was difficulty about the adoption of the constitution. Opposition was man- ifested everywhere; on the part of men like Patrick Henry, of Virginia, and Elbridge Gerry, of Massa- chusetts, it was decided, and in some instances in- tense. One of the New England states held aloof for three years. But in three months-on the Ist of January, 1788-Washington was able to write, "Pennsylvania, Delaware and New Jersey have al- ready decided in its favor." After the voice of this state had been heard and its great influence had been exerted the result was no longer doubtful, and he
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cheerfully continued, "There is the greatest pros- pect of its being adopted by the people."
After having been elected president of the na- tion he had done so much to create, he spent the whole of his two terms, with the exception of a year in New York, in the city of Philadelphia. For ten years this patriotic city, without compensa- tion of any kind, furnished a home to the govern- ment of the United States. The building at the southeast corner of Sixth and Chestnut streets was given up to the use of the Senate and House, and became Congress Hall. The Supreme court met in the building at the southwest corner of Fifth and Chestnut streets. For seven years Washington lived in a large double brick building on the south side of Market street, sixty feet east of Sixth, which had been the headquarters of Howe. To the east was a yard with shade-trees, and along the front of this yard ran a brick wall seven feet high. Next door to him dwelt a hairdresser. All of the important events of his administration-the establishment of the Mint; the wars conducted by St. Clair, Har- mer, and Wayne against the Indians; the Whiskey Insurrection, which took him through Carlisle
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again to Western Pennsylvania, after a long absence ; the troubles over Genêt and Jay's treaty with Great Britain-occurred during his residence here. He had a pew in Christ Church. He became a mem- ber of the American Philosophical Society, and was present at its services upon the deaths of Benjamin Franklin and David Rittenhouse. He attended the theatre in Southwark, seeing the play, "The Young Quaker; or, the Fair Philadelphian," and Rickett's Circus, and he took part in the dancing assemblies. He and Governor Mifflin saw the Frenchman Blanchard make the first balloon ascension in Amer- ica, January 9, 1793, amid much tumult and éclat. Blanchard was described as " Impavidus sortem non timet Icariam." The magistrates of the city gave him the use of the court-yard of the prison, and the roar of artillery announced to the people the moment of departure. Washington placed in his hands a passport which, with a pleasing uncertainty befitting the occasion, was directed "to all to whom these presents shall come," and authorized him "to pass in such direction and to descend in such place as circumstances may render most convenient." He started at nine minutes after ten, on a clear morn-
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ing ; sailed over the Delaware and frightened a flock of pigeons and a Jersey farmer near Gloucester, where he landed. He prevailed upon the latter to come to his help by the offer of one of the six bottles of wine with which Dr. Caspar Wistar had provided him. Jonathan Penrose, Robert Wharton, and six other Philadelphians chased after him on horseback and escorted him back to the President, to whom he presented his respects and colors.
Washington had sixteen stalls in his stable, generally full, and was a hard driver, upon one oc- casion foundering five horses. He wore false teeth, in part carved from the tusk of a hippopotamus. The Stuart portrait, which has come in time to be the accepted delineation of his features, was painted at the southeast corner of Fifth and Chestnut streets. Every Tuesday he gave levees, and on New Year's Day served punch and cake. Once he picked the sugar-plums from the cake and sent them to " Master John," later in life to be famous as the Old Man Eloquent. When James Wilson, justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, opened the law school of this university and, in the true sense, began legal education in this country, Decem-
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ber 15, 1790, it was in the presence of George and Martha Washington. One hundred and ten years ago to-day, at the hour of noon,-aye, this very hour,-the faculty of the University of Pennsylva- nia, in company with the heads of department, the members of the congress, and the governor of the commonwealth, in person offered their congratula- tions. He had a green parchment pocket-book; he kept it in a hair trunk, and he tied his keys together with a twine string. In this city he wrote his fare- well address, and here he was described as «first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen." He left Philadelphia March 9, 1797, and less than three years later he was dead.
The cloth is woven. The story is told. Through no accident was it brought about that Washington, though he was born and died in Virginia, spent in such great part his military and official life in this state. The cause was like that which took Napo- leon from Ajaccio to Paris, Shakespeare from Strat- ford to London, and Franklin from Boston to Philadelphia. "Every ship," wrote Emerson, "is a romantic object except that we sail in." Self-respect is a saving grace in the state as well as in the indi-
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vidual. Patriotism, like charity and all the other virtues, begins at the hearth-stone. When the Shun- ammite woman was urged to come to the court of Solomon, her answer was, "I dwell among mine own people." After the earliest of the great and good men of the Aryan race, he whom we call Cyrus, five centuries and a half before Christ, had overcome all of his enemies and had founded the most extensive empire the world had known up to that time, he inscribed over the gateway of his pal- ace only the simple words, "I am Kurush the King, the Akhæmenian." There is need of more of that spirit in Pennsylvania. We too lightly forget our achievements ; we are too ready to desert our heroes ; we are too willing to leave our rulers unsupported; we read with too little indignation the uncanny and untrue tales told by our rivals elsewhere and re- peated and reprinted by the unfaithful at home. Of all existing agencies this institution of learning, with its host of alumni and students devoted to it, to its interests, and to the commonwealth, appears to be doing the most effective service in the way of cultivating a more correct tone and a more elevated sentiment. To a great extent the future hope of
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the commonwealth depends upon you, young men of the university, and upon your efforts. Go forth, then, to fill your chosen spheres. Let it not be said of you, as was said of one of the lord chancel- lors of England, that if he had known a little about law he would have known a little about everything. Be earnest and thorough. If your field be the law, follow the example and study the work of Gibson and Sharswood. If it be medicine, you have before you the careers and the labors of Rush, Gross, Agnew, and Pepper. If it be science, to whom can you turn with more confidence than to Rittenhouse, Leidy, Audubon, and Cope? If you wish to store your minds with the facts of the past, read the histories of Lea and McMaster; and if you need mental relaxation, you will find no romance more worthy of your attention than "Nick of the Woods," "The Story of Kennett," "The Wagoner of the Alleghenies," and "Hugh Wynne." As you go along through life, sing with emotion your song of "The Pennsylvania Girl," and shout with vigor your
"'Rah, 'rah, 'rah, Pennsylvania !"
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that all may not only hear, but learn to appreciate and to admire. Benjamin West, of Delaware county, when he became president of the Royal Academy, reached the highest position which could then be attained by any artist. In his "Death of Wolfe" he overthrew the conventions and revolu- tionized the methods of his profession. It is not too much to assert that in his "Penn's Treaty with the Indians" he fastened upon the attention of mankind the most distinctive event in the early his- tory of the colonies. See to it that amid the fads of modern art he is not belittled and discarded. Your soldier, George Gordon Meade, not only won the most important battle of recent times, but in doing so he determined the destinies of the nation and influenced human affairs for all the ages to come. Cherish and extend his fame as your precious heri- tage. On brass, marble, and granite preserve the memory of his deeds. Give due praise to the ac- complishment of others, but do not overlook the worth and achievements of the earnest men who have gone from your own doorsteps. Scorn all cant, falsehood, and sensationalism. And when by zeal and application you have secured in life the
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rewards for which you have striven, do not forget how much of your success is due to the training and discipline conferred upon you by your vener- able and honored alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, and to the example of the long line of distinguished men who in the past have been the recipients of her benefits and been nurtured at her bosom.
PENNSYLVANIA AND MASSACHUSETTS
[A reply to an anonymous attack upon Pennsylvania, published by the Atlantic Monthly in October, 1901.]
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