The Intimate Lives of the Founding Fathers Read Online Free

friends were frequent visitors. George soon proved himself more than vulnerable to their charms. One belle, who remains nameless, inspired some of the worst poetry ever committed by an adolescent:
    O, ye Gods, why should my poor resistless heart
    Stand to oppose thy might and power
    At last to surrender to Cupid’s feather’d dart
    And now lays bleeding every hour
    For her that’s pitiless of my grief and woes
    And will not on me pity take .
    This atrocity may have been committed on behalf of “a lowland beauty” who particularly tormented George. He told his friend Robin during a sojourn in the Shenandoah Valley at Lord Fairfax’s hunting lodge that there was “an agreeable young lady” living in the house, but every time he looked at her, he thought of the “lowland beauty,” which was only “adding fuel to the fire.” There seems to be little doubt that George was powerfully attracted to the opposite sex—hardly surprising for a healthy, vigorous teenager. 14
    George’s romantic emotions slowly acquired a darker tinge. Sally Fairfax seems to have been a coquette who tantalized, teased, and dominated the men around her. She soon realized that one of her conquests was George Washington—a discovery that did not displease her. The contrast between the tall, muscular Washington and her short, precise courtier husband, whose greatest talent was assiduous flattery of his superiors, could not have been more complete. As they performed together in amateur theatrics, danced minuets in Belvoir’s ballroom, and exchanged gossip about the amorous doings of their contemporaries, George Washington fell violently in love with his close friend’s wife.
    One of their favorite plays was Cato , written by the celebrated essayist and poet Joseph Addison in 1713. It was the most popular drama of the century; more to the point, it had two parts made to order for lovers and would-be lovers. Marcia was Cato’s devoted daughter; Juba was a North African warrior who rallied to Cato’s side when he resisted the rise of Julius Caesar. Marcia confessed her love for Juba, but Cato refused his approval because he was a mere colonial. Juba nevertheless remained devoted to the untouchable beauty. 15
    VI
    By the time George realized what was happening to him emotionally, he was on his way to becoming Virginia’s best-known soldier. Grown to his full six feet two and one half inches, he stood, in the words of one eyewitness, “as straight as an Indian.” Thanks to his Fairfax connections, he was appointed a major of the militia at age twenty. The following year he won a skirmish against a French patrol that became the opening shots of the world’s first global conflict, the Seven Years’ War. Next, in spite of strenuous objections from his mother, George become a favorite aide of British general Edward Braddock and miraculously survived the rout of his army of regulars when they marched into western Pennsylvania to oust the French from Fort Duquesne, where Pittsburgh now stands. Ignoring four bullets through his coat and two horses killed under him, Washington was among the few who distinguished himself on that chaotic battlefield.
    He staggered back to Mount Vernon a very tired man. A letter from William Fairfax reveals how closely the residents of Belvoir followed Washington’s military career: “Your safe return gives an uncommon joy to us and will no doubt be sympathized by all lovers of heroick [sic] virtue,” Fairfax wrote. He hoped a Saturday night’s rest would refresh the weary warrior enough to enable him to come to Belvoir in the morning.
    Sally added a saucy note, cosigned by two visiting women friends, accusing the hero of “great unkindness in not visiting us this night. I assure you that nothing but being satisfied that our company would be disagreeable would prevent us from trying if our legs would not carry us to Mount Vernon this night; but if you will not come to us, tomorrow morning, very early, we shall be at