GEORGE WASHINGTON AND HIS SPECIAL BRAND OF AMERICAN LEADERSHIP

GEORGE WASHINGTON AND HIS SPECIAL BRAND OF AMERICAN LEADERSHIP

James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.
© March 9, 2008

"His words were smoother than oil and yet be they very swords."

The Book of Common Prayer

"Through all the doubt and darkness, the danger and long tempest of war, I think it was only the American leader's (George Washington) indomitable soul that remained entirely constant."

English novelist, William Makepeace Thackeray ((1811 - 1863)

"I hope that calm counsel and constructive leadership will provide the steadying influence and the time necessary for the coming of new and more practical forms of representative government throughout the world wherein privilege will occupy a lesser place and welfare a greater."

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882 - 1945), message to Congress, January 4, 1935 in the midst of the Great Depression.


I BACKGROUND

Only a week ago I was in New York City enjoying its total ambiance with Beautiful Betty, my wife, when I was struck with a dominant presence that kept reminding me of this city's history, and its relationship with America's first president, George Washington. There is a bridge here named for him, parks and streets and circles, as well as buildings and monuments celebrating his connection to the isle of Manhattan.

There are literally hundreds of books written on Washington, and sometimes I think I've read most of them, which clearly cannot be the case. My interest in our first president is how he became the leader that he became. I would like to share some of my thoughts on this subject with you now and the possible lessons learned from his leadership.

II CHARACTER

George Washington was born of an affluent family, the first son of his father's second wife, Mary Ball Washington. She doted on her son as he doted on his half brother, Lawrence, who had military adventures and shared them with his brother.

Little is known about Washington's formal education, but it is agreed that it was meager. He showed a facility for arithmetic early on, and was a surveyor when he was 15, no longer in school.

Following his brother's footsteps, he rose to a major in the Virginia militia, training recruits in military discipline and weaponry. He was not yet 21.

His brother died of tuberculosis at 34, and Washington inherited part of his estate. Later, he inherited much of his father's estate. A young man, independently wealthy, he was no slave to baser appetites.

He was blessed by circumstances but circumspect about revealing his ambitions. Already, he understood the less he used his power the greater his influence; and the less he revealed his ambitions the less threatening he would be and the more likely they would be achieved.

He participated in the French and Indian Wars and had his first military victory at Fort Necessity when he surprised a small body of French troops. The French avenged this defeat on July 3, 1754. The twenty-two-year-old Washington reported dejectedly, "I went out and was soundly defeated."

LESSON: Washington was a learner, not a knower. He assessed all his activities without camouflage or rancor. He made it his business to determine the building blocks to character that would serve him for the long haul. He was a religious man in his commitment to excellence.

III DISCIPLINE

From his earliest childhood, he admired his father's discipline and his half-brothers use of self-discipline to promote his growth and development. He kept ledgers of what he did right and what he did wrong, and how he might rectify his errors. His ambition was not only for political and military prominence, but also for social distinction.

He practiced before a mirror with how he used his hands and body to express himself, and then studied the guide to correct manners and conduct in society.

He knew he was taller and better proportion than most men of his day at six feet two inches tall and 215 pounds, and so he used this as a conduit to satisfy his ambitions, feigning modesty to the contrary so as not to reveal his motivation.

Somewhat critical of his voice and command of English, he studied the language and practiced his elocution as if his life depended on it.

Early on, he concluded he was not a remarkable thinker, but felt satisfaction in the way men responded to him as commander. He analyzed this as if he were an independent source separate from himself, and concluded he had a capacity to take success and failure in stride without hubris or complaint.

This resilience was a measure of demonstrative courage and morale. It became his boilerplate.

LESSON: He was the quintessential didactic all his life. He kept track of his progress as if it were a report card with him the teacher and student recording the grades. His reserve, which was so characteristic of him, was something he coached into being. It supported his ramrod character.

IV USES OF SYMBOLISM

From his look, stance, how he carried himself and the manner of his walk, people said, "That fellow will go far." He was known for his manner and dress, but most importantly for his presence.

One of his initial goals was to become the best horseman in the colonies. He didn't simply ride a horse; he rode it with authority and command. Already at twenty, his horsemanship was noted as a surveyor. This became part of his mystique when later he was in command of troops.

Already as a young man, he demonstrated the persona of command, and a person that stood apart. A notable peccadillo was his aversion to be touch. Touching indicated familiarity, which was antithetical to his personality.

In the late 1770s, when the Continental Congress had formed, and it was on the verge of declaring its independence from Great Britain, an army had to be created and a commander-in-chief chosen.

John Hancock, then president of the Continental Congress, campaigned for the position; Washington did not. Hancock thought surely he would be chosen for such a command. John Adams thought differently. He designated that role for George Washington instead. He did this with a carefully presented dossier of Washington's achievements, which won approval.

Washington attended these Continental Congress meetings in the full regalia of the uniform of a general of the Virginia militia.

He accepted the position of Commander-in-chief of the Continental Army with modesty and humility, and wrote his wife, Martha, that he did everything possible to avoid this travail when, clearly, he had been quietly and symbolically campaigning for the command.

LESSON: Great ambition is a product of character and discipline, but great ambition that is palpable and brooding neutralizes its effective. Symbolism is the single most powerful weapon of the ambitious. It is expressed in a language beyond words or bellicose but in symbolic interaction. This metaphor breeds allegiance and enthusiasm, which is distilled into passionate followership.

V AS A LISTENER

Washington was aware as a child that he was surrounded by people with casual grace and gymnastic intellect, who could discuss and argue critical questions of the day beyond the purview of his limited education and comprehension. He found it natural to be a listener than a talker. It was equally natural to ask polite questions to inspire learning. This would spur the conversation on, and people would say how bright and affable Washington was, when he had hardly said a word. Making people feel wise is the most powerful kind of flattery.

Listening was characteristic of Washington as a boy, effectively using it throughout his social, military and political career. He would gauge the quality of what he heard, and process it to his benefit.

John Adams appreciated Washington, in part, because he was a good listener. Adams was a thinker who loved to talk; loved to command the attention of an audience, but hated to listen. Thomas Jefferson loved to hear his own voice, too, and was never threatened by Washington, but was by Adams. They were both cut from the same cloth.

LESSON: There is no learning when you are talking expressing what you already know. You learn by reading, doing, and listening. Listening is the hardest work of all. It is why most of us are poor listeners. Washington decided listening would be an important contributor to his didactic progress. Listening is the hallmark of good leadership

VI GRACE UNDER PRESSURE

The courageous stance of the colonial militia at Breed's Hill has come to be known as the "battle of Bunker hill." The Americans ran out of ammunition but lost only 200 men out of 1,000 whereas the British lost 1,000 out of a force of 2,000. This heightened colonial resistance and morale. It also relieved general Thomas Gage of his command for general John Howe.

General Howe then retook Boston, and had victory after victory the rest of 1775 and through most of 1776. It was the Continental Armies darkest hour.

In August 1776, Washington was unable to hold New York against General Howe, then losing Long Island, Harlem Heights, and White Plains.

Howe was set to capture Washington's total army, and thus quash the rebellion, but an impenetrable Manhattan fog rolled in from the harbor to completely cover the Continental Armies retreat.

Morale couldn't be lower, the army had inadequate food, clothing, and ammunition. This produced rumbling all the way to Philadelphia for Washington to step down.

In the midst of this, the Continental's general Charles Lee, who wanted Washington's job, relished his many defeats, while failing to send his troops when Washington requested reinforcements.

Lee was in constant conversation with his coconspirators including colonel Joseph Reed.

Accidentally, Washington opened a letter from Lee to Reed, which included reference to Washington's crumbling command and "it was time for a change in leadership."

Washington penned a note to it, "I opened this by accident. I thought it was office business," and sent it on to Lee.

This ended the intrigue. Lee was later captured by the British and imprisoned in England. Colonel Reed remained loyal to Washington during the rest of the war. He was never sanctioned or rebuked.

LESSON: Picture the darkest of times with little or no evidence of resolving the difficulty. Imagine accidentally uncovering a plot to dislodge you from command, and you have an appreciation of Washington's situation.

He had little difficulty separating self-demands (his fragile ego) from role-demands (the job at hand), or his "ideal self" (how he ought to be) from his "real self" (how he actually was).

When you have such balance, such extraordinary equilibrium, you cannot help but see the situation clearly, which Washington did.

He didn't become paranoid; didn't go off halfcocked; knew he had to maintain the rectitude symbolically consistent with his character and office; knew he needed every man.

He willed his men on by dressing every day resplendently in his uniform with all its campaign ribbons and with the care of a victorious general.

Washington's intuitive sense spoke volumes: never is one so much at the top of his game than at the moment of supreme distress.

VII THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX

New York City and New York State were in the hands of the enemy. 1776 was the Continental Army's darkest hour. Washington knew Howe would be launching a major campaign in 1777 to control the Hudson and end the war.

It is December 1776, and a terrible dismal 1776 shows no prospects for a better 1777. Howe has stationed troops along the Hudson River at strategic points but has batten down for a spring offensive.

It is one of the worst winters in memory, and the temperature is consistently in the teens to low thirties.

Washington assesses his progress and setbacks and invites his generals and other officers to join him in this assessment.

He listens and sees a pattern: the Continental Army has always done what the British expect. Now, Hessians or German mercenaries, hired by the British, are doing much of the fighting and they have proven to be brutal adversaries.

Washington decides to cross the Delaware River at Trenton, New Jersey on the night of December 24, 1776 and to arrive before dawn.

He is looking for a surprise attack thinking the Hessians would have been celebrating Christmas Eve.

But before they embark, he has his officers read Thomas Paine's "The American Crisis" to their men. This is what the pamphlet says in part:

"These are the times that try men's souls. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value . . .Panics, in some cases, have their uses; they produce as much good as hurt. Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them, and acquires a firmer habit than before."

It was written from Paine's talented pen, but spoke to the soul of Washington.

Washington launches the boats at 11 p.m. and finds the river badly frozen making it nearly impossible to move horses and canons across. Instead of arriving in the predawn, they cross the river by 4 a.m., and don't arrive at Valley Forge until 8 a.m., with little chance of surprise.

Washington considers abandoning the campaign and returning to the other side of the river. He counsels with his officers, and they agree to go forward with Paine's words echoing in their minds:

"It is not necessary to win the war on the battlefield; he must not lose it there."

The Hessians are surprised, sleeping off their partying Christmas Eve. It is a stunning victory with over 1,000 Hessians prisoners captured and the fort's commander Colonel Henry Knox killed. The fighting was over in less than an hour.

A Hessian colonel failed to arrive with the reinforcement promised. He decided instead to visit a young widow in Mount Holly, New Jersey, 20 miles away. The lady that delayed the Hessian colonel is reputed to have been Betsy Ross, designer of the American flag.

LESSON: This was consistent with Edward de Bono's now famous "lateral thinking," or thinking outside the box. Washington decided that speed and stealth, and striking the enemy where it is weak and hitting it hard there would have to be their strategy.

His other generals would follow his lead, and no one more successful than general Benedict Arnold, more about him shortly.

VIII SALESMANSHIP

The Continental Army has shrunken to only 5,000 men with the British more than 30,000 strong. It is December 31, 1976, and most of the fight has been taken out of the men despite this latest victory. Most of Washington's troops have completed their enlistment obligation, and are ready to return to their homes.

On this day, he assembles his troops, and addresses them candidly. He commends them for their loyal and courageous service. And then says,

"Your country is at stake. We know not how to spare you. If you stay, each man will be given a $10 bonus."

This was more than a month's pay, and money that the Continental Congress did not have to give. It sounds as if a paltry sum, but more than half of his men stayed, and as the word spread of the victory at Valley Forge, new recruits flooded in.

Meanwhile, Benjamin Franklin was attempting to sell Louise XVI on entering the war in support of America. This was the court of Marie Antoinette, who like the king, would lose her head during the French Revolution of 1789, during the Reign of Terror.

LESSON: The fundamental nature of selling is that you sell the sizzle not the steak. The buyer translates the sizzle into the steak-of-his-mind.

Washington appealed to the patriotic spirit of his men who were walking with rags on their feet. He sold the sizzle of the steak with the promise of a financial bonus.

All they needed was a little sizzle to support their fragile wings of conviction, and that was the promise of money.

Franklin's problem in France was more challenging. He had to make the sizzle representative of victory, not only of the battle, but also of the war. He played on the French's hatred of everything British. This hatred was part of the sizzle, but it needed to be seasoned with a suitable victory. That would come with the Battle of Saratoga.

IX MANNERS, MORALS & VANITY

Imagine the British army the most powerful army in the world, and the British navy ruler of the seven seas, and then imagine an army of 12, 13, 14, and 15 year-old-boys, and old men, and you have the Continental Army for the most part.

Americans were ill trained, if trained at all, undisciplined, unsophisticated, poorly educated, and primarily farmers with little interest in city life or people of power.

These citizen soldiers don't like rules and regulations. They find Washington a hard taskmaster, but fair, consistent and unwavering. It rallies them.

Now consider general John Burgoyne. He loves the good life and travels with an ample supply of his favorites foods and liquors, in fact, with 30 carts of both. He likes to gamble and is known as "Gentleman Johnny." He also has a reputation as a playwright.

The Saratoga Campaign of October 1777 was meant to end the rebellion instead it turned the rebellion into an American Revolution that would last another five years.

Burgoyne's 8,000 troops were to move down the Hudson River to join Howe's 13,000 troops moving up the Hudson to take control of the Hudson River at Saratoga, and thus cut the Continental Army in half and take control of all its supply lanes.

It didn't happen.

Burgoyne failed to capture the fort because Howe didn't show up.

Howe was fixated on recapturing Philadelphia. He succeeded with his 13,000 men on 260 ships, but it was a victory that may have cost the British the war.


Word of Burgoyne's defeat was what Franklin needed to persuade the French to declare war on Great Britain and join the Americans in its fight for independence, which France did.

LESSON: Leaders are human, and perhaps even more human than most people. Therefore, it is likely that they have gigantic talents and equally gigantic shortcomings.

We tend to applaud their strengths or what they do well, and forgive their weaknesses, or what they do poorly.

We make them more than human so that we can treat them as less than human if they fail to perform as gods and only as men.

Generals Burgoyne and Howe were very capable generals but flawed human beings.

Burgoyne was a hedonist and Howe was an obsessive compulsive.

Washington was neither. Nor was he as brilliant a general as Burgoyne or as great a strategist as Howe. Equally true, he wasn't weighed down with their baggage.

X FATE

General William Howe could chalk it up to fate that the fog saved the Continental Army when it successfully retreated from New York under siege.

It may have been fate as well when officer Patrick Ferguson of the British army had Washington on horseback in his sights at Brandywine Creek and did not shoot. It was 18th century protocol not to kill the commanding officer on the battlefield as he roamed up and down his troop lines.

Then was it fate that general Benedict Arnold, the great strategist and bold warrior on the battlefield at Saratoga, should see the credit for his victory go to general Horatio Gates?


Arnold fought Indian style, putting snipers in trees and in blinds, causing the British army to constantly retreat and regroup.

It marked the most significant victory of the Continental Army. More than 6,000 British troops were captured and sent home.

But the celebrity went to general Horatio Gates, who was made senior officer of the combined Gates-Arnold command although he was an ineffective field commander.

Was it fate, then, when Benedict Arnold had the British general Simon Fraser in his sights and killed him with three shots disregarding 18th century protocol, which cemented the Saratoga victory?

Arnold was then shot but in the leg. When asked where he was hit, Arnold said, "It's my leg I wish it was my heart."

It was a prophetic reply. He would have been the hero of that battle and the Revolutionary War, but instead lived, and eventually became a traitor joining the British. To this day we call someone who has betrayed a trust, "a Benedict Arnold."

LESSON: The fickle finger of fate is not an honest or sympathetic Indian.

Any of us can look at moments in our life that pure luck or circumstance changed our plight and not necessarily because of our pluck.

Read any history of a prominent member of society and were it not for this or that fickle finger of fate he or she might never have made the cut to notice.

Fate touches all our lives, but we give it other names such as luck, bad fortune, karma, or simply s___ happens.

Washington felt from his earliest recollections that the hand of Providence guided him. It was something he believed in so completely that at his darkest hours came his greatest calm. He wanted from the beginning to make his mark and to be remembered as if an actor on a stage reading lines Providence provided.

XI Summary

When you think of leaders and leadership, wonder how they stack up in terms of character and discipline, as a listener, grace under pressure, thinking outside the box, salesmanship, manners, morals & vanity, and fate. Our first president used them all and well. My wonder is why they have fallen into disrepute. What do you think?

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See John Buchanan's "The Road To Valley Forge: How Washington Built the Army that Won the Revolution" (John Wiley & Sons 2004), or any other of hundreds of books on the subject. This is an overview from my perspective and reading.