First in the Hearts of His Countrymen

As I've grown older, I've really come to recognize how inadequate history classes in school are. I'm not trying to be snarky; it's just that history is so "thick" and filled with so many details there is absolutely no way a person can learn much more than the basics of names, dates, and places. That's one reason I like to tackle some historical nonfiction once in a while to go along with my favored diet of historical fiction. My latest was Joseph Ellis' biography of George Washington, His Excellency.

Shortly after beginning this book, I realized I knew very little about George Washington. Sure, I knew he was the commander in chief for the Continental Army and the first constitutional president of the United States. I'd heard the story about how he thwarted the mutiny of the Newburgh Conspiracy by using his spectacles and a sentimental reference to his advancing age. But I didn't have much of an understanding of the amazing human being that was behind all those accomplishments. While Ellis' biography isn't as focused on George Washington the human being as say, The Unexpected George Washingtion: His Private Life by Harlow Giles Unger, Ellis does give some analysis of Washington's psychology. (I borrowed both of these books from a friend and while I'd like to read the Unger book, it took me 2 1/2 months - YES - to read the Ellis book. I'm ready to get back to some fiction! And I want to return the books to the friend. Maybe I'll get to Unger some time in the future.)

I'm not going to go into everything I found interesting about Washington's life (although I had no idea he was a smallpox survivor and how that played a strategic role in the American Revolution). To keep this post short and sweet, I'll just focus on two things that gave me new respect for Washington: his planned solution to the problem of frontier settlement and Indian rights to the land, and his determination to somehow, eventually free his slaves.

Probably because I am working on a story which is centered around the conflict over land between the Cherokee and white settlers, I paid special attention to the section of the book that talked about Washington's plans as president to deal with the Indians. Ellis points out Washington firmly believed the nation's future lay in expanding into the interior of the continent, which meant there had to be some policy for dealing with the peoples who were already there. Unlike many officials (especially Andrew Jackson later), Washington respected the Indians as "familiar and formidable adversaries fighting for their own independence; in effect, behaving pretty much as he would do in their place." That view led him to come up with a policy of creating Indian "homelands" that would house the tribes as foreign nations with which the United States would interact just as they would with the nations of Europe. Washington was apparently opposed to confiscation of Indian lands, which he believed would "stain the character of the nation." Unfortunately, early on, the state of Georgia ignored Washington's Treaty of New York with the Creek Nation and sold more than 15 million acres that would have been the Creek homeland to a land speculating company. As Ellis pointed out, "Eventually Washington was forced to acknowledge his vision...could not be enforced." He may have had a magnanimous attitude toward Native Americans, but not enough people shared his view - or too many were too greedy for land to care.

I also found it interesting to follow Ellis' discussion of how Washington gradually moved from oblivious slave owner (oblivious to the rights of slaves, that is) to a man who freed his slaves in his will. Ellis spends considerable time discussing the development of Washington's moral stance on slavery; although Washington came to see slavery as in contrast with the democratic principles he fought for in the revolution, he was still constrained by his vision of economic security. Part of the problem was that he didn't have full control of all the slaves; more than half of his slaves actually belonged to the dowry that came with Martha on their marriage and he couldn't free them without paying their value to the estate (which he obviously wasn't willing to do). Part of the problem was also that Washington felt strongly the new nation couldn't survive the political battles that would break out if he as president made moves to eliminate slavery. Ellis notes how complicated the slavery question was for Washington, who had a strong commitment to avoid breaking up slave families by selling slaves and who continued to support all the slaves even when it didn't work economically for Mount Vernon. I suppose we could condemn Washington's position on slavery by saying he waited until he was dead and would no longer need their services to give his slaves their freedom. However, I look  at it this way - Washington was the only one of the slave-owning Founding Fathers who actually did anything about slavery, even if it came after his death. And his will didn't simply throw the slaves as free blacks out into the world; Washington allotted funds to provide care for the older or sick slaves for the remainder of their lives, and he called for the younger slaves to be taught to read and to do some kind of trade before being freed completely at age 25. And he was serious about it; his will included the following statement: "see that this clause respecting Slaves, and every part thereof be religiously fulfilled at the Epoch at which it is directed to take place without evasion, neglect or delay."

Even though it took me a long time to read the book, it was not because the book was boring or poorly-written. I thought it hit a good balance between giving an overview of the many significant events of Washington's life and of the motivations and personality of the man who lived those events. I'm glad I read it, and I'm glad to have more flesh put on the paper cutout figure of Washington that I had from studying American history in school.

I'm Sorry, but I Just Don't See It That Way

I recently finished reading (and really enjoyed) My Brother Sam Is Dead, by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier. The edition we have (from a book fair at my son's school, I think) had bonus features, including an interview with Christopher Collier. In that interview, Collier said, "Johnny Tremain provides a simple interpretation of the Revolution that puts it into easy categories of 'good' versus 'bad'....that book shows the war in a way it didn't really run."

Granted, I've been a huge fan of Johnny Tremain since Mrs. Howell read it to my sixth-grade class. So I immediately took offense to seeing it labeled as "the Revolutionary War for Dummies." Hot on the heels of finishing the Colliers' book, I started in on Johnny Tremain, seeing if maybe my fond nostalgia had clouded my memories and judgment.

My conclusion? No, it hasn't. I know Christopher Collier is the historian of that pair, and I am not the expert on the Revolutionary War that he is, but I think he is selling Forbes' book short on its portrayal of the war.

Let's take for an example his contention that the book puts the events of the war into "easy categories of 'good' and 'bad'." One area in which a reader might expect to find those easy categories would be in the development of characters. So for Collier's thesis to hold up, the British would be unequivocally "bad" and the Americans unequivocally "good." Yet I think of the portrayal of Lieutenant Stranger, the young British officer who at one point taught Johnny to jump with his horse. Certainly he is shown as eager for the fight; as one character described him, "He likes fightin' real good. He ain't no cardboard soldier...." Yet when Johnny is taking riding lessons with Lieutenant Stranger, he finds the officer treats him as an equal when they are in the saddle. The officer also displays a strong sense of honor. "Johnny knew he longed to own [Johnny's horse] himself. He could, any moment, by merely saying 'commandeer.' And Johnny knew he never would say it." The next paragraph sums up the complexity of Johnny's relationship with Lt. Stranger: "Johnny almost worshipped him for his skill and almost loved him...but still it was only where horses were concerned they were equals. Indoors he was rigidly a British officer and a 'gentleman' and Johnny an inferior. This shifting about puzzled Johnny. It did not seem to puzzle the British officer at all."

I can think of other British characters for which there was that same ambivalence. The deserter Pumpkin, tough little Sergeant Gale who married the daughter of Johnny's former master, the admired and hated Major Pitcairn. I think Forbes made it clear that though the characters disagreed on politics, they were all, at the heart of it, human beings with a combination of good and bad characteristics.

So maybe the fault lies in Forbes' portrayal of the American characters. But again, I would have to say no. I think about the way Sam Adams, one of the heroes of the revolutionaries, was portrayed. You would think a writer who is oversimplifying events would show the heroes to be universally good. But Forbes has Johnny observing that "the Tories were saying that Sam Adams has seduced John Hancock, even as the Devil had seduced Eve -- by a constant whispering in his ear." The reader is left with the impression that maybe the Tories aren't so wrong in their assessment. Adams is consistently shown as a warmonger: "He doesn't care much any more about our patching up our differences with England." Granted, Forbes does seem to indulge in some hero worship of Paul Revere (reading this book made me want to hunt up her Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of him).

Maybe Collier's objection rests with the glossing over of violence. He and his brother take a "gritty" approach to describing what happened in the war, like when the boy sees the slave's head come bouncing off his shoulders during a skirmish. Yes, Forbes doesn't go into graphic detail, but she does include the violence that was part of the war, and not just in battles. At one point, Johnny hears a Tory man being beaten by the Sons of Liberty: Johnny heard blows and oaths from the street outside. His hands shook....They were doing something -- something awful, to the Tory." And strangely enough, it was one of the images of violence, from Pumpkin's execution, that was most deeply linked to my memories of this book: "Squared scarlet shoulders - and on each shoulder a musket. Each musket ended with a wicked round eye....Eight cruel eyes. It was like looking into the face of death."

I would have to conclude that Mr. Collier's comments are wrong. However, I have a theory as to why he would think Johnny Tremain is oversimplified. Yes, it doesn't place the reader right into the action of the war the same way My Brother Sam Is Dead does. I think that's because the Colliers wrote their book after television and Forbes wrote hers before television. Once we have seen footage of actual battle scenes and extreme closeups of actor's faces, I suppose anything other than "gritty" writing seems naive and oversimplified. Johnny Tremain depends on the reader to be involved and fill in the details; My Brother Sam Is Dead gives the reader the details up front. Johnny Tremain allows the reader to stay at arm's length if he/she wants to; My Brother Sam Is Dead forces the reader to be right in the action.