Founding Fathers: Complete Biographies, Their Articles, Historical & Political Documents. Emory Speer
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and universal philanthropy.
For his arduous services during the revolution Washington took no compensation, and virtually paid about three-fourths of his own expenses. He only charged his actual disbursements, for each item of which he produced a written voucher. He made a book entry of every business transaction with as much system as if he had enjoyed the quiet of a counting-room. A fac simile of his journal is now before me, which has been politely furnished by Timothy Caldwell, Esq. of the city of Philadelphia, one of the few survivors of “the times that tried men’s souls.”
The first entry is dated the 22nd of June, 1775, and marked No. 1. £239. It commences with the outfit of the commander-in-chief and his staff at Philadelphia, and the expenses of the journey to Cambridge, immediately after his appointment by Congress, amounting to £466 2s. 10d. lawful money. But £3 of this amount was drawn from government at that time. The balance was furnished from his own pocket and credit, having received from Thomas Mifflin, Esq., £129 8s. 2d. The account current which is before me runs through a period of eight years, at the end of which time a balance was due to him of £1972 9s. 4d. His expenses for the eight years amounted to £16311 17s. 1d. He received $104,364 paper money, after March 1780, and passed it to the credit of the United States at forty for one, agreeably to the scale of depreciation, for which he did not obtain one for a hundred, by reason of which a large proportion of his expenses were actually paid with his own private money, for which he refused any remuneration. His expenses during his presidential terms exceeded his salary over five thousand dollars a year, which he paid from his private funds.
Had I time and power to trace the fair lines of Washington’s private worth and routine of life, I would present the picture of a man graced with native dignity, reducing all things around him to as perfect a system of order, economy, harmony and peace, as was ever devised by man. It should be chastened with sterling merit and magnanimity, and mellowed with benevolence and charity. It should be enlivened by the richest colours of virtue and consistency, and finished with the finest touches of a master’s hand. I would crown it with an amaranthine bouquet, richer and sweeter than the epic or civic wreath that decked his brow in the public view of an admiring world. He was a pattern of all that was great and good — the widow’s solace, the orphan’s father, the bountiful benefactor, the faithful friend, the kind husband, the true patriot, the humble christian, the worthy citizen and the honest man.
With the exception of his appointment to preside over the American army in 1798, when France threatened an invasion, Washington was relieved from any further participation in public affairs. He continued to live at Vernon’s sacred mount until the 14th of December, 1799, when his immortal spirit left its tenement of clay, soared aloft on angel’s wings to realms of ceaseless bliss, there to receive a crown of unfading glory, as the reward of a spotless life spent in the service of his country and his God.
His body was deposited in the family tomb, where its ashes slumber in peace, amidst the groves of his loved retreat.1 This hallowed spot is visited yearly by large numbers, who approach it with veneration, gratitude and awe. Foreigners are proud to say they have visited the tomb of Washington — all nations revere his memory, unborn millions will perpetuate his praise.
His history, like that of our nation, is without a parallel. Unblemished virtue marked his whole career, philanthropy his whole course, justice and integrity his every action. A calm resignation, to the will of God, under the most trying circumstances and under every dispensation, added a brilliant lustre to all his amiable qualities. His course was not tarnished with bold strides of misguided ambition, or base attempts at self-aggrandizement. He was consistent to the last. His character, like a blazing luminary, outdazzles the surrounding stars, and illuminates, with meridian splendour, the horizon of biography. His brilliant achievements were not stained with that unnecessary effusion of human blood which characterized the ambitious Cæsar, the conquering Alexander and the disappointed Bonaparte. His fame is beyond the reach of slander or the attacks of malice. He has left an example of human conduct worthy the contemplation and imitation of all who move in the private walks of life or figure on the stage of public action. His sacred memory will live through the rolling ages of time, until the wreck of worlds and the dissolution of nature shall close the drama of human action, Gabriel’s dread clarion rend the vaulted tomb, awake the sleeping dead, and proclaim to astonished millions — TIME SHALL BE NO LONGER.
1 Since writing this sketch I have been informed, that when the remains of Washington were placed in the sarcophagus prepared for their reception, in the autumn of 1837, his face retained its fleshy appearance and was but slightly changed — a fact as remarkable as the history of his life.
John Jay
John Jay, was born in New York City, on 12 December, 1745 and died in Bedford, Westchester co., N. Y. on 17 May, 1829. He was of Huguenot descent, and was educated in part by Pastor Stoope, of the French church at New Rochelle, and was graduated at Kings (now Columbia), New York, in 1766. He studied law with Benjamin Kissam, having Lindley Murray as his fellow-student, and in 1766 was admitted to the bar. When news of the passage of the Boston port bill reached New York, on 16 May, 1776, at a meeting of citizens, Jay was appointed a member of a committee of fifty-one to correspond with the other colonies. Their reply to the Boston committee, attributed to Jay, recommended, as of the utmost moment, “a congress of deputies from the colonies in general.” Jay was a delegate to the congress, which met in Philadelphia, 5 Sept. As one of a committee of three he prepared the “Address to the People of Great Britain,” which Jefferson, while ignorant of the authorship, declared to be “a production certainly of the finest pen in America.” Jay was an active member of the committee of observation in New York, on whose recommendation the counties elected a provincial congress, and also of a committee of association of 100 members, invested by the city of New York with general undefined powers. He was a member also of the 2d congress, which met in Philadelphia, 10 May, 1775, and drafted the “Address to the People of Canada and of Ireland”; and he carried against a strong opposition a petition to the king, which was signed by the members on 8 July. The rejection of this petition, leaving no alternative but submission or resistance, opened the way for a general acquiescence in the Declaration of Independence. Jay was a member of the secret committee appointed by congress, 29 Nov., 1775, after a confidential interview with a French officer, “to correspond with the friends of America in Great Britain, Ireland, and other parts of the world.” While he was attending congress at Philadelphia, Jay's presence was requested by the New York convention, which required his counsel. This convention met at White Plains, 9 July, 1776, and on Jay's motion unanimously approved the Declaration of Independence, which on that day was received from congress. The passage of a part of Lord Howe's fleet up the Hudson induced the appointment by the convention of a secret committee vested with extraordinary powers, of which Jay was made chairman, as also of a further committee for defeating conspiracies in the state against the liberties of America. The resolutions relating to this committee were drawn by him; and its minutes, many of which are in his hand, show the energy with which it exercised its powers by arrests, imprisonments, and banishments, and the vigorous system demanded by the critical condition of the American cause. The successes of the British in New York, and the retreat and needs of Washington's army, had induced a feeling of despondency, and Jay was the author of an earnest appeal to his countrymen, which by order of congress was translated into German and widely circulated.
Jay drafted the state constitution adopted by the convention of New York, which met successively at Harlem, Kingsbridge, Philip's Manor, White Plains, Poughkeepsie, and Kingston. He was appointed chief justice of the state, holding his first term at Kingston on 9 Sept., 1777, and acting also in the council of safety, which directed the military occupation of the state and wielded an absolute sovereignty. He was visited at Fishkill, in the autumn of 1778, by Gen. Washington for