Rating: 
Summary: "Wild Surmise" and the Long Road to Mount Vernon
Review: Don't be put off by the seemingly trivial subject matter of this delightful book, namely: The story of a journey made by George Washington from West Point to his home at Mount Vernon between the conclusion of the peace treaty with Britain and Christmas 1783. It was official: The United States of America was now recognized as a sovereign nation -- or was it thirteen nations? It becomes very apparent as the Father of Our Country crosses New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia on his way home that Americans were not all that sure what they had on their hands. The cobbled-together Articles of Confederation took the easy way out by giving all rights to the states and virtually none to a central government. As Washington bid farewell to the officers who had served him so well, many times he had to reach into his own pocket to allow them the luxury of returning home safely to their loved ones. Who was there to ask for money? The states simply weaseled out of any fiscal responsibilities when they involved another state. Even in 1783, this structure was teetering on the edge of collapse; and it continued for several more years until the Constitution was adopted. There is a sense of newness in Weintraub's America in the Winter of 1783. The only thing the people had in common was their love of and reverence toward George Washington. Wherever he stopped on his trek, people emerged from all sides to honor him with balls and ceremonial dinners. They came together to marvel in the strangeness of their freshly-won independence. It is like Cortez and his companions in Keats' "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer": "And all his men / Look'd at each other with a wild surmise..." I like this book most for giving me a feeling of what it was to be an American at a time that most historians have seen fit to ignore. Stanley Weintraub saw a psychological moment in the history of a people and shrewdly built his story around the character of the man who held the whole shooting match together: General George Washington. Don't expect penetrating scholarship here. Just enjoy this sparkling gem of a book and use it to point you in other directions for the big picture.
Rating:
Summary: Goin' South......
Review: Don't be put-off by the cheesy title of this book. Yes...it's obviously a marketing ploy meant to tie in to the holiday season. In any case, Mr. Weintraub has crafted an interesting book. We follow Washington from West Point to Mount Vernon, as he tries to get home for Christmas. Most notably, he stops in New York City, Philadelphia, and Annapolis. In NYC he says farewell to his officers. He also puzzles his subordinates by going to visit a bookseller who is a known Tory sympathizer. (Unknown to Washington's underlings, the man was part of the commander-in-chief's network of spies who kept Washington informed of the goings-on in British occupied NYC.) In Philadelphia, amongst other things, Washington orders some new spectacles from the noted scientist David Rittenhouse. In Annapolis, Washington returns his commission to Congress, thus making formal his resignation from public service and return to private life. The book is only about 175 pages and can easily be read in a day or two. However, Mr. Weintraub manages to provide a lot of information. Some of it is interesting on a "serious" level - for example, we see Washington at the start of the journey insisting that his departure from public life will be permanent. He made several speeches on the way home, and he constantly stressed that Congress needed strong legislative powers so that it could hold the bickering colonies together. By the time he reached Annapolis, Washington had come to the conclusion that it was going to be an extremely difficult process to turn a loose confederation, which no longer had the "glue" of battling a common enemy , into a true nation. Washington was not being an egomaniac, just realistic, when he came to understand that he was the only person who could be a unifying force. Therefore, when he gave the speech in Annapolis in which he resigned his commission as commander-in-chief he changed the language so as to leave the door open for a later return to public service, if such a thing proved to be necessary...which it did. Washington was remarkably unambitious for someone who was held in such awe. He was, indeed, the man who could have been king. (In his own day, everyone wanted to touch him, as though he were holy. Many years later, people had relics - as though he were a saint. Lincoln had a splinter of Washington's coffin contained in a gold ring he wore. McKinley had several strands of Washington's hair.) We owe Washington an eternal debt that he turned his back on dictatorship. On the lighter side, we see Washington the man, warts and all. We see him losing his temper, we see his pride in his dancing ability, his love of fine wine, etc. We also get to hear about his expense account, where it seems as though he put down every possible item, down to the last pound, shilling, and pence. (He even included tips he had given out to people who had waited on him.) I especially enjoyed the little personal touches that Mr. Weintraub included - such as letting us know that the 6'4" Washington slept in a 6'6" bed. The author also tells us about the time that Washington fired a Mount Vernon gardener for getting drunk. Then, when the man expressed remorse and wanted his job back, Washington agreed....but he made the man sign a contract specifying that he could only get looped at certain times of the year. For example, he was allowed 4 days of drunkenness around Christmas! The book, on rare occasions, becomes tedious when Mr. Weintraub gives us excerpts from speeches delivered during the various "farewell" dinners. But, for the most part, this book will hold your interest with its nice balance between the public and the private Washington.
Rating:
Summary: A Deeply Emotional Journey Home
Review: During this holiday season, replete with the comfort of "snow and mistletoe and presents under the tree," it's difficult to conceive of a time when things weren't so easy, when life was a struggle for survival and America, as a social and political entity, was just developing. Holiday movies remind us of Christmases past in a nostalgic haze, but one of the most important of all Noels took place over 200 years ago, bestowing the greatest of presents: the gifts of freedom. It was under such circumstances that George Washington, his battles won and his military work done, began his well-deserved trip home in time for the holidays. Stanley Weintraub, author of several books on military history, renders a most moving portrait in GENERAL WASHINGTON'S CHRISTMAS FAREWELL. Indeed, it does move, taking the reader from the battlefields of the east to the "greatest man's" home and family in Mount Vernon, Virginia. Having led his troops in victory over the British forces, the future president was the object of high approbation, bordering on worship. There were those among the founding fathers who would have made Washington king of the new nation, but he declined, declaring that the new nation would have no monarchy. (A pale modern-day comparison might be a sports figure legend like Cal Ripken, Jr., bidding goodbye to fans in each stadium during his final season.) Weintraub follows the slow, emotional journey made by Washington and his entourage, through New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, on their way to Philadelphia, the seat of the colonial Congress at the time. It was there, in settings most formal, that the general relinquished his commission. The author often compares Washington to the Roman general Cincinnatus, who, like his latter-day counterpart, looked forward to laying down his sword and returning to his lands. Washington's patriotism had come at great personal sacrifice, including financial "inconvenience," although he steadfastly refused any payment other than "expenses." What sets GENERAL WASHINGTON'S CHRISTMAS FAREWELL apart from similar books about the father of our country is its depth of emotion. The affection and admiration in which Washington was held by his officers, soldiers and the general citizenry were unparalleled. Weintraub writes of tears shed unabashedly as Washington delivered his famous farewell address, and of the great man's similar difficulties in maintaining composure. The author has done his homework well, as befits an Evan Pugh Professor Emeritus of Arts and Humanities from Penn State University. In addition to items of importance, he includes bits of the seemingly trivial --- such as the costs of room and board --- which help put the times in perspective as well as add a note of levity. With modern America's penchant for taking many of its gifts for granted, Weintraub has done well to remind readers of the early price of their current overall social and political well-being. --- Reviewed by Ron Kaplan
Rating: 
Summary: Washington Astonishes the World
Review: Eight years of warfare finally over, in 1783, George Washington wanted to go home for Christmas. It seems the most unsurprising of desires. Washington's army had defeated that of the British Empire, and the thirteen American colonies which had declared themselves independent in 1776 had fought to make the independence real rather than merely declared. Washington saw his job as complete, and he wanted nothing more than to resign his commission and become again a Virginia gentleman farmer. The very idea was inconceivable to many. To give up all power, to become a mere citizen when he could quite easily have become king, was simply not the way the game of power was played. We are accustomed to veneration of the Father of Our Country, so Washington's service and humility might not seem so remarkable to us. But in _General Washington's Christmas Farewell: A Mount Vernon Homecoming, 1783_ (Free Press), Stanley Weintraub has, if not made us surprised at Washington's desire for retirement, then made us feel the wonder that Washington's contemporaries felt about it, and has invited us to admire a particularly likable aspect of Washington the man. Weintraub's small, concentrated book follows Washington as he proceeds south into New York City, to Annapolis, Maryland, where Congress was in session and could accept his resignation, and finally to his home. Everywhere he went, citizens who already knew him as Father of His Country were eager to see him. He would leave one village to go to the next, only to find that riders had preceded him to alert the next village to prepare for celebration. There were fireworks and dancing; Washington was an enthusiastic dancer and the ladies eagerly sought their turn with him. Many citizens wrote their compliments to him, and he had an aide to write replies. There was longwinded oratory. There were bad commemorative verses. Manliness at the time did not include an aversion to tears, and many manly tears were shed; an observer of the final farewell wrote, "And many testified their affectionate attachment to our illustrious Hero and their gratitude for his Services to his country by a most copious shedding of tears." Barrels of ale and wine were drunk, as in each gathering thirteen toasts (for the thirteen colonies) were dutifully and gleefully swallowed down. The world was astonished at Washington's self-removal from the national stage. When King George III was told in 1783 that Washington declined further power and wanted only to return to his farm, he declared, "If Washington does that, he will be the greatest man in the world." Washington would have been astonished that we have developed a governmental system where people are politicians as a lifetime occupation and profit handsomely thereby. He clearly believed in his life outside of public service, and in his privacy. His modesty is evident in that we know almost nothing of his 1783 Christmas itself. He did successfully return on Christmas Eve, but his "family Christmas remained private and almost entirely unrecorded." It was his business, and his family's, and he had gloriously, successfully, and merely temporarily, become a private man again.
Rating:
Summary: Washington Astonishes the World
Review: Eight years of warfare finally over, in 1783, George Washington wanted to go home for Christmas. It seems the most unsurprising of desires. Washington's army had defeated that of the British Empire, and the thirteen American colonies which had declared themselves independent in 1776 had fought to make the independence real rather than merely declared. Washington saw his job as complete, and he wanted nothing more than to resign his commission and become again a Virginia gentleman farmer. The very idea was inconceivable to many. To give up all power, to become a mere citizen when he could quite easily have become king, was simply not the way the game of power was played. We are accustomed to veneration of the Father of Our Country, so Washington's service and humility might not seem so remarkable to us. But in _General Washington's Christmas Farewell: A Mount Vernon Homecoming, 1783_ (Free Press), Stanley Weintraub has, if not made us surprised at Washington's desire for retirement, then made us feel the wonder that Washington's contemporaries felt about it, and has invited us to admire a particularly likable aspect of Washington the man. Weintraub's small, concentrated book follows Washington as he proceeds south into New York City, to Annapolis, Maryland, where Congress was in session and could accept his resignation, and finally to his home. Everywhere he went, citizens who already knew him as Father of His Country were eager to see him. He would leave one village to go to the next, only to find that riders had preceded him to alert the next village to prepare for celebration. There were fireworks and dancing; Washington was an enthusiastic dancer and the ladies eagerly sought their turn with him. Many citizens wrote their compliments to him, and he had an aide to write replies. There was longwinded oratory. There were bad commemorative verses. Manliness at the time did not include an aversion to tears, and many manly tears were shed; an observer of the final farewell wrote, "And many testified their affectionate attachment to our illustrious Hero and their gratitude for his Services to his country by a most copious shedding of tears." Barrels of ale and wine were drunk, as in each gathering thirteen toasts (for the thirteen colonies) were dutifully and gleefully swallowed down. The world was astonished at Washington's self-removal from the national stage. When King George III was told in 1783 that Washington declined further power and wanted only to return to his farm, he declared, "If Washington does that, he will be the greatest man in the world." Washington would have been astonished that we have developed a governmental system where people are politicians as a lifetime occupation and profit handsomely thereby. He clearly believed in his life outside of public service, and in his privacy. His modesty is evident in that we know almost nothing of his 1783 Christmas itself. He did successfully return on Christmas Eve, but his "family Christmas remained private and almost entirely unrecorded." It was his business, and his family's, and he had gloriously, successfully, and merely temporarily, become a private man again.
Rating: 
Summary: 5 page story packed into 200 pages
Review: I am very seldom critical of the books that I read because I can appreciate how hard it is to write a good historical book. However, I was really disappointed with this book. The story is told more like a chronology that seems to have been converted from a list or bullet points. Little background is provided. Names pop up from time to time without any explanation of who they are. If a reader is not familiar with the relevant background history, these names will prove absolutely meaningless. I bought the book because I wanted to know about Washington's transition from officer to civilian, but there is almost nothing in the book about that except the repeated statement that he made such a transition. Instead, the pages are filled with a day-by-day account of Washington eating dinner and dancing with girls in towns along the route back to Mt. Vernon. One reviewer said not to be put off by the cheesy title of this book. I wish I had been.
Rating:
Summary: 5 page story packed into 200 pages
Review: I am very seldom critical of the books that I read because I can appreciate how hard it is to write a good historical book. However, I was really disappointed with this book. The story is told more like a chronology that seems to have been converted from a list or bullet points. Little background is provided. Names pop up from time to time without any explanation of who they are. If a reader is not familiar with the relevant background history, these names will prove absolutely meaningless. I bought the book because I wanted to know about Washington's transition from officer to civilian, but there is almost nothing in the book about that except the repeated statement that he made such a transition. Instead, the pages are filled with a day-by-day account of Washington eating dinner and dancing with girls in towns along the route back to Mt. Vernon. One reviewer said not to be put off by the cheesy title of this book. I wish I had been.
Rating:
Summary: Not a Lot Here
Review: If Mr. Weintraub wants to write some serious history, maybe he ahould avoid Christmas. This book is little better than the one he wrote about Christmas and WWI. This book traces Washington's journey from West Point, through New York City, Philadelphia, Wilmington and Annapolis to Mont Vernon. It is filled with tedious toasts and responses, and accounts of his going-away parties. Many of these are in the difficult to read spelling and syntax of the times. There are also countless repititive cites of comparisons made of Washington to Cincinnatus. I found the writing disjointed. Often I had to go back to see who was being quoted and in what context. Mr. Weintraub would leave the narrative of the farewell trip to make historical references without setting or foundation. In perhaps the most telling historical reference, he carried on about how Christmas was not really a big deal in 1783 - despite the title and his oft-repeated assertion (without foundation I might add) that Washington wanted to be home for Christmas. Equally disappointing was the short shrift given to Washington's actual farewell and resignation before Congress. It was given a scant few pages whereas the account of Washington's fetes in NYC went on and on interminably. There really is not much to this book beyond the fairly obvious points that Washington was extremely popular and his return to civilian status was impressive and noteworthy. Perhaps the best allusion in the book was the quote by the imprisoned Napoleon that "they wanted me to be a Washington". I wish I had skipped this book. The only knowledge it imparted was Washington was wined and dined from West point to Annapolis as he bid farewell to public life. It could have been a good 12 page magazine article.
Rating:
Summary: Not a Lot Here
Review: If Mr. Weintraub wants to write some serious history, maybe he ahould avoid Christmas. This book is little better than the one he wrote about Christmas and WWI. This book traces Washington's journey from West Point, through New York City, Philadelphia, Wilmington and Annapolis to Mont Vernon. It is filled with tedious toasts and responses, and accounts of his going-away parties. Many of these are in the difficult to read spelling and syntax of the times. There are also countless repititive cites of comparisons made of Washington to Cincinnatus. I found the writing disjointed. Often I had to go back to see who was being quoted and in what context. Mr. Weintraub would leave the narrative of the farewell trip to make historical references without setting or foundation. In perhaps the most telling historical reference, he carried on about how Christmas was not really a big deal in 1783 - despite the title and his oft-repeated assertion (without foundation I might add) that Washington wanted to be home for Christmas. Equally disappointing was the short shrift given to Washington's actual farewell and resignation before Congress. It was given a scant few pages whereas the account of Washington's fetes in NYC went on and on interminably. There really is not much to this book beyond the fairly obvious points that Washington was extremely popular and his return to civilian status was impressive and noteworthy. Perhaps the best allusion in the book was the quote by the imprisoned Napoleon that "they wanted me to be a Washington". I wish I had skipped this book. The only knowledge it imparted was Washington was wined and dined from West point to Annapolis as he bid farewell to public life. It could have been a good 12 page magazine article.
Rating:
Summary: The Long Way Home
Review: It was winter and Christmas not far away. Gen. George Washington, having won the American colonies' war against Britain with an army that endured years of poverty and on-the-run misery, wanted to hang up his sword, box his epaulets and return to his beloved Martha, at Mount Vernon, where he intended to become a gentleman farmer. Geographically, it was a long journey -- from West Point, N.Y., down to Manhattan, through New Jersey to Philadelphia and on to Delaware, Maryland and finally into Virginia, by horseback, carriage and barge. But it was even longer when measured by how much Washington had to do along the way: reoccupy New York (fighting had ended in 1781 but a treaty recognizing America's independence wasn't negotiated until two years later); oversee the evacuation of British troops from the city and Long Island; say farewell to his officers; decommission his ragged but loyal army; and resign his own commission before the wandering Congress, then housed in Annapolis, Md. Stanley Weintraub chronicles this journey beautifully in "General Washington's Christmas Farewell," capturing, among much else, the democratic version of a triumphal procession. Washington stopped in virtually every town, village, crossroads and dogtrot, as crowds gathered and civic leaders came forth to bestow honors and fulsome encomiums on the splendid, 6-foot-4 general. From horseback or carriage door, at banquets or balls (Washington was an elegant dancer), the general answered with fulsome encomiums of his own composed by the effusive Lt. Col. David Humphreys, who was ever at his side scribbling away and requiring Washington to get his wooden dentures around such phrases as, "I cannot however suppress the effusions of my gratitude for their flattering allusion to an event which hath immortalized . . ." With a bounty of enchanting facts and quotations from contemporary sources, Mr. Weintraub introduces the reader to the often extraordinary people with whom the general had to interact at each of his major stopping points. One such was Sir Guy Carleton, the British commander in New York and Long Island. He had the unenviable task of evacuating the remaining royalist civilians there (he had already convoyed 32,224 of them to Nova Scotia), along with his last 1,930 regular troops and the Hessian mercenaries. Though the Tories' hatred of the "rebels" was intense, and vice versa, Sir Guy accomplished the withdrawal without even one ugly incident, cooperating congenially with Washington. Mr. Weintraub writes that Sir Guy showed "a pragmatic respect for orderliness and good will" and had "made it publicly clear to royalists that the supplanting authority [Washington's bedraggled Continentals], whether they liked it or not, was already a legal entity." The Americans returned the favor by behaving civilly, astonishing the Redcoats, who could barely contain the fractious population during eight years of occupation. Mr. Weintraub's dramatic high point is, inevitably, Washington's farewell to his officers at Fraunces Tavern, in New York, on the afternoon of Dec. 4, 1783. Washington had laid out wine and cold meats, but no one felt like eating in the emotionally tense atmosphere. Everyone drank instead, and the general, scarcely able to speak, finally raised a goblet and toasted them in a choked voice: "With a heart filled with love and gratitude, I now take leave of you. . . ." As each tearful officer came up to take his hand, Washington also wept. Mr. Weintraub writes: "Each realized that they had all lived through something that would not be replicated in their lives, and that in the 1,600 mile length of the vast new nation, distance and time made it wholly impossible that they would share another such moment." After all the men had come up to him, and not trusting himself to speak more, Washington "raised his arm in a silent farewell and walked out the door without looking back, passing through a waiting guard of light infantry and then along Pearl Street." The officers followed behind, "not intending to overtake him and break the spell." Washington is of course the commanding presence in Mr. Weintraub's tale, but readers will meet fascinating, and unfairly obscure, figures in supporting roles, including Robert Morris, Congress's superintendent of finance, and the merchant Haym Salomon, a Polish- born Jew. They were heroes of the Revolution who fought the war in offices and countinghouses. No statues honor them, yet without their unceasing struggles to ferret money from every nook and cranny, by pleading everywhere, borrowing against nearly worthless Continental Congress scrip, kiting checks and using dodgy accounting methods (and eventually bankrupting themselves by lending their own money), Washington's army would have starved and collapsed. In Annapolis, Washington formally resigned before Congress on Dec. 23, 1783, in a grand ceremony immortalized in paintings and prints. On the evening of Dec. 24, he crossed the Potomac below Alexandria. As night fell, he and his now small escort party could see the lights of Mount Vernon glowing in the distance. The general had made it home on Christmas Eve.
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