George Washington was an American soldier, statesman and the first president of the USA. He was born in 1732 at Briges Creek, Virginia and died in 1799. Some of the familiar anecdotes of his early life rest on the more than doubtful authority of Weems, one of his first chroniclers. At the age of sixteen he was compelled to leave school, and he became a surveyor. His appointment as adjutant-general and major at the early age of nineteen was preparatory to his selection for the first striking public event of his life, his service as messenger from the Virginian to the French Governor in 1753-1754. The following summer at the Battle of Great Meadows fought by his small force ushered in the long French and Indian War. George Washington was obliged to surrender Fort Necessity. He resigned, but the next year served on Braddock's staff at the defeat of the Monongahela, and had a miraculous escape. George Washington continued in the army as a colonel until 1759, and had a part in the taking of Fort Duquesne in 1758.
He married in 1759, and the same year entered the Virginia House of Burgesses. For several years he led the life of a Virginia planter, at Mount Vernon. He was a delegate to the first and second Continental Congresses; by the latter body he was appointed commander-in-chief, on June the 17th, 1775, and took command of the army under the historic elm at Cambridge, on July the 3rd. It was his task to put into the form of an organized force the raw and ill-equipped soldiers. His first enterprise succeeded; Boston was evacuated by the British, on March the 17th, 1776, and the army was transferred to New York.
After the Declaration of Independence, a disheartening series of reverses marked the half year: the battle of Brooklyn, the withdrawal from New York, White Plains, the fall of Fort Washington, and the melancholy retreat of the diminishing army across New Jersey. The morale of the troops and of the country was suddenly raised by George Washington's brilliant surprise of Trenton and victory of Princeton. In
the autumn of 1777 his army, though defeated at Brandywine and German-town, kept a large British force occupied, and so contributed to the denouement of the year, at Saratoga. Then came the gloomy winter at Valley Forge, and the cabal of Conway and Gates.
The Battle of Monmouth was won in the summer, but thereafter George Washington's part was for some years in other phases of the war than in battles, and active hostilities drifted away principally to the south. The treason of Benedict Arnold in 1780 was a severe blow. In the following summer George Washington showed the qualities of a great general by his secret and rapid march from the Hudson to Chesapake Bay, a march which resulted in the fall of Yorktown.
His significance in the American War of Independence was largely moral; there was a widespread confidence in his thorough devotion to the cause. He replied severely to the Newburg address of 1783 (which had hinted at monarchy). After a letter to the State Governors he took leave of the army and officers, and, on December the 23rd, 1783, resigned to Congress at Annapolis his commission.
Deeply impressed with the need of a more efficient government, he presided over the Federal Convention of 1787. He was the unanimous choice for President, and was inaugurated at New York on April the 30th, 1789. Elected again without opposition, he served until 1797. Of his Cabinet, Jefferson was Secretary of State, Hamilton of the Treasury, Knox of War, and RandolphAttorney-General.
George Washington made tours to the North and South. In 1793 he issued a neutrality proclamation. His part in Jay's treaty of 1795 caused a temporary loss of his popularity. On September the 19th, 1796, he issued his Farewell Address.
Perhaps his greatness was even better shown by his conduct as President than by his generalship. When war with France seemed imminent in 1798, he was appointed lieutenant-general, but he died soon after at Mount Vernon. He has been universally deemed the greatest of Americans, and one of the noblest public characters of all time. Research George Washington
Henry Ward Beecher was an American preacher. He was born in 1813 at Connecticut and died in 1887. He was a son of Lyman Beecher, himself a distinguished clergyman, and was minister at Lawrenceburg, Indiana in 1837, and of Plymouth Congregational Church, Brooklyn, New York, in 1847. The latter pulpit he continued to occupy until his, though in 1882 he ceased his formal connection with the Congregationalists on the ground of disbelief in eternal punishment. From 1861 to 1863 he was editor of the Independent, and for about ten years after 1870, of the Christian Union. He was also the author of a considerable number of works, of which his Lectures to Young Men published in 1850, Life Thoughts, published in 1858, Lectures on Preaching published between 1872 and 1874, and the weekly issues of his sermons, commanded wide circulation. Few contemporary preachers appealed to as large and diverse a public. Research Henry Beecher
Henry Warner Slocum was an American soldier. He was born in 1827 at Delphi, New York and died in 1894. Educated at the military academy at West Point he left the army in 1856 and practised as a lawyer, but rejoined the army on the outbreak of the American Civil War. During the American Civil War he was present at both the Battles of Bull Run, Gaine's Mill, Antietam, Chancellorsville and at Gettysburg, and commanded the left wing on Sherman's famous march to the sea. In 1865 he settled at Brooklyn as a practising lawyer, also taking an active role in politics and municipal affairs. Research Henry Slocum
Israel Putnam was an American soldier. He was born in 1718 ay Danvers, Massachusetts and died in 1790. A Revolutionary general, he first settled as a farmer in north-eastern Connecticut, near Pomfret. Putnam's early life is associated with many romantic episodes, the wolfhunt, his service in the French and Indian War with Rogers' Rangers, his rescue of Fort Edward, and his narrow escape from death by burning while a prisoner of the Indians.
He was in command of a regiment with General Amherst in the Canadian campaign of 1760. In the stirring times following he was one of the chief 'Sons of liberty'. How at the news of Lexington he dropped his plough and rode in a day to Cambridge is a fireside story. Putnam was made commander of the Connecticut troops and a brigadier. He commanded at Bunker Hill conjointly with ColonelPrescott. Forthwith he was appointed one of the major-generals, and had charge of the centre in the siege of Boston.
In the defence of Long Island he was entrusted with the works on Brooklyn Heights, and in the retreat from New York his name is often mentioned. For a short time he was Governor of Philadelphia, and was then in 1777 placed in command of the defences in the Highlands of the Hudson. He was engaged in the repulse of Tryon's troops in the south-west of Connecticut, in connection with which is related the somewhat apocryphal story of Putnam's escape on horseback down a flight of stone steps. Research Israel Putnam
Matthew Calbraith Perry was an American sailor. He was born in 1794 and died in 1858. The brother of the victor of Lake Erie, he served as a boy in the War of 1812, and later against the pirates. He rendered important services while in command of the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and was promoted to be commodore in 1841. His aid in the capture of Vera Cruz in 1847 was valuable, as was his blockade of the coast. Commodore Perry is best remembered for his connection with Japan. He organized and commanded the military expedition to that country in 1853, and signed a treaty with its government in 1854, thus opening the 'Mikado's Empire' to western influences. Research Matthew Perry
Thomas de Witt Talmage was an American preacher. He was born in 1832 at New Jersey and died in 1902. Educated at New York and at a theological college of the Dutch Church in New Jersey, in 1856 he became minister of a Reformed Church in Belleville, New Jersey. In 1859 he moved to Syracuse and in 1869 he moved to Brooklyn. From 1895 until 1899 he was a minister at Washington. Thomas de Witt Talmage edited Frank Leslie's Sunday Magazine and The Christian Herald, and also wrote a number of books as well as earning a reputation as a popular preacher for his vogue sermons delivered with oratorical skill. Research Thomas de Witt Talmage
Thomas Mifflin was an American politician. He was born in 1744 and died in 1800. He had served in the Pennsylvania legislature before he entered the first Continental Congress. In the American War of Independence he was at first aide-de-camp to George Washington, and then quartermaster-general. He covered the retreat of the army in the evacuation of Brooklyn in 1776, and soon afterward was appointed major-general and a member of the Board of War. With Conway and Gates he was associated in the intrigues against George Washington, and in 1778 he was retired from the office of quartermaster-general. He was president of Congress in 1783, member of the Federal Convention of 1787, and a signer of the Constitution. He was Governor of Pennsylvania from 1790 to 1799. Research Thomas Mifflin
Washington A Roebling was an American engineer. He was born in 1837 and died after 1897. He was the son of the German immigrant John Roebling, was a colonel in the American Civil War, serving at South Mountain, Antietam and Bull Run. He succeeded his father in the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge, which had been started by his father in 1869 and was completed in 1883. Research Washington Roebling
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Bugsy Siegel
