Feeding my Hamilton the musical kick.

Interesting to see more of Washington beyond the accepted picture of him as a stolid but not very intelligent leader. Also interested to see how much he used Hamilton's energy and zeal about Federalism to shield himself and to be able to portray himself as more neutral, when really Washington also wanted a strong national government. Also interesting to see how this viewpoint came out of Washington's experience as a war general; how difficult it was to command and manage an army without a strong central government to provide money, supplies, communication, and support. I also hadn't realized that Washington viewed himself as a bit of an outsider among the Virginian elite, and that he discerned early on that Virginian plantation owners lavish lifestyle based on debt and slaves would not be sustainable. I was also interested in learning more about Washington's complicated views on slavery and Native Americans.

“He was that rarest of men: a supremely realistic visionary.” (A brilliant politician with a moral compass and the ability to imagine the judgements of posterity.) Like Lincoln, like Grant - and the three are companions on an old Cuban cigar box lid, “Los Inmortales.” To me Washington seems a heroic template for Lincoln and Grant, showing how one disciplines “a truly monumental personal ego” and “a massive personal agenda” - and, in Grant’s case, a primal ease in violence - to larger national interests, to themes of the common good. All three saw their opportunity in failing systems and were quick to pounce; they used their opportunity to establish and restore the United States; none established dynasties - Washington very purposefully so, sterile, he minced his estate among many heirs and freed his slaves.

“Washington’s powers of judgement derived in part from the fact that his mind was uncluttered with sophisticated intellectual preconceptions”; cue, for contrast, Jefferson and his fatuous self-deception, his agile intellectual masturbation; “the self Washington made was less protean and more primal because his education was more elemental,” the education of “an adventurer and soldier.” “Without ever reading Thucydides, Hobbes, or Calvin, he had concluded that men and nations were driven by interests rather than ideals, and that surrendering control to another was invariably harmful, often fatal.”

I've read other biographies on George Washigton, most notably Ron Chernow's 'Washington: A Life' back in 2020. Although Ellis' book is not the 900 plus page behemoth Chernow's work is, it certainly covers the highlights of Washington's life. Ellis also spends more effort in covering some of Washington's early military exploits that maybe weren't so laudatory. Throughout life Washington seemed to be able to attain all the goals he aimed for. None of it was easy. Often through his military campaigns and presidency he had to restrain his inner temper and drive to try and attain a balance, and the best possible outcome for the armies under his command as well as the nation he served. Ellis' book is a quick read, although it seems to me he spent quite some time analyzing Washington's motives and thinking. In my opinion as much as I loved Chernow's work, most of that book is reporting on Washington's role in historical events. Conclusion after reading, Washington perhaps was the last apolitical president or political leader our country will have, and he tried to keep our country that way. Jefferson on one side, Hamilton and Adams on the other seemed to bring our two-party political system to life. There have been times where bipartisan leadership has guided the US momentarily, but it never seems to last. Currently it seems forever broken.

Strangely enough, I didn't plan on reading this since I had read the Chernow book, but it was included with several books I brought back from my sister-in-laws house. I'm glad I did, and now I can recommend it to people who want to read about Washington, but don't have the time for Chernow. If you've read Chernow, this might seem repetitive at times but you might gain more insight into Washington as a person.

http://bestpresidentialbios.com/2013/...

“His Excellency: George Washington” is Joseph J. Ellis’ bestselling biography of our first President, published nearly a decade ago. Ellis is a well-known author and history professor focusing on the revolutionary era. He is perhaps best known for his Pulitzer Prize winning book “Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation” and has written about Presidents Adams and Jefferson as well.

Among the nine biographies of George Washington currently in my library (counting each of Flexner’s volumes individually), Ellis’ biography on Washington has been much more widely reviewed, and presumably read, than any of the others. Whether or not coincidental, it is also by a fair stretch the shortest book of the group. But since quality and quantity are often unrelated, my expectations for the book were not the least bit diminished by its relative brevity.

Having read “His Excellency: George Washington” so soon after completing Flexner’s more thorough series on Washington may have disadvantaged my ability to consider Ellis’ work entirely free of external influences, but also provided me a more enlightened frame of reference within which to absorb, enjoy and evaluate Ellis’ biography (and the others on Washington yet to come).

Reviews of Ellis’ book ubiquitously applaud the biography as an excellent introduction to Washington and a terrific primer for the casual reader who may not be interested in a doctoral-level dissection of the man. On that point, I agree whole-heartedly. For someone unfamiliar with Washington’s life (or for whom the passage of time has rendered high school American history a faded blur) this biography will, in the shortest reasonable time, well-familiarize the reader with Washington’s life and reinforce the dramatic impact he had on his emerging nation.

Ellis admitted in the earliest pages of the book that he didn’t intend to compete with authors before him who produced multi-volume tomes but, instead, wanted to paint a “fresh portrait focused tightly on Washington’s character.” While he was successful in avoiding a head-to-head challenge on the first point, I’m not so certain he fully met his objective on the second.

Whether Ellis added new depth or dimension to Washington’s character depends on your perspective. For the casual reader, this book clearly brings color and charm to the generic, impassive marble statue of Washington that is most widely recognized. However, compared to the vibrant description of Washington provided by Flexner three decades earlier, it is unclear Ellis goes any further (but how can you in 1/7th the space?) Where Flexner often seemed to put you “in Washington’s head”, Ellis more often provided the reader with “the fly on the wall” status, observing history from across the room.

The real value in Ellis’ book in my view is not that he uncovered new dimensions of Washington’s personality or moral principles; although this seems to have been his goal, I remain unconvinced. What is far more remarkable is that he was able to dexterously chronicle Washington’s two terms as President – replete with foreign threats and intrigue, domestic disharmony and polarization, intra-Cabinet malevolence and more – in a mere 60 or so pages. There can be great benefit in cutting to the chase where incremental detail provides no additional clarity or insight and Ellis executed this brilliantly.

Far from just summarizing the major events of the day in hit-and-run fashion, Ellis also provided insightful and thought-provoking conclusions relating to Washington’s evolution (maturation?) as a person and a leader, the fundamental principles that guided him to “True north” throughout his life, and how he recognized his flaws and used them (whether knowingly or not) to his advantage. As expected, Ellis also nicely weaves throughout the book his own observations and themes about the impact of Washington’s actions on his legacy, the future of the Presidency and the course of American history.

Overall, “His Excellency: George Washington” presents a fairly straightforward proposition: for someone committed to getting to know Washington but less interested in sitting on his shoulder (or getting inside his head) for a period of time, this biography is more than sufficient and, at times, excellent. You occasionally feel like you’re reading the Cliff’s Notes rather than the work of art itself (particularly relating to many of his extremely interesting personal and professional relationships), but you don’t really mind.

However, if what you really want to see is the high resolution photo of Washington’s life with a panoply of rich colors and billions of pixels, you will find that Ellis’ work has cropped the photo a bit and left what remains just a bit grainy. Perhaps one of the next three biographies on Washington I’ll be reading (by Chernow, Smith and Ferling) will provide the perfect balance of length and luminosity?

Overall rating: 4 stars

In a world filled with one-thousand page biographies, it was a pleasure to read a small one on Washington. Out of all of the Founding Fathers, I must have neglected Washington the most. He is our country's patron saint, boring and predictable. But, this book reveals a man who grappled with problems (the inefficiencies of the Articles of Confederation, how to get his sketchy-ass friends to pay him back, etc.) and who constantly failed only to get back up again.

Not a bad read for a quarantine.

This is a wonderful book that describes George Washington's life as a young officer, a landowner, and the nation's first president, and how he tried to stay above the partisan feuding of his cabinet.

Washington was the greatest. How fortunate we were and are to have had this man as our leader. He fought for the British. He was a commander in chief before there really was such a thing. He was the first President. And he formed, melded, and progressed an infant nation. We have had many great leaders in history, but I challenge those reading this to find one other person who has a similar or better resume. By the way, he was an uneducated man as well.

Washington is the only revolutionary leader that has given up power. Lenin, Castro, Mao, and all the other revolutionaries found it easier to become a dictator after "liberating" the masses. Napoleon and Cromwell followed the same path as Lenin or Mao only they were earlier dictatorial models. He was an ambitious man craving power, but he was also also something all the other dictators were not. He was a visionary leader whose prescience was phenomenal.

Washington saw the future. He led a war watching for the right time the British would blunder into a location where the French fleet and his forces could trap them...Yorktown. He saw a strong central government was needed to hold squabbling states together. He foresaw the need for a standing army and navy. He foresaw his legacy of greatness if he only served two terms as President. And upon his death he saw the need to abolish slavery by freeing all his slaves.

If you want to be a great leader, study Patton, Eisenhower, Roosevelt, and many others. But study them after you learn about Washington. Washington was the greatest.

This begins my journey to go through at least one biography per President. I decided to do this after I realized that there were many good things that I did not know about each president, and it would be time that I learned them as quickly as possible. So we begin, appropriately, with George Washington. This is a man who many people can cite for being a general in the American Revolution, and our first president, but little else. This is a somewhat incomplete picture that gives you an idea of the accomplishments, but not the man. Thankfully, Ellis’ book does both very well.

One interesting idea about his character is his journey to learn that he should do what was best for others, and not what was best for himself. This can be seen as a lesson that had to be learned throughout his life. Firstly, there was the blunder at Fort Necessity, where he wanted to gain personal glory against the French no matter what the cost, and ended up paying for it. Then there was his time as the Commander and Chief of the Continental Army. Here, he wished to prove his glory a second time, perhaps to prove that he was better than the British commanders of their day who had more experience, resources, and were better educated than himself. Here, however, is where his views began to change. For example, he could have stayed at New York, with his dream of marching into the city after vanquishing the British to a heroes welcome. Instead, he realized that the better plan would be to travel to Yorktown, to see what he could do with capturing the British. This ultimately proved successful and was a defining moment of his career.

The final evolution of his selflessness can be seen in his presidency. During his first term, Hamilton's infatuation with a national bank was unpopular. Being something that was considered reasonable in an economic sense was viewed with disdain and contempt by those in congress and the public. They saw it as a way to centralize the federal government, and, like many things that are politically charged, then and now, it was blown out of proportion. It was said that this was a way to take power away from the states and that Washington was a man with, dare we say, Kingly ambitions for wanting to let it happen. Yet, this was something that he saw as necessary. Without this federal line of credit, we would have a fluctuating currency, and massive state debt that would make foreign trade a nightmare.

Then there is the small problem of war between the two largest countries in the world: Britain and France. America was asked to choose sides, and Washington choose neutrality, asking John Jay to go to Britain to find a diplomatic solution. What would become to be known as the Jay Treaty was not quite what Washington would have wanted, especially since it was unpopular with the American public. However, he saw that the United States could not afford to go to war with either country, and decided that it was best for the country to remain neutral, whatever the cost. Yet, the best element of Washington’s Presidency is that he was willing to step down after two terms (there was no limit to how long a President could serve, yet). This shows the grace in letting someone else take the helm. I think that this is something that other presidents would not have done had they been first, such as Richard Nixon.


This book is one that accurately details Washington's life fairly well. It looks over many of the interesting points about his career, and manges to show his character in the process. This is a book that, I believe, should be read by those who either are new to Washington, or who do not have the time or physical space to read Ron Chernow’s book on the man. This text manages to tell you the most about Washington in the most expedient amount of time, which is to be commended.

Yet, this book does have a few flaws. One is that, occasionally, the author does have a few leaps in judgement. It isn’t bad, or anything, but noticeable. It is more like the editor said that he went over the word count and had to cut some of the book, and in the process, Ellis left out his evidence for his conclusions. Then there is his writing style. While it is fine, he does become overly wordy at times, leading to a cadence that tends to be drawn out in certain sentences.

Still these points are relatively minor, and I am glad that I read this book. If you haven’t read about Washington in a while, then I would suggest picking this one up. You won’t regret it. I give it a four out of five.

An excellent and well-written bio of our first president, George Washington. I read it in record time as I enjoyed the writing --and the story of this great man whom we have very little sense about who he was as a person as compared to, say, Lincoln. George is the stern unsmiling face on Mt. Rushmore and the dollar bill. What I like most about Ellis' book is that it brings Washington to life.
Some interesting points about G.W. He was lucky. As a young soldier, he accompanied the British army that moved toward the Ohio country and was ambushed by the mixed force of French and Indians. Men fell all around him- the commander, Gen. Braddock, was killed-but Washington survived--and rallied soldiers to make an orderly retreat. Needless to say, if the young colonial had died on that killing field, how different would American history have been? Another point about the man--he could be reckless. As the commander of the American army, he took a stand on Long Island in 1776, challenging the British to come for him. They did--and almost destroyed his army. He was later able to win a victory at Trenton, but it was a risky move. Certainly, if Washington had lost that gamble, the Revolution would have been "game over." Another point-Washington was not a Christian in the traditional sense. God was an impersonal force for him and whether or not there was an afterlife was a mystery to him...

Im glad that I can consider myself more educated about His Excellency, who is most certainly the most well built and most manly man to ever walk across the land of America. Thanks to this author, I now know how great and muscular Washingtons thighs were..

Audiobook

Since I was entertained by Robert A. Caro’s The Years of Lyndon Johnsonseries, I felt I was ready to reach way back in time and digest a biography of George Washington. . I did quick google search for “best George Washington biographies” and found lists of 20-30 books. Some are multi-volumes. I was not so curious that I would want tackle those. This book by Joseph J. Ellis, who has written a few other books about the revolutionary period, is a short 320 pages and touches all the important events in Washington’s life. It’s well written, entertaining and there a little bit of humor sprinkled about.

A theme of the book and probably a strain that runs through any book about Washington is that there exists a body of mythology around his life. The goal is break some these myths down and present the known facts from the historical record. As the author points out many times, Washington himself was aware that posterity would study him a historical figure and he was careful to craft a positive image and legacy. This makes the author’s job difficult. The winners write the history. Washington was clearly on the winning side. While we will never know if his leadership was essential, he was at center of every central event of the American revolution and the founding of the American republic.

Our first president is not somebody we remember for large ideas. He was not present at the signing of the Declaration of Independence, he was in the field with the newly formed continental army. He barely spoke at the constitutional convention. His main contribution to the early republic was keeping the USA neutral in the brewing conflicts in Europe that arose during the French Revolution. His lack of collision with other men and his role as a “unifier” has become a model for presidents and presidential candidates. It is fair to say that none have pulled it off quite like he did. He probably knew that if he served a few more terms as president, this “unifier” image would have been shredded as he was clearly on the Federalist side of most debates.

The book also does a good job of addressing the fact that Washington did own slaves. He knew this would tarnish his legacy and future generations would see the contradiction of fighting for “liberty” while holding other men down. The fact that Washington and the other founders didn’t close the slavery debate early on should tell us they were not progressive radicals looking to remake the entire social order. Their goal was to gain self-government, legitimatize their informal authority and have influence on the future of settlement on the continent.