Presidential
I have been researching Gen. James Wilkinson, a former Commander in Chief of the US Army, military governor of the Louisiana Territory and Spanish spy. Historians and biographers (never his, usually they're writing about Thomas Jefferson or George Rogers Clark ) refer to him as "the most skillful and unscrupulous plotter this country has every produced" or "the consummate treason artist."
He had his hand in two known...cabals? camarillas? "Failed coup" gives a greater sense of accomplishment than the conspiracies deserve, but he laid a lot of groundwork for the Spanish in the decade preceding the War of 1812.
Of course, reading about Gen. Wilkinson often brings up the feud between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr...and Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton...and Thomas Jefferson and John Adams...and well, John Adams and Alexander Hamilton both hated everyone. (Hamilton did found the New York Post and it has kept his tradition of journalistic integrity, if not his pith.)
But I didn't know that John Adams also loathed George Washington. He resented "the superstitious veneration that is sometimes paid to Genl. Washington" and further enumerated the General's "talents for which is owed his immense elevation above his fellows" in a letter to Benjamin Rush:
1. An handsome face. That this is a talent, I can prove by the authority of a thousand instances in all ages...
2. A tall stature, like the Hebrew sovereign chosen because he was taller by the head than the other Jews.
3. An elegant form.
4. Graceful attitudes and movements.
5. A large, imposing fortune consisting of a great landed estate left him by his father and brother, besides a large jointure with his lady...
6. Washington was a Virginian. This is the equivalent to five talents. Virginian geese are all swans. Not a bairn in Scotland is more national, not a lad upon the Highlands is more clannish, than every Virginian I have ever known...The Philadelphia and New Yorkers, who are local and partial enough to themselves, are meek and modest in comparison with Virginian Old Dominionism. Washington, of course, was extolled without bounds.
7. Washington was preceded by favorable anecdotes.
8. He possessed the gift of silence...This I esteem as one of his most precious talents.
9. He had great self-command.
10. Whenever he lost his temper, as he sometimes did, either love or fear in those around him induced them to conceal his weakness from the world.
He had his hand in two known...cabals? camarillas? "Failed coup" gives a greater sense of accomplishment than the conspiracies deserve, but he laid a lot of groundwork for the Spanish in the decade preceding the War of 1812.
Of course, reading about Gen. Wilkinson often brings up the feud between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr...and Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton...and Thomas Jefferson and John Adams...and well, John Adams and Alexander Hamilton both hated everyone. (Hamilton did found the New York Post and it has kept his tradition of journalistic integrity, if not his pith.)
But I didn't know that John Adams also loathed George Washington. He resented "the superstitious veneration that is sometimes paid to Genl. Washington" and further enumerated the General's "talents for which is owed his immense elevation above his fellows" in a letter to Benjamin Rush:
1. An handsome face. That this is a talent, I can prove by the authority of a thousand instances in all ages...
2. A tall stature, like the Hebrew sovereign chosen because he was taller by the head than the other Jews.
3. An elegant form.
4. Graceful attitudes and movements.
5. A large, imposing fortune consisting of a great landed estate left him by his father and brother, besides a large jointure with his lady...
6. Washington was a Virginian. This is the equivalent to five talents. Virginian geese are all swans. Not a bairn in Scotland is more national, not a lad upon the Highlands is more clannish, than every Virginian I have ever known...The Philadelphia and New Yorkers, who are local and partial enough to themselves, are meek and modest in comparison with Virginian Old Dominionism. Washington, of course, was extolled without bounds.
7. Washington was preceded by favorable anecdotes.
8. He possessed the gift of silence...This I esteem as one of his most precious talents.
9. He had great self-command.
10. Whenever he lost his temper, as he sometimes did, either love or fear in those around him induced them to conceal his weakness from the world.