The Only Unavoidable Subject Of Regret
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The Only Unavoidable Subject Of Regret
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Author : Mary V. Thompson
language : en
Publisher:
Release Date : 2019
The Only Unavoidable Subject Of Regret written by Mary V. Thompson and has been published by this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2019 with History categories.
"American historians began producing in-depth studies of slavery and slave life shortly after World War II, but it was not until the early 1980s that the country's museums took the first tentative steps to interpret those same controversial topics. Perhaps because of the tremendous amount of primary material related to George Washington, almost no one looked into the lives of Mount Vernon's enslaved population. Incorporating the results of detailed digging, of both the archaeological and archival varieties, the number of chapters grew as further questions arose. While a few scholars outside Mount Vernon turned their attention to Washington's changing ideas about slavery, they largely overlooked the daily lives of those who were enslaved on the estate, a subject about which visitors expressed a desire to know more. The resulting book makes use of a wide range of sources, including letters, financial ledgers, work reports, travel diaries kept by visitors to Mount Vernon, the reminiscences of family members, former slaves, and neighbors, reports by archaeologists, and surviving artifacts to flesh out the lives of a people who left few written records, but made up 90 percent of the estate's population. The book begins with a look at George and Martha Washington as slaveowners, before turning to various facets of slave life ranging from work, to family life, housing, foodways, private enterprise, and resistance. Along the way, readers will see a relationship between Washington's military career and his style of plantation management, learn of the many ways slaves rebelled against their condition, and get to know many of the enslaved people who made Mount Vernon their home"--
An Imperfect God
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Author : Henry Wiencek
language : en
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
Release Date : 2013-11-12
An Imperfect God written by Henry Wiencek and has been published by Macmillan + ORM this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2013-11-12 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
An Imperfect God is a major new biography of Washington, and the first to explore his engagement with American slavery When George Washington wrote his will, he made the startling decision to set his slaves free; earlier he had said that holding slaves was his "only unavoidable subject of regret." In this groundbreaking work, Henry Wiencek explores the founding father's engagement with slavery at every stage of his life--as a Virginia planter, soldier, politician, president and statesman. Washington was born and raised among blacks and mixed-race people; he and his wife had blood ties to the slave community. Yet as a young man he bought and sold slaves without scruple, even raffled off children to collect debts (an incident ignored by earlier biographers). Then, on the Revolutionary battlefields where he commanded both black and white troops, Washington's attitudes began to change. He and the other framers enshrined slavery in the Constitution, but, Wiencek shows, even before he became president Washington had begun to see the system's evil. Wiencek's revelatory narrative, based on a meticulous examination of private papers, court records, and the voluminous Washington archives, documents for the first time the moral transformation culminating in Washington's determination to emancipate his slaves. He acted too late to keep the new republic from perpetuating slavery, but his repentance was genuine. And it was perhaps related to the possibility--as the oral history of Mount Vernon's slave descendants has long asserted--that a slave named West Ford was the son of George and a woman named Venus; Wiencek has new evidence that this could indeed have been true. George Washington's heroic stature as Father of Our Country is not diminished in this superb, nuanced portrait: now we see Washington in full as a man of his time and ahead of his time.
Experiencing Mount Vernon
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Author : Jean Butenhoff Lee
language : en
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
Release Date : 2006
Experiencing Mount Vernon written by Jean Butenhoff Lee and has been published by University of Virginia Press this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2006 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
George Washington, acutely aware of the accomplishments and potential of the American Revolution, used his Mount Vernon estate both to preserve the memory of events that had created a new nation and to forward his keen vision of what that nation might become. During the 1780s and 1790s, an era when neither public museums nor a national library existed, visitors to Mount Vernon viewed John Trumbull's iconic image of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Houdon's famous bust of the countryís preeminent hero, and Washington's voluminous wartime correspondence. More important, they listened as the Washingtons recalled the remarkable events that had forged independence and the unique American experiment in representative government. At Mount Vernon, too, Washington and his guests discussed how best to secure the success and well-being of the United States. Here was a place to contemplate "what the nation, at its best, might be." Following George and Martha Washington's deaths, the estate passed to four successive heirs, the last of whom deeded it to the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association in 1860. While still in private hands, the property nonetheless attracted thousands of visitors each year, most of whom arrived after a fifteen-mile overland trek from Washington, D.C. With the establishment of regular steamboat access in the 1850s, the numbers swelled to ten thousand annually. The public claimed Mount Vernon as its own. In the words of a nineteenth-century Washington family member, "the Nation shares it with us." In a remarkable display of civic religion that testified to the siteís enormous hold on the public imagination, Americans pronounced Mount Vernon sacred ground and made it the nationís most important site of revolutionary memory and inspiration. The sacred ground was, nonetheless, contested ground: visitors criticized the heirs' management of the property; northerners abhorred the persistence of slavery at the estate. As pilgrims contemplated the highest ideals of the Revolution at Washington's home and tomb, they often found their own society wanting. Amid escalating sectional strife in the 1850s, some argued that if Mount Vernon could be saved for the nation, the nation might be preserved from ruin. In letters and journals, newspaper and magazine articles, and public speeches, visitors recorded, often in detail and with intense emotion, their varied reactions to the site. Experiencing Mount Vernon presents the most informative of these accounts, as well as selected documents from the Washington owners (beginning with Washington himself, who in 1784 prematurely wrote Lafayette that, at his beloved home, he had "retired from all public employments"). Numerous maps, contemporary images, and annotations complement the texts. This book constitutes the only eyewitness chronicle we have of the Washington estate's ascent to the status of national shrine, and it offers the closest possible evidence of Mount Vernonís singular role in helping forge American national identity.
Never Caught
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Author : Erica Armstrong Dunbar
language : en
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Release Date : 2017-02-07
Never Caught written by Erica Armstrong Dunbar and has been published by Simon and Schuster this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2017-02-07 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
A startling and eye-opening look into America’s First Family, Never Caught is the powerful story about a daring woman of “extraordinary grit” (The Philadelphia Inquirer). When George Washington was elected president, he reluctantly left behind his beloved Mount Vernon to serve in Philadelphia, the temporary seat of the nation’s capital. In setting up his household he brought along nine slaves, including Ona Judge. As the President grew accustomed to Northern ways, there was one change he couldn’t abide: Pennsylvania law required enslaved people be set free after six months of residency in the state. Rather than comply, Washington decided to circumvent the law. Every six months he sent the slaves back down south just as the clock was about to expire. Though Ona Judge lived a life of relative comfort, she was denied freedom. So, when the opportunity presented itself one clear and pleasant spring day in Philadelphia, Judge left everything she knew to escape to New England. Yet freedom would not come without its costs. At just twenty-two-years-old, Ona became the subject of an intense manhunt led by George Washington, who used his political and personal contacts to recapture his property. “A crisp and compulsively readable feat of research and storytelling” (USA TODAY), historian and National Book Award finalist Erica Armstrong Dunbar weaves a powerful tale and offers fascinating new scholarship on how one young woman risked everything to gain freedom from the famous founding father and most powerful man in the United States at the time.
You Never Forget Your First
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Author : Alexis Coe
language : en
Publisher: Penguin
Release Date : 2020-02-04
You Never Forget Your First written by Alexis Coe and has been published by Penguin this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2020-02-04 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AN NPR CONCIERGE BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR “In her form-shattering and myth-crushing book….Coe examines myths with mirth, and writes history with humor… [You Never Forget Your First] is an accessible look at a president who always finishes in the first ranks of our leaders.” —Boston Globe Alexis Coe takes a closer look at our first--and finds he is not quite the man we remember Young George Washington was raised by a struggling single mother, demanded military promotions, caused an international incident, and never backed down--even when his dysentery got so bad he had to ride with a cushion on his saddle. But after he married Martha, everything changed. Washington became the kind of man who named his dog Sweetlips and hated to leave home. He took up arms against the British only when there was no other way, though he lost more battles than he won. After an unlikely victory in the Revolutionary War cast him as the nation's hero, he was desperate to retire, but the founders pressured him into the presidency--twice. When he retired years later, no one talked him out of it. He left the highest office heartbroken over the partisan nightmare his backstabbing cabinet had created. Back on his plantation, the man who fought for liberty must confront his greatest hypocrisy--what to do with the men, women, and children he owns--before he succumbs to death. With irresistible style and warm humor, You Never Forget Your First combines rigorous research and lively storytelling that will have readers--including those who thought presidential biographies were just for dads--inhaling every page.
Martha Washington
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Author : Helen Bryan
language : en
Publisher: Turner Publishing Company
Release Date : 2007-08-03
Martha Washington written by Helen Bryan and has been published by Turner Publishing Company this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2007-08-03 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
"A contempary anecdote not only confirms that Martha commanded respect in her own right during her lifetime, but also suggests an awkward truth later historians have preferred to ignore-that without Martha and her fortune, George might never have risen to social, military, and political prominence.Toward the end of his life, George Washington, war hero, retired president, and object of universal fame and veneration, was negotiating to purchase a plot of land in the new capital city, to be named in his honor. The seller, an aged veteran of the Revolution, was reluctant to part with the plot, even to so distinguished a purchaser. Washington persisted until the veteran's patience snapped: 'You think people take every grist that comes from you as the pure grain. What would you have been if you hadn't married the Widow Custis!' " -from the Introduction to Martha Washington: First Lady of Liberty From the glittering social life of Virginia's wealthiest plantations to the rigors of winter camps during the American Revolution, Martha Washington was a central figure in some of the most important events in American history. Her story is a saga of social conflict, forbidden love affairs, ambiguous wills, mysterious death, heartbreaking loss, and personal and political triumph. Every detail is brought to vivid life in this engaging and astonishing biography of one of the best known, least understood figures in early American life.
The Indian World Of George Washington
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Author : Colin Gordon Calloway
language : en
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Release Date : 2018
The Indian World Of George Washington written by Colin Gordon Calloway and has been published by Oxford University Press this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2018 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
"An authoritative, sweeping, and fresh new biography of the nation's first president, Colin G. Calloway's book reveals fully the dimensions and depths of George Washington's relations with the First Americans."--Provided by publisher.
Freedom Has A Face
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Author : Kirt Von Daacke
language : en
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
Release Date : 2012
Freedom Has A Face written by Kirt Von Daacke and has been published by University of Virginia Press this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2012 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
Argues that the inhabitants of Albemarle County (in rural Piedmont Virginia), white, black, and mixed-race treated each other more on the basis of a person's reputations than on the basis of state laws requiring restrictions on black freedom. Examples are drawn from law proceedings, (blacks did testify in courts despite its being against the law), marriages, residence, and other matters.
Lives Bound Together
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Author : Jessie MacLeod
language : en
Publisher:
Release Date : 2016-09-15
Lives Bound Together written by Jessie MacLeod and has been published by this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2016-09-15 with categories.
At the time of George Washington's death in 1799, more than 300 enslaved men, women, and children lived on his Mount Vernon plantation. Lives Bound Together: Slavery at George Washington's Mount Vernon, published to accompany a 2016-2018 exhibition, explores this important example of eighteenth-century slavery through brief biographies of 19 enslaved individuals, 10 essays, and 130 illustrations (including paintings, prints, objects, buildings, landscapes, documents, charts, maps, and conjectural silhouettes that suggest the presence of the enslaved). The text illuminates three key themes: first, the lives, families, and experiences of the enslaved people of Mount Vernon; second, Washington's changing views on slavery, culminating in his pioneering action to free his slaves per the terms of his will; and third, the extent to which his public career and his family's lives were inextricably entwined with the labor of Mount Vernon's enslaved people. The biographies represent a range of experiences, including men and women; natives of Africa and the Virginia Tidewater; field-workers, artisans, and domestic laborers; some who escaped and some who were recaptured and sold as punishment; some who died in slavery and some who became free. Compiled by Mount Vernon Associate Curator Jessie MacLeod, these biographies draw upon documentary references, from Washington's diaries, letters, account books, invoices, farm managers' reports, visitor descriptions, and public records, supplemented by archaeology and oral histories. The essays provide a broader context for understanding the individual life stories, focusing on George Washington's changing attitude toward slavery; the resistance actions of the enslaved; the nineteenth-century history of slavery at Mount Vernon and images created by nineteenth-century artists; the kinds of evidence found in documents, databases, archaeology, and landscapes; and personal reflections by members of families descended from individuals enslaved at Mount Vernon. Harvard law professor and historian Annette Gordon Reed contributes the introduction; an appendix presents a timeline linking key events in the lives of people enslaved at Mount Vernon with George Washington's public and private actions relating to slavery as well as landmark events of national history. Detailed reference notes and suggestions for further readings complete the work.
Never Caught The Story Of Ona Judge
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Author : Erica Armstrong Dunbar
language : en
Publisher: Aladdin
Release Date : 2020-08-18
Never Caught The Story Of Ona Judge written by Erica Armstrong Dunbar and has been published by Aladdin this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2020-08-18 with Juvenile Nonfiction categories.
“A brilliant work of US history.” —School Library Journal (starred review) “Gripping.” —BCCB (starred review) “Accessible…Necessary.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review) A National Book Award Finalist for Nonfiction, Never Caught is the eye-opening narrative of Ona Judge, George and Martha Washington’s runaway slave, who risked everything for a better life—now available as a young reader’s edition! In this incredible narrative, Erica Armstrong Dunbar reveals a fascinating and heartbreaking behind-the-scenes look at the Washingtons when they were the First Family—and an in-depth look at their slave, Ona Judge, who dared to escape from one of the nation’s Founding Fathers. Born into a life of slavery, Ona Judge eventually grew up to be George and Martha Washington’s “favored” dower slave. When she was told that she was going to be given as a wedding gift to Martha Washington’s granddaughter, Ona made the bold and brave decision to flee to the north, where she would be a fugitive. From her childhood, to her time with the Washingtons and living in the slave quarters, to her escape to New Hampshire, Erica Armstrong Dunbar, along with Kathleen Van Cleve, shares an intimate glimpse into the life of a little-known, but powerful figure in history, and her brave journey as she fled the most powerful couple in the country.