General George Washington, longing for the Sea, wanted to join the British Navy at 15
General George Washington, Victorious general of the American Revolution, the first President of the United States,
When young George was 15, his half brother, Major Lawrence Washington and Colonel Fairfax endeavored to have him join the Royal Navy. George’s father died when he was 11. Due to George’s mother, Mary Ball Washington‘s, patent disapproval of this career for her eldest son, George’s dream was not yet to be fulfilled.
Lawrence, who became his young Brother George’s father image after their father died, had served in the Virginia Militia in 1741 in a British expedition against Spanish bases in the Caribbean under Vice Admiral Edward Vernon.
George’s first introduction to the sea came in 1751 when he accompanied Lawrence on a trip to the island of Barbados. Lawrence was suffering from tuberculosis and had been advised that the climate in Barbados might help. This was to be George’s only trip out of the colonies and his only true seagoing experience. It is believed that they boarded the sloop Success: 40 tons, 8-man crew, a cargo of 4,486-barrel staves, 7,627 feet of wood plank, 984 bushels of corn, and 31 barrels of herring.
The records of the South Potomac Naval District suggest that the departure was probably about September 28, 1751. During their stay in Barbados, George, now 19, became ill with smallpox.
On November 17, after a change of plans by Lawrence, Washington loaded his belongings aboard the Industry: a brig of 50 tons, 7-man crew with a cargo of 1,230 gallons of rum.This voyage served as a training cruise for George Washington. He had spent about two and a half months at sea, learned the ways of the sea, and could now be considered as an apprentice in the world of watermen.
The Washington brothers sailed about September 19, 1751. The precise date is not clear, because George Washington’s Barbados diary– the chief source of information about the trip– is badly mutilated. The brothers apparently sailed on the Success, a small trading sloop.
The voyage, the only long sea voyage of Washington’s life, took more than six weeks on what George Washington called the “fickle & Merciliss Ocean” (a flight from Washington, D.C., to Barbados, now takes little more than six hours).
French and Indian War
Washington began his career in the Virginia militia in 1753 and led a force of 300 colonials to current-day Pittsburgh in the first engagement of the French and Indian War.
In 1753, the Governor of Virginia, Robert Dinwiddie, learned that French troops had moved south from Canada and were constructing forts in the region south of Lake Erie, an area claimed by the British (now in Western Pennsylvania). Both France and England recognized the commercial potential of the region. French trappers had been working in the area for some time. Dinwiddie was concerned that the French troops would also fortify the forks of the Ohio River — the strategic point where the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers join to form the Ohio River. This point, now Pittsburgh, was the eastern gateway to the Ohio River Valley.
Allegheny Expedition In the fall of 1753, Dinwiddie sent 21-year-old Major Washington to deliver a message to the French, demanding they leave the area. Today, this journey is known as the Allegheny Expedition and Washington was aided by Christopher Gist, a frontier guide, and local Native Americans. The party finally reached the French post at Fort Le Boeuf on the evening of December 11, escorted by Seneca chief Tanacharison (Half-King), two Iroquois chiefs, and one from the Delaware Nation.
The return trip tested Washington’s endurance. He hiked for days through snowy woods, fell off a raft into the ice-choked Allegheny River, nearly drowned, and was forced to spend a freezing night on an island without shelter. Washington’s account of the arduous 900-mile journey was published by Governor Dinwiddie in both Williamsburg and London, establishing an international reputation for George Washington by the time he was 22.
Jumonville Glen Skirmish
A few months later Dinwiddie dispatched Washington, now a lieutenant colonel, and some 150 men to assert Virginia’s claims on the land. As they advanced, Washington’s men skirmished with French soldiers, killing 10 men, including the French commander, Joseph Coulon de Villiers, Sieur de Jumonville. Washington then retreated to an ill-placed and makeshift palisade he called Fort Necessity. He was forced to surrender when the French surrounded the fort. The campaign ended in humiliation for Washington and ignited the French and Indian War.
General Braddock
Although he resigned his commission after the surrender, Washington returned to the frontier in 1755 as a volunteer aide to General Edward Braddock. Braddock had been sent by the King of England to drive the French from the Ohio Country. Braddock’s army was routed near the Monongahela River and fled in confusion to Virginia. During the battle, while attempting to rally the British soldiers, Washington had two horses shot out from under him and four bullet holes shot through his coat. Although he behaved with conspicuous bravery, Washington could do little except lead the broken survivors to safety.
In recognition of his conduct, Washington was given command of Virginia’s entire military force. With a few hundred men he was ordered to protect a frontier some 350 miles long. Although this was a frustrating assignment, it provided him with experience in commanding troops through an arduous campaign. In 1758 the British finally took the forks of the Ohio. Peace returned to Virginia, and Washington resigned his commission to return to Mount Vernon, his duty faithfully performed.
His reputation soared after that, and he rose to the rank of brigade commander.
Washington resigned his military commission in 1758, but by 1774, he was fully behind the idea of revolution and accepted leadership of the volunteer Virginia militia. He was unanimously elected in June 1775 to be the general and commander in chief of all Continental forces.
For eight years, Washington managed to preserve his colonial forces despite many obstacles, and that was a feat that is still revered today. According to the U.S. Army Center of Military History, “only a soldier endowed with extraordinary foresight, personal integrity and self-discipline could have provided the necessary leadership. The claim can be made that without Washington, the Revolution would not have succeeded.”
After the war, Washington dismantled his army and returned to life as a private citizen, but in 1787, he was put in charge of the Constitutional Convention that led to the ratification of our Constitution. This led to Washington’s inauguration as the first president of the United States in 1789.
The diary George kept on the trip in 1951 to Barbados gives hints of how the two Virginians passed their time, both on the ship and on the island. As they made their way to Barbados, Washington recorded the weather, details about sailing, and the fish they caught—or tried to catch. These included dolphin, pilot fish, shark, barracudas (tigerfish). Washington also occupied his time at sea learning the practical science of navigation– skills that came easily to a surveyor.
Like everyone else on board, he was surprised when the crew unexpectedly sighted the east coast of Barbados at four o’clock on the morning of November 2, at a time when the captain’s calculations placed the ship nearly 150 leagues to the east. George Washington reported that everyone was “greatly alarm’d with the cry of Land.”
The fear was justified. The east coast of Barbados is rocky, bounded by coral reefs, and pounded by surf. The Washingtons were lucky that the crew saw the island in the night, or else Success might have been driven onto the reefs and destroyed. Success avoided these misfortunes, rounded the south end of Barbados, and anchored in Carlisle Bay later on November 2.
INTERACTIVE MAP
Washington’s World Interactive Map
George Washington traveled far and wide during his remarkable life. See all the places that he visited in our new interactive map.SEE THE MAP
VISIT BUSH HILL HOUSE
George Washington’s House in Barbados
The Bush Hill Tourism Trust Inc., in collaboration with the Barbados National Trust, restored the house and outlying buildings, creating a heritage site on the historic Garrison that celebrates the visit and the role that Barbados played in the settlement of America.
Bridgetown, Barbados
Barbados is a small coral island in the southeastern Caribbean. The island is roughly pear-shaped, 21 miles from north to south and 14 miles across at the widest point. But its historical importance is not proportional to its size. The English settled the island in 1627, just eight years after the Pilgrims landed in Plymouth. In the 1650s the colonists and enslaved workers began to cultivate sugar cane, which soon made the island’s leading planters spectacularly– even decadently– rich. Barbados was one of Britain’s most precious colonial possessions. Bridgetown– where the Washingtons landed– was one of the most populous cities in British American and the largest urban area George Washington had ever seen. Williamsburg, the largest town in Virginia, was a mere village by comparison.
Shortly after they arrived, the brothers received a note from Gedney Clarke, an uncle of Lawrence Washington’s wife, inviting them to his house. They went, though George Washington confessed “some reluctance” on his part because Mrs. Clarke was confined with smallpox, a dreaded disease he had so far avoided. It proved to be a fateful decision. Within two weeks he was stricken with the disease.
In the meantime, he had an opportunity to explore an exotic and completely unfamiliar landscape. Guided by their new friends, the brothers rode into the country to find a house to rent. The contrast between Barbados and Virginia was striking. Barbados was smaller than most Virginia counties but was intensively cultivated. The island was also densely populated, “so everywhere furnished with inhabitants,” a contemporary observed, “that it resembles a scattered village in the midst of a garden.”
see some of the most impressive fortifications in British America. Barbados was one of the most heavily fortified colonies in the British Empire. Examining the island’s defenses, Washington concluded that Barbados was actually “one intire fortification.”
He visited Charles Fort on Needham’s Point, guarding the entrance to Carlisle Bay, and dined repeatedly with the commander. He notes that Charles Fort was “pretty strongly fortifyed and mounts about 36 Gunes within the fortification” in addition to “2 facine Batterys” beyond the walls. Wherever he went along the west coast he found that the islanders “have large Intrenchments cast up wherever its possible for an enemy to Land.”
These were the first forts the future American general ever saw, and they are still there to be seen today. The crumbling stone ramparts of Charles Fort still stand on a quiet point overlooking the Carlisle Bay. Dozens of cannon barrels– some of which look old enough to have been in service when Washington was there– lie in the surf at the base of the wall, their muzzles now filled with sea urchins.
George Washington’s encounter with the British military establishment in Barbados seems to have had a crucial impact on his aspirations. Before his trip, Washington has little acquaintance with military men or military matters. After returning to Virginia, he dedicated himself to advancement in the military more completely than any of his Virginia contemporaries. And unlike most of the prominent colonial militia officers of the 1750s, he sought a commission in the regular British military establishment– an ambition that was probably prompted, and undoubtedly stimulated, by his experience in Barbados.