"In the Hands of a Good Providence": Religion in the Life of George Washington

Preface

Mount Vernon has attracted visitors in large numbers, beginning in George Washington’s lifetime with those who were curious to see this famous man who had been something of an international celebrity since the age of twenty-two. In the nineteenth century, the estate itself developed almost religious connotations as a pilgrimage site or shrine. In the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, Mount Vernon has become a tourist center, each year welcoming roughly one million visitors, who see evidence of George Washington’s taste in decorative arts and clothing, study Martha Washington’s needlework and expertise at domestic management, and marvel at the agricultural innovations directed by Washington and put into practice by his slaves. Until the opening of a new museum and education center at the end of October 2006, however, what they did not get a sense of was the spiritual life of the people who lived on the plantation . While this topic has, at last, been touched on, still, the constraints imposed by the medium of an exhibit case leave a lot of room for questions . Much of the lack of interpretation on this subject has reflected not only a modern reticence to discuss a potentially emotional issue and the secularism of our society, but, perhaps even more, the reserve of the estate ’s most famous resident regarding his own religious beliefs and those of the other individuals with whom he lived. This is unfortunate, because the Washington family at Mount Vernon lived in a period of incredible turmoil in the religious life of England and its colonies. Some of this unrest even led to the family’s emigration to America in the mid-seventeenth century. Following their arrival in the New World, the Washingtons, like others in Virginia, had to find ways to adapt the Anglican practices they had known in the mother country to the very different conditions found in America. During George Washington ’s lifetime, the modern evangelical movement was born; other denominations , especially Baptists, Methodists, and Quakers, challenged Preface Preface x the state church for the right to worship freely; the Anglican Church itself went through major changes before and after the Revolution; and Unitarians and Universalists were talking and writing about new ideas regarding God and Christianity. Because of his prominence in both national and international affairs, George Washington drew into his orbit many of the leading figures in the religious history of the eighteenth century. Washington’s death came just two weeks before the start of the nineteenth century. Within five years of his demise, a new spirit broke out in the church in which he had spent his entire life. That change influenced younger members of his family, who found themselves caught up in the great movements of nineteenth-century Christianity, such as the Sunday School and missionary societies. In many ways, the history of the American church through two hundred years can be read in the history of this one prominent family. This work began with a question from a person who wrote to Mount Vernon via the Internet in the spring of 1997, asking simply about George Washington’s religious beliefs. When asked that question in the past (which was not often, because such questions would typically have gone to the staff in the library), I had answered, as I had been taught, that George Washington was a Deist. For some reason, this particular inquiry came to me and arrived at an unusually slow period, when I had the luxury of time to investigate my answer. I very quickly came to the conclusion that Washington was not a Deist, but it has taken many years to flesh out the story of where he fit in the religious milieu of the time in which he lived. The chapters that follow will explore the place of religion in the life of George Washington. While the primary focus will be him (he is, after all, the member of the family in whom most people are interested), Washington came to believe the way he did through the influence of generations of those who lived before, and he, in turn, would influence the religious practices of younger members of the family and generations to come. It will be necessary, therefore, to examine the lives of other members of this extended family, as well as trends within the Anglican/Episcopal Church, which served as the framework for their actions. Some readers may be wondering who I am and what I bring, both positively and...