Washington’s Farewell to his Officers in NYC, 1873

From Bruce Lancaster, From Lexington to Liberty, reprinted in The American Heritage History of the American Revolution.

Washington was known to be austere, aloof and not amenable to casual camaraderie. Legends of his frosty behavior, even to his closest colleagues, are plentiful. Even Alexander Hamilton once felt his wrath. But those who served with him under the most arduous of conditions may have known him best. This depiction of his farewell to his official staff in 1783, based on the Memoirs of Benjamin Tallmadge, tells a very different story.

Back in the golden, almost forgotten days of peace, in the year 1765, West India-born Samuel Fraunces had acquired, along with an enviable reputation as purveyor of fine food and wines, the old De Lancey mansion at the corner of Pearl and Broad streets in New York. Fraunces, the “Black Sam” of Philip Freneau’s poem, had known stirring days in the dormered, gambrel-roofed mansion. Here, as times grew troubled, the leading Sons of Liberty met to talk and debate and plan, secure in their knowledge of their host’s sympathies and discretion. Later, British officers replaced the Sons about the ever famous table. The Englishmen seem to have been unaware of the fact that Fraunces’ sympathies remained unchanged while his discretion must have increased many-fold, for after the war Congress and the New York legislature voted him cash grants for services to American prisoners of war and for “other acts,” not specified but easily imagined.

Great days dawned for Fraunces as the war petered out. When General Sir Guy Carleton went up the Hudson to confer with General George Washington at Tappan, the American commander in chief summoned Samuel Fraunces to act as headquarters caterer during Carleton’s stay. When the British evacuation of New York was complete, American officers and civil dignitaries flocked through the fanlighted doors at Pearl and Broad streets.

But that fourth of December, 1783, brought Black Sam the greatest day that he had yet known. His windows were polished to make the most of the thin winter sun that filtered over the island, and his waxed floors glistened. In the main room waiters were setting out a great buffet lunch on linen-draped tables that held hot and cold joints and slices, platters of bread, golden mounds of butter, heaps of green “garden sauce.” Along each of the big tables decanters of wine glistened beside stacks of polished glasses as Samuel Fraunces and his staff waited for the company to arrive.

One by one they came, spurs jingling and sabers clanking, flicking invisible bits of dust from worn blue sleeves, giving a furtive whisk of a handkerchief to mended boots. Fraunces knew most of’ them, like General Alexander MacDougall, Son of Liberty a short decade ago, or the affably rigid Baron von Steuben with his glittering decoration nearly a palm’s breadth across. Major Robert Burnet had commanded the rear guard of the little force that had marched into town on the heels of the departing British. The steps creaked as General Henry Knox edged his 280 pounds through the rather narrow door in the wake of General James Clinton of New York. There could have been quick, understanding glances between Samuel Fraunces and the strikingly handsome man from Connecticut, Major Benjamin Tallmadge, with his beautifully kept dragoon helmet, for the Major had been Washington’s Chief of Intelligence, fully aware of those “other acts” for which the tavern keeper was later to be rewarded.

Slowly the room filled up with faces known and unknown, but as Black Sam bustled about he missed the customary hum and buzz of old comrades-in-arms reunited. There were brief greetings, sketchy snatches of conversation that died quickly. Officers perched uneasily on the chairs set about the walls, glanced at each other, drummed on white knees with battle-scarred fingers.

Suddenly there was blue and buff in the corridor and Fraunces discreetly vanished as the guests snapped quickly to their feet, hats or helmets tucked correcstly under their left arms. The commander in chief entered the room with a quick inclination of his powdered head, a few barely audible words of welcome. There was a muted rustle of response, then silence again, as though a group of strange children bad been thrown together in an unfamiliar room. Washington made a hospitable gesture toward the tables but only a few officers edged up to them. As though to give the lead, the Virginian dabbed some food onto a plate, picked up a fork, set them both down. One officer remembered later that he had never seen men so hopelessly, adrift, and he noted, when the commander in chief filled a glass, that the strong-fingered hand was shaky and the powdered head was bent. Other glasses were filled, but the officers who held them merely stared woodenly at the floor, as if avoiding each other’s eyes and those of their chief.

Then the Virginian began to speak in an odd, tight voice, the words forming with difficulty, syllable by syllable. “With a heart full of love and gratitude, I take leave of you.” Slowly and carefully he added, “I most devoutly wish that your later days may be as prosperous and happy as your former ones have been glorious and honorable.” He raised his glass. Here and there a man managed to stammer out some kind of a response. The commander in chief was speaking once more, struggling with each word while his cheeks glistened unashamedly, as did those of tough old von Steuben or of young Benjamin Tallmadge. “I cannot”—he stopped, and then went on with considerable effort—“I cannot come to each of you but shall feel obliged if each of you will come and take me by the hand.”

The first to stir was vast Henry Knox, who moved blindly, across the room, hand out. Washington started to take it, but memories of the old years together swept over him and he threw his arms about his Chief of Artillery, whom he had first met riding about the Boston lines back in ‘75. One by one the others stumbled up to be greeted by the same accolade, simple, unaffected, immeasurably sad. Benjamin Tallmadge remembered, “Such a scene of sorrow and weeping I had never before witnessed, and hope I may never be called upon to witness again.... Not a word was uttered to break the .solemn silence … or to interrupt the tenderness of the scene. The simple thought that we were then about to part from the man who had conducted us through a long and bloody war, and under whose conduct the glory and independence of our country had been achieved, and that we should see his face no more in this world, seemed to me utterly insupportable. But the time of separation had come, and waving his hand to his grieving children around him, he left the room. …

Still the commander in chief’s ordeal was not over. In the street he passed through a guard of honor and the vast crowds of New Yorkers who choked the lane leading to Whitehall Ferry. People along the way remembered as long as they lived his tense, set face, the convulsive throbbing of his jaw muscles, as he saw mothers holding up their children for a glimpse of that tall Virginia planter who had once stood before Congress and said, “I do not think myself equal to the command I am honored with.”

He did not pass on alone. All the guests from Fraunces’ Tavern had followed after him “in mournful silence to the wharf, where a prodigious crowd had assembled to witness the departure of the man who, under God, had been the great agent in establishing the glory and independence of these United States. As soon as he was seated, the barge put off into the river, and when out in the stream, our great and beloved General waved his hat and bid us a silent adieu.” So Benjamin Tallmadge recalled that last affecting scene at Whitehall Ferry as the barge bore General George Washington across to Paulus Hook on the Jersey shore.