History in Five: Why has Washington served as such an ongoing inspiration in American history? What makes his life after the presidency so compelling?

Jonathan Horn: John Adams once said that George Washington staged his farewells as if a great playwright. Washington’s willingness to walk away from power at the end of the Revolutionary War and then again at the end of his second term as president made him the wonder of his age. He acted so eager to give up control that we today delude ourselves into believing it was easy and forget how it went against the grain of not only most of human history but also basic human nature.

What makes the story of Washington’s final years so compelling is that it lays bare his own inner struggle and the temptations he faced. Not long after Washington exited the public stage at the end of his presidency, events he could not have imagined brought him back into the limelight and into an astonishing power struggle that risked the part of his legacy he most cherished.

Hin5: What motivated you to delve into Washington’s life after the presidency?

JH: Three different parts of my life brought me to the story of George Washington’s post-presidency. The first was having served as a White House speechwriter at the end of an administration and having watched a president leave office and make this same transition. 

The second was having written an earlier book, The Man Who Would Not Be Washington, about Robert E. Lee, who was the son of George Washington’s most famous eulogist and the son-in-law of Washington’s adopted child. At the heart of that book was a question: How did someone so associated with Washington’s legacy go to war against Washington’s greatest legacy, the Union? Looking at Washington’s legacy drew me to his last years and to the realization that the full story of his post-presidency had gone untold. 

The final part of what drew me to this story was living around Washington, DC, and musing over the irony that a city so synonymous with political divisions could bear the name of a man who did more than anyone to unite the country. In so many ways, Washington’s End is the story of George Washington’s struggle to cede control of not just the country that he had forged but also the name that he had made famous around the world. 

Hin5: What is one of the most common misconceptions about George Washington?

JH: One of the most common misconceptions about Washington is that he “rode off into the sunset” after his second term as president and disappeared from the public stage. The myth has such a strong hold over the American imagination for understandable reasons. Washington was at the center of so much history—the French and Indian War, the American Revolution, the Constitutional Convention—that biographers almost always exhaust themselves by the time they reach the end of his presidency.

As a result, the full story of Washington’s last year years has gone untold. People assume that he just lived out his days as a farmer. That was the ending that Washington wanted, but it was not the ending that history delivered. 

Hin5: You did extensive research into Washington’s life and where he lived post-presidency. Can you give us a five of the most fascinating things that you learned about his last years?

1. How quickly Washington returned to public life after leaving the presidency in March 1797: Little more than a year later, a foreign policy crisis with France brought him back into command of the armies of the United States and into a conflict with his successor.

2. How partisan Washington became and how serious the plot was to convince Washington to return to the presidency just four years after he left it: He openly identified as a Federalist, favored excluding Republicans from army posts, and supported the infamous Alien and Sedition Acts. As the election of 1800 neared, prominent Federalists hoped to convince him to do what he had sworn not to do: accept a third term. He died before the election.

3. How strained Washington’s relationships with his successors had become by the time of his death in 1799: He was barely communicating with the then-sitting president (Adams) and had essentially ceased all communication with each of the next three men who would occupy the office afterward (Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe).

4. Just how painful Washington’s final hours of life were: He stoically accepted his fate, even as the medical treatments of the age made his suffering worse.

5. How much Washington still thought about Sally Fairfax, the married woman he had fallen in love with as a young man: As an old man, he recalled the hours he spent with Sally as “the happiest of my life.”

Hin5: When writing about a well-known and beloved subject, do you worry about the reaction of readers because of the attachment to someone they think they know?

JH: Because the full story of Washington’s last years has gone essentially untold, I knew that much of what was in this book would surprise readers. For a time, I wondered how they would respond to seeing Washington struggle in his quest to leave power. But I came to realize that rather than diminishing Washington’s legacy, this story enhances it. Only by understanding how difficult it was to surrender power can we appreciate Washington’s true greatness. 

Hin5: Washington’s End will come out during a deeply contentious political moment. Does the expanded, more nuanced understanding of Washington we gain from this book help us better understand, or reveal something about, our current political situation?

JH: What is interesting is that many people back then looked to the future with the same sense of dread we often hear expressed today. They worried about how the country could stay united with political parties pulling it apart, partisan news outlets spreading fake news, and foreign powers interfering in presidential elections (as France had in 1796). It is a reminder that Americans have often wondered whether they are living in the last days of the republic. Knowing that our country has survived past periods of doubt, I think, should give us hope for our future.