Washington [14]
George won more than grudging entree to the Fairfax estate, for Colonel Fairfax spied unusual potential in this capable youth, invited him on foxhunts, and took an active interest in furthering his career. The colonial world revolved around such pivotal connections. To secure a powerful patron was an indispensable prerequisite to advancement for a boy born outside the upper gentry. In the mid-1750s, while coaching his younger brother Jack, George exhorted him to spend more time at Belvoir: “I should be glad to hear that you live in perfect harmony and good fellowship with the family at Belvoir, as it is in their power to be serviceable upon many occasions to us as young beginners . . . to that family I am under many obligations, particularly to the old gentleman.”5 That old gentleman, Colonel Fairfax, seemed to dote on Washington and signed his letters to him “your assured and loving friend.”6 The Fairfax sponsorship lifted George above the mass of Virginia commoners and made the world of the highborn seem tantalizingly within reach. Perhaps he relived his own youth when he later instructed a young relative, “It is therefore absolutely necessary, if you mean to make any figure upon the stage, that you should take the first steps right.”7 From their letters, we can also tell that George and Colonel Fairfax shared copies of Caesar’s Commentaries and a life of Alexander the Great and frequently swapped views on military heroes from antiquity. Since the colonel once boasted that he had trained himself to make no “outward show” of emotion, he may also have provided a model of restrained behavior for George as well.8 Colonel Fairfax knew George thoroughly enough that, in writing to Mary Washington, he pinpointed her son’s outstanding flaw, which he must correct: “I wish I could say that he governs his temper.”9 It should be said that the authenticity of this letter has been questioned.
In September 1746 Lawrence Washington and Colonel Fairfax concocted a plan to spring fourteen-year-old George from his mother’s domination and launch him on a promising career in the Royal Navy. At a confidential meeting in Fredericksburg, designed to keep Mary Washington securely in the dark, Fairfax transmitted to George a letter from Lawrence telling of an open position for a midshipman aboard a royal frigate then anchored in Virginia. When George acquiesced in the idea, Fairfax reported back to Lawrence that his brother vowed to “be steady and thankfully follow your advice as his best friend.”10 As George later acknowledged, it was “the wish of my eldest brother . . . that this should take place.”11 From Lawrence, George received a letter endorsing the plan, which he was then to deliver to his mother, whose approval was hardly taken for granted.
At first, Mary Washington gave qualified approval to the move. Perhaps eager to flee from Ferry Farm, George indicated that he had his “baggage prepared for embarkation.” 12 Then Mary consulted a family friend, Robert Jackson, who supported the plan, but she seized on passing statements that he made to confirm her growing reservations. As Jackson informed Lawrence, “She offers several trifling objections such as fond and unthinking mothers naturally suggest and I find that one word against his going has more weight than ten for it.”13 Mary also consulted her rich half brother in England, Joseph Ball, who sent back a canny analysis about naval discrimination against colonials. Advising that