Washington [201]
Even as he fought the British, Washington deemed their army the proper model to emulate. As late as 1780 he made passing reference to “the British Army, from whence most of our rules and customs are derived, and in which long experience and improvement has brought their system as near perfection as in any other service.” 38 As in choosing aides, Washington believed that well-bred people made the best officers, advising Patrick Henry that the most reliable way to select a candidate was to find someone with “a just pretension to the character of a gentleman, a proper sense of honor, and some reputation to lose.”39 As in the French and Indian War, he warned officers to avoid excessive familiarity with their inferiors. “Be easy and condescending in your deportment to your officers,” he instructed a Virginia commander, “but not too familiar, lest you subject yourself to a want of that respect which is necessary to support a proper command.”40 He required noncommissioned officers to wear swords “as a mark of distinction and to enable them the better to maintain the authority due to their stations.”41 At the same time he pleaded with officers to lead by example and share their men’s hardships, saying “it ought to be the pride of an officer to share the fatigue as well as danger to which his men are exposed.”42 That he championed Knox and Hamilton shows how the exigencies of the war forced him to search beyond his own social stratum and democratize the army almost in spite of himself.
During that Morristown winter Washington stressed the importance of clean clothing and sanitary quarters and a nutritious diet with vegetables and salads. He issued blanket prohibitions against playing cards and dice. While he couldn’t ban alcohol outright—the daily rations of rum were bottled courage—he tried to have soldiers drink it in diluted form and avoid “the vile practice of swallowing the whole ration of liquor at a single draft.”43 Washington valued well-played music in army life and assigned a band to each brigade. At one point he chided a fife and drum corps for playing badly and insisted that they practice more regularly; a year later, after the drummers took this admonition to an extreme, Washington restricted their practice to one hour in the morning, a second in the afternoon. He was also irked by the improvisations of some drummers and, amid the misery of Valley Forge, took the trouble to issue this broadside to wayward drummers: “The use of drums are as signals to the army and, if every drummer is allowed to beat at his pleasure, the intention is entirely destroy[e]d, as it will be impossible to distinguish whether they are beating for their own pleasure or for a signal to the troops.”44
In crusading for moral reformation among his men, Washington feared that profane language would undermine discipline. He winced when soldiers swore in his presence. As the general orders said of Washington, “His feelings are continually wounded by the oaths and imprecations of the soldiers whenever he is in hearing of them.”45 He was also apt to invoke the aid of religion. During the summer of 1776 the Continental Congress granted him permission to attach chaplains to each regiment, and he encouraged attendance at divine services by rotating his own presence among them. “The blessings and protection of Heaven are at all times necessary, but especially so in times of public distress and danger,” he assured his men, hoping “that every officer and man will endeavor so to live and act as becomes a Christian soldier defending the dearest rights and liberties of his country.”46 This was one of the rare times Washington referred to Christianity rather than Providence. In fact, he favored having chaplains chosen by local military units so no denominational character could be imposed from above.
Washington construed favorable events in the war as reflections of Providence, transforming him from an actor in a human drama into a tool of heavenly purpose. This expressed his religious faith but also satisfied certain political