How was George Washington's character formed? His parents' genes may be part of the answer. By Paula S. Felder George Washington's heritage

Date published: 3/12/2005

First of two articles

GEORGE WASHINGTON was, by all reckonings, an exceptional man, although no one has been able to account satisfactorily for his talents. Ambitious, but with little education or breadth of experience, at 23 he became the military commander of an improvised army to protect Virginia's frontiers and demonstrated the intelligent leadership that made him exceptional at every level of his career. At 40, he was still untested beyond his niche in Virginia's Colonial hierarchy.

Washington's innate talents seemed to grow with his growing responsibilities on the national scene. He made very few missteps in judgment or execution--in the unprecedented roles of military commander in the War for Independence and first executive of the new nation. Without question, he functioned with his own inner radar, but the scope of his leadership and wisdom in governing was beyond impressive.

How he came by those talents, or gifts, as his respon-sibilities grew ever larger has never been satisfactorily explained--even though his biographers have chronicled his moves in painstaking detail.

These articles are a brief consideration of the two people who gave him his genes. By now, we have become confined by the pronouncements of biographers and scholars, and we are not encouraged to ponder intuitively on a possible link of personality or character between parent and child.

But first, his mother--Mary Ball Washington--should be rescued from her harsh type-casting (courtesy of historian Douglas Southall Freeman) as a nagging and selfish parent. And then his father--Augustine Washington--can be considered in the light of his own movements and choices.

Since we in the Fredericksburg area are fortunate to occupy the same geographic space as Washington's parents, with access to the records of their activities and relationships and surrounded by evidence of their Colonial environment, we are free to examine their lives and make our own speculations.

Can we not look for clues to Washington's character from a genetic as well as a cultural base? Why did he not feel constrained by the class system that marked one's destiny in rigidly structured Colonial Virginia? In fact, he mastered it, and without nursing feelings of inferiority from having to start on a lower rung.

We cannot begin to account for the wisdom of his conduct in his public role during the last quarter-century of his life, which he lived on the national stage.

But perhaps we can more closely examine the lives of his parents, who were both unusual for their time and place in Virginia's Colonial society. That is the unique opportunity available to us as modern students of our historic area.

PAULA S. FELDER of Fredericksburg is a historian and author specializing in the area's 18th-century past. She has continued her interest in the Washington family. George Washington's father, Augustine, will be the subject of a second article. Contact her by mail in care of Gwen Woolf, The Free Lance-Star, 616 Amelia St., Fredericksburg, Va. 22401, or by e-mail to gwoolf@freelancestar.com.

Date published: 3/12/2005