His Excellency: George Washington

This biographical study of George Washington, the founding father who was "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen," reexamines the personal and public sides of the man who set this nation on its course and became its first president. Joseph Ellis draws on voluminous research, and especially on the archives in the University of Virginia, displaying the same masterly grasp of the period as he did in his bestselling FOUNDING BROTHERS and his biography of Thomas Jefferson, AMERICAN SPHINX. Setting Washington in his time, class, and milieu, Ellis explores how Washington's relations with his family as well as his commercial relations with England as a landowner shaped his thinking, and how Washington rose above his contemporaries in his evolving views on slavery. Ellis comes up with a fresh picture of a landowner, general, and statesman who played a significant role in the debates of the period about which direction the new nation should take. His solid account of this decisive figure brushes away the myths of history and presents a refreshingly readable and interesting portrait.

"Ellis has a gift for getting inside the skins of his subjects and showing what makes them tick...To demystify this larger-than-life, quasi-divine personage, to make him understandable as a human being, is the formidable task Ellis has set for himself. By and large, he succeeds." - S. K. Lazell (New York Review of Books, 11/7/04)

"Readers who are familiar with the vast array of writings about Washington will not find much that is new or original in Ellis's book. But they will find his usual engaging style of writing. He has a wonderful knack for summing up a mass of complicated material in a few pithy sentences." - Ernest Berke (New Republic, 12/20/04)

"Yet Ellis's is not simply a good retelling of an old story. He brings new insights. One [is] Washington's fear that he did not have a long life to live. Another is the way Washington's financial concerns led him to support American independence....Ellis is very good on Washington's attitude toward slavery." - Richard L. Pratt Jr. (New York Review of Books, 3/10/05)

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