eastern on c-span. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] part one of the two-part interview tonight, and then remarks from ed miliband. after that, gordon brown speaks at harvard university. .

>> he would have been the fiercest in the drives. the people who knew washington best and did so by that same personality, someone but was much more personality. we tend to think of washington as a bland but were the character. he was anything but. there was a tremendous will. he was tremendous in his personality under this very reserved facade. >> you say in your preludin to this book that you want a fresh portrait. after all that has been read, how did to do a fresh portrait? >> hamilton had washington in the revolutionary war. hamilton wrote a series of very

perceptive letters about washington. i can remember being absolutely startled. i read so much about washington. these were significant things that were overlooked by previous biographers. the more that i read about washington, he was a man of many moods and many passions. because it was covered by this intense self control, people did not see it. what we have done in the very understandable and laudable desire to generate washington, we have the rough edges of the personality. he made him land and even boring. people at the time saw him as a very dynamic and charismatic figure. i would love for contemporary

americans to share that kind of excitement. i pay tribute to washington in the university of virginia that began to publish new editions of his papers. every year, another volume appears. they have now published more than 60 volumes. to give you an idea of how much information there is available, the old edition from the 1930's is based on 17,000 documents. the new edition is based on 135 documents collected from archives all over the world. what is wonderful about this is that you have lavishly annotated letters with extracts from letters, diaries, contemporary newspaper accounts.

i have hundreds and maybe thousands of eyewitness accounts. it made me feel that i could possibly do what has been so difficult. to bring him alive as a fully three-dimensional character. as someone so vivid that if he walked into the room, you would know what he looked like, how he sounded. he was a very reserved character. you kind of have to tease out this personality. suddenly, we have so much anecdotal material that we've really can try not to recreate the man. >> you said that he had a colossal temper. how did you find that out? >> there are a lot of examples, of washington losing his temper. there was a cabinet meeting where jefferson said that washington lost his temper. he had been shown a satirical cartoon that showed him being

guillotined the with louis the 16th was guillotined. washington lost his temper and had difficulty regaining control of his emotions. there are a lot of stories like this. people noticed this before but had thought that it was more incidental to his personality. for me, it suggests that these emotions were boiling under the surface. washington was a passionate man. it hit was almost too mighty for any other human to control. the people closest to him since this tremendous intensity. >> you said that he was prone to tears. >> many times, the evidence is everywhere in the story. we all know the story about his

farewell to the officers at the end of the war. there were officers standing in the long room and he said that he could not come to them, and he asked if they could come to him. i was struck a number of times how many times a contemporary observers noticed tears in his eyes with this tremendous emotion that he was fighting. he was a highly emotional man. he was somebody who was very reluctant to show those emotions. he became an almost overly controlled personality. he was emotionally muscle bound. >> you say that he was a man of fierce disposition. >> i do not want to overstate that side. i am stressing that because i felt that was the overlooked dimension.

these were his political associates and military officers that said he could and often was sensitive and courteous. i do not want to pay a portrait of him as tyrannical but rather someone who was very sensitive in dealing with people. he had a tremendous sense of tact and courtesy. this is a very complicated man. he was a tough nut to crack social logically and psychologically. >> what makes you think a 900 page book will sell? >> i think americans are enchanted with american politics. they are looking for a heroic figures from america's past and there is no figure more heroic or fearless or courageous than george washington. what i tried to show in the

book, this is something that slowly and gradually happens in his life, washington, as a young man, has an amazing perseverance about him. you can often see glimmers from the future leader. he is someone who is pursuing power. he is not an attractive character in certain ways when he was younger. he was one who transcends his past. he was ennobled by circumstance. after the constitutional convention, these monumental challenges bring out this greatness and this is a man who is much greater than anyone who had -- who would have predicted. he is tremendously inspirational. this a time when we need inspiration.

the american public is pretty depressed at the moment. >> i want to have you do is snap shot of several places where he was in his life and we will come back to some of these. what did he do around boston? >> he takes control of the continental army. his presence was extraordinarily important because the continental army was really composed exclusively of new england militia. one of the reasons that washington was chosen, it suddenly gives a continental perspective to the continental cause that they did not have before that. the redcoats are bottled up in boston and are under siege from the continental army. washington manages to drive them out of boston and he has his

first great victory. maybe a little bit of beginner's luck because he had an enormous difficulty duplicating the feat. he goes to new york and that is where he has a string of disasters. at the battle of brooklyn, it is having an army pounce on the army. it drives the entire army across the east river. they flee up to northern manhattan. it is not the last disaster. washington loses twin forks on opposite sides. he began this demoralized retreat across new jersey and across the delaware river into pennsylvania. >> philadelphia? >> what happens is that there is

a fear that the british were going to take philadelphia. they hope to stop them. it was one of the battles that washington showed his intelligence. the british occupied philadelphia until the spring of 1778. >> washington d.c.? >> washington d.c.. >> virginia, mount vernon. >> the residents act cwas george washington who got on horseback and picked the spot where washington d.c. is going to be. there was a certain amount of rumbling at the time because it was it was very close to mount

vernon, where washington owned 8,000 a.. it is not accidental that the white house stands we're it is because it faces south towards mount vernon. >> something you spend enough time on but i want to ask you more about it because i never thought about this. we always talk about the tv. -- bthe teeth. because of this contraption he wore in his mouth, he had a hard time speaking. >> this is not a trivial aspects of washington's life. by the time that he was inaugurated, he had only one tooth left. it was a lonely bicuspid hanging on. he had a complete set of dentures made and there was a hole drilled without teeth was. the ditchers were held in place by that one too. -- tooth.

they were connected by a curved metal spring. the only way is that they stayed in the mouth is the person had to keep their mouth closed. as you open your mouth to speak, the pressure was released on that spring and there was always the possibility that the dentures would come flying out of your mouth. i think that one reason why washington tended to keep his speeches very short, he must have been very self-conscious. he was not given to long winded speeches. for a man of washington's pride, he always have to worry of an occasion that the ventures would slip out of his mouth. >> any idea of when he started losing his teeth? >> he started losing his teeth when he was in his 20s. at the very end of the revolution, he had a french

dentist that comes to the continental army headquarters to work with washington and washington was so self-conscious about his bad teeth that he thought that people would mock it. he does not even mention that he is meeting with this dentist. he had a dentist in new york named john greenwood. when washington corresponds with greenwood, he never uses such telltale words as teas or dentures. he would say that he received the items that he said. it is funny to think of such a great man who was so self- conscious about this defect.

this creates an enormous sense of compassion, particularly -- one set of his dentures were ungainly contraptions and you see them in the picture them rubbing along the guns and day after day, you realize how agonizing it must have been to have those in your mouth. it was gruesome. >> you talk a lot about hemorrhoids. >> by the time that george washington is 30 years old, he has had smallpox. he has had malaria. he has had dysentery. in the 18th century, if you lived to 50 or 60, you probably live to 70 or 80 because there were so many epidemics all the time. i think that washington was a very hearty specimen who was able to survive all of these

illnesses. he came from a very short lived family. his father died at 49 and his older brother died at 34. it probably gave him a sense that he was going to defy the odds of his family and actually have the long life. he died at 67, which is much younger than the next five or six presidents, but by the standards of the washington mail, washington was unusually long lived. >> you said that he traveled lying down. >> he had dysentery during the french war. it caused diarrhea. it was very painful for him to sit on his horse. there is an extraordinary example of washington's bravery, writing in this battle as a

conspicuous target on a horse and the took four bullets in his clothing. he had two horses shot out from under him. a presbyterian minister said that it looked like george washington was being preserved by province for some important future service for his country which was one of the great calls in history. >> you said that nobody touched washington. >> washington did not like to be touched. there is a story that makes the point. that the constitutional convention, hamilton and morris were talking about whether it was true that washington did not like to be touched. what -- hamilton made morris a bet that he would not go over and touch washington. morris went over and gave

washington a slot on the shoulder and asked how he was. washington turned and gave him a glare that he never forgot. we do not know that story is authentic, but people were shocked when washington -- many stories have lafayette embracing washington with both arms. the fact that people recorded this was an expression of their shock that someone was behaving this way. he always told his of ordnance, whether it was a military or political supporters, but one of the symbols of leadership was not to be overly familiar with the support net. >> this sounds like the same question, but you also said that he did not shake hands. >> yes.

when he had the reception as president, he would go around the room and not the people. whether this was borrowed from the royalty, we do not know. this was an aping of royal ways. he had the sense of personal dignity. it was very much a part of his power and very much a part of his mystique. washington would never make it as a politician today because he was not a glad handing, backslapping man. there is something very attractive about the formality and innate dignity of the man. >> you mentioned a tribute to james/near -- to james.

what do you have in your book that they do not have in their books. ? >> i have probably five-to-10 times as much material to work with. freeman was a researcher. the other author had a another style. the conception of biography has changed quite rapidly over the last century. at the time that freeman was writing, biography was still the public record of a public man. now, when we read a biography, we expected to be a rounded portrait of the person. i have a very detailed portrait of george his marriage to mark the which you would not get in those books.

marriage to margaret which you would not get in those books. this was seen as war incidental of a great man. he was a private man that you would not find in those biographies. >> speaking of the slave question, there is a note that you make where george washington th of slaves.e >> we do not know if the got them from his own slaves. ditchers were not made of wood. people thought it was would because -- it was made of ivory.

it took on a granular look. if you look at it now, you would think it would be would. the ivory was actually the frame. there were actually real teeth inserted into the dentures. we do not know this for fact, but it has been discovered that he bought teeth from negros. he may have had in his mouth, teeth from his own slaves. dentist would advertise in the fromapers and by theeth people who would lose them. he may have been walking around with teeth from one or several slaves. >> any idea what the first run is on the book and how much it will put out on the market? >> i do not know exactly.

>> would it be 50,000, 60,000 or 100,000? >> a little bit more than 100,000. >> you have a book on j.p. morgan, the warbugs which was more successful? >> in a commercial standpoint, i have tried to keep broadening my focus. number of people have come in commented that there was not a large economic dimension. after i did morgan and "the warbugs," i was being stereotyped and i would give a speech and people would start yelling in the audience for me

to do it vanderbilt or carnegie next. -- to do vanderbilt or carnegie next. with hamilton, it would lead me into constitutional law and foreign policy. with each book, you have to try to expand your range as a writer or other was to go stale. i hope the people that read the previous books, i hope they do not mind that with washington, there is not a very big financial or economic dimension. >> when did you start this book? >> i started it six months ago. even though you say is a very long book, i felt that i was writing it on the back of a postage stamp because the books that i had it -- the book that i had in mind, the standard residences -- the standard references on washington, i was

trying to do the same thing as others in a single volume. there have been a lot of books on washington in recent years. i noticed that people were either doing a year such as 1776 crossing.ton's the gatt that i saw in the literature was the -- the gap that i saw in the literature was something that would be all encompassing. it would need to be a synthesis of all of the new documents and all of the new information about washington. that is what i set out to do. >> where did you spend your time along the way?

>> most of the time, i just spent in my home office. usually, i travel to archives and i sit there wiping the dust off of records and straining my eyes to decipher handwritings. in this case, i was able to buy these 60 volumes of the washington papers and the 17 volumes from the old edition. >> how much of that did you really read? >> i can honestly say that i stand every page. i cannot say that i rread every word of every page. you develop instincts as a historian in terms of what is significant or useful. since washington died, there have been 900 biographies. i could not read every page of

every biography, so i decided i could focus more of my time and attention on going through original materials rather than going through every single book that has been written about washington. >> in your book, if you also pay tribute to your deceased wife who died in the middle of all this in 2006. what did that do to this whole process? >> this is the darkest period in my life. my wife and i were together for almost 28 years. in addition to being the most wonderful wife a man can have, she played a very important part in my career. she was my muse. she was my confidant. she was my in-house after. over dinner, we would discuss the book and she would ask me a question that would send me scurrying back to the books. i used to read the books aloud

to her. she was a perfect proxy for my ideal reader. she would suddenly interrupt and say that she did not understand something or that one line was not clear. she would say to my distain that the book was dragging a little bit. she was absolutely -- i was very grateful for this book because i was working on it during the final year of her life. after i lost her, the book had structure. i was lucky. every morning, i would open the door and i was in the 18th century, which was a nice escape. remember, george washington is a great story. he is someone coping with adversity with 42, will power, patience, forgiveness,

thesetance, all of qualities. he was a good role model for me to have. it was tough. >> how old was she? -- how long will she sit? >> she was sick for about a 4.5 your time. -- for 0.5 year. -- period. i would have valerie there at the breakfast and it was a solitude surrounded by this extraordinary marriage. the solitude became quite heroin. suddenly, she was not there. i was very fortunate to have terrific friends and family members. buddy, lost her, when you have been with somebody -- when i

lost her, we have been was somebody for so long, i began to say to myself -- i would hear her in my mind. i did sometimes carry on an imaginary dialogue with her. she would ask me different questions. it was very hard. i was actively worried about the writing, that there was some very significant dimensions in my writing career. could i produce something that was worthy of the earlier books? >> you mentioned earlier that he spent a lot of time on washington's marriage. >> yes. >> where did that relationship start? >> it started back in 1758 when

he went to go consult a doctor. met this young widow. she was living in a house called the white house, i kid you not. there was a whirlwind courtship. they dated a few times before they decided to marry. it was not the most romantic marriage in history, but i think that it was one of those marriages that ripened into a deep friendship. i think that marcia washington was absolutely indomitable -- invaluable to george washington. she was extraordinarily wealthy as a widow. she gave him emotional support. he really needed a confidante. he was a reserved character.

she was a real social asset. you have a sense, with washington, that once they married, they went to having one kind of life and having been settled. i think that they really needed a very subtle all live in order to be successful. >> we might as well throw sally fairfax in there at this point. >> this is one of the great mysteries of' s life. on the eve of his marriage -- on the -- great mysteries of washington's life. the occupied a beautiful mansion.

the fairfax family control 5 million a. between the potomac and another with -- 5 million acres between the potomac and another river. he writes a letter to sally in declaration of love. she rebuffed. i concluded that this had to have been an infatuation rather than what i would call low. i would argue it this way. infatuation can cool rather quickly when circumstances change. real love would have endured. the fact that it deal bought -- it did not endure, george and martha washington became very close friends with sally fairfax. after their marriage, the travel

together. they vacationed together. i think that george washington, had he really been a lot -- been in love with sally fairfax, the idea of traveling with your wife and woman you love it, it would have been out. there was no question that the rights this declaration of love, but i think that it fairly quickly cooled into something else. >> what documents survived the letters? >> we have more of the letters that george wrote to sally rather than what sally wrote to george, which might surprise some of the people. it is based on a small handful of letters that were discovered only -- i think they came to

light in the 1950's and people were very shocked by this. george washington was a very passionate figure. he was very attentive to women. the aphrodisiac of power -- i have a many quotes in the book about women swooning over washington and various assemblies. washington took very careful notes of those swooning women. >> you said that he was never able to express his forbidden feelings of rage. he learned to equate silence and a certain man is the liberty of with strength -- certain manly stolidity with strength. you think that the mother of

a father of our country will have all sorts of pride or pleasure in her son. we really do not have any proof. she was constantly critical of george for neglecting. we have quite a number of letters to her. it is a very correct and rather frothy tone. he is suppressing this rage against his mother. there is speculation that he first learned to govern and these powerful emotions in dealing with his mother. he was never really able to openly express the hostility that i think that he felt towards her. >> how long was she in his life? >> she was there a long time. she was still alive when he becomes the first president.

she dies, even though she had never gone to new york to visit him. she did not attend george and martha's wedding. even though she was living in fredericksburg, we have no evidence that she ever went to visit george and martha at mount vernon. george washington was the most dutiful silent family man and everyone loved martha washington. it is hard to imagine someone having a bad relationship with martha washington. there is an episode that i described in the books where she gets a letter from the speaker of the virginia assembly assaying that there is something no -- assembly, saying that his mother was in the state chapel, lobbying for an emergency pension.

she also implied that she had been abandoned by her sons. washington is humiliated and sits down and writes to his brother and tells him to please talk to their mother because he knew how much money he had given her. that was quite a public situation to have's the commander in mother seeking poverty -- commander in' mothermmander in chief's in poverty. washington was a very wary person and it took a long time to win his trust. he would very slowly let down his part.

dr. james gregor was the family physician. he was there with washington at the moment he dies. it was not that washington was a solitary figure at all, but it is a very different kind of figure from the other founders. he have the most difficult relationship with of all the founders? >> i would think john adams. even though john adams was the first vice-president, john adams was conspicuously excluded from the inner council. adams starts out at the second continental congress.

it was adams it was the most influential advocate of george washington to be commander in chief. there was a lot of sniping as the years go by. adams, who was always worried about his place in history is petrified that he will be upstaged by two people. benjamin franklin and george washington. he said that when the story of the revolutionary war is told, it will be benjamin franklin striking the ground with his lightning rod and out spring george washington and there you have the whole thing in a nutshell. he was not wrong. washington and franklin would receive this tremendous adulation. in terms of washington's relations with the other founders, he had much better relations with the founders of the previous generation like franklin, who was 25 years older

than washington. madison and hamilton were about 25 years younger. he had difficult relations with his age group. adams was three years younger. jefferson was about 12 years younger than washington. this is true during the revolutionary war, that washington feels competitive with his age peers on a subconscious level and feels threatened. whereas he has a much better relations with both older and younger men. i am thinking of the year 1775, i found almost no one over 50. >> alexander hamilton very quickly was chief of staff. he was only 22 years old.

when hamilton becomes the first treasury secretary and facto prime minister, in washington's first term, hamilton was 34 years old. the population was under them they would be now. you would not have the political system dominated by people in their 50s and 60s. this was a unique period of history. there was a need for youth and vitality and creativity. we had a war to fight in the constitution to right and the government to create. people had that kind of creativity and you see this in the careers of both madison and hamilton. they are quickly drawn into politics and the need was there. >> was he a humble man or was he a man would ride a big white

horse. he requested a personal guard. explain that story. >> this is a rather bizarre story. washington decided to create personal guard early in revolutionary war to guard him and to guard his papers. he tells his officers that the man he once for this regard cannot be taller than 5 ft. 10 in. and neither shorter than 5 ft. 8 in.. the following year, not satisfied with that, he issues a new set of orders that they cannot be taller than 5 ft. 10 in. or shorter than 5 ft. 9 in.. it was kind of a hollywood uniformity to his personal guard. i find out that washington

thought that your personal appearance was made up of your inner order. he spent more than five years in the french and indian war and had been exposed to a lot of british generals and they had their of followers and their staff. the >> you said that he went to every state after he became president. but when he would go into a community, what was the group that would precede him? >> it is very interesting. he decided that he would visit the northern states and then he would visit the soft -- of the southern states. he traveled from town to town by carriage, but he will always bring along a white parade horse. when he was a mile or to outside of town, he would dismount from

the carriage and on the white parade horse and into the town. why did he do that? >> he had a great sense of showmanship. he knew that he looked great on horseback. it is not coincidental that we have all of these statues of george washington. on the other hand, he feels so burdened by his own celebrity. the same man rides into town on a white horse will then inform us in his diary is that he learned that a procession of dignitaries will accompany him out of time -- out of town. he would leave early before the escorts could accompany him because he tired of all the adulation and receptions and speeches. he was not -- washington had many virtues, but one virtue he did not have a spontaneity.

nowadays, you think a politician of someone who can come up with anecdote.t bu they wanted to idolize him and he got tired of it. whatever ambitions he had as a young man, and his ambitions were quite enormous, he had more than his though as time went on and he begin to feel depressed. >> when did you know almost nothing about washington? when did your process of learning about him start and where did you are to change a perception? >> the hamilton maugre to was the first 18th-century book that i did. hamilton was the protagonist of the book and washington was the hero. i was very impressed by the way

that all the other founders became partisans for a particular cause. all of them get sidetracked into a very petty, sometimes very ambitious personal disputes with each other george washington is the one person who keeps his eyes fixed on the goal. that impressed me tremendously when i was writing the hamilton book because hamilton and jefferson become consumed by a pathological hatred of each other. that leads to the formation of these two parties. he was always trying to rise above the fray, not unlike president obama, he gets into office open to be a non-partisan president and very reasonable and learn exactly what president obama learned, that it was not going to happen. >> money, you point out that his taxes were in arrears.

>> i was shocked by that. one of the paradoxes of washington is that it is said that he was one of the richest men in the colony. he was a land rich and certainly slaves rich, but he was cash poor. he had to borrow money to go to his own inauguration in new york in 1789. at the end of his second term as president, he had to borrow money again to take his family and slaves back to philadelphia. this is a man who is constantly weighed down by concerns over money. it runs throughout his entire life. unfortunately, like a lot of the virginia planters, he was a real spendthrift. he was a compulsive shopper.

>> at the time that he had the most land, how many acres did he on? >> washington, by the end, have at least -- at least 400 thousand or 50,000 -- 40,000 or 50,000 a.. he was constantly trying to sell to pay off his debt. this sounds like a lot, but at the time, there were a lot of people that were massive land owners. in fact, one of washington's grievances against the british empire is that at the end of the french and indian war, they settled or west of the allegheny mountains and there were a lot of virginians like washington that were snapping up all of this -- snatching up all of this land in western virginia and they felt that the british empire was suddenly the working their ambitions.

everything revolved around land at that time. >> one thing that also popped up was the tumor that kept recurring. what was the tumor? >> washington, during his first few years in will office almost died. he began running a high fever. at the time, it was thought that it might be a form of anthrax. it was an infection, but they feared for his life. it was very painful for him to sit. the reconfigured his counsel that he could lie down. the cordoned off the street and sprinkled strauss of the other would not be any nor is the bother washington. it flared up again a couple of years later. then, there was an episode, the following year, when washington

had the flu that developed into pneumonia. he was sick for several weeks. everyone has written him off and then, miraculously, he survives. that was something. >> thomas to the public know about all of these illnesses? >> the press kept a very discreet silence on both occasions. they did not immediately say anything because they knew that the executive mansion was cordoned off and there was a lot of gossip going around. the press did not reveal its until relatively late in the processed. at that point, the press was still protective of a politician's privacy. that would change very rapidly. >> in the second hour of this

two-part series, we would talk more about the things other in the book. leading up to that, i went through and found a number of pages devoted to each section. what was the purpose of calling that section the frontiers and? >> there was so much of washington's last bet on the frontier, not only fighting in the french and indian war, but by the time he was 50 or 16, the was in the frontier area. washington also has a vision of america expanding to the west. i wanted to draw the contrast to the second section when he became a planter and was a much more genteel kind of life. i point out that this was

somebody who shuttled very easily with in the world of a bachelor. >> the biggest section is 267 pages devoted to the general. >> that would have to be the center of it. i really tried to do the whole life. sometimes you read the whole lot of washington and it is the revolutionary war. i wanted to give attention to both terms of president and the time is passing between the revolutionary war and the time that he becomes president. >> y 83 pages to the statesman? >> you have to pity me, here, brian. i had 5.5 years of the french and indian war.

i have eight years of the two term presidency. i am very aware that i have to do justice to those big chunks of the story. you really cannot skimp when it ose.s to that o the presidency gets 205 pages. we will continue this discussion, but the most interesting thing you learned about this presidency? >> sometimes it is portrayed that george washington somehow floated above the fray, that he was a figurehead. not at all. washington was absolutely on top of everything but was going on. even jefferson marveled at the way that not only was everyone reporting to washington, but washington wanted to review all outgoing letters and jefferson

marveled at the way that washington was aware of roughly everything that was happening in the of administration. he was a much stronger president than i think people realize. he was very creative. he was forging the office of the presidency. he establishes a benchmark in terms of brilliance. he is defining the system of separation of powers and checks and balances. most importantly, we are still living with george washington's presidency. washington decided that the engine of for a domestic policy is going to be the presidency. it is not want to be the congress. >> ron chernow, author of "washington: a life." that you for joining us. >> thank you.

>> for a dvd copy of this program call 1-877-662-7726. for free transcripts or to give us your comments about this program, visit us at q&a.org. >> into night, newly elected british labor party ed milliband, then harvard -- been gordon brown at harvard university and then a second chance to see q&a with ron chernow. tomorrow, the first televised debate between ohio senate candidates.

lee fisher and rob portman. watch live coverage at 7:00 p.m. .astern here on c-span > the c-span networks is available on television, radio, online and on social media networking sites. find our content any time through a c-span's video library trip we take c-span on the road with our digital bus and local content vehicle, bringing resources to your community. the c-span network is available in 100 million homes, created by cable, provided us about it -- a public -- . provided as a public service. he describes himself as an optimist and the leader of a new generation of labor. he