Colonel Washington, 1772

Oil on canvas. Washington and Lee University, Lexington, VA.

This portrait, commissioned by George Washington and painted by Peale at Mount Vernon, is the only authenticated pre-Revolution portrait we of the man. It depicts him ten years later in the uniform he wore while commander of the 1st Virginia Regiment (1754 – 62). Sticking out of his vest pocket is a paper inscribed Order of March.

On 21-May-1772 Washington wrote to Jonathan Boucher in Annapolis, Maryland, who had recommended Peale: I am now contrary to all expectation under the hands of Mr. Peale; but in so grave — and so sullen a mood — and now and then under the influence of Morpheus when some critical strokes are making, that I fancy the skill of this gentleman’s pencil will be hard put to it, in describing to the world what manner of man I am.

Despite deceptive appearances, the British were far from luxuriating in Philadelphia while Washington and his army suffered at Valley Forge. Every public building was used to house two thousand sick and wounded British and Hessian soldiers. The army was placed on half-rations, and there was a shortage of medical and hospital supplies that caused tension between the British and the Hessians. Unable to obtain supplies, the city became a prison for as many as fifty thousand inhabitants and troops.

— Andrew Jackson O’Shaughnessy

The Men Who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution, and the Fate of the Empire (2013)