George Washington lived sixty-seven years, from 1732 to 1799. During his last twenty-four years—more than a third of his life—he was the foremost man in America, the man on whom the fate of his country depended more than on any other man. And these were fateful years. From 1775 to 1783—the years of the American War of Independence—Washington was Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army upon whose victory the thirteen colonies depended to secure their separate and equal station among the powers of the earth.
George Washington is called "the father of his country" for his crucial role in fighting for, creating and leading the United States of America in its earliest days. Washington was a surveyor, farmer and soldier who rose to command the Colonial forces in the Revolutionary War. He held the ragtag Continental Army together -- most famously during a frigid encampment at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania during the winter of 1777-78 -- and eventually led them to victory over the British. His success in the war made him a tremendously popular figure in America even after he retired to his farm at Mount Vernon in 1783. He was the natural choice to serve as the country's first president in 1789 after the new United States Constitution was ratified.
When he was a young officer in the Virginia Militia, he made a big mistake.The French were encroaching on the English territories, now the US, from Canada. They built a fort at present day Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. George Washington was sent out on a Reconnaissance mission to check out the fort. He had a Delaware Indian guide named "Halfking".On their way to the fort, they ran into some French soldiers and Washington ordered an attack. They captured a French Officer who was delivering a letter to the British at Williamsburg. Halfking killed him.To make matters worse, some of the French got away and made it back to the fort and the French and Indians went after Washington and his troops.
Washington decided to make a stand and built a small fort.It was a poor excuse for a fort though and to make matters worse, it was in a valley. The French could shoot down on the Virginians from the hills. It started raining and the valley flooded, to include the fort. George Washington had to surrender. He didn't read French and so didn't know that he signed a document ceding the land west of the appalachian mountains to the French. This started a war that lasted seven years with the French and the Indians.
