In the glorious annals of our Great Republic, who was our first great spymaster?
The answer: George Washington.
It’s true. During the American Revolution, our great Continental Army had a very great problem: it was pathetic. So pathetic, it was awe-inspiring. Ill-equipped, ill-fed, ill-tempered, many of General Washington’s soldiers didn’t even have shoes. The Continental Congress paid those gritty guys what the Congress called Continental dollars. It was paper money worth less than the paper itself. Hence the American expression, “Not worth a Continental.”
America’s first great spymaster. In his right hand General Washington is holding a telescope, also known as a spyglass.
Quill in hand, an exasperated General Washington scribbled to a friend:
”Our treatment at the hands of the Congress and the States is a scandal… If the British Army doesn’t defeat us, it seems likely that our own factions will… Yesterday, when an aide reported that a delegation of enlisted men was at my door — something quite unheard of — I feared the worst: mutiny or desertion. (One could hardly blame them!) And when they expressed great sympathy with my difficulties and said they just wanted to assure that their own were understood, my eyes filled with tears.”
As I said, pathetic and awe-inspiring. Many went without shoes even during those bitterly cold winters spent camping out and shivering at Valley Forge.
With this colorfully ragged force, faced against the mighty British Empire, General Washington rode gallantly into battle. And lost. Repeatedly. Which is better than losing just once, when you consider the finality.
In point of fact, the history books record that Washington lost more battles than he won. But due to the good intelligence gathered for him by his spies, Washington did win the few battles that mattered. And oh, what wondrous spies Washington ran! Centuries before our own time, his spies utilized secret codes, invisible ink, even special equipment. In Philadelphia, a woman named Lydia Darragh hid messages inside the cloth buttons of her young son’s winter coat. Then the boy trounced off to visit his older brother in the Patriots’ camp. Day after day.
“My word, Agnes! Have you noticed every time that little boy goes into the woods, he comes back with a button missing? What his mother must think! My word! Kids today!”
Or in the words of General Washington himself, “There is nothing more necessary than good intelligence to frustrate a designing enemy. And nothing requires greater pains to obtain.”
Respectfully (because all my readers deserve respect),
Reginald Dipwipple
Secret Agent Extraordinaire
The Spymaster confers with one of his agents. Would you believe I found this picture on www.CIA.gov?