#william maclay

Let's go back to Washington's early youth where he wrote down the "Rules of Civility & Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation". There, one rule, in particular, stands out:

"In the presence of others sing not to yourself with a humming noise, nor drum with your fingers or feet."

Washington wanted to be a part of high society since his early youth and unfortunately, the Washington family was not there from the beginning. So he has strived all his life to be accepted by the high society and has oriented his actions and behavior accordingly.

Now of course the question arises, if Washington was always so anxious to make a good impression, why did he seem to throw this behavior completely overboard when he became president? And the period of the presidency is correct since no information takes place before this time (is probably because before the war nobody was really interested in Washington and during the war nobody had time to document Washington's habits. (Among other things, because these poor soldiers didn't have enough food or dishes)).

When Washington became president, he became again equally a public figure. The problem, however, was that at that point Washington felt he was no longer sufficiently capable of handling the stress of public life. In addition, he had always had difficulty approaching strangers and making small talk with them (he didn't like it either).

All the better that Hamilton recommended him to hold the so-called "Levees" once a week. The reason for this recommendation was that Washington feared he would not be able to do his job as president properly if some curious admirers wanted to see him all around the clock.

Levees were receptions where Washington offered visitors a chance to talk to him at a set time once a week. Washington was not thrilled with the idea but went along with it. His Levees were held every Tuesday afternoon at three p.m. These Levees, however, were for men only, and usually only bigwigs like senators and the like. (Levees for the women were held by Martha Washington every Friday evening between Seven to Ten).

Washington, punctual as he was, greeted his guests exactly at three and at three-fifteen no more visitors were allowed to come (they were not punctual and Washington was quite merciless about that. My german heart loves him for this ^^). The visitors bowed to Washington and Washington bowed to them, but he never shook hands (he usually held a sword or a hat to avoid such physical contact). The dinner itself (of course they ate there, but only at four p.m.) was mostly described as fairly quiet. Visitors did try to engage Washington in conversation but mostly failed to do so, as Washington did not accommodate them in any way. The visitors, however, did not find this rude but recognized positive aspects in Washington's behavior. (In short, Washington could do what he wanted, people admired him... If one disregards his second term as president, but that is also a completely different story).

Of course, there were also some (among others a newspaper) who were very critical of these receptions and accused the Washingtons of wanting to introduce a monarchy. One of these critics was William Maclay.

Maclay was the Senator from Pennsylvania and although he was rather critical of Washington, he gave us a wonderful insight into Washington's social behavior as he was a regular guest at these Levees. These insights of Maclay's, fortunately, survive in his diary.

At a dinner in August 1789, Maclay saw Washington kept a fork as the meal was cleared and at first thought, he would keep it to eat a few nuts in between (Washington loved nuts) but was proven wrong when Washington suddenly began drumming the fork on the table. Maclay described this dinner as solemn but also deadly quiet.

At another dinner in March 1790, Maclay described another such dinner where Washington drummed on the table with his knife and fork, like drumsticks at every interval between drinking or eating. In short, dinners with Washington were pretty darn quiet, and to fill that awkward silence and boredom, Washington drummed on the table.

But it is also very interesting to mention here that Washington did not talk to his guests out of pure meanness or on purpose. Washington was already 58 years old at that time, not so old by today's standards, but not bad by the standards of that time (and even more so for a Washington, considering that most of the male Washingtons died before their fifties). Washington had lived his entire life as a soldier and was surrounded by musket or cannon fire, which is not good for a hearing in the long run. In short, Washington was deaf as hell and probably didn't hear much of the conversation going on around the table, which is why he was rather absent.

In conclusion, Washington didn‘t like these Levees and made only meager effort to start a conversation with his guests. Mostly because he didn‘t like smalltalk and was also not really good at it. Another reason for his silence was, that he was pretty deaf. To fill this silence or to enjoy himself he drummed.

So, yeah! Washington was drumming on the table with his silverware, and I hope I've now been able to clarify a bit why he was doing that.

As for my sources, I used Washington: A Life by Ron Chernow and George Washington's Rules of Civility & Decent Behaviour In Company and Conversation. Links down below :D

https://managers.usc.edu/files/2015/05/George-Washingtons-Rules.pdf