By Michael Ledwith

July 12th, 2026

So, what do you remember about George Washington prior to the 21st Century?

That he couldn’t tell a lie?

That he chopped down a cherry tree and admitted it to his father?

That he was The Father of Our Country?

First in war, first in peace, first in the hearts of his countrymen?

That he was famously taciturn, never smiled, rejected being a King and went home after being our first President to farm and lead a quiet life?

Today, in 2026 in the sacred towers of academia, on the most distinguished CNN panels, he is dismissed as a white enslaver.

His statues spray painted by the mob. The key George for young people in American history, George Floyd.

The George who defeated the British Empire after an eight-year war. The guy who signed The Constitution. The man who was elected the first President of The United States. The visionary who organized the Federal government, created the two term Presidency, secured the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity?

Not so much anymore.

Young Washington hopes to change the narrative back to what really happened and how George came to be first in our hearts.

Do you, or members of the mob, know anything about him when he was…young?

That he laughed, and flirted with pretty girls, was ambitious, was insanely brave and that he once washed his hands with the brains of a French officer after a savage skirmish that precipitated the French and Indian War?

That the stern-faced guy on the one-dollar bill turned to one of his generals, a rather portly fellow, just before crossing the ice-clogged Delaware river at midnight, and joked:

“Shift that fat ass, Harry, but slowly, or you’ll swamp the damned boat.”

The ‘Harry’ being Henry ‘Harry’ Knox of Fort Knox fame.

Or, that his bar tab at his farewell dinner after the War with his officers consisted of 54 bottles of Madeira, 60 bottles of claret, 8 bottles of whiskey, 22 bottles of porter, 8 bottles of hard ciders, 12 bottles of beer, and 7 large bowls of punch—for just 55 people?

Party on, George!

Young Washington came out of the blue (or maybe the Red, White, and Blue) unpromoted, unannounced, no pre-release interviews with the stars, no Access Hollywood or The View appearances.

It just, well, opened.

On the 3rd of July.

250 years before, on July 3rd 1776, Washington was in New York commanding the Continental Army, preparing for a British invasion.

I went to the first showing along with three other people at the Evanston Theater.

It was terrific. It was entertaining. It’s a serious movie.

Who knew there was a young Washington?

Who knew that there was a young America?

Vast forests. Indian Tribes. Colonists. Arrogant British generals.

The movie opens on a day in 1743.

George is eleven. The British have already been in Virginia for a hundred and forty years.

There are towns and cities and churches and farms and estates and classes. Position and wealth and privilege rule the day.

George’s father dies and his world is turned upside down. He is forced to drop out of school.

After the death, the family can’t afford to pay for school.

He discovers that he has an immutable position in life. A tenant farmer without fortune.

But, he’s determined little boy, and will go to school .

They’ll let me in, he cries to his mother!

But, alas, they won’t. The world is hard and uncaring, and he is turned away.

Homeschooled, instead by his half-brother. Who encourages him to read the classics. To read a book about how to be a gentleman. Who presents him with a surveyor’s compass and teaches him how to use it.

But, the young man’s ambition is to become a British Army officer.

He’s told by the British Army that he has neither the family connections nor the fortune required to be a British officer.

How different the world would be if he had been given a commission in the Coldstream Guards?

Pursuing a pretty girl he has met, he crashes a party at Dinwiddie Hall. Finagles his way into Lord Halifax’s presence, and asks to borrow some of his books. Volunteers to map the Lord’s vast new estates beyond the mountains in the Ohio Territory.

His pluck and confidence impress Halifax and soon he’s leading a surveying expedition into the wild, uncharted, Ohio Territory. Ostensibly to map the land, but also to investigate reports that the French are already there.

The fierce Mingo ‘Half-King’ Tenacharison leads him to the newly built French Fort Duquesne.

Rather than winter in place in harsh conditions, Washington gives the Half-King his horses and hurries back to report the devastating news on a raft.

Which overturns in icy rapids. The party is washed up on a small island in the middle of a raging river to slowly freeze to death in the night.

Providence intervenes. God has further use for a young George Washington despite his lack of position or wealth. The river freezes solid and they walk to shore.

Did you know that about George Washington?

Then, despite his complete lack of military experience, Washington is sent back with a detachment of colonial soldiers to confront the French and force them to leave the Crown’s land.

A hopeless mission designed to fail and perhaps get the pushy, ambitious Washington killed.

Guided by Tenarchison and his warriors, Washington discovers a small French Army detachment camped, having breakfast in the wilderness. Against his instructions, given the great power politics in play not to engage the French, a shot is fired.

The Mingos proceed to massacre the French.

Our future President is there.

He kills people. He witnesses the French aristocrat Joseph Coulon de Villiers, Sieur de Jumonville have his head split open with a tomahawk by Tenarchison.

In some accounts of the incident, not in the movie ,Washington is offered Jumonville’s scooped out brains to wash his hands with.

Did you know that about George Washington?

The mission is a failure. It might lead to war.

It leads to more battles in the wilderness. Savage battles and massacres. Washington’s military decisions lead to disaster.

He loses the pretty girl he flirted with to another. He’s considered a failure. A hopeless soldier.

But, he learns from his mistakes. He is a natural leader of men. The Indian warriors think he is blessed by God when, after a battle, they count the bullet holes in his clothing, bullet holes through his tricorn. They marvel that he survived.

Young Washington is a thrilling movie.

An exhilarating experience. The young, handsome William Franklyn-Miller, a convincing, compelling young George. The supporting cast solid, and seem to be having fun in their roles, their period costumes, in the natural, logical dialogue.

Nothing in Young Washington seems forced.

His belief that Americans should live in a meritocracy rather than class, privilege, and birth determining fate, a natural progression from his experiences.

His half-brother, teaching him how to play chess, mentions, “even a pawn can topple a king”.

Indeed.

At the end of Young Washington, George is twenty-three years old.

-30-

Frequent contributor Michael Ledwith is a former bag boy at Winn-Dixie, who worked on the Apollo Program one summer in college. A former U.S. Army officer, he ran with the bulls in Pamplona and saw Baryshnikov dance ‘Giselle’ at the Auditorium Theater. Surfer. Rock and roll radio in Chicago. Shareholder, Christopher’s American Grill, London. Father. Movie lover—favorite dialogue: “I say he never loved the emperor.”