Is America’s greatest myth really a myth?
Detail of Grant Wood’s 1939 painting Parson Weems’ Fable.
It became the most popular story about George Washington—a story about how honest he was. And then historians fell in love with the idea that it was all a lie. But is it really accurate to call this story a myth?
Listen to our 2-part series on this story, the man behind it, and the two men working to rewrite the idea that it’s a myth.
The story that defined George Washington for generations has also become known as one of the greatest myths in American history. It’s the story that Washington, when he was just six years old, took a hatchet to his father’s favorite cherry tree. And instead of lying about it, he told his father that he could not tell a lie; he was the culprit.
The cherry tree story was first put into print by Mason Locke Weems, AKA Parson Weems, in 1806. Since then it evolved and took on new meanings and soared in popularity. By the late 19th century, especially after Henry Cabot Lodge’s 1889 biography, professional historians increasingly dismissed Weems and called the story apocryphal, a myth, a fabrication. A pure invention of Weems.
Some biographers continue to call it that. Alexis Coe recently appeared on the podcast American History Hotline to discuss Washington myths with host Bob Crawford. Coe, who wrote the bestselling Washington biography You Never Forget Your First, called the cherry tree story “by far the greatest fan fiction ever invented because it was a lie.” To support her point, she said that Weems “doesn’t have any connection to Washington.”
To be fair, Coe did not invent the idea that Weems invented this story. Even Mount Vernon’s website calls the story “an invention.” Coe is echoing the confident claims of generations of historians and biographers. Many of them, Coe included, have been authorities on George Washington. But here’s the thing: No one claiming Weems invented this “myth” has been an authority on Weems himself. In fact, the more a historian knows about Weems, the less confident they seem to be in calling this story a myth.
We’re going to dig into the origins of the story, how it became so popular and then so reviled, and why the evidence suggests it should not be called a lie. We’re also going to look at the background of Parson Weems—the man whose reputation is at the heart of this “myth.”
Two men have made it their mission to explore the cherry tree truth: researchers James Bish and Dr. Richard Gardiner. They recently wrote a paper called “An Analysis of the Scholarly Consensus Regarding George Washington and the Cherry Tree ‘Myth’” where they make a compelling case for revisiting the mythical status of this story. As they explain, much of the disdain and vitriol directed at Weems has little to do with anything he actually said.
That’s because over time, the cherry tree story has morphed into something far less plausible than Weems’ original version. Weems never wrote that George Washington “chopped down” a cherry tree or that he was somehow physically incapable of lying. What Weems did write about was a young boy who “barked” up a cherry tree so much that it died, and a father who had frightened that young boy into believing that telling a lie would cost him his father’s love. It is a complete misreading of Weems to think he seriously said George Washington could never lie.
Let’s look at exactly what Weems said, in his own melodramatic words.
First, immediately before the cherry tree anecdote, Weems tells us about George’s dad Augustine, and Augustine’s love of honesty:
Never did the wise Ulysses take more pains with his beloved Telemachus, than did Mr. Washington with George, to inspire him with an early love of truth. “Truth, George,” said he,” is the loveliest quality of youth. I would ride fifty miles, my son, to see the little boy whose heart is so honest, and his lips so pure, that we may depend on every word he says. How lovely does such a child appear in the eyes of everybody! His parents dote on him. His relations glory in him. They are constantly praising him to their children, whom they beg to imitate him. They are often sending for him to visit them; and receive him, when he comes, with as much joy as if he were a little angel, come to set pretty examples to their children.
Then, Weems takes us to a dark place of child disownment and death:
“But, oh! How different, George, is the case with the boy who is so given to lying, that nobody can believe a word he says! He is looked at with aversion wherever he goes, and parents dread to see him come among their children. Oh, George! my son! Rather than see you come to this pass, dear as you are to my heart, gladly would I assist to nail you up in your little coffin, and follow you to your grave. Hard, indeed, would it be to me to give up my son, whose little feet are always so ready to run about with me, and whose fondly looking eyes, and sweet prattle make so large a part of my happiness. But still I would give him up, rather than see him a common liar.”
This is when Augustine’s messages get a bit muddled. After telling young George he would rather see him dead than a liar, he progressively decries parents who beat their children for lying:
“Pa,” said George very seriously, “do I ever tell lies?”
“No, George, I thank God you do not, my son and I rejoice in the hope you never will. At least, you shall never, from me, have cause to be guilty of so shameful a thing. Many parents, indeed, even compel their children to this vile practice, by barbarously beating them for every little fault: hence, on the next offence, the little terrified creature slips out a lie! just to escape the rod. But as to yourself George, you know I have always told you, and now tell you again, that, whenever by accident, you do any thing wrong, which must often be the case, as you are but a poor little boy yet, without experience or knowledge, you must never tell a falsehood to conceal it; but come bravely up, my son, like a little man, and tell me of it: and, instead of beating you, George, I will but the more honour and love you for it, my dear.”
This, you’ll say, was sowing good seed!—Yes, it was: and the crop, thank God, was, as I believe it ever will be, where a man acts the true parent, that is, the Guardian Angel, by his child.
Keep in mind this was almost 300 years ago. As tempting as it is to impose our current understanding of emotional abuse onto an 18th century father telling his son he would gladly nail him in his coffin if he lied, this was apparently considered enlightened parenting compared to gratuitous beatings.
Now that we’ve set up George’s dad’s feelings about liars, let’s give this kid a hatchet and see what happens:
The following anecdote is a case in point. It is too valuable to be lost, and too true to be doubted; for it was communicated to me by the same excellent lady to whom I am indebted for the last.
“When George,” said she, “was about six years old, he was made the wealthy master of a hatchet of which, like most little boys, he was immoderately fond, and was constantly going about chopping every thing that came in his way. One day, in the garden, where he often amused himself hacking his mother’s pea-sticks, he unluckily tried the edge of his hatchet on the body of a beautiful young English cherry-tree, which he barked so terribly, that I don’t believe the tree ever got the better of it. The next morning the old gentleman, finding out what had befallen his tree, which, by the by, was a great favourite, came into the house; and with much warmth asked for the mischievous author, declaring at the same time, that he would not have taken five guineas for his tree. Nobody could tell him anything about it. Presently George and his hatchet made their appearance. “George,” said his father, “do you know who killed that beautiful little cherry tree yonder in the garden?” This was a tough question; and George staggered under it for a moment; but quickly recovered himself: and looking at his father, with the sweet face of youth brightened with the inexpressible charm of all-conquering truth, he bravely cried out, “I can’t tell a lie, Pa; you know I can’t tell a lie. I did cut it with my hatchet.”—Run to my arms, you dearest boy, cried his father in transports, run to my arms; glad am I, George, that you killed my tree; for you have paid me for it a thousand fold. Such an act of heroism in my son is worth more than a thousand trees, though blossomed with silver, and their fruits of purest gold.”
In this original version, young George barked up his father’s tree and—after a moment of hesitation—fessed up to it. And George’s father, instead of having to gladly bury a tiny liar-filled coffin, rejoiced that his arboricidal son was honest.
It is important to consider Weems’ version of this story because—aside from the flowery imagined dialogue and Augustine being so extra—it’s entirely plausible. There is nothing unbelievable about a kid with a hatchet hacking away at a young tree. Nor is there anything remarkable about a scared child confessing to something they obviously did. Only later did George’s character become twisted into an impossibly pious six-year-old lumberjack felling trees.
Mason Locke Weems has been dismissed for making up lies about George Washington just to make a buck. To me this idea seems rooted in societal beliefs that historians and clergy should both be poor. It also speaks to a misunderstanding of Weems’ immense popularity and literary career.
Weems was born in Maryland in 1759, the nineteenth child in his family. He trained in medicine before turning to theology and was among the first Americans ordained in the Church of England before it transitioned into the Episcopal Church in the United States. As a preacher, Weems had a big personality and habits that church elders looked down upon—preaching in scandalous places like ballrooms and Methodist churches, and to enslaved Blacks. He also played the fiddle and told jokes. He was a little too showy, and it probably cost him his congregation. That’s when he took to the road, becoming an itinerant bookseller—the “book-peddling parson” as one short biography dubbed him.
Portrait of Parson Weems, from the Collections of the South Carolina Historical Society.
Weems traveled the country pulling his wagon full of books from Philadelphia to Savannah and setting up shop in churches, town squares, and outside general stores and taverns, especially on court days when the townspeople would gather. He would set up wherever he could deliver a rousing sermon, followed by a sales pitch.
His travels gave him a keen sense of what Americans in the 1790s and early 1800s wanted—things like Bibles, morally instructive children’s books, and lurid true crime wrapped in a moral lesson. That was a market need that Parson Weems filled by writing it himself. He wrote a series of “God’s Revenge” books including God’s Revenge Against Murder, or the Drowned Wife and the spoiler-heavy title: God’s Revenge Against Adultery: Awfully Exemplified in the Following Cases of American Crime: The Accomplished Dr. Theodore Wilson, Who for Seducing Mrs. Nancy Wiley Had His Brains Blown Out By Her Husband.
Weems also wrote about politics, particularly the dangers of party politics. His work here is worthy of another look, especially today. Weems saw the growing partisan divide during the election between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, and he wrote a pamphlet called The Philanthropist warning the nation against putting party before country. After Weems praises the American form of government as something that should be loved, he asks:
But how shall we manifest our love? By splitting into parties and mortally hating one another? No, God forbid; for a furious party spirit is the greatest judgment, the heaviest curse that can befall our country. It extinguishes love in the best hearts, and in the worst it blows up the coals of hatred to ten fold fury.
Weems believes the purpose of government “is to unite men in promoting their mutual interest, but the aim of party spirit is to disunite them entirely.” He says that party spirit:
makes even good men shy of one another and breaks off the sweetest friendship. This vile spirit deforms everything; by giving a hardness to the features and a fierceness to the eyes it turns the loveliest woman into a fright, and the comeliest man into a demon. It pollutes the most sacred places, introducing unnatural strifes even there where sweetest harmony should ever sound; in our streets and at our tables.
Weems sent a copy of this pamphlet to Washington and Washington happily endorsed it, probably because it echoed the sentiments in his own farewell address.
In 1799, months before Washington died, Weems set out to write a morally instructive biography of him. After Washington’s death the appetite for such a work only grew, and Weems already had a head start in feeding it. His first version of the life of Washington came out in 1800. In 1806 he greatly expanded the work with newly collected anecdotes and released the fifth edition; this is the first edition that contains the story of Washington and the cherry tree.
Weems’ biography of Washington became so popular that for decades it was reportedly the second bestselling book in the country, second only to The Bible. A backlash against such a popular work was practically inevitable.
In their paper, Bish and Gardiner trace the history of the backlash against Weems and address the main reasons historians have written him off, even acknowledging that Weems wasn’t above the occasional plagiarism.
Let’s be clear: there are many reasons to be skeptical of Mason Locke Weems. If he were a victim in an episode of Law & Order: SVU, the assistant district attorney would be nervous about putting him on the stand—would he be credible enough for the jury to believe him? And Olivia Benson would remind the ADA that there are no perfect victims. Nor are there perfect sources. Then Ice-T would chime in, “No perfect parsons, either.”
Parson Weems is the only printed source we have for this story, and a major reason historians have dismissed him—recently cited by Alexis Coe—is the idea that he had no connection to Washington or his family, no access to a family story like this. Folks who have studied Weems know this isn’t true. Weems corresponded with Washington, he stayed at Mount Vernon with him, and he married into his extended family. In his book I Can’t Tell A Lie: Parson Weems and the Truth about George Washington’s Cherry Tree, Prayer at Valley Forge, and Other Anecdotes, Bish painstakingly makes the case that Weems was extremely well-connected to collect anecdotes for a book about Washington’s youth from people who knew Washington as a young man.
So where did Weems get this story? He said the cherry tree story was “related to me twenty years ago by an aged lady who was a distant relative, and when a girl spent much of her time in the family.” This vague reference to a nameless source has been used to discredit the story, but Bish and Gardiner make a compelling case that Weems would likely have interacted with a woman who fit this exact description while he was drafting the book. That woman was Washington’s cousin Sinah Ball McCarty. Four years his elder, she spent a lot of time with George as a child.
Bish and Gardiner admit this is no smoking gun, but it should be ample enough evidence to stop anyone from saying Washington had no connection to Weems.
Even if we assume that Sinah Ball McCarty was Weems’ source for the story—which is a speculative assumption—that still doesn’t make the story true. In other words, even if an elderly Sinah Ball told Weems the story, that doesn’t mean it actually happened.
That would be relying on something called “reminiscent testimony,” not a historian’s preferred sourcing, but sometimes the best or only thing you can get about certain subjects. Lincoln biographer Douglas L. Wilson talks about this in his book Honor’s Voice: The Transformation of Abraham Lincoln:
In the absence of reliable evidence, Lincoln biography for this period must be almost exclusively woven out of a more doubtful material: the recollections and anecdotes, reported long after the fact, of people who knew him.
Reminiscent testimony is admittedly problematical. Not only is it often vague and ambiguous, it is notoriously subject to the aberrations of memory, the prejudices of the informant, the selective character of the reporting, and the subtle transformations that occur when a story is either resurrected from the depths of the past or recalled repeatedly over time.
Reminiscent testimony may have been, in this case, all Weems had. For him that would have been more than enough. He wasn’t writing history the way professional historians write history, but the field wasn’t really defined at the time he was writing. Collecting anecdotes and publishing them was a major part of biographies through the early 20th century.
Weems was taking anecdotes and adding dialogue and accentuating the moral lessons he wanted to convey. This resulted in stories that sound overwrought and unbelievable, but when you remove the style and look at the substance, there’s nothing unbelievable about a six-year-old boy hacking at a young tree with a hatchet and confessing to it. That is the heart of the story, and that story has never been proven false or definitively debunked.
The anecdote may be dubious or even doubtful. It may even be a myth in the sense that it has become a legendary story. But the meaning of myth as something false—as a lie—cannot be accurately or responsibly applied to this story. In that sense, the real myth—according to Bish and Gardiner—is that this story has been proven to be a myth.
For more about Bish and Gardiner’s cherry tree truth seeking journey, check out James Bish’s book I Can’t Tell A Lie: Parson Weems and the Truth about George Washington’s Cherry Tree, Prayer at Valley Forge, and Other Anecdotes and Bish and Gardiner’s incisive paper “An Analysis of the Scholarly Consensus Regarding George Washington and the Cherry Tree ‘Myth.’”
Listen to our two-part deep dive into this story. In our first episode, we dig into the background and larger-than-life character of Mason Locke Weems:
In our second episode, we welcome researchers James Bish and Dr. Richard Gardiner to discuss their recent work on the cherry tree story and its source.
