George Washington, Revolutionary War general, Founding Father, and first President of the United States was a warm and fascinating person. He suffered the agony of adolescent passion, fell in love with his best friend's wife, and married his friend Martha Custis. He poured out his political and military woes to his brother Jack in the dark days of 1776, and, in the midst of a miserable winter camped with his troops in Valley Forge, wrote a chatty letter to a friend in England. All these incidents are here in Washington's own words. Only through what Washington called his "letters of friendship" can we fully understand this complex man. They show him joking with his favorite Frenchman, the Marquis de Lafayette, advising his younger relatives on love and marriage, writing with emotion to the unobtainable woman he loved, and reconnecting with her in his old age. Selected and edited by New York Times bestselling author and historian Thomas Fleming from the thirty-seven volumes of Washington's collected writings, this book will be a revelation to all.