The Plot to Remove Washington: Part 2
Yesterday we began this story (see it here). You heard about Dr. Benjamin Rush, the Father of American Psychiatry, who was one of the most vocal critics of Washington’s handling of his troops. This was the same Benjamin Rush who, all evidence to the contrary, championed bloodletting as a miracle cure. I’m sure the leeches loved him. Rush insisted you could remove up to 80% of a person’s blood with harming him. No wonder fellow physicians called him the “Remorseless Master Bleeder.” No wonder today’s psychiatrist call him “father.” (These “modern” doctors champion shock treatment and implanting permanent wires in people’s brains to deliver shocks throughout the day.) That was the kind of man who sought to remove George Washington as Commanding General. But he was not alone. One of those trying to undermine Washington was an ambitious foreign officer named Thomas Conway. In a letter to Congress, Conway boasted of his skills and asked for a promotion to major general – skipping right