There is no story that demonstrate’s George Washington’s honesty than the story of him chopping down the cherry tree and later confessing to it. But the story itself is of shady origin with little but widespread legends to account for the fact. But the reason of its existence and creation today center around the need for a stainless American icon to gather under.
The story was first popularized by Weem in one of his biography of George Washington. It is important to realize that Weem was mostly interested in two things: spreading “good” and making money by appealing to the common people. Weem realized he could accomplish both by making a saint out of George Washington. In that way, the morals would be spread and the common people would clamor to read what they wanted to read about their hero, fiction or real. Weem shaped his Washington to his standards and cut out everything that didn’t apply such as his lack of children and the fact that he owns slaves. If Weem was witholding information to sculpt the ideal Washington, then fabricating information wouldn’t be that far of a step. But Weem wasn’t the only one creating a Washington. William Thayer also told the story of the cherry tree with his own flair. Instead of George simply confessing to the crime, Thayer inputs him protecting a slave boy in the process also. This edit is simply to emphasize George Washington’s compassion to slaves at the whim of the author. What happened here was no different than stating George Washington prayed at Valley Forge in order to put him in a pious light. Or that George Washington was born as an unprivileged child (he was an agricultural upper class child) in order to make him easily relatable to the common man. Given the variations of the story and the biased intent of the authors, the story lacks historical evidence to deem it undeniably true.
But if it lacks evidence as it does now, why then was it created and ,more importantly, why does it still exist today? George Washington was a very popular man of his time even without his fable childhood. He was the war general that delivered America to victory. He was the reluctant first ruler of the nation. There was not a more perfect match to attatch a fable underlining honesty. The people loved Washington and this story was created to re-affirm their affection and almost-worship-reverence. As to why it still exists today? The people’s love of Washington has integrated him itself into the very identity of America. If all of America were to see him as a national figure, we want to see the best of him. And what better side of him to potray than his honest confession to chopping down his father’s most prized tree? It is only until we look deeper into the story that we discover that this story is not as honest as the Washinton it potrays is.