Bookstore in washington, d. C. In 2019. Hello, everyone. Im a member of the event staff and i would like to welcome you all on this cold evening to politics and prose. Just a few quick notes before we get started, cspan is here with us tonight and we are also filming for our own Youtube Channel so if you could take a moment to silence your cell phone please take a moment along the same lines when we get to the q a portion of the event, we have a microphone up over here we want to make sure we keep the dialogue running. Books are available at the register. Also fun and an interesting books that make great gifts to you might want to pick up a couple of those as well which is of course why we are here the secret plot to kill George Washington. Writing history with the same command that made him one of the finest thriller writers he tells the story of the plot to assassinate George Washington. Looking back, he shows the iconic view was brought with uncertainty. It was anything but a sure. Only to become the target of the plot nonetheless. They call it an excellent book beyond fascinating but fans of thrillers and american history. In conversation with his coauthor and awardwinning documentary Television Producer for the networks lik network lid discovery. Please help me welcome to politics and prose. [applause] we want to welcome you here. This is my first hometown bookstore and i can talk to because i used to live here that this means a lot to me. Yesterday i was in new york which meant i had to deal with all of my relatives. You have relatives in new york if you are laughing. I understand. I want to first say thank you. It was a big deal and ive done all the books at this store so first round of applause. [applause] i want to introduce very quickly i found this where all Great Stories high become in the footnotes. And irony to remember reading about the secret plothat the sel George Washington. Is this true, is this nonsense or internet madeup stuff but it was true. When he found out about it he gathered those responsible and took the coconspirators and hanged them in front of 20,000 people at the point of the thatt public execution in northern american history. George washington brought the hammer down but do not mess with me. I am George Washington. I am going to be on the money one day. It is a quote which is Pretty Amazing also. [laughter] i was fascinated with it and when i started, i thought how do you figure this out. I went to the pulitzer prizewinning author and i said to him you know this story and he said there there is no modek written on it except the stuff he knew was wrong but he said i have to tell you this involves washingtons spies. You can find exactly how many he owned and you will never find all his spies. By nature he said what you are looking for will forever be elusive. The best you get the book out of it for the worst worse, what has when you have an adventure. I love an adventure. I couldnt get it out of my head by the time i spoke to joe. And that is when i knew i got it right but it wasnt going to take off. The first thing i did is josh and i to give you a background, i told him what he was doing. I knew i had to call him because we met while working on our tv show, lost history. Lost history, the title of the show was brad meltzers lost history. I said what are we having for dinner tonight because she said you can go sleep on brad meltzers couch. We worked on it together and our goal was to find the 9 11 flag the firefighters raised at ground zero that have gone missing. We were able to find it for days after the episode aired a. We got a phone call from a guy in Washington State who identified himself as a former aryan. He said i stole the show lost history of the stories he told. This is the flag i want to return it and the reason they returned it is because hes the executive producer on the show and did research and we were able to go and see in new york city. We spent a year authenticating it and working with the head of the unit and we got to unveil it. One of the most amazing moments of my life. He was by far the single driving force. I told him you are an incredible writer. I would love to work on this with you. He was like ive never written a book before. My publisher they were sending all these writers that had written books before but they were just missing the good parts. To make a good book youve got to take out the parts people skip and put in the good parts. It sounds silly but he is right. He knew those Little Details like George Washington one of the first things he did when he was put in charge of military was he startethemilitary was heg books on how to be a better general. That is the kind of detail that tells you the mindset. We found this amusing story and i dont want to ruin it because i will miss out on the buck but we will see details like George Washington had his own private bodyguards. He asked them to give me your for best man. Washington, then himself and now down to about 50 people. Then they called them the general cards, the commander cards, but the name that stuck was the lifeguards because their job. I know this is also the moment they watch comes from, but it had nothing to do with the beach or swimming but they were going for washingtons life. These were the men who turned on him and became involved in the process helped George Washington. I dont care how strong you are, that is devastating. Somebody was scared and terrified him thought they couldnt go on. There were moments they thought they could never do it but they decided to go forward. I love this fact thats what the book does is explores George Washington when he is not the best, when he is and doing everything right. One of the first things he does when he finds out about the plot is they put together a secret committee. Many were led by john j. Of course the First Supreme Court justice and its bigger than it was smaller to those in the secret committee. Its john j. , governor morris and that is what they trusted the circle and they are the ones kicking down doors during interrogation. Thats what happens in those moments as you can see the first Counter Intelligence agency being born right there as they are trying to figure this out. The typical father of counterintelligence. And we all know that the its really this moment not military with civilians seeking out information to try to find intelligent, using it. George washington had this military but also great defense. Its not just the plot against George Washington but also the counterintelligence to ge tickeo see if developed piece by piece and one of the things i loved his enough to imagine us as like Indiana Jones and throw the idle and with. Thats how i picture us pretty much every day. The reality is most of these things are online, the founders online its a beautiful resource to use but no one wants to read some of these things. We got to read it and full credit to josh arrived was a great expert to find these things out and i remember we were constantly talking about will be find enough information. And i remember him turning up the transcripts of the secret tribunal and i remember when you called me for that and i was like here we go, now weve got it. With all of these feelings and beliefs, washington isnt like that. Then place a much closer and you will see many books that say George Washington fought the sandbag. We are a country now found on budgets and this is a country. The especially the town divided today of the 1776 in new york city as the first big battles are taking place, there are nearly as many loyalists in new york on the british side as there are on the patriots side. It wasnt like we fought together and saying. We have these different regiments. He didnt know each other or like each other or even wear the same uniform. Regimens were wearing Something Different than the massachusetts one where it was Something Different than virginia. There was a scene i loved in the first conspiracy where you see a meet the regimen and they are wearing some things on their uniform. There wasnt any lectures today. Sometimelike there istoday. Sometimes it was just wearing work shirts. They were making fun of them and they are all fighting each other and George Washington comes in on his horse, gets of off, grabs two of the big guys and is shaking them basically saying stop fighting with each other we are on the same team. Where we are today, thats where we are. And i love right now we have leaders and politics who will tell you how american they are. There was no flags bac flag bace United States back then. George washington had to help build it by willing it to happen. The men he was dealing with the word also a mess. 10,000 men came to fight in all the rich people were like i dont want to be here if theres a war, and leaving. They want to drink, gamble and go to the whorehouse. George washington is the proper virginia gentleman horrified by this. The general orders youll see come out no gambling, stop drinking, dont go to the courthouse, just like my rules growing up. [laughter] same thing. Not even joking. [laughter] weve lost in america the word united. Weve forgotten it. Its important to find something. I think first and foremost among them and this is the part you get to see the death of George Washingtons character in the book. One of my favorite things about we get to the qanda handle anl that stuff but its the battle for clinton. We think we just bandied together, we fight but we got our rear ends kicked. He didnt have the experience the british generals had. Our soldiers were being outfoxed. Held fought. They barely have shoes let alone the. They get totally is over. George washington is pinned on east river. He should be dead and its over with keyword different leader he would say we are going out in a blaze of glory to take out as many show them whos who and show them what a man he is. George washington doesnt do that, he does the best thing he always does, he adapts. He plans off a daring escape in the middle of the night. They commandeer all of the votes they can on the east river and one by one in the middle of the night start putting these men on the votes. The key moment George Washington wont coun get on the boat of hn were on first. Theres this man, George Washington in absolutely risking his life for theirs no matter how high or low the ranking. There were moments before, its not like a single moment about them together of course but those are the moments that created the United States, where we are united and realize what is important. Again, i hope in those moments do you get to see the tip of his character and humility and i key should be someone we look up to and i think that is the greatest part of a conspiracy does. Its titillating to say we found that was far more interesting is to see why it matters today and we need leaders like that and that is why George Washington matters. With that im going to turn over to my friend and i will sit here and judge whatever he says. [laughter] dont worry, cspan is watching. Can everyone hear me. I wont talk for very long so we can get to the qanda debris they want to sabriefly want to k you to politics and prose for hosting this event and a willingness to be here. Thank you for inviting me on this journey and writing this book and i will say quickly he eluded to this a little bit at a time now when they any measure theres a lot of political turbulence and disagreement and divisiveness and confusion and fear, the ability to Research History and learn about history is so important and vital if you go back and look at the times in history when things were uncertain and no one knew what was going to happen if so illuminating and informative and helpful to study other periods in history and i think it was a privilege. Hopefully those of you that the book will sort of go on that journey with us and find something to announce low and hopefully they will find it entertaining. Thats all i have to say. You can ask about whatever you want, you can ask about this book but also about the thrillers, the kids books, anything else we do. This is the one place someone tells you whats wrong with your book. Full disclosure my name is chris jim mcburney and im excited about the footnotes as an author who thinks the point was to get out of washington as opposed to kill them. I am not convinced its necessary to kidnap. It could have been either but im curious how you arrived at that conclusion. Thank you for proving my point. [laughter] i love the right. Theres Nothing Better than being right on National Television. Thank you. I should have paid you to ask that question, but thank you for bringing this up. To clarify a little bit, we debated the title a long time. The plot to kill George Washington, and again this is in the book but there are some people who say the point was to kill him and some who say the plot was to kidnap him. When you look at what they did with anyone they kidnapped at a lower level in the military if he were a lower level officer if they kidnapped you they would trade you. When you go to washingtons level they hung you. So either way it was a secret plot against the birth of the Intelligence Movement which we felt was the best title. That is the honest answer. The footnotes for their own name. I did take a quick look at the text it is a fair discussion. He and john adams sorry i didnt think of that. Why you so awesome . Thank you for sharing that. I want to say thank you because they read your book and appreciated it. He was arrested and imprisoned and the mystery is why wasnt he tried and convicted and hung is the this poor irish born a small guy. I love this and you will see in chapter 34 and then to kill washington and everything going on against him yet the mayor and governor. And then they let him go. And i like the ending and something that happens in my thriller i change the ending. And i like that character i kill him that because im a fiction writer to be even more scrutinized for this to say can you just change history and those that are on the subject most want to tell you flat out heres what happened and that is one of the questions because i woman who disappeared we had leaves to find every single one we found the 9 11 flag and the hitler diary obviously the people you are talking about right now and tell this on National Television i promise this will happen. We will get a letter someone related to these people enable say heres my Family History and what really happened. Thats more than get credit for just what you to know. [laughter] and that comes from those who know the truth out there. Entertainment weekly talk about the influence on your work and chosen. So the question is from politics and prose and everything he has war and is asking about Entertainment Weekly asked me to write his obituary which was obviously this crazy honor. And not one that you want. And what i wrote online of social media and adapted for them. And it just poured out of me i didnt think about it. It was my feelings that this man it was so nice to me, stanley had died and when i heard he died everything came out of me and what i mourned in that moment we know spiderman and his creations and co creations fantastic four or black panther or xmen all these amazing creations. With the lessons that they shared were so good in the foundation of who i am. And it is vital and no one says that anymore. No corporations says that no advertisement says that. But i feel those are vital lessons that we want and need in got them from a kid from comic books. If you look at stan lees original writings in the back from the sixties these are the early sixties he would have a fan soapbox. He would write racism is a terrible thing. If you are going out there someone is different because of their skin color or religion or where they are born that something is wrong with them that is wrong and stand against that he is writing this on the back of spiderman comics. Telling people in the most impressionable moment and i love that. I love that stanley has the soapbox to use it for good and justice and equality we all love those words. Whatever your politics are we say we stand for those words because of where they are born if you do that, you do it wrong. In this whole thing came out of me and i put it on facebook and my twitter page the only thing that i have written that has really gone viral. I was watching the news that night. It was on cnn. Those are cool words. Weight. Thats me. [laughter] then he said can you adapt this for the call and we would like to make this his obituary. What can i say . That was humbling. I knew him because i was researching the book superman for one of my books. And they say you have to interview stan who was there at the start as a 17 yearold kid. I got to talk to him and he was always nice to me anytime i needed anything he was the first to say how can i help i him for his kindness ball those lessons he gave me. Thanks for asking. When i think the American Revolution i think of a personal betrayal against George Washington. How does this story fit in chronologically to that did they have an influence on his reaction. Benedict arnold i have been a different book on him and of course the great betrayal of George Washington i went down to the National Archives years ago and they have treasure vaults there and its where they keep the best step in the open the drawer and pull out a sheet of paper that looks like an index card the oath of allegiance is one at the start of the