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Subject Area: Political Theory
Subject Area: War and Peace
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

TO BRIGADIER-GENERAL JOHN CADWALADER. - George Washington, The Writings of George Washington, vol. VI (1777-1778) [1890]

Edition used:

The Writings of George Washington, collected and edited by Worthington Chauncey Ford (New York and London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1890). Vol. VI (1777-1778).

Part of: The Writings of George Washington, 14 vols.

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TO BRIGADIER-GENERAL JOHN CADWALADER.

My Dear Sir,

Your favor of the 12th instant came safe to my hands and gave me sincere pleasure; as it encouraged a hope, which I had before entertained, of seeing you in camp again. Most sincerely do I wish it was in my power to point out some post or place in the army, which would invite you to and fix you in it. We want your aid exceedingly; and the public, perhaps at no time since the commencement of the war, would be more benefited by your advice and assistance, than at the present, and throughout the whole of this campaign, which must be important and critical. One thing certain is; a seat at my board, and a square on my floor, shall always be reserved for you. But this, though it would add to my pleasure, is not the height of my wishes. I want to see you in a more important station.

By death and desertion we have lost a good many men since we came to this ground, and have encountered every species of hardship, that cold, wet, and hunger, and want of clothes, were capable of producing; notwithstanding, and contrary to my expectations, we have been able to keep the soldiers from mutiny or dispersion; although, in the single article of provisions, they have encountered enough to have occasioned one or the other of these in most other armies. They have been (two or three times) days together without provisions; and once, six days without any of the meat kind. Could the poor horses tell their tale, it would be in a strain still more lamentable, as numbers have actually died from pure want. But, as our prospects begin to brighten, my complaints shall cease.

It gives me much pleasure to hear, that the recruiting service in the counties near you is in so hopeful a way; but I despair of seeing our battalions completed by any other means than drafting. The importance of the place you speak of is obvious. It has engrossed much of my thoughts; but in our present situation and under our present prospects it is one of those things, that is more like to become an object of our desire, than attainment.

I have every reason short of absolute proof to believe, that General Howe is meditating a stroke against this army. He has drawn, some say two thousand, and others twenty-five hundred, men from New York, who I believe are arrived at Philadelphia, as a number of transports have just past Wilmington in their way up the Delaware; and reports from Newport say, that the garrison there had orders to be in readiness to embark by the 20th instant. Their invalids had gone off for England, and the women and children for New York. I am, &c.1

[1 ]“Sunday next being the time on which the Quakers hold one of their general meetings, a number of that society will probably be attempting to go into Philadelphia. This is an intercourse that we should by all means endeavor to interrupt, as the plans settled at these meetings are of the most pernicious tendency. I would therefore have you dispose of your parties in such a manner as will most probably fall in with these people.”—Washington to General Lacey, 20 March, 1778.