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

TO LUND WASHINGTON. - George Washington, The Writings of George Washington, vol. X (1782-1785) [1891]

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. X (1782-1785).

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

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Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


TO LUND WASHINGTON.

Since the letter which Bushrod delivered to me in Philadelphia, I have received your favors of the 24th of July from Westmoreland, and 12th of Novr. from Berkley.

Dear Lund,

The latter gave me extreme pain. In God’s name, how did my brother Samuel contrive to get himself so enormously in debt? Was it by making purchases? By misfortunes? or sheer indolence and inattention to business? From whatever cause it proceeded, the matter is now the same, and curiosity only prompts me to the enquiry, as it does to know what will be saved, and how it is disposed of. In the list of his debts, did it appear that I had a claim upon him for the purchase money of the land I sold to Pendleton on Bullskin? I have never received a farthing for it yet, and think I have been informed by him, that he was to pay it.

I did not write to you by the last post. I was too much engaged at the time, in counteracting a most insidious attempt to disturb the repose of the army, and sow the seeds of discord between the civil and military powers of the continent, to attend to small matters. The author of this attempt, whoever he may be, is yet behind the curtain; and as conjectures might be wrong, I shall be silent at present. The good sense, the virtue and patient forbearance of the army on this, as upon every other trying occasion which has happened to call them into action, has again triumphed; and appeared with more lustre than ever. But if the States will not furnish the supplies required by Congress, thereby enabling the Superintendant of Finance to feed, clothe, and pay the army, if they suppose the war can be carried on without money, or that money can be borrowed without permanent funds to pay the interest of it; if they have no regard to justice, because it is attended with expence; if gratitude to men, who have rescued them from the jaws of danger and brought them to the haven of Independence and Peace, is to subside, as danger is removed; if the sufferings of the army, who have borne and forborne more than any other class of men in the United States, expending their health, and many of them their all, in an unremitted service of near eight years in the field; encountering hunger, cold and nakedness, are to be forgotten; if it is presumed there is no bounds to the patience of the army; or that when peace takes place, their claims for pay due, and rewards promised may die with the military non-existence of its member—if such, I say, should be the sentiments of the States, and that their conduct, or the conduct of some, does but too well warrant the conclusion, well may another anonymous addresser step forward, and with more effect than the last did, say with him, “You have arms in your hands; do justice to yourselves, and never sheath the sword, till you have obtained it.” How far men who labor under the pressure of accumulated distress, and are irritated by a belief that they are treated with neglect, ingratitude and injustice in the extreme might be worked upon by designing men, is worthy of very serious consideration. But justice, policy, yea common sense must tell every man that the creditors of the continent cannot receive payments unless funds are provided for it, and that our national character, if these are much longer neglected, must be stamped with indelible infamy in every nation of the world where the fact is known.

I have heard a favorable account of Bushrod, and doubt not but his prudence will direct him to a proper line of conduct; I have given him my sentiments on this head, and persuade myself that with the advice of Mr. Wilson, to whose friendship, as well as instruction in his profession, I recommended him; and the admonition of others: he will stand as good a chance as most youth of his age, to avoid the vices of large cities, which have their advantages and disadvantages in fitting a man for the great theater of public life.