From George Washington to James Wilkinson, 19 December 1779
To James Wilkinson
Morris Town Decr 19: 1779
sir
From the wretched & miserable condition of many of the Troops for want of their Cloathes, Many of them being absolutely naked, I must urge again1 in the most earnest terms, that you will use every possible & Instant exertion to have the Cloathing as formerly directed, brought forward that it may be delivered.2 The public service as well as the dictates of humanity require that it should be done without a moment’s delay.3 That there may not be any impediments on the score of transportation—You will apply to the Quarter Master Genl & inform him it [is] my desire that every practicable exertion should be made to get the Cloathing down. I am sir Yr Most Obedt servant.
Df, in Robert Hanson Harrison’s writing, DLC:GW; Varick transcript, DLC:GW.
A letter from GW’s secretary Robert Hanson Harrison to Wilkinson on the same subject, dated 22 Dec., reads: “From the very distressed situation of the Troops and their importunate incessant applications for Many Articles of Cloathing—particularly Shoes—his Excellency wishes to know what information you have received with respect to the Cloathing’s coming on—and when you expect it will arrive. If you have no intelligence of its being in motion—or in such a train that it’s arrival may be justly looked for in a very short time—the General thinks it will be absolutely necessary for You or Mr [John] Moylan to proceed to Newburg or Chester, or wherever the Cloathing is, in order to hurry the transportation of it with all possible dispatch. His Excelly desires me to add, that the deficiency of Shoes is so extensive that a great proportion of the Army is totally incapable of duty and could not move on the most pressing exigency” (DLC:GW).
1. At this place on the draft, Harrison initially wrote “request.” He then struck out that word and wrote “urge again” above the line.
2. See GW to Wilkinson, 6 December.
3. Obtaining clothes remained a serious problem. Writing from winter camp near Morristown on 25 Jan. 1780, Erkuries Beatty, paymaster and regimental clothier, informed his brother Reading: “I have lately drew Cloathing for the Regt & it is almost all to make up from the Cloth … If you was just now to step into my Hutt (which is only a very small Room if it ever got finished) I will tell you just how you would find me … You’ll find me sitting on a Chest, in the Center of Six or Eight Taylors, with my Book, Pen & Ink on one side and the Buttons and thread on the other—the Taylors yo’ll find some A Cutting out, others sewing, outside of the taylors you will see maybe half Dozen Men naked as Lazarus, begging for Cloathing, all about the Room you will see nothing but Cloth & Cloathing, on the floor you’ll find it about knee deep with Snips of Cloth & Dirt” ( 209–10).