To George Washington from Lieutenant Colonel John Brooks, 21 February 1777
From Lieutenant Colonel John Brooks
Boston Feby 21t 1777.
Sir,
Major Willm Hull, the Gentleman your Excellency was pleased to appoint to Colo. Michael Jackson’s Regt, finds some inconvenience in not haveing his Commission As your Excellency gave him his appointment (in the Room of Major Swasey) the Commissioners of this State, do not think, they have a Right to commissionate him. Coll Jackson still continues very lame & unfit for Duty; and I have no body to assist me in forming the Regt. Therefore, if your Excellency would be pleas’d to grant the Major his Commission, it would not only be an easement to me, but, also conduce to the Regiment’s being compleated much sooner.1 Submiting the Matter to your Excellency I am your Excellency’s Most Obedt & very Humble Servt
Jno. Brooks
ALS, DNA: RG 93, manuscript file no. 1960.
1. GW sent William Hull’s commission to Brooks on 11 Mar. 1777, along with a letter that reads in part: “As the season favourable for military operations is near at hand, I beg every effort may be made to recruit and equip your regiment as speedily as possible, that it may be ready to take the field, when called upon” (Df, DLC:GW). Joseph Swasey (1750–1816) of Ipswich, Mass., served as a captain in the 14th Continental Regiment from 1 Jan. to 31 Dec. 1776. Swasey was appointed major of William Raymond Lee’s Additional Continental Regiment in January 1777. Michael Jackson, Sr. (1734–1801), was a tanner from Newton, Mass., and a veteran of the French and Indian War. He commanded a company of minutemen at Lexington and Concord in April 1775, and from June to December 1775 he was major of Col. Thomas Gardner’s Massachusetts Regiment. Jackson served as lieutenant colonel of the 16th Continental Regiment from January to December 1776; he was severely wounded at Montressor’s Island in New York on 24 Sept. 1776. Jackson became colonel of the 8th Massachusetts Regiment on 1 Jan. 1777 and was ordered to Ticonderoga in the spring (see GW to Horatio Gates, 28 April 1777, LS, NHi: Gates Papers). On 30 Sept. 1783 Jackson was brevetted brigadier general.