George Washington Papers

[Diary entry: 6 May 1775]

6. At Baltimore all day. Reviewd the Companies there & dind at an Entertainmt. given by the Townsmen.

“Four companies of the town militia were drawn upon the Common, where they were reviewed by Col. Washington . . . accompanied by the other delegates. . . . In the afternoon the delegates, accompanied by the Rev. Clergy and principal gentlemen of the town, preceded by Capt. [Mordecai] Gist’s independent company, and the officers of the other companies, walked from the Fountain Inn to the new Court-house, where an entertainment was provided” (SCHARF [2] description begins J. Thomas Scharf. The Chronicles of Baltimore; Being a Complete History of “Baltimore Town” and Baltimore City from the Earliest Period to the Present Time. Baltimore, 1874. description ends , 132). Pursuant to a resolution by the Second Maryland Convention (8–12 Dec. 1774), Baltimore County organized 68–man militia companies in each district or “Hundred” of the county (Md. Journal, 2 Jan. 1775; Md. Gaz., 19 Dec. 1774, 26 Jan. 1775). GW may also have reviewed a company of Baltimore Independent Cadets, which had been formed in December (Md. Hist. Mag., 4:372).

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