From George Washington to Samuel Washington, 18 October 1776
To Samuel Washington
Heights of Haerlem 18th Oct. 76.
Dear Brother,
Your Letter of the 26th Ulto intended to have come by Captn Thomas Rutherford was delivered to me by Mr Vale. Crawford who will also be the bearer of this Letter to you.1
I wrote you last Week under cover to Lund Washington (who I desired to forward it by a safe hand) a long Letter, containing a full Acct of our Matters in this Quarter;2 to this, & the bearer, I must refer you for further particulars; as the present critical Situation of our Affairs scarce allows me time to read, much less to write Letters, althô I have no pleasure or gratification here equal to that of hearing from my friends.
We are, I expect, upon the Eve of something very important; what may be the Issue; Heaven alone can tell, I will do the best I can, and leave the rest to the supreme direction of Events. My sincere good wishes attend you, and my Sister and Family and all friends and be assured that with the most unfeigned Love I am and ever shall be Yr Affecte Brother
Go: Washington
ALS, PWacD: Sol Feinstone Collection, on deposit PPAmP.
1. Samuel Washington’s letter to GW of 26 Sept. has not been found. Thomas Rutherford of Berkeley County, Va., in 1750 sold GW the rights to a 443-acre tract of land on Evitt’s Run in Frederick County, the first of the several Shenandoah Valley tracts that GW ultimately bought. A lieutenant in Capt. John Ashby’s company of rangers during the early years of the French and Indian War, Rutherford became an Indian agent in 1757 and a deputy commissary the following year. From 1761 to 1769 he represented Hampshire County in the House of Burgesses. On 12 April 1776 Rutherford contracted with the Virginia council of safety to furnish arms for public use, and on 17 Dec. 1776 the state council gave him £250 for the establishment of a gun factory in Shepherdstown (see , 1:258, 286, 383, 388, 2:63).