George Washington Papers

General Orders, 26 November 1777

General Orders

Head-Quarters, White Marsh [Pa.] Novr 26th 1777.

Parole Carlisle.C. Signs Derby. Dover.

If any Gentlemen of the army can give information to the General, of shoes, stockings or leather breeches, in quantities, he will be exceedingly obliged to them—He will likewise be obliged to any of the General officers, for recommending proper persons to be employed in collecting these articles.

General Smallwood, and the Colonels of the Maryland regiments are to meet to morrow morning, at nine o’clock, at General Smallwood’s quarters, to state, as far as they can, the ranks of all other officers in those regiments, and the dates which their commissions ought to bear—Where there are competitions for rank among the Colonels, they are to state their claims.

The money for the payment of the army for september is expected every moment—The regimental pay Masters are immediately to make out their Abstracts for the month of October, and deliver them to the pay Master General for examination—As an alteration in the payment of rations is now under consideration of Congress, it is recommended to the commanding officers of regiments not to add their ration accounts, to the pay-rolls, until their determination is known, which will be signified in General Orders1—The Pay Master General has complained of the slovenly, careless manner in which some of the captains make out their pay rolls—The regimental pay Masters are not to receive any but such as are made out fair, and agreeable to the form some time since given out, by the Pay Master General, which the regimental Pay Masters are to furnish such captains with, as have not already received the same.2

No regimental Pay Master is to leave the service, without first applying to the Commander in Chief, nor any new pay master appointed without first obtaining his approbation.

Varick transcript, DLC:GW.

1The general orders for 3 Jan. 1778 include Congress’s resolution of 30 Dec. 1777 that beginning on 1 Jan. 1778 the commissary general of purchases was to “compute the cost of each part of a ration . . . [and] send a certificate thereof to the Board of Treasury, and also to the commissary general of issues, who is thereupon directed to publish the same to the issuing commissaries, to be by them observed . . . [and] That General Washington be directed to recommend to the officers of the army to draw such a part of their rations only as may be necessary for their respective subsistence, and to receive the residue in money, at the estimated cost aforesaid” (see JCC description begins Worthington Chauncey Ford et al., eds. Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789. 34 vols. Washington, D.C., 1904–37. description ends , 9:1068).

2See GW’s General Instructions to the Regimental Commanders of the Continental Army, 1777.

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