From George Washington to Colonel Timothy Pickering, 19 February 1781
To Colonel Timothy Pickering
New Windsor Feby 19th 1781
Dr Sir,
If the detachment now forming, pursues its object, it will be a strong additional motive against having deposits at, and upon the Morris Town road to this place;1 because the Troops now on that communication will be considerably reduced, without the means of replacing them. If therefore my former order on this head is not fully complied with no time should be lost in the completion of it.2 A quantity of Provisions at Ringwood (till we are in greater force) will run eminent danger of being destroyed by a Partisan stroke, I desire therefore it may not be suffered to accumulate at that Post.
If there is no particular inconvenience, with which I am not acquainted, I think the back communication by Sussex Court House—or the middle one by the white House, Germantown, Succasuny Meeting House, Kennys forge, New found land, Davenports Mills & Colo. Sewards to Warwick would, circumstanced as we are, be the most eligible because less ha⟨zar⟩dous3—& I believe equally convenient to this place—The last, I am informed, is the nearest and best road of any from this place to Trenton. Mr DeWit is about measuring of it.4 I am with esteem & regard Dr Sir Yr Obedt Servt
Go: Washington
ALS, DNA: RG 93, manuscript file no. 25297; Df, DLC:GW; Varick transcript, DLC:GW.
1. For this detachment, see GW’s second letter to William Heath of 15 Feb., and Heath to GW, 16 Feb.; see also GW’s letters to Lafayette of 20 February [1 and 2].
2. GW presumably gave Pickering this order after writing him on 15 Feb.; see also Pickering to GW, 18 February.
3. Newfoundland, located within both what is now West Milford Township in Passaic County and Jefferson Township in Morris County, was about seventeen miles south of Warwick, N.Y., on the road that leads from the White House in New Jersey through Succasunna, N.J., to Warwick. “Colo. Seward’s” house was about five miles north of Newfoundland.
4. Simeon DeWitt was the Continental army’s geographer.