1. Shreve was a colonel in command of New Jersey’s Second Regiment, which was stationed at Elizabethtown, New Jersey.

2. The “further orders” directed Shreve to proceed to Easton, Pennsylvania, to join General John Sullivan’s campaign against the Indians (George Washington to John Sullivan, May 28, 1779 [Df, George Washington Papers, Library of Congress]).

On May 28, 1779, Shreve asked Washington for permission to march directly to the forks of the Raritan River in central Somerset County, New Jersey, without stopping at Middlebrook (ALS, George Washington Papers, Library of Congress; copy, dated May 27, 1779, University of Houston Libraries). Although no reply from Washington has been found, the journal of Lieutenant Samuel M. Shute of New Jersey’s Second Regiment indicates that Shreve’s request was granted. On May 29, 1779, Shreve’s troops left Elizabethtown and marched fourteen miles to Samptown, and on the following day they marched sixteen miles to the forks of the Raritan (“Journal of Lieutenant Samuel M. Shute,” Journals of the Military Expedition of Major General John Sullivan against the Six Nations of Indians in 1779 With Records of Centennial Celebrations [Auburn, New York, 1887], 267–68).