From George Washington to Jeremiah Wadsworth, 10 July 1778
To Jeremiah Wadsworth
On the March [Paramus, N.J.] 10th July 1778.
Sir,
Having received information that there is a quantity of fat Cattle and Sheep in the district called Barbadoes neck1—which by their situation are exceedingly exposed to the enemy, and are besides the property of persons disaffected to the United States—I hereby authorise you to take all such Cattle and Sheep as may not be absolutely necessary for the use of the families settled in that neighborhood—paying the value of them—and secure them for the use of the Army. Given at Head Quarters this 10th day of July 1778.
Df, in John Laurens’s writing, DLC:GW; Varick transcript, DLC:GW. A purported ALS of this letter was offered for sale in 1943 by William Todd of Mount Carmel, Conn., who noted: “On third page is an order from Wadsworth to Royal Flint, Asst. Commissary General, ‘to immediately wait on Major General, the Marquis Lafayette with his Excellency’s letter’ and the request he carry out the order. Suggests Flint go with the party and that they cross ‘a little this side of Shyler’s House where I observed a large snow [a small ship resembling a brig].’”
1. The New Barbadoes Neck was the name given to the peninsula formed by the Hackensack and Passaic rivers in the neighborhood of present-day Kearney, New Jersey.