From George Washington to Thomas Walker, 11 November 1755
To Thomas Walker
[Williamsburg, 11 November 1755]
To Mr Commissary Walker.
You are hereby ordered to proceed with the utmost dispatch to Winchester, where you will receive the Orders left there by me, which you are, as soon as possible, to execute. The Cattle I shall leave entirely to you; to order up altogether or in small droves, as you shall think proper. You are to set up Advertisements, at all the most public places convenient to the Fort, for the Inhabitants to bring in all the Pork they can spare, and that they will be allowed the market price; and ready money for any Quantity. You are then to proceed to the Fort, where the Beeves and Hogs are to be killed, with all convenient dispatch; and you are to see that they are well salted and packed up in the Barrels, which you are to have made for that purpose. The Salt is to be forwarded to the Fort with the utmost dispatch from Winchester, or other places where it is lodged.1 Given &c. at Williamsburg November 11th 1755.
LB, DLC:GW. This letter appears in the letter book after the letter of 13 Nov. from George Mercer to James Craik.
Dr. Thomas Walker (1715–1794), merchant and land speculator, was associated with Charles Dick as a commissary for the recent Braddock expedition and, like Dick, was a storekeeper in Fredericksburg. He was now replacing Dick as “Commissary for the Expedition” (GW to Peter Hog, 28 Nov. 1755).
1. GW’s most recent orders to Commissary Dick, written at Winchester on 29 Oct., provided instructions with regard to the public’s cattle, to the acquiring of pork, and generally to the provisioning of Fort Cumberland. See also Adam Stephen to GW, 7 Nov. 1755, n.2, for the agreement between Dick and Andrew Shepherd about the cattle from North Carolina. For the arrangements regarding the commissary’s pay, see Memorandum from Committee to Supervise Military Expenditures, 8–11 Nov. 1755.