To George Washington from Colonel Oliver Spencer, 22 July 1779
From Colonel Oliver Spencer
Wyoming [Pa.] July 22d 1779
May it please your Excellency
the Bearer Cap: Combs, late of Forman’s Corps, waits on your Excellency to inform you that their Situation at present, is not So agreable as they could wish, Originating in Some degree from a want of their Commissions, and not knowing whether they are annexed, or incorporated with the Regt which I have the Honor to Command; which last circumstance, renders it also Somewhat inconvenient to the Regiments in General, for as their being incorporated remains with me a matter of Uncertainty, I cannot take the necessary Steps towards an Arrangement, which if it was determined I could wish to do agreable to the enclosed.1
I would also take the Liberty of informing your Excellency, that in the Commissions forwarded for the Regt I find there is none for Lt Col: Smith,2 the Surgeons, nor myself. Which circumstances if your Excellency will please to Consider, and make me Acquainted with your pleasure concerning them, I Should Acknowledge an addition to the Obligations I am at present under.3 I have the Honor to Subscribe myself your Excellency’s Most Obedt & Devoted Servant
Oliver Spencer
ALS, DLC:GW. Spencer addressed this letter to GW at New Windsor, N.Y., and also wrote on the cover: “Capt. Combs who expected to be the Bearer is Disappointed.” GW’s secretary Robert Hanson Harrison docketed this letter: “ansd by writing the Bd War—8 Augt 1779 to transmit Commissions.”
1. The enclosure has not been identified. For the decision to incorporate Col. David Forman’s Additional Continental Regiment into Spencer’s Additional Continental Regiment, see GW to John Jay, 3 March, and n.4 to that document; see also GW to John Sullivan, 31 May (second letter).
2. For Spencer’s request to have Lt. Col. William Stephens Smith transferred to his regiment, see Sullivan to GW, 8 May.
3. No reply from GW to Spencer has been found.