General Orders, 17 December 1779
General Orders
Head-Quarters Morristown friday Decr 17th 1779.
Parole—New-Haven— C. Signs North-Castle Natick.
Lieutenant Colonel Barber is to do the duty of Sub-Inspector in Major General Lord Stirling’s division and Lieutt Colonel Regnier in the division composed of Clinton’s and Stark’s brigades.
Colonel James Livingston’s regiment now in General Stark’s brigade to be annexed to and immediately join General Hands brigade.
The following is to be considered as our general order of battle; The army to form in two lines; the first composed of three divisions, the second of two.
The 1st line to form from right to left, thus 1st Maryland. 2nd Maryland. Hand’s. Maxwell’s. 1st Connecticutt. 2nd Connecticutt[.] The 2nd line from right to left, thus—1st Pennsylvania 2nd Pennsylvania—Clinton’s Stark’s.
The firing of two pieces of Cannon from the spot pointed out in the order of the 1st instant1 will be the signal of Alarm—the several brigades are then to form on their respective parades and when marched to their Alarm-Posts to take their places in the line in the foregoing order.
The regimental surgeons to make returns to the Director General of the Flying Hospital next monday at Doctor Canfield’s,2 where they may draw the necessary stores; In those regiments where the surgeons and mates are absent the regimental officers of Police are to send in the returns.
Varick transcript, DLC:GW.
Adj. Gen. Alexander Scammell’s orderly book entry for this date includes an additional general order: “General St Clairs Division gives the Main Guard tomorrow” (orderly book, 17 Oct. 1779–22 March 1780, DNA: RG 93, Orderly Books, 1775–1783, vol. 33).
Records in GW’s expense book for this date indicate purchases of four geese, six quail, and four rabbits (household account book, 11 April 1776–21 Nov. 1780, DLC:GW, ser. 5, vol. 28).
1. Scammell’s orderly book entry for this date correctly identifies this general order’s date as “the 4th inst.” (orderly book, 17 Oct. 1779–22 MArch 1780, DNA: RG 93, Orderly Books, 1775–1783, vol. 33).
2. The general orders are referring to the home of Jabez Campfield (1737–1821), who graduated from Princeton in 1759 and subsequently practiced medicine in Morristown. Campfield served as surgeon in several regiments during the Revolutionary War and kept a noteworthy diary of his experiences and observations during Maj. Gen. John Sullivan’s expedition against the Six Nations (see “Diary of Dr. Jabez Campfield, Surgeon in ‘Spencer’s Regiment,’ while attached to Sullivan’s Expedition Against the Indians, From May 23d to Oct. 2d. 1779,” Proceedings of the New Jersey Historical Society, 2d ser. 3 [1872–74]: 115–36). Campfield’s house in Morristown stood across the village green from GW’s headquarters at the Ford mansion. During the 1779–80 winter encampment, John Cochran, surgeon general of the army in the middle department, and his wife occupied Campfield’s house, which is much better known as the Hamilton-Schuyler house for its role in the romance between GW’s aide-de-camp Alexander Hamilton and Cochran’s niece Elizabeth Schuyler (see 209–19).