Captain Isaac Craig to George Washington, 15 April 1781
From Captain Isaac Craig
Philadelphia 15th April 1781
May it Please Your Excellency
On Compearing the Indent of Ordnance Stores &c., Requiered for General Clarks Expedition, with the Articles on hand it was found A Considerable Part was Wanting,1 It Appeared also that My Company was Much too Weake for the Duty to be done by it, and that Nine or ten Artillery Artificers were also Necessary, in Consquence of which I Rec’d Orders to Prosceed to this Place, and forward with all Possible Expedition the Militarry Stores & Men Wanted—to Fort Pitt—I have found no dificualty in Obtaining the Stores, and I hope Your Excellency will See it Neccessary to Order me A Reinforcement—I Presume your Excellency is well acquainted with the Number & Calibers of the Ordnance to be Made Use of on this Enterprize, My Company Consists of only thirteen Men, One Capt. & one Capt. Lieut. General Clarke Assured me Your Excellency was disposed to give every Assistence to the Expedition—Col. Procters Reg’t to which I belong is now within A few Miles of Philadelphia from which I wish to have my Company filled up, the Artificers Can be had at Carlisle2—it is not necessary to observe that one full Company will Still be inssufficent to Work Eight Peices of Artillery, and that I must Still have Recourse to Militi[a] for further assistance.
I Expect the Boats will be all finished and at Fort Pitt the 10th of next month,3 I Shall wait Here with Impatience for Your Excellencys Instructions Respecting the Men.4 I have the Honour to be with Due Esteem Your Excellencys Devoted Most Obedt Servt
Ic Craig Capt. Artillery
ALS, DLC:GW.
1. For Craig’s estimate of supplies required for Brig. Gen. George Rogers Clark’s prospective expedition against the British at Detroit, see Daniel Brodhead to GW, 18 Feb., n.4; see also Thomas Jefferson to GW, 13 Dec. 1780. The expedition proved abortive (see William Irvine to GW, 2 Dec. 1781, DLC:GW).
2. Congress directed the Board of War on 8 May to “take order by draughts on the paymaster general to the amount of nineteen thousand and twenty-four dollars,” partly “to enable Captain Craig to take a number of artificers from Carlisle” (, 20:489).
3. Capt. James Sullivan addressed this issue when he wrote Clark from “Beargrass” (likely Beargrass Creek, Ky.) on this date: “The Boats I were to have built for you is so difficult a task for the hands that can be had but shall leave nothing in my power that can be done towards Accomplishing them” (, 3:528–29; see also Brodhead to GW, 27 March). Sullivan wrote Clark again from Sullivan’s Station by Beargrass Creek on 22 May: “I have engaged a sufficient number of hands, to compleate nearly all the boats you wanted, but I am much Distressed, for want of the necessary Gaurds and fattaiegs [fatigues], Mjr Slaughter refusing, to furnish either which put me under the necessity, of applying to Colo Floyd, for a Guard from the Millitia. … I hope you will bring Coarking for the Boats as there is none to be had here” (, 3:556, brackets in source; see also Clark to Thomas Jefferson, 23 May, in , 6:11–12).
4. GW replied to Craig from headquarters at New Windsor on 25 April: “I have recd your favr of the 15th—The present State of Colo. procters Regt does not admit of your Company’s being made up to its full complement, but I have, by this conveyance desired Genl St Clair to let you have as many Men as will put you on a level with the others. This is all that can now be done—I have already desired the Board of War to send six Artificers to Fort Pitt, you may wait upon them with this letter and ask three or four more, if they can be spared.
“I would wish the inclosed for General Clarke and Colo. Brodhead to reach them as speedily as possible; you will be pleased to take charge of them yourself, if you do not meet with a good opportunity previous to the time you intend setting out” (Df, in Tench Tilghman’s writing, DLC:GW; Varick transcript, DLC:GW; the draft is addressed to Craig “care of Board of War Philad.”). For the enclosures, see GW’s letters to Brodhead and to Clark, both 25 April. For additional correspondence involving Craig and Fort Pitt, Pa., see GW to the Board of War, 20 April, and to Arthur St. Clair, 25 April; see also Board of War to GW, 30 April.