Major General Riedesel to George Washington, 21 April 1781
From Major General Riedesel
Brooklyn April [21] 1781
Sir
Several German Officers of the Convention of Saratoga having applied to me to be exchanged on account of their particular private affairs, I made a requisition accordingly to Major General Phillips to propose Such an Exchange to Your Excellency, and in answer to my request General Phillips communicated to me Your letter of the 25th of January to His Excellency Sir Henry Clinton, in which the proposed Exchange made by Major General Phillips to you, Sir, on the 23d of December last is agreed to, and consequently involves in it the German Officers, who were included in the proposition, though not nominated at that time.1
In consequence of Your Excellency’s acquiescen[c]e to this measure I delivered to Major General Phillips a List of the Officers I begged to be exchanged, which he has assured me has been forwarded in his last proposals made between the British and American Commissaries General of Prisoners on the 3rd of March.2
As all the British Officers Major General Phillips asked to be exchanged at that time are already arrived, without one German Officer included in their number I presume that the before mentioned list has not reached Your Excellency’s hands, being Convinced You, Sir, would be guided with the same impartiality towards one Nation, as another; I, therefore, take the liberty of repeating Major General Phillips’s application for, Sir, Your having the goodness to exchange the German Officers mentioned in the Said List, a Copy of which I annex to this, and to give Your Excellency’s orders for those Gentlemen being sent to New York.3
Major Meibom of my Regiment of Dragoons and Ensign Meibom of my Regiment of Infantry belonging to the Troops of His Serene Highness The Duke of Brunswick being made prisoners of War a few days past on Long Island I shall acknowledge it as an effect of Your Excellency’s goodness to permit these two Officers to come to New York on Parole;4 the infirm state of Major Meibom’s health claims a particular attention, and I shall make use of every interest in my power with His Excellency General Sir Henry Clinton to procure permission for their being exchanged if Your Excellency will please to give your approbation.5 I have the honour to be, Sir, Your Excellencys most obedient and most humble Servant
Riedesel Maj: Gen:
LS, DLC:GW; DfS, GyWoS. The date, omitted from the LS, is taken from the draft. GW’s aide-de-camp Tench Tilghman docketed the LS: “recd 6th May.”
Hessian major Carl Leopold Baurmeister reported from New York on 26 April: “General von Riedesel will soon sail for Quebec with the dragoons who had been imprisoned near Bennington and have been exchanged” (, 429).
1. See William Phillips to GW, 23 Dec. 1780, and GW to Henry Clinton, 25 Jan. 1781; see also Samuel Huntington to GW, 2 Jan., and n.1.
Lord George Germain had written Maj. Gen. William Phillips from Whitehall in England on 7 Feb. to express happiness that he had “effected a general Exchange of the King’s Troops who were Prisoners of War, tho’ you were not able to prevail that the Convention Troops should be exchanged against the Rebel Forces taken in Carolina. I most heartily sympathize with those unfortunate brave Men in their Sufferings, from so long a Captivity and Removals from places so very distant from each other, and think every Attention should be shewn to render their hard Condition as little irksome as possible, consistent with the Army Rules. …
“I understand there are still several of the Brunswick Troops Prisoners of War. I wish they could be exchanged as soon as possible, as the Duke of Brunswick is desirous of having his Regiments in Canada so complete as may enable them to distinguish themselves in His Majesty’s Service, and the plan sent to His serene Highness, by Major General Riedesel, cannot be carried into execution without the Exchange of these prisoners. I believe they amount to about 250. I must, therefore, beg you will mention this to Sr Henry Clinton, and, if he has no Objection to the Exchange being effected, receive His Orders for it” (DNA:PCC, item 51).
2. The exchange proposal listed forty-two German officers (see Abraham Skinner to GW, 10 March, and n.5 to that document).
3. The enclosed list of German officers proposed for exchange has not been identified, but it probably repeated the names sent previously (see n.2 above).
4. British major Frederick Mackenzie, stationed in New York City, wrote in his diary entry for 16 April: “Major Meibom and another Officer of the Brunswick troops, were carried off last night from Yellow hook, by a Rebel party that came in a whaleboat (supposed) from the Rariton. This Officer had 90 men of the Brunswick troops under his Command, and ’tis supposed neglected the usual means of guarding his quarters, he being cantoned within the Narrows, and seeing the Fleet so near him” (, 2:508; see also Elias Dayton to GW, 9 May, DLC:GW). British captain John Peebles, then on Long Island, N.Y., wrote in his diary entry for 16 April that the officers were carried off “with all their Money said to be 500 guineas” (, 438).
Riedesel’s wife, Frederika, reported in her journal that in “spring of 1781,” she had settled on Long Island, N.Y., where “the Americans made all sorts of attempts to take prisoners. They seized Major Maybaum from his bed, and we knew they intended to do the same thing for my husband” (, 108–9).
Justus Christoph von Meibom (Maibom; d. 1804) served as major in Riedesel’s Brunswick dragoon regiment.
Carl Christoph von Meibom (Maibom; d. 1794) served as ensign in Riedesel’s Brunswick infantry regiment.
Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand (1735–1806) became duke of Brunswick in 1780.
5. GW replied to Riedesel from New Windsor on 11 May: “I have been honored with your favor of April without particular date. You must either have been misinformed as to the letters which passed from General Phillips to me of the 23d of December and from me to Sir Henry Clinton on the 25th of January in answer, or you must have misunderstood them. I therefore inclose you Copies of them. You will observe that I acceded only to the exchanges of the British Officers particularly named in General Phillips’s letter. I refused his proposal of permitting an indeterminate number of British or German Officers to be sent to New York, at the discretion of Brigr Genl Hamilton.
“Some time after, proposals for a further exchange bearing date the 3d of March, and in which are included the German Officers whose names you mention, were communicated to me by my Commissary General of prisoners, to which I did not think proper to accede, as I conceived the Exchange of Lieutenant General Burgoyne was unreasonably delayed. My answer and instructions upon this head have been communicated at large to Mr Loring by Mr Skinner.
“Were I inclined to partiality in favor of the British Officers, I have it not in my power to exercise it, as the choice of the objects of Exchange does not lie with me.
“At your particular request, I have given orders to have Major and Ensign de Meibom sent into New York upon parole” (LS [photostat], in Tench Tilghman’s writing, ViMtvL; Df, DLC:GW; Varick transcript, DLC:GW; see also GW to Dayton, 11 May, DLC:GW).