From George Washington to Brigadier General Edward Hand, 4 April 1779
To Brigadier General Edward Hand
Head Quarters Middle Brook 4th April 1779
Sir
The Arms, Cloathing and Camp Equipage for Colo. Spencers and the German Regiment and for Armands and Schotts Corps, of which Capt. Schott brought down a return, will all be sent up the Susquehannah to Wyoming, at which place the troops ordered to march thither will meet them—As Colo. Cortlandts Regt will not be employed upon the same service, the necessary Cloathing and Camp equipage for it will be provided from another quarter—I have given you this information lest the Corps ordered to Wyom⟨ing m⟩ight have waited for Capt. schotts return before they marched—which should they not have done when this reaches you, you w⟨i⟩ll immediately put them in motion.1 I am Sir Your most obt Servt
G: Washington
Be pleased to forward the inclosed to Colo. Cortland.2
LS, in Tench Tilghman’s writing, NN: Emmet Collection; Df, DLC:GW; copy (extract), enclosed in GW to John Jay, 21 Aug. 1779, DNA:PCC, item 152; copy (extract), DNA:PCC, item 169; Varick transcript, DLC:GW. The LS is addressed to “Genl Hand or in ⟨his⟩ absence ⟨the⟩ commanding officer.” The postscript does not appear on the draft manuscript. For that reason, while the mutilated text in the body of the LS is supplied from the draft manuscript, that in the postscript is supplied from the Varick transcript. Both extracts consist of the first two sentences of the letter.
1. For the supplying of the needed items, see GW to Board of War, this date (second letter). For the troops ordered to the Wyoming Valley, see GW to Alexander McDougall, 1 April.
2. This enclosure probably is the letter that GW’s assistant secretary James McHenry wrote to Col. Philip Van Cortlandt on 5 April from Middlebrook. It reads: “Captn Schott, came down from General Hand, for arms clothing and camp equipage—but as you will not act in the same quarter with General Hand, you will therefore receive elswhere such a proper supply of these articles as are wanting in your regiment” (DLC:GW). Van Cortlandt’s 2d New York Regiment, which at this time was stationed at Rochester, Ulster County, N.Y., subsequently was ordered to Wyoming, Pa., to participate in the frontier expedition against the Indians (see GW to Van Cortlandt, 19 April, DLC:GW).