Orders, 17 September 1755
Orders
[17 September 1755]
Ensign Forgie for the Day.1 Parole Success. Fort Cumberland: September 17, 1755.
George Washington Esquire, is by His Honor Governour Dinwiddie, appointed Colonel of the Virginia Regiment, and Commander in Chief of all the Forces that now are, and shall be Raised &c. &c.
Captain Adam Stephen is appointed Lieutenant Colonel; and Captain Andrew Lewis, Major of the same Regiment—Captain George Mercer, of the Virginia Forces, is appointed aid de Camp to Colonel Washington.
Lieutenants John Savage, John Mercer, Joshua Lewis, and Henry Woodward, are promoted as Captains in the Virginia Regiment.
Mr Robert Spotswood, Carter Harrison, Charles Lewis, William Peachy, David Bell, and Robert McKenzie, are appointed Captains in the same Regiment.
Ensigns Thomas Bullet, Walter Stewart, John Blegg, Hancock Eustace, and George Frazier, are promoted to Lieutenants—Mr John Edward Lomax, Peter Steenbergen, John Williams, Augustine Brokenborough, John Campbell, John Hall, John Lowry, John King, and James Baker, are appointed Lieutenants: Quarter Master, Mordecai Buckner, is appointed Ensign. Mr John Polson, William Dangerfield, Edward Hubbard, John Dean, Nathaniel Milner, William Fleming, Leonard Price, Nathaniel Thomson, Thomas Carter, Charles Smith, Lee Hessius Dekeyzier; George Gordon, and George Weeden, are appointed Ensigns.
The former Captains and Lieutenants, who are not promoted, continue in their former posts2—James Livingston, Fort-Major, is appointed Adjutant to the Virginia Regiment—Every Officer of the Virginia Regiment, to provide himself as soon as he can conveniently, with a Suit of Regimentals of good blue Cloath; the Coat to be faced and cuffed with Scarlet, and trimmed with Silver: a Scarlet waistcoat, with silver Lace, blue Breeches, and a silver-laced Hat, if to be had, for Camp or Garrison Duty.
Besides this, each Officer to provide himself with a common Soldiers Dress, for Detachments, and Duty in the Woods.
The Captain or Commanding Officer, of each Company, to give in an exact Return of the State of his Company; specifying the number of Arms, Tents, Kettles, and Clothing thereto Belonging. All Orders before given for the Regulation of the Fort and Camp, to be punctually obeyed.
Mr Defever, Conductor of the Train, to give in an exact Return of the ammunition of all Sorts, and Tools of every kind.3
All the Officers of the Virginia Regiment, to attend Colonel Washington at five O’Clock this Evening, in the Room adjoining the Fort Majors’.
LB, DLC:GW.
1. Charles Lewis mentions in his journal an Ens. Winter Fargie who was in Dec. 1755 in charge of a party of men who were harvesting corn from deserted farms on the war-ravaged frontier near Fort Cumberland (ViU). Fargie was probably an officer of the Maryland or North Carolina troops remaining at the fort.
2. The officers here promoted from lieutenant to captain or from ensign to lieutenant in the Virginia Regiment were all serving in the Virginia forces before GW formed the new regiment in early September, as were the two regimental officers named, GW’s aide-de-camp, and the regimental adjutant. The 6 newly appointed captains and the 9 newly appointed lieutenants are the same men that GW listed on 3 Sept. when he sent these new officers from Williamsburg to recruit. He also listed at Williamsburg 9 of the 14 men whom he named here to serve as ensigns in the regiment; he added at Fort Cumberland the names of ensigns Mordecai Buckner, Lehaynsius De Keyser, John Polson, Charles Smith, and George Gordon. The officers who continued in rank and, except for George Mercer, are not named in these orders of 17 Sept. are captains Peter Hog, George Mercer, Thomas Waggener, Robert Stewart, Thomas Cocke, and William Bronaugh and lieutenants John McNeill and William Stark. Although a number of new names were added to the roster of officers in the regiment after Sept. 1755, and the names of other officers had already disappeared through death and resignation before 1 Sept. 1755, these men holding commissions in the Virginia Regiment at this time include most of the Virginia officers with whom GW served beginning with his defeat at Fort Necessity in 1754 and ending with his resignation as colonel of the Virginia Regiment at the end of 1758. See note 1 in GW’s first Memorandum of 17 Sept. 1755.
3. As conductor of the train of artillery John Defever had custody of the king’s stores at Fort Cumberland until his departure, probably in the summer of 1756. For the time of his departure, see GW to Adam Stephen, 18 May 1756, and to John Stanwix, 28 May 1757. His return of the stores to GW is dated 18 Sept. 1755.