From George Washington to Colonel Armand, 6 February 1780
To Colonel Armand
Morris town Feby 6th 1780
Sir
I have received your two letters of the 4th and fifth.1
Inclosed you will find a letter to the Board of War, recommending the incorporation of your corps with the late Pulaski’s including the troop command⟨ed⟩ by Capt. Bedkin.2 I do not unite the Marechaussee, because that corps is destined for a particular service, to which it will be altogether applied in the course of the next campaign, nor should I think it adviseable to convert it to any other purpose—The infantry with Selin is now necessarily employed on the frontier, and cannot at this time be conveniently relieved; Besides the circumstances under which that corps was formerly separated from your’s make me unwilling to recommend a reunion.3 I have advised the Board to give you orders for assembling your whole corps in Georgia, and to make the necessary arrangements without delay for enabling you to march there.
I have read the letter from the Board of War to you on the subject of Monsieur Du Plantier.4 It is not possible for me to give efficacy in our service to his commission in that of France or to oblige your officers to submit to his command; but so far as the views of the Board can be accommodated by you to the officers of your corps, it will give me the greatest pleasure to see Monsieur Du Plantier furnished with the opportunity he desires of being useful. This however must be absolutely an affair of accommodation not of authority.
The inclosed certificate will show the sense I entertain of your services and I hope will be satisfactory to you.5
As you will probably be removed from my immediate command, I take this occasion of repeating to you the assurances of my esteem—You may depend that I shall always be happy to hear of your success—and that circumstances have seconded your zeal, & your talents. I am &c.
G.W.
Df, in Alexander Hamilton’s writing, DLC:GW; Varick transcript, DLC:GW.
1. Armand’s letter to GW of 4 Feb. has not been found; for an indication of its possible contents, see GW to the Board of War, this date.
2. For the draft of this letter, see GW to the Board of War, this date.
3. Capt. Anthony Selin’s company had been part of the light infantry corps of Maj. Nicholas Dietrich, Baron de Ottendorf. When Ottendorf suddenly left the service in the spring of 1777, GW gave the command of the corps to Armand. When the corps was broken up in April 1778, Selin’s company became an independent unit. When Armand raised a new partisan corps in June 1778, Selin’s company was not part of the corps.
4. This letter has not been identified.
Formerly a cavalry officer in France, Armand Gabriel Allard Duplantier (1753–1827) served later in 1780 as a volunteer officer at Fort Pitt (see Daniel Brodhead to GW, 21 Aug., DLC:GW). In May 1781, he settled in New Orleans, where he later became a land agent for Lafayette. For a time, Duplantier owned extensive properties, but by 1814 he was heavily indebted and forced to declare bankruptcy. He fought in the Battle of New Orleans in January 1815. Between 1816 and 1820, Duplantier moved to his wife’s plantation in Baton Rouge, La., where he died penniless.
5. The draft of the certificate, dated this date at Morristown, reads: “I certify that the Marquis De La Rouerie has served in the army of the United States since the beginning of 1777—with the rank of Colonel, during which time he has commanded an independent corps with much honor to himself and usefulness to the service. He has upon all occasions conducted himself as an officer of distinguished merit—of great zeal activity vigilance intelligence and bravery. In the last campaign particularly he rendered very valuable services; and towards the close of it made a brilliant partizan stroke by which with much enterprise and address, he surprised a Major and some men of the enemy in quarters at a considerable distance within their pickets, and brought them off without loss to his party. I give him this certificate in testimony of my perfect approbation of his conduct and esteem for himself personally” (DfS, in Hamilton’s writing, DLC:GW). For Armand’s “brilliant partizan stroke,” the capture of Maj. Mansfield Bearmore, see William Heath to GW, 8 Nov. 1779, and the notes to that document.