Category: Revolutionary War

The Second Virginia Regiment, commanded by Colonel Christian Febiger, was inspected on May 25, 1779. The regiment was somewhere in the New York area at the time. The Second Virginia wasn’t inspected that day by just anyone, but by the Inspector General Friedrich Wilhelm Steuben himself. On that day, there were7 officers, 6 staff, 20 non-commissioned officers, 10 musicians, and 224 privates. According to the Inspector General’s report, the regiment was 280 men short of a full compliment. The men polished their weapons, cleaned up their equipment, and presented themselves as best as they could. So, how did they do? At the bottom of the report is written, “Arms, in good order, 51 stands missing.” “Accouterments – in good order.” “Cloathing – very bad.”

So how bad DOES your clothing have to be, to earn the words: Very bad?

Did you know that was the number of musket cartridges surrendered by the Crown forces at Yorktown in October of 1781? Someone counted them. In fact, someone counted all of the cannon balls, muskets, swords, flags, and every other piece of equipment surrendered at Yorktown. And why not? You capture an army, and all of its equipment, well, someone has to count everything to see what you have.

Accounting for an army, debits and credits. Debits were the items given out from stores to various units, and credits were the items that were turned in.

On October 8^th, General Knox picked up a ream of writing paper.

It rained on the night of October 8-9^th. And things got wet and were no longer usable. On October 9^th, the artillery brigade turned in 350 damaged musket cartridges (probably from the rain) and Colonel Alexander Scammel’s detachment turned in 1016 damaged cartridges.  

On October 13^th, Colonel Ebenezer Stevens obtained a 2-foot rule.

And on October 19^th, the United States received 266,274 musket cartridges. Fortunately for us, this record is preserved in the National Archives.