The writings of George Washington; being his correspondence, addresses, messages, and other papers, official and private, selected and published from the original manuscripts; with a life of the author, notes and illustrations. By Jared Sparks.

62 WASHINGTON'S WRITINGS. [rET. 49.
TO MAJOR-GENERAL GREENE.
New Windsor, 1 June, 1781.
MY DEAR SIR,
The difficulties, which you daily encounter and surmount with your small force, add not a little to your
reputation; and I am pretty well assured, that, should
you be obliged finally to withdraw from South Carolina
and even from North Carolina, it will not be attributed
to your want either of abilities or of exertion, but to
the true cause, the want of means to support the war
in them. I feel for your mortification at the loss of the
day before Camden, after it seemed so much in your
favor; but I hope you will have found, that the enemy
suffered severely, as in their publication of the affair in
New York they confess the loss of two hundred. The
reduction of Fort Watson does honor to General Marion and Colonel Lee.
I have lately had an interview with Count de Rochambeau at Weathersfield. Our affairs were very attentively considered in every point of view, and it was
finally determined to make an attempt upon New York
with its present garrison, in preference to a southern
operation, as we had not the decided command of the
water. You will readily suppose the reasons, which
induced this determination, were the inevitable loss of
men from so long a march, more especially in the approaching hot season, and the difficulty, I mav say impossibility, of transporting the necessary baggage, artillery, and stores by land. If I am supported as I
ought to be by the neighbouring States in this operation, which you know has always been their favorite
one, I hope that one of these consequences will follow,
either that the enemy will be expelled from the most
valuable position which they hold upon the continent,