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.

84 WASHINGTON'S WRITINGS. [AlgT. 49.
TO COUNT DE ROCHAMBEAU.
Camp, near Peekskill, 27 June, 1781.
SIR,
I have had the honor of receiving your Excellency's
favor of the 23d instant from Hartford. It would have
given me the greatest pleasure could I have made it
convenient to meet you at Newtown; but independently of many arrangements, which are necessary at
the first taking of the field, I am detained by the hourly
expectation of the Chevalier de la Luzerne. I am
pleased to find, that your idea of the position, which
will be proper for the troops under your command, coincides exactly with my own; and I shall be happy in
giving your quartermaster-general every assistance in
reconnoitring and marking out your camp.
Lieutenant-Colonel Cobb, one of my aids-de-camp,
will have the honor of delivering to you this letter, and
will return to me with any despatch or message, which
your Excellency may wish to communicate; or, should
you rather incline to come forward from Newtown
before the army, Colonel Cobb will be proud to attend
you. I shall be much obliged if your Excellency will
present to the Count de Barras, by the next occasion,
my sincere thanks for the readiness with which he was
pleased to accept the proposition I had the honor to
make to him through your Excellency. I am, &c.*
* Extract from Count de Rochambeau's Letter. - "I arrived here yesterday with the first regiment, which has been followed this day by the
second, and will be so to-morrow by the third, and the day after by the
fourth. I shall stay here this day and to-morrow to give time for our
broken carriages to be mended, and our young artillery-horses and oxen
to refresh themselves. I shall set off the day after to-morrow with the first
regiment for Newtown, the army to march in four divisions as before;
and I shall probably arrive there on the 28th, and stay the 29th and 30th,
to assemble the brigades and march in two divisions to the North River.
The corps of Lauzun will march as far advanced as my first division