Apr 17, 2012 - Sale 2276

Sale 2276 - Lot 53

Price Realized: $ 18,000
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 2,500 - $ 3,500
"THE ENEMY AS WERE AT YORK HAVE CROSSED OVER TO GLOCESTER" LAFAYETTE, GILBERT DU MOTIER; MARQUIS DE. Letter Signed, "Lafayette," as Major General, to Brigadier General George Weedon, informing that Cornwallis is concentrating his entire force at Gloucester, and requesting cavalry stores and ammunition. 3 pages, 8vo, on a single folded sheet; minor foxing. "Camp Forks of York River" [VA], 18 August 1781
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Lafayette passes on a major piece of intelligence, in which he seems not completely confident: "I received information this morning that such of the enemy as were at York have crossed over to Glocester, where Lord Cornwallis is with his whole force. I do not wish to give the militia of the northern neck the least unnecessary fatigue, and for this reason, in place of calling them into the field, I would have them to be in a state of readiness to act on the shortest notice."
He also makes an urgent request for arms and ammunition: "It is said that there is a stock of Continental ammunition in cartridges at Leesburg. We want nothing so much, except arms, as this article." Abstracted in Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution, IV:509.