1782 TIMOTHY PICKERING, Signed Revolutionary War Autograph Letter

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Oct 19, 2019

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  Autographs
  1782 Timothy Pickering Signed Revolutionary War Letter as the Official Quartermaster General of the Continental Army
  TIMOTHY PICKERING (1745-1829). American Revolution Aide to General George Washington, Adjutant General, then Quartermaster General of the Continental Army; U.S. Postmaster General, Secretary of War, and Secretary of State under President's George Washington and John Adams.
  August 27, 1782-Dated Revolutionary War Period, Autograph Letter Signed, "Tim. Pickering - Q.M.G" as Quartermaster General of the Continental Army, at New Windsor, NY., Choice Extremely Fine. Timothy Pickering Signs as the official Quartermaster General of the Continental Army, in rich brown ink, 2 pages, measuring 9" x 7.25", written in deep brown ink on fine quality laid period paper. Pickering writes to Colonel Henry Jackson (1747-1809) who received a brevet promotion to Brigadier General on September 30, 1783 and led Continental forces into New York City on the heels of the British evacuation in November. Henry Jackson was a Continental Army officer from Boston, Massachusetts during the American Revolutionary War and an original member of the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati. For most of the war he was colonel of Jackson's Additional Continental Regiment, which was redesigned the 16th Massachusetts in 1780. He commanded the Last Regiment of the Continental Army, the 1st American, which was disbanded in 1784. Jackson was a lifelong friend of Henry Knox another Continental Army officer. This Letter reads, in part:
  
  "The conditions mentioned by the persons proposed for quarter master and adjutant for your regiment of light infantry are reasonable, and shall be granted. Col. Webb desires a brigade quarter master. The service will be so short & not probably active, I wish that expense may be avoided. Every such demand increases my embarrassments, already greater than I can find means to struggle with. I have proposed to him that the Regimental quarter master should do each for himself, or by turns for the brigade, what would otherwise be required of the brigade quarter master. I will thank you to consult with him on the subject..."
  
  Docketed on second page. Small minor tear to lower left corner, seal remnant in upper left corner and overall clean and well written, being easily readable. Colonel Webb had been brevetted as Brigadier General in 1780, after having previously served on George Washington's staff. Col. Henry Jackson's universally well-regarded regiment later formed the nucleus of the postwar army. Although often criticized for financial "embarrassments" during the war, Pickering managed despite enormous obstacles to keep the army running long enough to achieve victory.
  Henry Jackson was the youngest son of Joseph and Susannah (Gray) Jackson. Before the American Revolutionary War, he was an officer of the First Corps of Cadets in Boston, which was disbanded during the British occupation. After the evacuation of Boston, six former cadet officers organized a company of seventy-eight officers and men called the Boston Independent Company on 17 March 1776, with Jackson as their commander.
  
  In January 1777, the unit was taken into Continental service, designated Jackson's Additional Continental Regiment. He led his regiment in the Philadelphia campaign of 1777, at Monmouth and Rhode Island in 1778, and at Springfield, New Jersey in 1780. In 1780 the regiment was taken into the Massachusetts Line and renamed the 16th Massachusetts Regiment.
  
  Jackson's regiment was disbanded in 1781 and Jackson was transferred to command the 4th Massachusetts Regiment. He received a brevet promotion to brigadier general on September 30, 1783 and led Continental forces into New York City on the heels of the British evacuation in November.
  
  He was retained as commander the 1st American Regiment (1783-1784), which was the only infantry unit still active after the dissolution of the Continental Army. Jackson was discharged from the Army on June 20, 1784 when the 1st Regiment was disbanded and the standing army was reduced to only 80 soldiers.
  
  In 1783 Jackson became an original member of the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati.
  
  He later served as a Major General in the Massachusetts militia from 1792 until 1796 and was the agent supervising the building of the frigate USS Constitution at Boston in 1797.
  
  He was a lifelong close friend of Major-General Henry Knox, and acted as his agent in his business affairs (particularly those concerning Knox's vast land holdings in Maine) while the General was Secretary of War. Other close associates included Hepzibah Swan of Boston, in whose household Jackson lived for some years.
  
  Henry Jackson is the namesake of the town of Jackson, Maine.
  
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