Page:Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies, from the papers of Thomas Jefferson - Volume 1.djvu/238

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LETTER LVII.

TO HIS EXCELLENCY GENERAL WASHINGTON.

Charlottesville, May 28, 1781.

SIR,

I make no doubt you will have heard, before this shall have the honor of being presented to your Excellency, of the junction of Lord Corawallis with the force at Petersburg under Arnold, who had succeeded to the command on the death of Major General Phillips. I am now advised that they have evacuated Petersburg, joined at Westover a reinforcement of two thousand men just ar rived from New York, crossed James river, and on the 26th instant, were three miles advanced on their way towards Richmond ; at which place, Major General the Marquis Fayette lay with three thousand men, regulars and militia : these being the whole number we could arm, until the arrival of the eleven hundred arms from Rhode Island, which are, about this time, at the place where our public stores are deposited. The whole force of the enemy with in this state, from the best intelligence I have been able to get, is, I think, about seven thousand men, infantry and cavalry, including also, the small garrison left at Portsmouth. A number of priva teers, which are constantly ravaging the shores of our rivers, pre vent us from receiving any aid, from the counties lying on naviga ble waters : and powerful operations meditated against our western frontier, by a joint force of British and Indian savages, have, as your Excellency before knew, obliged us to embody between two and three thousand men in that quarter. Your Excellency will judge from this state of things, and from what you know of our country, what it may probably suffer during the present campaign. Should the enemy be able to produce no opportunity of annihila ting the Marquis s army, a small proportion of their force may yet restrain his movements effectually, while the greater part are em ployed, in detachment, to waste an unarmed country, and lead the minds of the people to acquiescence under those events, which they see no human power prepared to ward off. We are too far re moved from the other scenes of war to say, whether the main force of the enemy be within this state. But I suppose, they cannot any where spare so great an army for the operations of the field. Were it possible for this circumstance to justify in your Excellency a determination to lend us your personal aid, it is evi dent from the universal voice, that the presence of their beloved countryman, whose talents have so long been successfully employ-