TO MAJOR GENERAL GREENE.
Office of Finance, October 17th, 1782.
Dear Sir,
I have received your letter of the 1st of September, for which I pray you to accept my acknowledgements. Amid the many distresses and cares, which await every step of my administration, it is a great relief and consolation to have met with the support of those who command (and what is more, who worthily command) the armies of the United States. I have felt, my Dear Sir, your efforts to support my measures, and I know that they have been useful. I wish it were in my power to give to you and to your brave army that full relief, which their conduct, their sufferings, and above all, their patience, have merited.
I had intended to supply their subsistence, and the little contracts in Virginia, from the quota of that State, as the money there collected would have been nearest the spot where it was to be applied. But I need not tell you how deficient that State has been. The consequence is, that I must endeavor to supply the deficiency from other sources, which I am now doing; but in the precarious state of things at present, there is no reliance to be placed on any measure. I suppose, however, that the evacuation of Carolina will enable you to move northward, with a considerable part of your army; these will, I hope, meet the relief intended. I shall direct a statement of the whole to be made out by the Pay Master General, and do whatever may lay in my power; but as to pay, my inviolable determination is, that the whole army shall equally share whatever is disposed of in that way.
The disposition of the State of North Carolina to pay in specie, is far from being peculiar to that State. Attempts of the same kind have been made by others; and they have invariably been opposed and shall be. There is however a distinction to be taken. You recollect that Congress called for large quotas of specie. I am perfectly persuaded, that no State has fully obeyed that call, but many, and indeed almost all, aver that they have overpaid. The last requisitions have been for money; and if I had not by the publications prevented such assertions, it would not be surprising, that they should be repeated, even as to the money quotas. Now if the State of North Carolina are desirous of paying in specie, on the requisitions of specie, I shall not have the least objection; but on the requisitions for the service of the current year, I will receive money alone. I make this distinction in such clear and peremptory terms, to avoid all further cavils on the subject. I see that it has already been drawn into some length, and must, therefore, be finally terminated. Besides, under the present appearances there can be little doubt, that specie in North Carolina will be almost as useless as if they were in Otaheite. A copy of my letter to Governor Martin on this subject shall be enclosed to you.
You have in several of your letters, made very just observations on the business of my department, and such as convince me you have turned your attention to it. I have therefore taken the liberty to enclose to you a copy of a letter to Congress, on the subject of a mint, of one on the establishing public credit by funding our debts; and of a third, on the estimates for the ensuing year.
As there is a report, that the enemy got several letters intended for you, it is possible that some or other of those, may be among the number.
I pray you to believe me, with very sincere esteem, your most obedient servant,
ROBERT MORRIS.