Spring of 1781, words from George Washington

By the spring of 1781 Washington was in despair.

Instead of having Magazines filled with provisions, we have a scanty pittance scattered here and there in the different States. Instead of having our Arsenals well supplied with Military Stores, they are all poorly provided, and the Workmen all leaving them. Instead of having various articles of Field equipage in readiness to deliver, the Quarter Master General . . . is but now applying to the several States to provide these things for the Troops respectively. Instead of having a regular System of Transportation established upon credit-or funds in the Qr. Masters hands to defray the contingent expenses of it we have neither the one nor the other and all that business, or a great part of it being done by Military Impress, we are daily and hourly oppressing the people-souring their tempers-and alienating their affections.³

2. Ibid., 4:124 (to Joseph Reed, 28 Nov 75).
3. George Washington, The Diaries of George Washington, ed. John C. Fitzpatrick, 4 vols. (Boston, 1925), 2:207-09 (May 1781).

Borrowed from http://www.history.army.mil/books/RevWar/risch/chpt-1.htm

A bit of history...