This jealousy of military power indeed pursued Washington from the beginning to the end of the Revolution.

It cropped out as soon as he was appointed, and came up in one form or another whenever he was obliged to take strong measures.

Even at the very end, after he had borne the cause through to triumph, Congress was driven almost to frenzy because Vergennes proposed to commit the disposition of a French subsidy to the commander-in-chief.
If this feeling could show itself toward Washington, it is easy to imagine that it was not restrained toward his officers and men, and the treatment of the soldiers by Congress and by the States was not only ungrateful to the last degree, but was utterly unpardonable.
Again and again the menace of immediate ruin and the stern demands of Washington alone extorted the most grudging concessions, and saved the army from dissolution.

The soldiers had every reason to think that nothing but personal fear could obtain the barest consideration from the civil power.

In this frame of mind, they saw the war which they had fought and won drawing to a close with no prospect of either provision or reward for them, and every indication that they would be disbanded when they were no longer needed, and left in many cases to beggary and want.