His letter begins stiffly: "The state of affairs now at this post, you will please to observe, is as follows," and after this business has been stated, he goes on to give some of the reasons for delay.

One of his regiments was at White Plains, "under inoculation with the smallpox.

Dubois's regiment is unfit to be ordered on duty, there being not one blanket in the regiment.

Very few have either a shoe or a shirt, and most of them have neither stockings, breeches, or overalls....

Several hundred men are rendered useless, merely for want of necessary apparel, as no clothing is permitted to be stopped at this post." No complaint was made, but merely a statement of facts; for Putnam must have known that many of the soldiers under his commander were at that very time half starved and half naked at Valley Forge.