Printed in Journals of the Continental Congress, 5:474.

The committee brought in a report on July 19, but it was tabled and the committee allowed to meet again. The committee reported back again on July 30. The report blamed the “miscarriages” in Canada primarily upon the shortage of continental troops in Canada and also the shortage of hard money with 235which to supply the troops, and that “a still greater, and more fatal, source of misfortune has been, the prevalence of the small pox in that army; a great proportion whereof has thereby been usually kept unfit for duty.” Congress concurred with the report (Journals of the Continental Congress, 5:592, 617–618).

William Whipple (1730–1785), a merchant from Portsmouth, N.H., was a representative in 1775 to New Hampshire’s Fourth Provincial Congress, which commissioned him as colonel of the First Regiment of militia. Elected to the Continental Congress in 1776, Whipple served on the marine, commerce, cannon, and secret committees as well as the Board of War. He supported and signed the Declaration of Independence. In June 1777 he was promoted to major general and, among other duties, commanded the troops that accompanied General Burgoyne’s captured army to Winter Hill near Boston. Whipple served in Congress again from November 1778 to September 1779 ( ANB ).

George Clinton (1739–1812) practiced law in Ulster County, N.Y., from 1759. He was a member of the New York delegation to the Continental Congress from May 15, 1776, to July 8, 1776, when he took up the rank of brigadier general of militia. Clinton served as governor of New York from 1777 to 1795 and again from 1801 to 1804. In the latter year he was elected vice president of the United States, a position he held until his death ( DAB ).

William Floyd, Caesar Rodney, and Abraham Clark were added to the committee on July 6. On July 9 Congress voted that five of the committee would constitute a quorum in order to proceed with business (Journals of the Continental Congress, 5:524, 530).