Samuel Hodgdon Esq^r A.D. M^r Newburgh April 3. 1784 Dear Sir, This will be handed you by Lieu^t Gunn late [undecipherable] director of artificers in the southern Army. I have settled and paid his pay account up to the 24^th of July last, the time of his embarkation at Charlestown to return home. Last summer in Philadelphia he received — [undecipherable: McReed], a [undecipherable] to the hay master general, [undecipherable] hay for himself and men up to the first of May, on his information. He now presents me a hay roll commencing that day and continued to the 8^th November when the army was discharged, with [undecipherable] his men who were enlisted for the war. [In] times of the then having [undecipherable] expired. After deducting the deputies wages, there is a balance due on the hay roll eight hundred and [undecipherable] [undecipherable] [undecipherable] [undecipherable]. By this from you will be pleased to apply to the superintendent of finances, adding to it an account of [undecipherable] in pay due three artificers who served at the southward that were detached from the line, [undecipherable] well [undecipherable], in the army — his account amounting to [undecipherable] two [undecipherable] — [undecipherable] [undecipherable]. Colonel Carrington has commissioned his artificers in the southern army not only [undecipherable] his [undecipherable], but hay of my [undecipherable] commands also and has taken a letter with by [undecipherable: McShane] [undecipherable] to the 1^st of March 1783 [undecipherable]. On the [undecipherable] mention — [undecipherable] Lieu^t Gunn, [he] should [undecipherable] [undecipherable] company of [undecipherable] armes in the southern army, agreeable to the [undecipherable] of the quarter master's department, and his company's pay from that time to be [undecipherable] from the [undecipherable] — [undecipherable] this application is made. [The] [undecipherable] [undecipherable] is [undecipherable] — actual payment in money after they were furloughed last summer on this [undecipherable] [undecipherable] have [undecipherable] about two months [undecipherable] before they were discharged, [undecipherable] on the 3. of November — [These] artificers received little or no hay in 1782, while they [undecipherable] in my detachment with the main army, being hired for the carriages, [undecipherable] and high wages, [undecipherable] universally demanded by [undecipherable: citizens]. The southern artificers are entitled to twelve [undecipherable] a month only. [undecipherable: Ernest Gibons] observes that the artificers of Patton's company serving with the artillery in the main army, being enlisted for the war, are [undecipherable] [undecipherable] A [undecipherable: Polonius] [undecipherable] given in 1781, turned over (as I [undecipherable: had supposed]) to the artillery, where there were good artificers. [Officers] without men — [these] artificers, I say, have been [undecipherable] only, as the books in general have been [undecipherable: tried]. I have thus given you a [undecipherable] state of facts to be laid before the superintendent of finance. One remark I must add in favor of the southern artificers — that their [undecipherable] has been uncommon[ly] more severe, and [undecipherable] even more in [undecipherable]. I [undecipherable] settle with Lieu^t Gunn, you will [undecipherable] from his pay [undecipherable] a copy of his pay, with an [undecipherable] in actual payment [undecipherable] to [undecipherable] the [undecipherable] payments once [undecipherable] made — I am, dear Sir, very affectionately yours, Tim Pickering [undecipherable]