“I Set off from Baltimore”
Joining the German Regiment
As noted on this slip of paper, newly commissioned Lieutenant Samuel Gerock left Baltimore, Maryland, for Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on Sept. 11, 1776. There, he joined Captain George Keeports’s company of the German Regiment, a Continental Army unit mostly composed of ethnically German men from Pennsylvania and Maryland. Nicholas Haussegger, a Swiss-born veteran of the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763), was given command as colonel.
Memorandum Fragment
Written by Samuel Gerock
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
November 1776
Paper, Ink
Museum of the American Revolution, Gift of Nanette Reid Osborne and Dr. Robert Kent Reid, children of Virginia Gerock Reid
In the period, it was common for homeowners to rent out extra beds in their houses or taverns. Officers in the Revolutionary War commonly rented beds rather than stay in crowded barracks.
A rank for a junior officer. At full strength, each company (40-60 men) of an infantry regiment would have a first lieutenant and a second lieutenant. Samuel Gerock held the rank of first lieutenant.