the Temple of Virtue
Books
- The Officers at Newburgh George Washington, the Newburgh Conspiracy, and the Crisis That Forged the American Republic · Liszt Think
In March 1783, peace had been signed but the Continental Army remained unpaid and restless at Newburgh. Two anonymous addresses circulated through camp, urging officers to defy Congress and march on Philadelphia.
- The Anonymous Addresses…anguage of petition. The address ended with a call to assembly. The officers were to meet the following day at the public building known as the Temple of Virtue. They were to come prepared to adopt such measures as shall appear best calculated to obtain justice. The phrase was vague enough to permit…
- Summons to the Temple of Virtue…day and the hour: Saturday, March 15, at eleven in the morning. It named the location: the “Public Building,” known to every man in camp as the Temple of Virtue. The summons had the quality of an operational order. Someone had decided that grievance alone was insufficient. Grievance needed a vessel,…
- The Meeting CalledThe answers would come on March 15. The Temple of Virtue stood ready that morning, a forty-by-seventy-foot wooden hall the army had built with its own hands for sermons and dances, now repurposed…