Washington’s Invalid Corps: Wounded Warriors Still Served the Revolutionary Cause

Although some readers may be familiar with the Civil War’s Invalid Corps, which wrought value and service from even grievously wounded men during that conflict, few probably know that America’s first such organization appeared during the Revolutionary War. Like its later counterpart, Washington’s Corps of Invalids provided the nation valuable service and roles for men who had paid a high personal price for seeking liberty. This is their story.

Tapping the skills of organized wounded soldiers, “invalids” as they were then called, to support national objectives was first recorded in England. In 1688, when the British army of King James II faced rising manpower demands ahead of a feared invasion by William of Orange, the Corps of Invalids was formed to free able-bodied men for active service by using wounded soldiers for rear area duty. Initially manning fortifications in Chelsea and Tynemouth and serving as Hampton Court Palace’s ceremonial guard, the Corps was repeatedly abolished and restarted by various monarchs over the years. By the time of the American Revolution, British invalid companies served in garrisons throughout Great Britain, and were augmented by pensioners recalled to service during times of emergency (such as when France declared war in 1778). In North America, the Royal Garrison Battalion was created and manned by discharged soldiers, manning posts such as Paulus Hook in New Jersey and forts in Bermuda. Soldiers of this battalion served periodically as guards aboard the infamous prison hulks posted in New York harbor. Although France spawned the term “invalid” and French King Louis XIV founded the Hotel Royal des Invalides in 1670 as the first dedicated institution caring for wounded soldiers, the nation never reached England’s level of organizing and utilizing its injured veterans.^[1]

The Second Continental Congress first proposed forming an American “corps of invalids” on August 26, 1776, following deliberations of a report from its committee on disabled soldiers and seamen. Although it provided these men a half-pay pension, the ever-frugal Congress included provisions requiring any man capable of still providing even limited service to do so. For soldiers, this would be in a newly-formed corps of invalids, which was announced by publishing the report in newspapers in Philadelphia, New York, New Hampshire and elsewhere in August and September, 1776.[2]

Action to make this corps a reality came, however, not from Congress but rather from Ireland-born writer and merchant Lewis Nicola. Despite his twenty-seven years as a British army officer, being fifty-eight years old at the war’s outbreak prevented Nicola from field service. Although made Philadelphia’s Town Major, leading the city’s guard force, the ambitious Nicola wanted a higher post. It remains unclear if he was aware of Congress’s 1776 announcement, but in spring 1777, Nicola wrote the Second Continental Congress proposing that it create a “Regiment of Invalids” and place him in command. Like Britain’s corps, Nicola suggested it would perform rear-duty functions to free able men for combat, adding that discharging wounded veterans “without some provision would be inhuman to them & disadvantageous to the publick, as others, whose services may be wanted in camp, must be employed in certain duties these invalids could perform, for which reason all nations in Europe employ them in garrison.”[3]

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In response, on June 20, 1777, the Continental Congress established America’s first Invalid Corps. As Nicola had recommended, it was intended to provide meaningful rear-duty service for wounded and injured officers and men, while also supporting regiments in the field by freeing able-bodied men for service and providing officers for army recruiting and training. Consisting of nearly 1,000 men, it would organize into eight 100-man companies; like Continental infantry companies, each would include “one captain, two lieutenants, two ensigns, five serjeants, six corporals, two drummers, two fifers.” The Corps of Invalids was “to be employed in garrisons, and for guards in cities and other places, where magazines or arsenals, or hospitals are placed; as also to serve as a military school for young gentlemen, previous to their being appointed to marching regiments.” As Nicola had also recommended, Congress that same day elected him as the corps’ commander, with the rank of colonel. Although the military academy concept proved to be stillborn, the Invalid Corps had been created.[4]

As with its 1776 proposal, in June 1777 Congress published news of forming a “regiment of invalids” in several newspapers. To staff the new organization, it directed that all soldiers in or within twenty miles of Philadelphia receiving half-pay as invalids were to report within fifteen days to “Col. Nicola, in Front street, four doors below the Coffee house.” Discharged wounded soldiers receiving half-pay elsewhere in the new nation were to report to the nearest “Continental general, field officer, physician or surgeon” for their consideration before joining the Corps, although no time frame for this action was noted. Former soldiers, even those not wounded, too “may present themselves” to voluntarily be considered for the Corps. To further build out the Invalid Corps’ ranks, on July 16 Congress approved the Board of War’s proposal that physicians and surgeons consider transferring enlisted men capable of serving garrison duty, rather than discharging them, even those who had lost an arm or a leg. Officers were to be transferred to the Corps by General Washington or Congress’s Board of War, as was the practice. [5]

Washington quickly followed the Continental Congress’s lead by standing up the new unit. On July 30, 1777 he wrote Congress asking to be sent the June Resolution creating the Corps so he could issue a general order. It remains unclear if he ever issued such an order, but on December 14 Washington notified Congress’s Board of War that he had ordered muster of the Corps of Invalids and that Doctor William Shippen, Director General of the Continental army’s Medical Department and its chief physician, “has requested me to allot them to guard the Hospitals.” “I don’t know how they can be better employed,” added Washington. Another intended use for the invalids Washington noted was as guards at storehouses and “laboratories” (ammunition production sites). That Washington expected the war to eventually generate a large Corps of Invalids for his use was reflected in comments written to Maj. Gen. William Heath in Boston on November 5, 1777: “[I] dare say we shall have subjects enough to establish a Corps of Invalids in the Eastern as well as the middle Colonies.”[6]

To ensure such a steady supply of men, on August 7, 1779 Washington formalized the process for transferring wounded soldiers to the Corps of Invalids, making it much hardener for men to be sent home. Declaring “It being found prejudicial to the service to discharge soldiers from the army who are capable of doing duty in the Corps of Invalids, the Commander in Chief directs that no officer or soldier shall be discharged without a certificate from the Director General or a senior surgeon of the Flying Hospital that he is unfit to serve in the corps of invalids.” Driving home the importance of filling the Corps’ ranks, Washington at once invalidated all previously issued discharges. Further enabling filling the Invalid Corps’ ranks was that it was apparently racially integrated, like much of the Continental Army. Formerly-enslaved man Thomas Nichols was—much to his dismay—transferred into its tanks in February 1781.[7]

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Both Washington and Congress nonetheless wanted to ensure the Invalid Corps would not become a haven for shirkers. Taking a page from Congress’ August 1776 Resolution, each man considered for transfer to the Invalid Corps had to present “a certificate from the commanding officer . . . and the surgeon that attended him” attesting to “the nature of his wound, and in what action of engagement he received it.” Officers seeking to join the Invalid Corps also had to demonstrate good moral qualities, showing they had “served with reputation, and having supported good characters both as citizens and soldier.”

Although the new organization settled in quickly its official name was never formally resolved, so a variety of terms for the unit appears in wartime documents. These include the “Invalid Corps,” the “Invalid Regiment,” “Col. Nicola’s regiment,” and the “Corps of Invalids.” This latter term was the one most often used in Congressional documents and appears most frequently in Washington’s correspondence.[8]

The new Invalid Corps was first assigned to Philadelphia, as Congress directed, and by June 10, 1777 it had grown to comprise 574 enlisted men and 49 officers. By September it was posted to guard and garrison nearby Fort Mifflin, prompting Washington to write Colonel Nicola on the 29th that he had “put great dependance upon you and all your officers exerting yourselves in the defense of a post of so much consequence. You must be sensible that Genl. Howe can neither support his Army in Philadelphia, if he is cut off from his Ships, neither can he make a retreat should any accident befall him.” Despite the honor and respect offered by this important role, Washington was treating his new Invalid Regiment as if it was in effect just another Continental infantry force, which it most certainly was not.[9]

By November, with the British having captured Philadelphia, threatening enemy cross-river supply lines by holding Fort Mifflin became vital to Washington’s plan for retaking the capital. In two months’ time Washington had apparently become convinced that the Corps was not up to adequately securing Fort Mifflin, so Nicola’s men were moved to nearby Trenton, New Jersey. There the Corps performed more suitable duties, including guarding stores. While in Trenton Colonel Nicola observed “a large vessel in the river with a very valuable Cargo belonging to Congress which was in danger of falling into the enemies hands,” and he quickly dispatched a force of thirty Invalid Corps men to nearby Bordentown to secure and guard the ship. Also reflecting its growing usefulness, the Corps was ordered on October 29 to guard hospitals and additional military stores, initially in Allentown, Pennsylvania and later instead in nearby Easton, Bethlehem, and Reading through May 1778. [10]

The Corps of Invalids returned to Philadelphia in June 1778 following the British evacuation, and Colonel Nicola established himself at Pauling’s Farm, near Washington’s Valley Forge headquarters. In the city its men also guarded British and Hessian prisoners—from whom their commander apparently collected intelligence that he sent to Washington—and staffed army recruiting posts. By October 19, 1779 a detachment from the Corps had been posted to guard the hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, where it remained until returning to Philadelphia on May 21, 1782.[11]

On June 13, 1781, at Washington’s request Congress ordered the Invalid Regiment to the West Point, New York garrison, leaving a single invalid company in the capital and another company guarding the hospital in Boston. This major geographic move posed a challenge to Colonel Nicola’s leadership skills because while the New York and New England men were pleased, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Delaware invalids grumbled loudly about being so far from home. Nonetheless, arriving at West Point’s King’s Ferry on August 4, 1781, the invalids set up camp on Constitution Island in the North (Hudson) River, reflecting their apparent mission to secure the vital position directly across the river from West Point. The barracks they were to occupy had not been finished (and never would be during their stay in New York). By August the Corps of Invalids at West Point comprised 260 men, eight officers, and—a first for the Corps—19 women, probably working as laundresses and cooks. On August 9, 1781 an invalid detachment was sent to guard the nearby supply depot at Fishkill, New York, where it remained until at least February 1783. So useful was the Corps of Invalid troops at West Point that their presence featured in General Washington’s plans for implementing the 1783 Treaty of Paris that ended the war.[12]

Throughout its service, the Invalid Corps suffered some significant problems, many of which would similarly plague their Civil War era counterparts two generations later. Not being paid for months at a time—a problem facing all American servicemen throughout the Revolution—seemed to trouble Invalid Corps men more so than troops in the field, in part probably because their less taxing routine allowed time to focus on the problem and because, being posted in populated areas, their proximity to commercial goods only made their lack of money more obvious. Urban postings also provided temptations of drink and opportunity to commit crimes such as theft, assault, and in one case, treason. So numerous were crimes committed by Nicola’s invalids that it took two letters, written on April 12 and April 14, 1778, for him to advise Washington of the problem. Similarly, with one foot in the military and another in the nearby civilian world, discipline of the men and frequent absences from camp challenged the regiment. Colonel Nicola to complain to Washington that his officers were unable to meet these challenges.[13]

The Corps of Invalid’s frequent moves strained the constitutions of many already-compromised veterans, thinning the Corps’ ranks through illness. For example, by June 26, 1781, just before departing for West Point, the invalid regiment numbered just 224 men and 13 officers, nearly half of its original force. In response, Colonel Nicola later wrote to Washington pleading that “the disabilities of the invalids entitle them to certain indulgences beyond other soldiers,” recommending that they should not be given the same duties as able-bodied men and that “no more military duty than one day in three should be required of them.” Although Washington never again put the Invalids in a role like that at Fort Mifflin, the war’s demands required more of these men than their colonel wished.[14]

Endemic Continental army supply, equipment, and uniform shortfalls hit the low-priority Invalid Corps particularly hard. In response, Nicola wrote the president of Pennsylvania’s Supreme Executive Council in January 1778 that “many of my people are almost naked & besides what they suffer from the severity of the weather the appearance of many of them is offensive to decency.”[15]

Maintaining the Corps’ manpower levels also constantly troubled Colonel Nicola, despite its strong start and Washington’s initial expectations. This problem was certainly exacerbated by Washington’s unexplained June 15, 1781 general order directing “no men to be transferred to the Corps of Invalids until further orders.” Perhaps in response, on May 21, 1782 Nicola proposed a series of modest organizational changes, notifying Washington that Congress’ original plan for eight 100-man companies had never come to fruition and that “the number of men has never been sufficient to compleat four companies.” In that same letter Nicola complained he was burdened by too many officers, most of whom were so badly injured as to be useful only for office work, if even that.[16]

These issues and other personal frustrations may have prompted Nicola to write Washington on May 22, 1782 an intemperate letter blaming his and other problems on Congress and the democratic system it advocated, suggesting Washington could fix many of the nation’s ills by declaring himself king. Washington immediately and directly rebuked this scheme, with lasting effect. Referred to today as the Nicola Affair, it doomed Nicola’s military career and by close personal association, probably the Corps of Invalids too. In October 1782, Gen. Benjamin Lincoln proposed dissolving the Invalid Corps, arguing it was expensive and had failed to meet its original goals. In 1783, along with other Revolutionary wartime military units, the Invalid Corps was disbanded.[17]

The Revolutionary War Invalid Corps had nonetheless proven the concept’s value, that wounded veterans could usefully continue contributing to the nation’s military needs and—General Lincoln’s arguments aside—it had in fact fulfilled Congress’ intentions upon its creation. For example, reflecting that the Corps freed able-bodied men for field service, Washington wrote on May 18, 1778 that “Col. Nicola’s Invalids have been at Easton and Bethlehem, where they were kept as a guard to the Hospitals and Stores, and therefore Militia were not necessary there,” a sentiment he repeated on August 10, 1781. The Invalids had served in hospitals so effectively that Dr. Shippen and his medical staff advocated for retaining Invalid Corps troops when they were moved away by necessities of the war. Despite its problems, officers and men continued seeking out service in the Corps to the war’s end, suggesting that it similarly met Colonel Nicola and Congress’s hope that it would provide the Revolution’s wounded soldiers a sense of purpose and proof that despite sometimes major wounds they could continue contributing to their nation and families as full men.[18]

So successful was the concept of using recovered soldiers that two states sought to use invalids for their own purposes. In 1781, New York planned to create its own such force, drawing from the New York Line troops. Washington, understandably, opposed this plan which would have created a new state-level military unit that would both reduce his control over the new nation’s military forces and undermine the effectiveness of the Invalid Corps already under his service. To Gov. George Clinton he wrote on February 8 that although such a New York unit “might be attended with some good consequence, yet I conceive (besides being contrary to the spirit of the late establishment of the Army, by which all independent Corps are reduced) it would not, on every consideration, be an eligible measure.” Driving his point home, Washington reminded the governor that any men who were “proper subjects” should be transferred to the Corps of Invalids. Similarly, in early 1783 the Connecticut state government twice pressed Congress to have invalids from the Connecticut Line serve only in their state, though to no avail.[19]

The United States would once again call its wounded warriors back into the ranks during a time of great national crisis, nearly 100 years later amidst the Civil War. That Union invalid organization, later renamed the Veteran Reserve Corps, had much in common with their counterparts in Washington’s Corps of Invalids, but that’s another story . . . .

[1] Caroline Louise Nielsen, “The Chelsea Out-Pensioners: Image and Reality in Eighteenth-Century and Early Nineteenth-Century Social Care,” PhD Thesis, August 2014, Newcastle University, UK: Captain G.T. Dean “The Corps of Invalids,” Royal United Services Institution Journal, August 1944, 282–287; A. S. White “Garrison, Reserve and Veteran Battalions and Companies,” Journal of the Society for Historical Research, 1960, 156–167; Donald Grady Shomette Privateers of the Revolution: War on the New Jersey Coast, 1775-1783 (Atglen, Pennsylvania: Schiffer Publishing, 2016) 263; Stanley Michael Suplick, Jr., “The United States Invalid Corps/Veteran Reserve Corps,” PhD thesis, University of Minnesota, 1969), 1-13.

[2] Journals of the Continental Congress, Volume V, August 26, 1776, 705, tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/llscd/lljc005/lljc005.pdf; The Philadelphia Evening Post, August 29, 1776; The New York Gazette and Weekly Mercury, September 9, 1776; The Freeman’s Journal, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, September 9, 1776.

[3] Lewis Nicola to Congress, March 1777, Life in Letters: American Autograph Journal, Vol. 2 No. 4 (July 1939), 149-51; Pennsylvania Archives, Fifth Series, 4:3-5, 255; Robert F. Haggard, “The Nicola Affair: Lewis Nicola, George Washington, and American Military Discontent during the Revolutionary War,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society Vol. 146 No. 2 (June 2002), 147-148; Lewis Nicola, Return of Troops quartered at Philadelphia, June 10, 1777, George Washington Papers. Although Nicola was wrong in claiming that all European nations utilized wounded soldiers so, he nonetheless wrote Anthony Wayne, on March 19, 1779 about “the plan I offered to Congress for forming the Invalid Regiment” (Pennsylvania Archives, First Series, 7:255 and Fifth Series, 4:3.). For more on Lewis Nicola’s life, see Douglas R. Cubbinson, “Colonel Lewis Nicola: Soldier, Scientist, and Man of Letters, Journal of the American Revolution, July 25, 2013, allthingsliberty.com/2013/07/colonel-lewis-nicola-soldier-scientist-and-man-of-letters/.

[4] Haggard “The Nicola Affair” 143- 148; Nicola to Congress, March 1777, Life in Letters, 149–151; Suplick, “The United States Invalid Corps/Veteran Reserve Corps,” 16-19; Journals of the Continental Congress 8:485; Pennsylvania Archives, First Series, 7:255; George Washington, August 7, 1779, George Washington Papers. Some accounts date its creation to April 21, 1777 when Congress “considered” the Board of War’s report on this issue. Although Nicola’s rank is often listed as major by many historians, that was his rank as Philadelphia’s “town major”; when commanding the invalids he was a colonel.

[5] Pennsylvania Archives, Fifth Series, 4:4-6; Dunlap’s Philadelphia Packet, June 22 and 24, 1777; The Freeman’s Journal, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, July 26 and August 23, 1777; Washington to Nicola, June 9, 1778, George Washington Papers.

[6] Washington to Continental Congress Board of War, December 14, 1777, George Washington Papers; general orders, June 16, 1778, George Washington Papers; Washington to Continental Congress, July 30, 1777, George Washington Papers; Washington to William Heath, November 5, 1777, George Washington Papers.

[7] Continental Congress, June 20, 1777, Resolutions on the Invalid Corps, George Washington Papers; Washington to Heath, December 19, 1780 and January 29, 1781, George Washington Papers; general orders, March 13, 1778, George Washington Papers; Christian McBurney, “The Discovery of an Important Letter from a Soldier of the 1st Rhode Island Regiment,” Journal of the American Revolution, April 14, 2021, allthingsliberty.com/2021/04/the-discovery-of-an-important-letter-from-a-soldier-in-the-1st-rhode-island-regiment/. Although these orders declare they are from the commander in chief—Washington—on December 19, 1780 and again on January 29, 1781 Washington wrote to General Heath claiming he was “not sufficiently informed of the mode of transferring to the Corps of Invalids” suggesting the August 7 directive was instead the work of Congress’s Board of War or some other author.

[8] Inspection Board Report on Invalid Regiment, June 10, 1783, George Washington Papers; The Pennsylvania Packet, February 20, 1783; Nicola, August 9, 1781, Return on Detachment, George Washington Papers; Washington to Nicola, February 5, 1780, George Washington Papers; Washington to Anne Cesare, Chevalier de la Luzerne, January 2, 1782, George Washington Papers.

[9] Nicola, June 10, 1777, Report on Troops at Philadelphia, George Washington Papers; Washington to Nicola, September 3, 1777, September 29, 1777, George Washington Papers.

[10] Nicola to Washington, October 6, 1777, George Washington Papers.

[11] Nicola, July 29, 1778, Report on Troops at Philadelphia (Return), George Washington Papers; general orders, June 16, 1778, George Washington Papers; Washington to John Cochran, June 18, 1782, George Washington Papers.

[12] Continental Congress Board of War to Nicola, October 29, 1777, George Washington Papers; Haggard “The Nicola Affair,” 148-153; Whitfield J. Bell, “Colonel Lewis Nicola: Advocate of Monarchy, 1782” (Philadelphia: A Paper Read before the Pennsylvania Society of the Cincinnati, 1983), 4; Washington to Nicola, September 29, 1777, June 21, 1781, George Washington Papers; Consultation of Officers of Invalids at Fort Mifflin, September 27, I777, Papers of the Continental Congress, National Archives, Item 163; Nicola to Washington, October 6, 1777, July 24, 1781, George Washington Papers; Nicola to Washington, June 26, 1781, August 4, 1781, May 21, 1782, George Washington Papers; Washington to Cochran, June 18, 1782, George Washington Papers; Nicola, August 3, 1781, Return of Regiment with Copy, George Washington Papers; Peace Settlement, May 1, 1783, George Washington Papers; Benjamin Walker to Nicola, February 7, 1783, George Washington Papers.

[13] Nicola to Washington, October 6, 1777, December 6, 1777, April 12 and April 14, 1778, November 6, 1780, George Washington Papers; Washington to Nicola, October 8, 1779, October 19, 1779, George Washington Papers; general orders, August 5, 1778, George Washington Papers.

[14] Nicola to Washington, June 26, 1781 and November 20, 1782, George Washington Papers.

[15] Nicola to Washington, August 14, 1781, George Washington Papers; Washington to Nicola, September 29, 1777, George Washington Papers..

[16] General orders, June 15, 1781, George Washington Papers; Nicola to Washington, May 21, 1782, George Washington Papers; Haggard “The Nicola Affair,” 139-169; Suplick, “The United States Invalid Corps/Veteran Reserve Corps,” 20-24.

[17] Haggard “The Nicola Affair,” 139-169; Suplick, “The United States Invalid Corps/Veteran Reserve Corps,” 20-24; Washington to Nicola, May 22, 1782, George Washington Papers.

[18] Washington to Continental Congress Board of War, May 18, 1778, George Washington Papers; Donald Jackson and Dorothy Twohig, The Diaries of George Washington (1976), Vol. III, 1771-1775, 1780-81, image 426, Library of Congress.

[19] Nicola to David Humphreys, February 6, 1783, George Washington Papers.