“there is a conduct observed towards” the General “by certain great men, which as it is humiliating, must abate his happiness....  The Commander in Chief of this army is not sufficiently informed of all that is known by Congress of European affairs.  Is it not a galling circumstance, for him to collect the most important intelligence piecemeal, and as they choose to give it, from gentlemen who come from York?  Apart from the chagrin which he must necessarily feel at such an appearance of slight, it should be considered that in order to settle his plan of operations for the ensuing campaign, he should take into view the present state of European affairs, and Congress should not leave him in the dark.”

Furthermore, as already noted, Washington was criticised for his Fabian policy, and in his indignation he wrote to Congress, “I am informed that it is a matter of amazement, and that reflections have been thrown out against this army, for not being more active and enterprising than, in the opinion of some, they ought to have been.  If the charge is just, the best way to account for it will be to refer you to the returns of our strength, and those which I can produce of the enemy, and to the enclosed abstract of the clothing now actually wanting for the army.”  “I can assure those gentlemen,” he said, in reply to political criticism, “that it is a much easier and less distressing thing to draw remonstrances in a comfortable room by a good fireside, than to occupy a cold, bleak hill, and sleep under frost and snow, without clothes or blankets.”

The ill feeling did not end with insults.  With the defeats of the years 1776 and 1777 it gathered force, and towards the end of the latter year it crystallized in what has been known in history as the Conway Cabal.  The story of this conspiracy is so involved in shadow that little is known concerning its adherents or its endeavors.  But in a general way it has been discovered that the New England delegates again sought the aid of the Lee faction in Virginia, and that this coalition, with the aid of such votes as they could obtain, schemed several methods which should lessen the influence of Washington, if they did not force him to resign.  Separate and detached commands were created, which were made independent of the commander-in-chief, and for this purpose even a scheme which the General called “a child of folly” was undertaken.  Officers notoriously inimical to Washington, yet upon whom he would be forced to rely, were promoted.  A board of war made up of his enemies, with powers “in effect paramount,” Hamilton says, “to those of the commander-in-chief,” was created It is even asserted that it was moved in Congress that a committee should be appointed to arrest Washington, which was defeated only by the timely arrival of a new delegate, by which the balance of power was lost to the Cabal.