Log City

After arriving on December 19, 1777, the men immediately began building huts for shelter. General orders issued the previous day called for huts fourteen by sixteen feet, six and a half feet high, with a door next to the street and a fireplace in the rear. In practice, hut size, location, and materials varied. Men from different regions knew different building techniques, and a few were skilled craftsmen. A surgeon's mate wrote home that they had one dull ax to build a log hut and did not know when it would be done. To encourage industry and skill, the general promised twelve dollars to the party in each regiment that finished its hut the quickest and in the most workmanlike manner.

Chesterbrook, Pennsylvania · United States