New York State Provincial Congress Military Returns

This series consists mostly of election returns for military officers and reports on the strength of military units. The Provincial Congress, acting as an extralegal administrator of the internal affairs of the colony, requested local committees to choose local militia officers and to report the results back to the Congress.

The records exist in several forms: charts providing the name of the commanding officer (colonel) of a specified regiment, the captain of each company in the regiment, number of officers by rank and of troops in each captain's company, and the total number in the regiment; lists of officers, sometimes with dates commissioned; extracts or copies of minutes of local committee meetings at which officers were chosen; and letters to the Provincial Congress from local committees certifying that specified officers had been elected.

The series contains other records concerning the military including: lists of enlisted men; lists of prisoners; minutes of the Provincial Congress concerning election returns; records of arms and ammunition on hand; and incoming correspondence of the Committee of Safety, sometimes from local committees, regarding orders carried out and often relating to officers or enlisted men.

Microfilm is available for use at the New York State Archives or through interlibrary loan.

Selected documents from the series were published in Calendar of Historical Manuscripts Relating to the War of the Revolution in the Office of Secretary of State (Albany, 1868).

Rough alphabetical name and subject indexes to part of series (old volumes 26 and 27).

The records were at one time bound by the Secretary of State's office as Volumes 26-29 of a series titled "Papers Laid Before the Provincial Congress." The records suffered burn damage in the State Capitol fire of 1911; Volume 28 was destroyed in the fire.

Records are fragile due to burn damage. Use is restricted. Microfilm is first use copy.