Click for a larger view.The Institution of the Society of the Cincinnati
May 1783
May 1783
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
Adopted at the founding meeting on May 13, 1783, the Institution remains the principle guiding document of the organization to the present day. The first official copy was inscribed on a large, irregularly shaped sheet of parchment and signed by George Washington and thirty-five other officers. The Institution lays out the tenets and organizational structure of the Society, the rules of eligibility to membership, the establishment of constituent branches, and details of the Society’s insignia. To join the Society, the original members were required to sign their names to the Institution, thus pledging their allegiance to the immutable principles upon which the Society was founded.
Click for a larger view.Drawing of the Society of the Cincinnati medal
Pierre-Charles L’Enfant
June 1783
Pierre-Charles L’Enfant
June 1783
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
At the request of the Society, Pierre-Charles L’Enfant, a French volunteer in the Continental Army Corps of Engineers, drew a design for a medal bearing imagery of the life of the fifth-century BC Roman hero Cincinnatus, from whom the Society takes its name. The obverse, shown here, depicts Cincinnatus receiving his sword from Roman senators as he leaves home to lead his country against its enemies.
Click for a larger view.Drawing of the Society of the Cincinnati Eagle
Pierre-Charles L’Enfant
June 1783
Pierre-Charles L’Enfant
June 1783
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
This cutout of the design for a badge in the form of a bald eagle suspended by a blue-and-white ribbon was submitted by L’Enfant as an alternative to the medal described in the Institution. In June 1783, the Society adopted the Eagle as its official insignia. General Steuben, acting as president pro-tem of the Society, boldly signed his name across the top of the ribbon, consigning this original watercolor drawing to the archives. L’Enfant made additional copies of the Eagle design, which were circulated among the state branches to encourage orders.
Click for a larger view.Drawing of the Society of the Cincinnati diploma
Pierre-Charles L’Enfant
June 1783
Pierre-Charles L’Enfant
June 1783
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
Concerned that all members of the Society might not be able to afford to purchase an Eagle, L’Enfant also submitted this design for an elegant membership certificate, to be called the diploma. The imagery depicts America forcing Britannia away from its shores, with Fame heralding the achievement of American independence. The Society adopted the diploma and the Eagle as the official emblems of membership at its June 19, 1783, meeting.
Click for a larger view.Certification of Pierre-Charles L’Enfant’s membership in the Society of the Cincinnati
George Washington
October 16, 1783
George Washington
October 16, 1783
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
In the fall of 1783, L’Enfant traveled to Paris to oversee the production of the first gold Eagles and the engraving of a copperplate for the diploma. This certificate, signed by George Washington as president general, states that L’Enfant is a member of the Society and is authorized to “transact some necessary business relative to the Order” while in France.
Click for a larger view."Idees sur l’Associaton des Cincinnati"
Charles Henri, comte d’Estaing
July 13, 1784
Charles Henri, comte d’Estaing
July 13, 1784
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
Admiral d’Estaing, who served as the first president of the Société des Cincinnati de France, wrote a twelve-page essay in response to the amendments to the Society’s Institution proposed at the first general meeting held in May 1784. In addition to recommending a special structure of officers for the French branch (two vice presidents, one from the army and one from the navy), he suggested that women who have demonstrated their zeal for the American cause by supporting their husbands and fathers also be eligible to wear the Eagle of the Society.
Click for a larger view."Journals of the Society; or Order of the Cincinnati, by their Delegates in Genl. Meeting Convend May, MDCCLXXXIV"
George Turner
1784-1787
George Turner
1784-1787
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
The minute book of proceedings of the Society’s earliest meetings was kept by Assistant Secretary General George Turner, who drew an elaborate rendering of the Society’s Eagle on its front paste-down end paper. Turner, a captain in the First South Carolina Regiment, settled in Philadelphia after the war and took an active role in gathering and organizing the Society’s papers during its first decade. He later served as a judge in the Northwest Territory.
Click for a larger view.George Washington to the "Delegates of the State Societies of the Cincinnati Assembled at Their Triennial Meeting"
May 1790
May 1790
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
In his message to the delegates to the 1790 Triennial Meeting, Washington recognized that much of the public’s early concerns about the Society as an elitist or political force seemed to have been defused: “The candor of your fellow-citizens acknowledges the patriotism of your conduct in peace, as their gratitude has declared their obligations for your fortitude and perseverance in war. A knowledge that they now do justice to the purity of your intentions ought to be your highest consolation, as the fact is demonstrative of your greatest glory.”
Click for a larger view.Cincinnati. At a meeting of Delegates from the State Societies to the General Society.
July 4, 1811
July 4, 1811
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
This printed broadsheet details the Society’s 1811 general meetings, the first to be called by Charles Cotesworth Pinckney since he succeeded to the office of president general following Alexander Hamilton’s death in 1804. The notable business of their August 8 meeting was Pinckney’s report that he had received from Mrs. Hamilton “the Diamond Insignia of the Order of the Cincinnati which had been presented by the Marine Officers of France … to His Excellency General Washington, and by the heirs of the General had been sent to General Hamilton.” The Society responded with a resolution thanking Mrs. Hamilton for “this highly acceptable present” and affirming General Pinckney’s recommendation that the Diamond Eagle “be hereafter considered as appurtenant to the Office of President-General.”
Click for a larger view.Henry Alexander Scammell Dearborn to Alexander Washington Johnston
January 1, 1849
January 1, 1849
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
When Henry Alexander Scammell Dearborn was elected the eighth president general of the Society of the Cincinnati in 1848, he became the first hereditary member to hold the office. In this letter to the Society’s secretary general, Dearborn wrote of the honor of receiving the Diamond Eagle, noting that the presentation had taken place on December 14, 1848, the forty-ninth anniversary of Washington’s death. “As a humble disciple of that Greatest and Best of Men, may I be ever emulous to imitate his preeminent virtues, & anxiously endeavor to maintain those lofty principles by which he was actuated … as one of the most decided & efficient advocates for the Rights and Liberties of his countrymen.”
Click for a larger view.Triennial banquet program
May 10, 1905
May 10, 1905
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
Starting in 1851, the individual constituent societies in rotation took on the responsibility of organizing and hosting the Society’s Triennial Meetings. Through the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the hosting societies produced souvenir programs, menus, and other printed ephemera of notable elegance and design. The program for the Triennial banquet hosted by the Virginia Society, held in Richmond on May 10, 1905, featured a gilded embossed Eagle.
Click for a larger view.Larz Anderson to Gist Blair
April 6, [1934]
April 6, [1934]
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
In this letter to his fellow Cincinnatus Gist Blair, Larz Anderson discussed his interest in the possibility of Anderson House becoming the headquarters of the Society of the Cincinnati: “[M]y interest goes so far back as the building of the house in Massachusetts Avenue, for even then I introduced the Eagle in the pediment in front and had frescoes, allegorical, painted in his day by Siddons Mowbray.” Explaining the uncertainties he and his wife were facing in “this changing age,” he concluded, “Time alone can tell what may be in a position to do.”
Click for a larger view.Presentation of Anderson House to the Society of the Cincinnati
April 19, 1939
April 19, 1939
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
This photograph documents the ceremonial unveiling of a bronze plaque in the Entrance Hall of Anderson House marking Isabel Anderson’s gift of the house to the Society to be its first national headquarters. From left to right: Robert Copeland Jones, Lt. Col. Edgar Erskine Hume, Francis Althorp Foster, Gist Blair, Mrs. Anderson, Bryce Metcalf, George B. Kinkead, and John Phillip Hill.
Click for a larger view.British Prime Minister Winston Churchill receiving the Society of the Cincinnati Eagle from Maj. Gen. Edgar Erskine Hume
January 16, 1952
January 16, 1952
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives, Gift of the U.S. Army Office of Information, 1952
Sir Winston Churchill was admitted to hereditary membership in the Connecticut branch of the Society in 1947, representing the line of Lt. Reuben Murray, a Revolutionary War officer from whom he was descended on his maternal side. While on an official visit to the United States in 1950, the British prime minister received his Society Eagle in a ceremony in the Anderson House Ballroom. A portion of Churchill’s remarks that afternoon were captured on a Fox Movietone News clip: “I thank you from the bottom of my heart for the kindness which you have shown me. I value this honor, and let it be a help to all of those forces—they are, in my opinion, irresistible forces—which draw our two nations together; not for any unworthy purpose of combination or gathering strength, but in order that we may defend the freedom of the world.”
Click for a larger view.Telegram from Stephen Caldwell Millett to Harry Ramsay Hoyt
November 30, 1973
November 30, 1973
The Society of the Cincinnati Archives
The Society of the Cincinnati archival collection, which had been on deposit for safekeeping at the Library of Congress since the 1930s, was returned to the Society’s custody on November 30, 1973. This telegram, sent by the chairman of the Museum Committee on behalf of Secretary General Stephen Caldwell Millett informed Vice President General Harry Ramsay Hoyt that mission was accomplished.
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