On this day 250 years ago in Cambridge, Massachusetts General Washington issued the following Order:

The Congress have been pleased to appoint Joseph Fry Esqr. a Brigadier General in the Continental Army; he is to be obeyed as such and his Excellency the General orders that he shall take the command of the vacant Brigade commonly called the Cambridge Brigade.

Joseph Frye of the part of Massachusetts that is now Maine was then 63 years old. That is my age now which should inspire me to more service to my country, except that Frye would resign from the Continental Army within two months after deciding he was too old to command the brigade.

Source: “General Orders, 17 February 1776,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-03-02-0234. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 3, 1 January 1776 – 31 March 1776, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1988, pp. 329–330.]