Robert Erskine was born in Scotland back in 1735. He attended the University of Edinburgh. He invented the Continual Steam Pump and Platometer which was a centrifugal hydraulic engine. He became known as an inventor and engineer gaining renown in Scotland. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society at the tender age of 36.
In 1771 he was hired by some ironworkers to run a plant near Ringwood, New Jersey. Shortly after he arrived in the colonies the American Revolutionary War started. He was sympathetic to the American cause, he organized the workers at the ironworks into t militia and was appointed as captain of that militia in 1775.
On their first meeting George Washington was impressed with Robert from the moment they met. So during the American Revolution George appointed him to do something. The question is can you tell me what that something was? Well George Washington appointed him to the post of Geographer and Surveyor General of the Army. He drew more than 275 maps covering the northern sector of the war. Washington used his maps during the war and they remain historically valuable today. His maps can be found in the Erskine Dewitt Map Collection at the New-York Historical Society. While out on a map-making expedition in 1780 he became ill and died on October 2nd 1780.
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