One in a series of articles recounting Philadelphia's days in the Revolutionary War.

While George Washington's soldiers shiver in their hastily built huts on the hillsides of Valley Forge, their commander-in-chief is feeling the heat of criticism - and reacting sharply.

The date is Feb. 9, 1778, a bleak Monday. A heavy snow fell yesterday, the latest in the cavalcade of troubles that has visited the Continental Army since it went into winter quarters just before Christmas.

Meat is scarce. Discipline is a continuing problem. (A court martial has just sentenced an artillery lieutenant to have his sword broken over his head for thievery as soon as weather permits.) Sanitation is appalling, even by 18th-century standards, and Washington eventually will order five lashes for "any soldier who shall attempt to ease himself any where but at a proper necessary."

An alarming number of soldiers appear ready to desert. Most of the troops are three months behind in their pay. And while the American army's supply system is a disaster, leaving the soldiers hungry, some local residents have been busy selling cattle and flour to the British army occupying Philadelphia.

Amid all this, Washington is fending off the efforts of what he describes as "a malignant faction" seeking to have Congress replace him with Maj. Gen. Horatio Gates, who defeated a British army at Saratoga in New York in October.

On this day after the big snow, a letter is on its way to Gates from the tidy stone house that Washington has been renting at Valley Forge from the widow Deborah Hewes.

In one tightly argued paragraph after another, Washington all but accuses the hero of Saratoga of scheming against him.

Is an organized effort really afoot to seek Washington's ouster? Probably not.

But it's easy to understand why he would think so, for in this troubled winter, the dignified Virginia planter - not yet an American icon - does not lack for critics.

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Washington should hardly be surprised to find himself the target of criticism.

In the space of just about a month, from early September through early October, he lost two battles and the city of Philadelphia to the British army of Sir William Howe - just about the time Gates was humiliating the British at Saratoga.

The difference in the outcome of the two campaigns has not been lost on some impatient revolutionaries.

Jonathan Sergeant, the attorney general of Pennsylvania, complains to Congressman James Lovell, of Massachusetts, that "thousands of lives and millions of property are yearly sacrificed to the insufficiency of our commander in chief. Two battles he has lost for us by two such blunders as might have disgraced a soldier of three months' standing."

The eminent Philadelphia physician Benjamin Rush, now a high-ranking officer in the Continental Army's medical department, has written to Gov. Patrick Henry of Virginia, describing what would happen if the army had real leadership: "A Gates... or a Conway would in a few weeks render them an irresistible body of men."

Conway.

Now there's a name Washington detests. Thomas Conway is a brash and ambitious French officer, born in Ireland, who has come to America to serve in the Continental Army.

Washington believes Conway is at the center of the presumed plot, which will come to be known as the Conway Cabal.

Back in late October, James Wilkinson, a loose-lipped aide to Gates, claimed in a tavern one night that Conway had written a letter to Gates criticizing Washington. When Washington heard about it, he fired off a short, but pointed letter to Conway on Nov. 5.

"Sir: A Letter which I received last Night, contained the following paragraph. In a Letter from Genl. Conway to Genl. Gates he says: 'Heaven has been determined to save your Country; or a weak General and bad Councellors would have ruined it.'

I am Sir Yr. Hble Servt."

The "weak general," of course, would be Washington.

Conway, replying that same day with a four-page letter, admits writing to Gates but denies criticizing Washington.

"I will venture to say that in my Whole Letter, the paragraph of Which you are pleased to send me a copy can not be found," Conway writes.

Seeking to reassure Washington, Conway adds, "I am willing that my original letter to General Gates should be handed to you."

It never is, which just confirms Washington's suspicions.

Relations between Washington and Conway deteriorate. When Conway gets himself appointed inspector general of the army, Washington - who regards Conway as "a dangerous incendiary" - receives him with a correct but frosty distance that prompts Conway to complain to Congress. Valley Forge is not big enough for both Washington and Conway, and there is absolutely no doubt about who has to go. Eventually, Conway is ordered to act as second-in-command to the Marquis de Lafayette in an invasion of Canada.

Meanwhile, a plainly alarmed Gates, upon hearing the story of Wilkinson's indiscretion, writes to Washington to try to smooth things over. But his tone seems more evasive than open, and he makes the mistake of sending Congress a copy of his letter to Washington, which only ratchets up Washington's anger.

An exchange of letters between the generals culminates with Washington's Feb. 9 letter, a skeptical and sarcastic document that amounts to a dressing down. A chastened Gates replies nine days later that he is "of no faction," apologizes if he has unintentionally offended Washington, and hopes Washington will not "spend another moment upon this subject."

Washington quickly replies, declaring himself "as averse to controversy, as any Man" and that Gates' assurance of intending no harm "makes me willing to close with the desire, you express, of burying [the whole affair] hereafter in silence... ."

If there is a cabal, it has fizzled out. In any event, the complaints about Washington never achieve the critical mass necessary to trigger action by Congress.

Washington's posture during the whole affair has been one of injured innocence. He concedes that his office does not exempt him from criticism, but he brands the criticism a form of dissension that can injure the cause.

Conway finds out several months later the danger of expressing displeasure with the boss too loudly when Gen. John Cadwalader, a staunch Washington supporter, seriously wounds him in a duel on July 4, 1778. Conway, who thinks he is dying, writes to Washington to apologize for anything he ever said or did that might have offended the general. But Conway recovers and returns to France. Meanwhile, there is a war to fight.

Washington's relations with Congress improve after a congressional committee visits Valley Forge in January and February. The committee concludes that the wretched condition of the troops is not the general's fault.

In a lengthy report to the committee on Jan. 29, Washington outlines the challenges the army faces, and one of the most pressing is more manpower.

As part of the effort to meet that need, Washington already has approved a plan to search for recruits among people he had previously wanted to bar from the Continental Army.

Next time: Black soldiers of the American Revolution.