Chapter 19

[61]The fortifications erected at the upper part of the island are noticed inChapter V. Mr. Lossing, it should be said, gives a very full list of the Revolutionary works in and around New York ("Field Book of the Rev.," vol. ii., p. 593), from which the list as given here, based on Hills' map, differs in several particulars.

[62]One side of this barricade ran in front of theTimes, and the other in front of theTribunebuilding.

[63]This officer was Lieutenant-Colonel of Jonathan Ward's Massachusetts Regiment, and subsequently became colonel in the Massachusetts Continental Line.

[64]Force, 4th Series, vol. vi., p. 1011.

[65]"Thursday, 13th June.—Here in town very unhappy and shocking scenes were exhibited. On Munday night some men called Tories were carried and hauled about through the streets, with candles forced to be held by them, or pushed in their faces, and their heads burned; but on Wednesday, in the open day, the scene was by far worse; several, and among them gentlemen, were carried on rails; some stripped naked and dreadfully abused. Some of the generals, and especially Pudnam and their forces, had enough to do to quell the riot, and make the mob disperse."—Pastor Shewkirk's Diary, Doc. 37.

[66]The particulars of this plot need hardly be repeated; indeed, they were never fully known. It was discovered that an attempt had been made to enlist American soldiers into the king's service, who at the proper time should assist the enemy in their plans. They were to spike cannon, blow up magazines, and, as at first reported, assassinate our generals; but the latter design seems not to have been proved, though universally believed. Governor Tryon and Mayor Matthews, of the city, were suspected of furthering the plot and furnishing the funds. Matthews was arrested at Flatbush by a party of officers under Colonel Varnum, but the evidence against him was insufficient. Among the soldiers implicated was Thomas Hickey, of Washington's guard, who was tried by court-martial, found guilty of sedition, mutiny, and correspondence with the enemy, and executed in the presence of the army on June 28th. Something of the feeling excited by the discovery of the plot is exhibited in the letter from Surgeon Eustis of Colonel Knox's regiment (Document39). This is better known as the "Hickey Plot."

[67]The following memorandum, preserved among Governor Wolcott's papers, is of interest in this connection:"An Equestrian Statue of George the Third of Great Britain was erected in the City of New York on the Bowling Green at the lower end of Broadway. Most of the materials wereleadbut richlygildedto resemble gold. At the beginning of the Revolution this statue was overthrown. Lead being then scarce and dear, the statue was broken in pieces and the metal transported to Litchfield a place of safety. The ladies of this village converted the Lead into Cartridges for the Army, of which the following is an account. O.W.Mrs. Marvin,Cartridges6,058Ruth Marvin,"11,592Laura Wolcott,"8,378Mary Ann Wolcott,"10,790Frederick ""936Mrs. Beach,"1,802Made by sundry persons"2,182Gave Litchfield Militia on alarm,50Let the Regiment of Col. Wigglesworth have300———42,088Cartridges."

[67]The following memorandum, preserved among Governor Wolcott's papers, is of interest in this connection:

"An Equestrian Statue of George the Third of Great Britain was erected in the City of New York on the Bowling Green at the lower end of Broadway. Most of the materials wereleadbut richlygildedto resemble gold. At the beginning of the Revolution this statue was overthrown. Lead being then scarce and dear, the statue was broken in pieces and the metal transported to Litchfield a place of safety. The ladies of this village converted the Lead into Cartridges for the Army, of which the following is an account. O.W.

Mrs. Marvin,Cartridges6,058Ruth Marvin,"11,592Laura Wolcott,"8,378Mary Ann Wolcott,"10,790Frederick ""936Mrs. Beach,"1,802Made by sundry persons"2,182Gave Litchfield Militia on alarm,50Let the Regiment of Col. Wigglesworth have300———42,088Cartridges."

[68]"For two or three days past three or four ships have been dropping in, and I just now received an express from an officer appointed to keep a lookout on Staten Island, that forty-five arrived at the Hook to-day—some say more; and I suppose the whole fleet will be in within a day or two."—Washington to Hancock, June 29th.

[69]Extract of a letter from an officer in the Thirty-fifth Regiment at Staten Island, July 9th, 1776: "Our army consisted of 6155 effectives, on our embarkation at Halifax; they are now all safe landed here, and our head-quarters are at your late old friend, Will Hick's Mansion house."—London Chronicle.

[70]The expedition sailed from Cork for the Cape River in North Carolina, where Clinton joined it. It was expected that the loyalists in the State would rise in sufficient numbers to give the expeditionary corps substantial aid; but not over eighteen hundred were mustered, and these under General McDonald were completely defeated by the North Carolina Militia under Colonels Caswell and Lillington at Moore's Creek Bridge on the 27th of February. The expedition then moved against Charleston, S.C., and there met with the famous repulse from Colonel Moultrie off Charleston Harbor on the 28th of June. Clinton and Cornwallis after this could do nothing but join Howe at New York.

[71]Colonel Knox to his wife.—Drake's Life of Gen. Knox, p. 131.

[72]"General Washington was very handsomely dressed, and made a most elegant appearance. Colonel Patterson appeared awe-struck, as if he was before something supernatural. Indeed, I don't wonder at it. He was before a very great man, indeed."—Ibid.p. 132.

[73]Memorandum of an interview between General Washington and Colonel Patterson.—Sparks' Washington, vol. iv., p. 510.

[74]On August 17th Washington requested the New York Convention to remove the women, children, and infirm persons, as the city was likely soon to be "the scene of a bloody conflict." He stated that when the Rose and Phœnix sailed past, "the shrieks and cries of these poor creatures, running every way with their children, was truly distressing." Pastor Shewkirk says: "This affair caused a great fright in the city. Women and children, and some with their bundles, came from the lower parts and walked to the Bowery, which was lined with people."

[75]Captain Nathan Hale, the "Martyr-spy," says in a letter of the 20th of August: "Our situation has been such this fortnight or more as scarce to admit of writing. We have daily expected an action—by which means, if any one was going, and we had letters written, orders were so strict for our tarrying in camp, that we could rarely get leave to go and deliver them. For about six or eight days the enemy have been expected hourly, whenever the wind and tide in the least favored."—Document40.

[76]Original in possession of Chas. J. Little, Esq., Cambridge, Mass.

[77]Greene's Life of Greene, vol. i.

[78]General Orders, August 20, 1776.—... "General Sullivan is to take command upon Long Island till General Greene's state of health will permit him to resume it, and Brigadier Lord Stirling is to take charge of General Sullivan's division till he returns to it again."

[79]In a letter to Peter Van Schaack, dated New York, February 23d, 1776, Fred. Rhinelander says: "We are going to raise a new battalion; Colonel Lasher and Gouverneur Morris are candidates for the command. As both the gentlemen have great merit, it is hard to tell which will succeed." The reference here is probably to a plan formed by private citizens in New York to raise a battalion of fifteen hundred men for nine months, on condition that the projectors could appoint the officers. This being refused by the Provincial Congress the plan was abandoned.—Life of G. Morris, vol. i. p. 89, n.

[80]SeeBiographical Sketches,Part II.

[81]The New York Congress voted that the City and County of New York should furnish twelve hundred men as their quota of the three thousand recently called for, and these were to consist of "the two independent battalions." They were composed of ten companies each, which, however, never reached their maximum strength. In September Lasher's total was 510; Malcom's, 297.

[82]Lewis Morris, one of the Signers of the Declaration, was appointed brigadier-general of the Westchester County militia, but he remained in Congress until later in the fall, when he took the field for a short time with New York militia in the Highlands.

[83]List of the Officers and Men from New Jersey who served in the Revolution.By Adjutant-General W.S. Stryker.

[84]Delaware's Revolutionary Soldiers.By William G. Whiteley, Esq., 1875.

[85]Durkee's Continentals garrisoned Powle's Hook, and Bradley's Connecticut regiment was at Bergen, both being returned on Washington's rolls, but otherwise under Mercer's orders.

[86]At New York, the artillery was increased by Captain Alexander Hamilton's company, and soldiers were detached from the several regiments to act as gunners in consequence of Knox's inability to furnish enough from his own regiment to man all the points.

[87]Document 43,Part II., contains interesting and important extracts from Colonel Putnam's Journal, now published for the first time.

[88]On his promotion to a brigadier-generalship in August, Parsons was succeeded by his lieutenant-colonel, John Tyler.

[89]This was the same officer who came down with Lee in the spring. When his regiment returned home he was put in command of another raised on the continental basis. He joined the army in August, but did not cross to Long Island.

[90]The original letter from Trumbull to Wolcott, among the latter's papers, informing him of his appointment, states that the fourteen regiments had been called out upon "the most pressing application of General Washington." The governor adds: "Having formed raised expectations of your disposition and ability to serve your country in this most important crisis, on which the fate of America seems so much to depend, I trust you will cheerfully undertake the service," etc. General Wolcott proceeded at once to New York, and was with the militia in the city during the fighting on Long Island, and for some time after. As to the number of the regiments that came down, see Colonel Douglas' letter of August 23d (Document 22), where he says twelve were on the parade the day before.

[91]When it was proposed to put the Boston army on the new Continental basis on January 1st, 1776, Washington evidently hoped to have it all uniformed. Thus his orders of December 11th, 1775, read: "As uniformity and decency in dress are essentially necessary in the appearance and regularity of an army, his Excellency recommends it earnestly to the officers to put themselves in a proper uniform.... The general by no means recommends or desires officers to run into costly or expensive regimentals; no matter how plain or coarse, so that they are but uniform in their color, cut, and fashion. The officers belonging to those regiments whose uniforms are not yet fixed upon had better delay making their regimentals until they are." The orders of January 5th, 1776, say: "The regimentals, which have been made up, and drawn for, may be delivered to the respective Colonels, by the Quartermaster-General, to the order of those Colonels, who drew them at such prices as they have cost the continent, which is much cheaper than could otherwise be obtained. As nothing adds more to the appearance of a man than dress, and a proper degree of cleanliness in his person, the General hopes and expects that each regiment will contend for the most soldierlike appearance." These "regimentals" were of a brown color. That Little's and Hitchcock's men, or most of them, were in uniform when they came to New York, appears from General Greene's Providence order of April 4th (ante,p. 62). A description of the colors of Colonel Joseph Read's Massachusetts Continental regiment refers to the "uniform of the regiment;" so doubtless most of the Boston army was in uniform. But whether they were kept supplied with uniforms may be doubted. The men wore out their clothes fast while throwing up the works, and Washington speaks of the "difficulty and expense" of providing new ones. (Orders, July 24th, 1776.) At this date he does not insist on uniforms, but recommends the adoption of the hunting shirt and breeches as a cheap and convenient dress, and as one which might have its terrors for the enemy, who imagined that every rebel so dressed was "a complete marksman." A valuable article on "The Uniforms of the American Army" may be found in theMagazine of American History, for August, 1877, by Professor Asa Bird Gardner, of the West Point Military Academy.

[92]Force, 5th Series, vol. ii., p. 244.

[93]The last official return of the army before the battle, published inForce's Archives, bears date of August 3d; the next about September 12th. The latter is the proper basis for making an estimate of the numbers for August 27th, as it includes all the regiments except Haslet's known to be then present, and no more. On September 12th the total of rank and file on the rolls, not including the absent sick, was 24,100. To these add 1800 commissioned officers and 2500 sergeants, drums and fifes, and the total strength is 28,400. On the same date, rank and file,fit for duty, numbered 14,700. Add to these 1000 lost on Long Island and 3500 officers, sergeants, drums and fifes fit for duty, and we have, all told, between 19,000 and 20,000 effectives on August 27th; and these figures correspond with Washington's statement of September 2d: "Our number of men at present fit for duty is under 20,000." The army suffered greatly from sickness during August and September. General Heath writes in hisMemoirs, under date of August 8th: "The number of sick amounted to near 10,000; nor was it possible to find proper hospitals or proper necessaries for them. In almost every farm, stable, shed, and even under the fences and bushes, were the sick to be seen, whose countenances were but an index of the dejection of spirit and the distress they endured." On the 4th of August, Colonel Parsons wrote to Colonel Little: "My Doctor and Mate are sick. I have near Two Hundred men sick in Camp; my neighbours are in very little better state." And he asks Little to consent to his surgeon's mate remaining with him until his own surgeons were better. [MS. letter in possession of Charles J. Little, Esq.]

[94]General Clinton being absent all summer in the Highlands, the brigade was commanded first by Colonel Read, and afterwards by Colonel Glover.

[95]The figures given here represent the total number of enlisted men on the rolls on September 12, absent sick included. In the case of some of the regiments, especially from the flying camp, under Lutz, Kachlein, and others, only an estimate can be formed. The strength of these is noted in connection with the losses on Long Island in thenext chapter. The Connecticut militia regiments are credited with 350 men each, as Washington gives the figures.

[96]Glover's regiment did not join the army at New York until August. It was assigned on the 12th to Stirling's brigade, and on the 15th to Fellows'.

[97]Sargent's and Ward's reported on the ground in August. They wereprobablyin Mifflin's brigade.

[98]These regiments were nominally under General Woodhull, but actually under Greene and Sullivan. At the time of the battle of the 27th both were doing duty with Nixon's brigade. (Sullivan's orders, August 25th.Document2.) Their strength can only be estimated, but it is probably correct to say that together they were less than five hundred strong.

[99]See Appendix to Drake'sLife of General Knox.

[100]The "Highlander" regiments were the Forty-second and Seventy-first. InStewart's Highlanders, vol. i., p. 354, as quoted in theMemoir of General Graham, the following passage appears: "On the 10th April, 1776, the Forty-second Regiment being reviewed by Sir Adolphus Oughton, was reported complete, and so unexceptionable that none were rejected. Hostilities having commenced in America, every exertion was made to teach the recruits the use of the firelock, for which purpose they were drilled even by candle-light. New arms and accoutrements were supplied to the men; and the colonel of the regiment, at his own expense, suppliedbroadswords and pistols.... The pistols were of the old Highland fashion, with iron stocks. These being considered unnecessary except in the field, were not intended, like the swords, to be worn by the men in quarters. When the regiment took the field on Staten and Long Island, it was said that the broadswords retarded the men by getting entangled in the brushwood and they were therefore taken from them and sent on board the transports."

[101]General Clinton, quoting from Howe's returns on this date, says he had "24,464 effectives fit for duty; a total of 26,980, officers not included, who, when added, amount to 31,625 men." See General Carrington'sBattles of the Revolution, p. 199. To the British force should be added two or three companies of New York loyalists.

[102]The list that follows is copied from what appears to have been the roster-book of Adjutant Gilfillan of the Fifty-fifth Regiment. The book was captured by Captain Nathaniel Fitz Randolph, of New Jersey (seeDocument56), and is now in the possession of Captain John C. Kinney, of Hartford, a great-grandson of the latter. There is no date attached to the "Order of Battle," but from the few dates that follow it was probably made out in the first part of August, 1776. The list gives the full British strength, and is interesting as naming the majors of brigade, represented by the abbreviation M.B.

[103]An error, evidently, for Battalion.

[104]The arrangement of the Hessian troops, as here given, is compiled from Von Elking's work, Baurmeister's Narrative, and the Hessian map in vol. ii. of the Long Island Historical Society'sMemoirs.

[105]"Till of late I had no doubt in my own mind of defending this place."—Washington to Congress, September 2d, 1776.

[106]"Before the landing of the enemy in Long Island, the point of attack could not be known, nor any satisfactory judgment formed of their intentions. It might be on Long Island, on Bergen, or directly on the city."—Washington to Congress, September 9th, 1776.

[107]The Tories gave Howe all the information he needed. One Gilbert Forbes testified at the "Hickey Plot" examination that a Sergeant Graham, formerly of the Royal Artillery, had told him that he (the sergeant), at the request of Governor Tryon, had surveyed the works around the city and on Long Island, and had concerted a plan of attack, which he gave to the governor (Force, 4th Series, vol. vi., p. 1178). On his arrival at Staten Island, Howe wrote to Germaine, July 7th: "I met with Governor Tryon, on board of ship at the Hook, and many gentlemen, fast friends to government, attending him, from whom I have had the fullest information of the state of the rebels, who are numerous, and very advantageously posted, with strong intrenchments, both upon Long Island and that of New York, with more than one hundred pieces of cannon for the defence of the town towards the sea," etc.—Force, 5th Series, vol. i., p. 105.

[108]This storm, which is mentioned by Colonel Douglas, Captain Hale, Chaplain Benedict, and others, hung over the city from seven to ten in the evening, and is described by Pastor Shewkirk as being more terrible than that which "struck into Trinity Church" twenty years before. Captain Van Wyck and two lieutenants of McDougall's regiment and a Connecticut soldier were killed by the lightning.

[109]The landing-place was at the present village of Bath. No opposition by the Americans would have availed and none was attempted. Washington wrote to Hancock, August 20th: "Nor will it be possible to prevent their landing on the island, as its great extent affords a variety of places favorable for that purpose, and the whole of our works on it are at the end opposite to the city. However, we shall attempt to harass them as much as possible, which will be all that we can do." To the same effect Colonel Reed's letter of August 23d: "As there were so many landing-places, and the people of the island generally so treacherous, we never expected to prevent the landing." General Parsons says (Document5): "The landing of the troops could not be prevented at the distance of six or seven miles from our lines, in a plain under the cannon of the ships, just within the shore." An American battery had gone down to De Nyse's, earlier in the summer, to annoy the Asia, but there was none there at this date. The particulars of the debarkation and of subsequent movements of the enemy appear in the reports and letters of the two Howes and Sir George Collier. (Force, 5th Series, vol. i., pp. 1255-6; andNaval Chronicle, 1841.)

[110]"On the morning of the 22d of August there were nine thousand British troops on New Utrecht plains. The guard alarmed our small camp, and we assembled at the flagstaff. We marched our forces, about two hundred in number, to New Utrecht, to watch the movements of the enemy. When we came on the hill we discovered a party of them advancing toward us. We prepared to give them a warm reception, when an imprudent fellow fired, and they immediately halted and turned toward Flatbush. The main body also moved along the great road toward the same place."—Lieutenant-Colonel Chambers, of Hand's riflemen, to his Wife, September 3d, 1776.Chambersburg in the Colony and the Revolution.

[111]Strong's History of Flatbush.

[112]Livingston sent a spy to Staten Island on the night of the 20th, who brought word that the British were embarking, and would attack on Long Island and up the North River. Washington received the information during the storm on the following evening, and immediately sent word to Heath at King's Bridge that the enemy were upon "the point of striking the long-expected stroke." The next morning, the 22d, he wrote again instructing Heath to pick out "eight hundred or a thousand, light, active men, and good marksmen," ready to move rapidly wherever they were most needed; and he promised to send him some artillery, "if," he continues, "we have not other employment upon hand, which General Putnam, who is this instant come in, seems to think we assuredly shall, this day, as there is a considerable embarkation on board of the enemy's boats." (Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., volume for 1878. The Heath correspondence.) On the same date Washington wrote to Hancock: "The falling down of several ships yesterday evening to the Narrows, crowded with men, those succeeded by many more this morning, and a great number of boats parading around them, as I was just now informed, with troops, are all circumstances indicating an attack, and it is not improbable it will be made to-day. It could not have happened last night, by reason of a most violent gust." (Force, 5th Series, vol. i., p. 1110). On the 21st, Colonel Hand at the Narrows reported three times to General Nixon that the British transports were filling with men and moving down, and the reports were sent to Washington. These facts show how closely the enemy were watched. The embarkation was known at headquarters early on the morning of the 22d, before the landing was made on Long Island.

[113]Washington wrote to Heath the next day: "Our first accounts were that they intended by a forced march to surprise General Sullivan's lines, who commands during the illness of General Greene; whereupon I immediately reinforced that post with six regiments." Miles, Silliman, and Chester's adjutant, Tallmadge, state that their regiments were among the first to cross after the enemy landed. Sullivan's orders of the 25th and other records seem to indicate that Atlee's, Lasher's, and Drake's were the other three battalions sent over at the same time.

[114]See Sullivan's orders, Silliman's letters, Miles' Journal (Part II.), and Chambers' letter. [Transcriber's Note:The marker in the text for this footnote is missing in the original.]

[115]Referring evidently to this skirmish, Lieutenant-Colonel Chambers says: "Strong guards were maintained all day on the flanks of the enemy, and our regiment and the Hessian yagers kept up a severe firing, with a loss of but two wounded on our side. We laid a few Hessians low, and made them retreat out of Flatbush. Our people went into the town and brought the goods out of the burning houses. The enemy liked to have lost their field-pieces. Captain Steel acted bravely. We would certainly have had the cannon had it not been for some foolish person calling retreat. The main body of the foe returned to town, and when our lads came back they told of their exploits."

[116]Little's Order Book,Document2. But it seems that Remsen's Long Island militiamen were seized by a panic, either during this skirmish or at a later hour, on the Bedford Road, and ran from their posts. Sullivan rebuked them sharply in his orders of the 24th (Document2), and confined them thereafter to "fatigue" duty. This proved to be only the first of several militia panics experienced in this campaign.

[117]Sullivan's Orders, August 24th.Document2.

[118]Washington to Congress, January 30th, 1776.

[119]In regard to the change in the command, the adjutant-general's statement in full is this: "On General Greene's being sick, Sullivan took the command, who was wholly unacquainted with the ground or country. Some movements being made which the general did not approve entirely, and finding a great force going to Long Island, he sent over Putnam, who had been over occasionally; this gave some disgust, so that Putnam was directed to soothe and soften as much as possible." (Sedgwick's Life of Livingston, p. 201.) What movements were referred to, unless it was the random firing of the skirmishers and the burning of houses at Flatbush by some of our men, or how Putnam was to reconcile Sullivan to the change, as he was directed (this evidently being the meaning of Reed's last phrase), does not appear. From subsequent occurrences, the inference is justified that Putnam did not disturb Sullivan's arrangements, but left the disposition of the troops to him. What Sullivan himself says is given in a note further along in the chapter. That Putnam went over on the 24th, and in the forenoon, is evident from a letter from Reed to his wife of that date, in which he says: "While I am writing, there is a heavy firing and clouds of smoke rising from the wood [on Long Island]. General Putnam was made happy by obtaining leave to go over—the brave old man was quite miserable at being kept here." (Reed's Life of Reed.) This firing, as Washington wrote to Schuyler on the same date, occurred in the morning. Putnam had been engaged during the summer, principally, in looking after the defences in the city and the river obstructions. He had charge, also, of the water transportation, boats, pettiaugers, etc. His division was in the city or close to it. Had the enemy, accordingly, attacked the city directly, it would have fallen largely to Putnam to conduct the defence; and this is doubtless the reason why, as Reed says, he was "kept here." But as it now seemed certain that the British were concentrating on Long Island, he evidently wished to be with the troops there, where that morning there was "a heavy firing" going on, and obtained leave to cross. Finding a change desirable, Washington, probably at the same time, gave Putnam the command and "sent" him over.

[120]Mr. Davis, in his Life of Aaron Burr, who was Putnam's aid at this time, states that after crossing to Long Island and making the round of the outposts, he (Burr) urged his general to beat up the enemy's camp, but that Putnam declined, on the ground that his orders required him to remain strictly on the defensive.

[121]Sullivan's Orders, August 25th.Document2.

[122]Several writers, Mr. Sparks among them, make the statement that neither Washington nor Putnam went outside of the Brooklyn lines. It would be impossible to credit this without absolute proof of the fact. Washington always reconnoitred the position of the enemy whenever they were near each other; in the last scenes of the war at Yorktown he was among the first at the outposts examining the British works. Undoubtedly he rode out to the Flatbush Pass on the 26th, as stated by the writer of the letter to theSouth Carolina Gazette(Document 19), who says: "The evening preceding the action, General Washington, with a number of general officers, went down to view the motions of the enemy, who were encamped at Flatbush." A letter from a survivor of the Revolution, present on Long Island, published in a newspaper several years since, well authenticated, and preserved in one of Mr. Onderdonk's scrap-books in the Astor Library, New York, confirms this statement. The soldier recollects that he saw Washington and others looking at the enemy with their glasses.

[123]Statement of Colonel Thomas Grosvenor to the late David P. Hall, Esq., of New York, who knew Grosvenor well, and preserved many facts in writing in regard to his military career. Knowlton's captains were Grosvenor and Stephen Brown, of Pomfret, Conn. The detachment was on duty at the outposts on the night of the 26th. The soldier whose letter is referred to in the note preceding this was one of the "Rangers," and he states that their number was about one hundred. That Smallwood's and Haslet's regiments crossed on the 26th, we have from Smallwood himself.—Force, 5th Series, vol. ii., p. 1011.

[124]The regiments were Little's and Ward's, from Massachusetts; Varnum's and Hitchcock's, from Rhode Island; Huntington's, Wyllys's, Tyler's, Chester's, Silliman's, and Gay's, and Knowlton's "Rangers," from Connecticut; Lasher's and Drake's, from New York; Smith's and Remsen's, from Long Island; Martin's, Forman's, Johnston's, Newcomb's, and Cortland's, from New Jersey; Hand's, Miles', Atlee's, Lutz's, Kachlein's, and Hay's, detachment from Pennsylvania; Haslet's, from Delaware; and Smallwood's, from Maryland. Among other artillery officers on that side were Captains Newell and Treadwell, Captain-Lieutenants John Johnston and Benajah Carpenter; Lieutenants Lillie and "Cadet" John Callender. This list is believed to include all the battalions and detachments on Long Island at the time the British attacked.

[125]Parson's own statement, letter of October 5th: "On the day of the surprise I was on duty."—Document5.

[126]The site of this breastwork is now within the limits of Prospect Park, and it stood across what is known as "Battle Pass." Dr. Stiles in his History of Brooklyn, and Mr. Field in vol. ii. of the L.I. Hist. Society'sMemoirs, put a well-constructed redoubt at this point on a hill-top to the left of the road. The account in theSouth Carolina Gazettesays that the Flatbush Pass guards were posted "near a mile from the parting of the road [i.e., a mile from where the Flatbush Road branched from the Jamaica Road] where anabattiswas formed across the road, and a breastwork thrown up and defended by two pieces of cannon." In the original sketch of the "engagement," made by John Ewing, who was Hand's brother-in-law, and with him on the spot, there is this reference: "F. Where a considerable Number of our people were stationed with several Field-pieces & Breast-works made with Trees felled across the Road to defend themselves when attacked." (Document15.) Colonel Miles speaks of "a small redoubt in front of the village [Flatbush]" (Document20.) The breastwork across the road was doubtless the principal defence here, and this was merely temporary.

[127]The number of men at each of the three passes was about eight hundred, and on the left of these were Miles' two battalions, with perhaps five hundred men on duty. Sullivan's orders of August 25th give the detail which was to mount for picket on the following morning. This detail, therefore, was the one on duty on the night of the 26th. The order runs: "Eight hundred [men] properly officered to relieve the troops on Bedford Road to-morrow morning, six field officers to attend with this party. The same number to relieve those on Bush [Flatbush] Road, and an equal number those stationed towards the Narrows. A picket of three hundred men under the command of a Field Officer, six Captains, twelve subalterns to be posted at the wood on the west side of the creek every night till further orders." (See alsoDocuments5,18,19.) That Miles was on the extreme left, we well know; that Wyllys was at the Bedford Pass, appears from both Miles' and Brodhead's accounts; that Chester's regiment was with him, appears from an extract quoted below—Chester's lieutenant-colonel being Solomon Wills; that Johnston was at the Flatbush Pass, appears from the same and other authorities; that Henshaw with Little's regiment was there, he himself states; that Cornell was also there with Hitchcock's Rhode Islanders, appears from Captain Olney's narrative as given inMrs. Williams' Life of Olney, and from the lists of prisoners; that Hand was at the lower road, until relieved, and Major Burd also, the major himself and Ewing's sketch both state; the New York detachment there was probably a part of Lasher's regiment. The extract referred to is from theConnecticut Courant, containing a letter from an officer engaged in the battle, which says: "The night before August 27th, on the west road, were posted Colonel Hand's regiment, a detachment from Pennsylvania and New York; next east were posted Colonel Johnson, of Jersey, and Lieutenant-Colonel Henshaw, of Massachusetts; next east were posted Colonel Wyllys and Lieutenant-Colonel Wills, of Connecticut. East of all these Colonel Miles, of Pennsylvania, was posted towards Jamaica, to watch the motion of the enemy and give intelligence."

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