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expect Howe was preparing to give us a general action. 1777 On Friday morning his troops appeared on Chefnuthill; at night they changed their ground, On Sunday from every appearance, there was reason to apprehend an action. About fun fet, after various marches and counter-marches, they halted, and I still supposed they would attack us in the night, or early the next morning, but in this I was mistaken. On Monday afternoon they filed off, and marched toward Philadelphia. Their lofs in skirmishing was not inconfiderable. I fincerely with they had made an attack, the issue would in all probability have been happy for us. Policy forbad our quitting our posts to attack them."

The American army marched from White Marsh to 11. Sweed's Ford. The want of clothing was so extreme, that gen. Washington was under the absolute neceffity of granting warrants to different officers to impress what the holders would not willingly part with, agreeable to the powers with which congress had invested him, He removed with the troops, on the 19th, to Valley-forge, where they hutted, about fixteen miles from Philadelphia. When the mode of hutting was first propofed, some treated the idea as ridiculous, few thought it practicable, and all were surprised at the facility with which it was executed. It was certainly a confiderable exertion for the remnant of an army, exhausted and worn down, by the severity of a long and rather unsuccessful campaign, to fit down in a wood, and in the latter end of December to begin to build themselves huts. Through the want of shoes and stockings, and the hard frozen ground, you might have tracked the army from White

1 1777. Marsh to Valley-forge by the blood of their feet*.

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taking of this position was highly requisite. Had the army retired to the towns in the interior parts of the state, a large tract of fertile country would have been exposed to ravage and ruin; and they must have distressed in a peculiar manner the virtuous citizens from Philadelphia, who had fled thither for refuge.

Sir W. Howe has plainly the advantage of the Ame*rican general, but nothing to boast of; for all the fruits derived from his various manœuvrings and engagements, from the beginning to the close of the campaign, amount to little befide good winter quarters for his army in Philadelphia, while the troops possess no more of the adjacent country than what their arms immediately command. Certain persons indeed are permitted to carry provisions into the city; that so upon their return they may fupply the Americans with intelligence. Thefe muft fubmit to spare a little for fuch purposes, though in the utmost want themselves. At one time the army remained quiet four days together, without bread; on the fifth two regiments refused to do duty upon the account; but the prudence and perfuafion of the commander in chief restored order. To a similar event,

there was probably an allusion, in the following extract 23. from his letter of the 23d-" This brought forth the only commissary in the purchasing line in this camp, and with him this melancholy alarming truth, that he had not a single hoof of any kind to flaughter, and not more than twenty-five barrels of flour, and could not tell when to expect any. - The present commissaries are

Dec.

* General Washington mentioned it to me, when at his table,

June 3, 1784.

by no means equal to the execution of the office, or the 1777. disaffection of the people is past all belief. The change in that department took place contrary to my judgment, and the consequences thereof were predicted.-No man ever had his measures more impeded than I have, by every department of the army. Since the month of July we have had no assistance from the quarter master general, and to want of assistance from this department the commissary general charges great part of his deficiency. We have by a field return this day, no less than 2898 men in camp unfit for duty, because they are barefoot and otherwise naked.-Our whole strength in continental troops, (including the eastern brigades, which have joined us since, the furrender of Burgoyne) exclufive of the Maryland troops fent to Wilmington, is no more than 8200 in camp fit for duty. - Since the fourth our number fit, through hardships, particularly on account of blankets (numbers have been, and still are obliged to fit up all night by fires, instead of taking comfortable rest in a common way) have decreased near two thousand men. Upon the ground of fafety and policy, I am obliged to conceal the true state of the army from public view, and thereby expose myself to detraction and calumny. There is as much to be done in preparing for a campaign, as in the active part of it." Gen. Mifflin in a letter of October the eighth, had represented to congrefs, that his health was so much impaired, and the probability of a recovery so distant, that he thought it his duty to return to them their commifsions to him of major general and quarter master general. While the army was fuffering as above related for want of shoes, &c. hogsheads of shoes, stockings and

1777- clothing, were at different places, upon the road and in the woods, lying and perishing, for want of teams, and proper management, and money to pay the teamsters.

Nothing great has happened in the neighbourhood of New York, fince the return of the troops under gen. Vaughan from their expedition up the North river: but it may not difpleafe you to read the following particulars. On the 18th of November, gen. Tryon fent about roo men under capt. Emmerick to burn fome houses, on Phillips's manor, within about four miles of gen. Parfons's guards. They effected it with circumstances of barbarity, stripping the clothing off the women and children, and turning them almost naked into the streets in a most severely cold night. The men were made prifoners, and led with halters about their necks, with no other clothes than their shirts and breeches, in triumph to the British lines. A few days after Parfons wrote to Tryon upon the occafion, expoftulating with him upon the business, and told him, That he could destroy the houses and buildings of col. Phillips and those belonging to the Delancey family, each as near their lines as the buildings deftroyed were to his guards; that notwithstanding all their vigilance, the deftruction could not be prevented; and that it was not fear or want of opportunity, but a fenfe of the injustice and savageness of fuch a line of conduct, that had hitherto saved the buildings. Tryon answered from Kingsbridge on the 23d, and faid among other things, "Sir, could I poffibly conceive.myself accountable to any revolted fubjects of the king of Great Britain, I might answer your letter of yesterday refpecting the conduct of capt. Emmerick's party upon the taking of Peter and Cornelius

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Vantassel. As much as I abhor every principle of in-1777 humanity or ungenerous conduct, I should, were I in more authority, burn every committee man's houfe within my reach, as I deem them the wicked instru ments of the continued calamities of this country; and in order the fooner to purge this colony of them, I'am willing to give twenty silver dollars for every acting committee man who shall be delivered up to the king's troops."" The stinging repartee made to this letter was contained in an expedition undertaken immediately after to Greenwich, about three miles from New York, where a small party arrived in the evening, advanced to Mr. Oliver Delancey's house, secured the sentry, dismissed a few ladies in peace, though rather hastily, made a few men prifoners, burnt the house, occafioned the firing of the alarm guns in New York, then crossed the river and got fafe off.

New York reminds me of the American prisoners confined in that city, and in Philadelphia. In the courfe of letters that passed between gens. Howe and Washington, the former alluded to the cafes of royal prisoners of war being injuriously and unjustifiably loaded with irons. The latter, in one of November the 14th, says" If there is a fingle instance of a prisoner of war being in irons, I am ignorant of it, nor can I find on the moft minute inquiry, that there is the least foundation for the charge. I wish you to particularize the cafes you allude to, that relief may be had, if the complaints are well-founded. Now we are upon the fubject of griev ances, I am conftrained to observe, that I have a variety of accounts, not only from prisoners who have made their escape, but from perfons who have left Philadel

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