The brigades of Generals Nixon and Glover, and Morgan's corps, were ordered to cross the creek and fall upon the enemy's camp. Morgan advanced at about daylight, the fog being so thick that he could see but a few rods around him. He at once fell in with the British pickets, who poured in a volley upon him and killed a lieutenant and several privates. Morgan instantly conceived that the rumor was false, and that the enemy was in force near. At that moment Deputy Adjutant-general Wilkinson, who had been sent by Gates to reconnoiter, rode up, and, coinciding in opinion with Morgan, hastened to report to his commander the supposed peril of his corps. The brigades of Patterson and Learned were immediately dispatched to its support. Nixon and Glover were at the same time pressing forward to attack the camp, while the whole army advanced to the heights immediately south of the creek. Nixon crossed the creek to the plain, and surprised a picket guard at Fort Hardy; and Glover was about to follow him, when a British soldier was seen hastily fording the stream. He was captured, and professed to be a deserter. Glover questioned him, and was informed that the entire British army were in their camp, drawn up in order of battle. The general suspected him of untruth, and threatened him with instant death if he should deceive him. The soldier declared that he was an honest deserter, and solemnly affirmed the truth of his tale, which was soon confirmed by a German deserter, and by the capture of a reconnoitering party, consisting of a subaltern and thirty-five men, by the advance guard, under Captain Goodale, of Putnam's regiment. The deserter was immediately sent with one of Glover's aids to General Gates, and information was forwarded to General Nixon, with urgent advice to halt. Satisfied of the deserter's truth, Gates revoked all the orders of the evening previous, and directed the troops to return to their respective positions. His headquarters were nearly a mile in the rear of his army, and his order came almost too late to save the troops, who had General Gates's Headquarters at Saratoga. *
* This house is still standing. The view is taken from the road, a few rods southwest of the building. It is of wood, and has been somewhat enlarged since the Revolution. It was used by General Gates for his quarters from the 10th of October until after the surrender of Burgoyne on the 17th. It belonged to a Widow Kershaw, and General Gates amply compensated her for all he had, on leaving it. It is now well preserved. It stands on the east side of the Albany and Whitehall turnpike, about a mile and a half south of the Fish Creek. The Champlain Canal passes immediately in the rear of it; and nearly half a mile eastward is the Hudson River.
Retreat of the Americans to their Camp.—Perplexity of Burgoyne.—A scattered Retreat proposed
The fog soon passed away and discovered them to the enemy, then in full view, and under arms upon the heights. Nixon, however, had retreated, and the cannonade opened upon him by the British took effect only upon the rear of his brigade. *
General Learned, in the mean while, with his own and Patterson's brigades, had reached Morgan's corps, and was pressing on rapidly to the attack when Wilkinson came up, not with a counter order from Gates, but with the intelligence that the right wing of the Americans had given way. The brave veteran disliked the idea of retreating, preferring to carry out the standing order of the previous day to the very letter;** but, on counseling with Colonels Brooks and Tupper, and some other officers, a retreat was deemed advisable. As they turned, the British, who were awaiting an attack, opened a fire upon them; but the Americans were soon masked by the woods, and Morgan took post upon the flank and rear of the enemy.
Thus, by the providential circumstance of a deserter flying to our camp, our army was saved from a terrible, perhaps fatal, loss; for, had the several brigades of Nixon, Glover, Learned, and Patterson been cut off, Burgoyne might have so much weakened the American army, and strengthened his own by the adherence of the now wavering loyalists and Indians, as to scatter the remainder of the Continental forces and reach Albany, the darling object of all his efforts. But the breath of the deserter blasted all his hopes, and the incident was, to use his own words, "one of the most adverse strokes of fortune during the campaign." ***
Burgoyne now saw no way of escape. He sent out scouts toward the north, who reported the roads impassable and the woods swarming with republicans. The few Indians who had remained now left him, utterly disheartened; and the loyalists, feeling that their personal security would be jeoparded in case of a surrender, left the army every hour. It was proposed to make a scattered retreat, each soldier carrying in his knapsack provisions enough for two or three days, Fort George being the place of rendezvous; but such a step would be perilous in the extreme, for the Americans, apparently as numerous as the leaves upon the trees, and ever on the alert, would cut them off in detail. In battle, a fortunate circumstance might occur in their favor; but General Gates, assured that he had his enemy in his power, could not be induced to jeopard the lives of his troops by an engagement. Burgoyne's only hope rested upon aid from Clinton below. Not a word, however, could he get from that general; yet, clinging with desperation to every hope, however feeble, he resolved to await that succor quietly in his strong camp as long as his exhausted stores and a powerful enemy would allow.
Burgoyne's camp, upon the heights near the Fish Creek, was fortified, and, extending more than half a mile in the rear, was strengthened by artillery. On an elevated plain, northwest of the village of Schuylerville, his heavy guns were chiefly posted. Directly in his rear Morgan and his corps were stationed. In front, on the east side of the Hudson,