Fort Washington, situated between One hundred and Eighty-first and One hundred and Eighty-sixth Streets, upon the highest eminence on the island (between ten and eleven miles from the City Hall), was a strong earth-work of irregular form, covering, with its ravelins, several acres. It contained an inner work, a sort of citadel, within which was the magazine. About twenty heavy cannons were mounted upon it, besides several smaller pieces and mortars. Its chief strength consisted in its position. On the promontory below it (Jeffery's Hook), where the Telegraph mast stands (between One hundred and Seventy-sixth and One hundred and Seventy-seventh Streets), was a redoubt, intended as a covering to chevaux de frisé constructed in the channel there. The banks of this redoubt, among dwarf cedars upon the rocks, are yet (1852) very prominent. Northward of Fort Washington, on the same lofty bank of the Hudson, between One hundred and Ninety-fifth and One hundred and Ninety sixth Streets, was a redoubt with two guna, which was afterward strengthened by the British and called Fort Tryon. Near the extreme point of this range, at Spyt den Dyvel Kill (Spite the Devil Creek), at Two hundred and Seventeenth Street, was a little redoubt of two guns, called Cock Will Fort; and across the creek, on Tetard's Hill, was a square redoubt, with bastions, called Fort Independence. At the point where the Hudson River railway strikes the West Chester shore, was a small battery, and upon a hill commanding King's Bridge from the south side, between Two hundred and Twenty-fifth and Two hundred and Twenty-sixth Streets (just above (he present mill), was a redoubt. This was strengthened in 1781 by the British, and called Fort Prince, in honor of Prince William (afterward William the Fourth), then in New York. The embankments of Fort Washington, and all of the works mentioned in this paragraph, are yet visible. Those of the Citadel of Fort Washington (indicated at the foot of the flag-staff, page 826) are well defined. The military works mentioned in this note, with those in the note on page 799, composed the whole of the Revolutionary fortifications upon Manhattan Island, except sortie breast-works at M'Gowan's Pass, between One hundred and Fifth and One hundred and Eighth Streets and the Fifth and Sixth Avenues, now known as Mount St. Vincent. The embankments now seen at M'Gowan's Pass, and the square excavation in the rock a few rods northwest of the Roman Catholic school, were constructed in 1812. Very few of the streets mentioned in this note have yet been opened; all of them have been surveyed and located upon the city maps. The streets are generally opened and graded as far as the State Arsenal, Sixty-third Street.
Flight of the Americans on the Landing of the British.—Washington's Mortification.—Evacuation of the City.
Street) under cover of a severe cannonade from ten ships of war, which had sailed up and anchored opposite the present House of Refuge, at the foot of Twenty-third Street. * Another division, consisting chiefly of Hessians, embarked a little above, and landed near the same place. The brigades of Parsons and Fellows, panic-stricken by the cannonade and the martial array, fled in confusion (many without firing a gun) when the advanced guard of only fifty men landed. Washington, at Harlem, heard the cannonade, leaped into the saddle, and approached Kip's Bay in time to meet the frightened fugitives.
Their generals were trying in vain to rally them, and the commander-in-chief was equally unsuccessful. Mortified, almost despairing, at this exhibition of cowardice in the face of the enemy, Washington's feelings mastered his judgment, and casting his chapeau to the ground, and drawing his sword, he spurred toward the enemy, and sought death rather than life. One of his aids caught his bridle-rein and drew him from danger, when reason resumed its power. ** Unopposed, the British landed in full force, and, after skirmishing in the rear of Kip's house with the advance of Glover's brigade, who had reached the scene, they marched almost to the center of the island, and encamped upon the Incleberg, an eminence between the present Fifth and Sixth Avenues and Thirty-fifth and Thirty-eighth Streets. The Americans retreated to Bloomingdale, and Washington sent an express to Putnam in the city, ordering him to evacuate it immediately. Howe, with Clinton, Tryon, and a few others, went to the house of Robert Murray, on Murray Hill (see page 789), for refreshments and rest.