Wishing exact information of the position of the enemy and of the topography of the country, the commander-in-chief, on the morning of the 20th, requested Colonel Reed and Colonel Putnam, his engineer, to undertake a reconnoissance in person. Setting out from King's Bridge with a foot-guard of twenty men, these officers proceeded to the heights at East Chester, where they saw some of the enemy near the church, but could obtain no intelligence. The houses in the vicinity were deserted. From this point Reed returned to attend to his office duties, while Putnam, disguising his appearance as an officer by taking out his cockade, loping his hat, and concealing his sword and pistols under his loose coat, continued on alone in the direction of White Plains. Learning from a woman at a house that the British were at New Rochelle, he passed on to within three or four miles of White Plains, where he met some "friends to the cause" and ascertained the general situation. "I found," he writes, "that the main body of the British lay near New Rochelle, from thence to White Plains about nine miles, good roads and in general level open country, that at White Plains was a large quantity of stores, with only about three hundred militia to guard them, that the British had a detachment at Mamaroneck only six miles from White Plains, and from White Plains only five miles to the North River, where lay five or six of the enemies ships and sloops, tenders, etc. Having made these discoveries, I set out on my return." Reporting this information to the commander-in-chief about nine o'clock in the evening, Colonel Putnam retired to "refresh" himself and horse, only to receive orders soon after to proceed immediately to Lord Stirling's brigade,[211] now in Spencer's division, which had already advanced on the road towards White Plains. He reached Stirling at two o'clock that night, and at dawn the general pushed on to White Plains, arriving there about nine o'clock on the morning of the 21st. Washington himself and Heath's division followed during the day, and the troops set to work throwing up lines at that important point. By delaying near New Rochelle, Howe had missed his opportunity. During the night of the 21st, Colonel Haslet, of Stirling's brigade, surprised and captured some thirty men belonging to the partisan Rogers' Scouts, and soon after Colonel Hand with his now veteran riflemen proved himself more than a match for an equal party of yagers encountered near Mamaroneck. In the first of these skirmishes, Major Greene, a fine Virginia officer, was mortally wounded.
Washington concentrated his army at White Plains, completed two lines of works, with his right on the river Bronx, and awaited the advance of the British. Howe had moved from New Rochelle to Scarsdale, and on the morning of the 28th marched against the Americans. A mile or more from White Plains, on the main road to New York, he fell in with General Spencer's advance parties under Colonels Silliman, Douglas,[212] and Chester, who offered resistance and lost some men, but they were driven back by superior numbers. On the left of the American position, across the Bronx, rose Chatterton's Hill, which offered a good site for the better defence of that flank. Colonel Putnam had just arrived on the hill to throw up works when the enemy made their appearance below.[213] According to Haslet, the Delawares were the first troops to report on this hill, where they took post with one of General Lincoln's Massachusetts militia regiments, under Colonel Brooks, on their right. They were followed immediately by McDougall's brigade, consisting of what was lately his own battalion, which had no field officers, Ritzema's, Smallwood's, and Webb's. The troops formed along the brow of the hill, and stood waiting for the enemy. The two-gun battery brought up at the same time was Captain Alexander Hamilton's.
The British marched up in brilliant array towards Washington's position, but unexpectedly declined to make an attack in front, although the centre was our weakest point. Chatterton's Hill appeared to engage Howe's attention at once, and it became the first object of capture. The troops assigned for this purpose were the Second British brigade and Hessians under Donop, Rall, and Lossberg, in all about four thousand men. They crossed the Bronx, under cover of their artillery, and prepared to ascend the somewhat abrupt face of the hill on the other side. McDougall's men reserved their fire until the enemy were within short range, when they poured a destructive shower of bullets upon them. The British recoiled, but moved up again to the attack, while Rall came around more on the left, and after a brisk fight, in which the militia facing Rall failed to stand their ground, they succeeded in compelling McDougall to retreat. Had the militia held their own, the fight might have been another Bunker Hill for the enemy. As it was, Colonel Putnam compared it to that engagement. In falling back, McDougall suffered some loss, but the whole force escaped to the right of our lines, with fewer casualties than they inflicted on the enemy. The latter lost about two hundred and thirty; the Americans something over one hundred and forty. Colonel Smallwood was wounded, and lost two of his captains, killed. Ritzema's New York Continentals suffered the most, having made a brave fight. Lieutenant-Colonel Samuel B. Webb, of Wethersfield, Ct., one of Washington's aids, who had shown his coolness under fire on Bunker Hill, was slightly wounded and had a horse shot under him while carrying orders.[214]
This affair on Chatterton's Hill is known as the Battle of White Plains. On the side of the Americans, not more than sixteen hundred troops were engaged, but the action was an important one, as it had the effect of changing the direction of future operations.[215]
On the following day, the 29th, Howe waited for reinforcements. On the 30th, the rain postponed an intended attack. On the 31st the weather proved fine about noon, but the British General "did not think proper to put his former intentions in execution." The next morning, November 1st, there was a further excuse for not attacking: Washington during the night had fallen back to the almost unassailable heights of North Castle, in his rear. Howe was thus again baffled in his attempt to bring the Americans to a decisive engagement, or to surround them, and he now turned his attention to another line of campaign. Stedman, the British historian, probably gives the correct reason why Washington was not followed. The American position, he says, was now "so advantageous that any attack on them must have proved unsuccessful, for the river Croton stretched along their front, and their rear was defended by woods and heights. Convinced that it was part of the enemy's system studiously to avoid an action, and that their knowledge of the country enabled them to execute this system with advantage, General Howe resolved to cease an ineffectual pursuit, and employ himself in the reduction of King's Bridge and Fort Washington." This accomplished, he could then push on to Philadelphia and close the year's operations with the occupation of that place. The capture of two cities, the successive defeats inflicted upon the Americans, and the good prospect of ending the rebellion in the next campaign, would be a brilliant military record with which to gratify the home government.
Fort Washington.
Howe broke up his camp near White Plains on November 5th, and marched west to the Hudson at Dobb's Ferry. Knyphausen, who had lately arrived with a second division of "foreigners," had already been despatched to King's Bridge. After various movements and delays, the entire British force also moved on the 12th to the immediate vicinity of the bridge, and dispositions were made to attack and capture Fort Washington. On the 15th, Howe sent a summons for the surrender of the fort, in which he intimated that a refusal to comply would justify the putting of the garrison to the sword.
The commander of Fort Washington was Colonel Robert Magaw, of Pennsylvania. In addition to his own regiment and Colonel Shee's, now under Lieutenant-Colonel Cadwallader, he had with him several detachments of troops from the Pennsylvania Flying Camp, under Colonels Baxter, Swoope, and others, together with a Maryland rifle battalion, under Colonel Rawlings, whose major was Otho Holland Williams, an officer distinguished later in the war. The artillery numbered about one hundred men, under Captain Pierce, and there were also the "Rangers," parts of Miles's and Atlee's old regiments, such as escaped the Long Island defeat, and about two hundred and fifty from Bradley's Connecticut levies, many of whom were to die in captivity. The whole force under Magaw numbered about twenty-eight hundred officers and men. The ground they were expected to hold was that part of Harlem Heights from the first of the three lines already described, northward to the end of Laurel Hill on the Harlem, and the hill west on the Hudson, a distance of two miles and a half.
At the lower lines at One Hundred and Forty-sixth Street, Cadwallader's men, the Rangers, and some others were posted; at Laurel Hill, Colonel Baxter, and west of him, at the northern termination of the level summit of the ridge where Fort Washington stood, was Colonel Rawlings. Magaw remained at the fort to direct movements during the attack. The outer defences where the troops were stationed were to be held as long as possible, while the fort and the intrenchments immediately surrounding it were to be the point of retreat. Magaw believed he could hold the post against almost any force until December, and when the summons for a surrender reached him he returned the following spirited reply:
"15 November, 1776.