A few weeks earlier the British fleet had sailed out of New York harbor and had turned toward the south, with all the British army on board. No one knew where the fleet was going; no one knew where the army would land and make their next attack, and there was great anxiety.
General Washington and his army were at this time camped in Bucks county, north of Philadelphia. It was on August twenty-second that a hot and dusty messenger galloped into camp with news for the General that the British fleet had been seen in Chesapeake Bay.
As soon as Washington heard this news, orders were given to the army to break camp, and he marched with them down to Delaware, to be ready to meet the enemy, and to keep them from attacking Philadelphia, for that was then the capital of the colonies.
Wilmington at that time was still a small town. It had a few shops, a market house, and a fire engine company called the “Friendship.” A new ship-building company had just built and launched their first boat, which was named the “Wilmington.” But the most important of all the manufactories were the Brandywine flour mills, which stood on the Brandywine, some little distance above where it flows into the Christiana.[1] Washington had the “runners” (or upper stones) taken from these mills and hauled up into Chester County for fear they might be seized and used by the British.
Wilmington is very hilly. It has been said of it that it is “as full of lumps as a napkin thrown over a blackberry bush.”
The steep part of West Street that slopes up from Front to Fourth was called “Quaker Hill,” for almost all the houses that were there were owned by Quakers. The houses were built in a prim, plain fashion, but within they were full of comfort. Furniture, linen, food, were simple but of the best quality for the Friends knew how to live comfortably, in spite of their plain ways.
It was in one of these houses that Washington made his headquarters. The house is still standing, on the west side of the street, between Third and Fourth Streets.
A little beyond Quaker Hill was an old apple orchard, and still beyond that were the open country and the wooded hills of the Brandywine.
It was near the Brandywine that the army encamped. In the next few days soldiers might often be seen kneeling on the edge of the stream to wash their pieces of clothing. Their voices echoed through the woods in loud jokes and laughter. Sometimes a trooper in buff and blue brought a dozen clattering horses down to the water to drink.