The posts at Stony Point and Verplanck's had been begun as outposts of West Point, and to protect King's Ferry, the crossing below the Highlands. Before the works were finished the British had captured them, in June (Sparks's Washington, vi. 292). Washington planned a surprise of the British garrison, and the two annexed sketches, furnished to him by Gen. Heath, seem to have been prepared in anticipation of the movement.
The first, "Stoney Point", is from a pen-and-ink sketch, indorsed "From Genl. Heath, letter 3d July, 1779", which is among the Sparks maps in Cornell University library, and carries the following Key: 1, the capital work on the highest part of the point, commanding the out-flêches, which is conformed to the broken eminence it is built on; 2, 3, 4, 5, flêches built on so many little eminences, each with one embrasure; but in the principal work (1) the number of embrasures is uncertain, being covered by the works and the declivity of the hill. Two rows of abatis (× × ×) cross the point from water to water. The other plan, marked "Verplanck's Point", is sketched from a pen-and-ink drawing in the same collection, also indorsed "From Genl. Heath, letter 3d July, 1779", and bears this Key: 1, Fort de la Fayette, with block-house and barbette battery; 2, board huts in form of tents; 3, American barbette; 4, British tents, about one regiment; 5, 6, two new flêches by the Britons; 7, block-house on a stony hill, with a redoubt. The abatis is marked × × ×.
FADEN'S STONY POINT, 1779.
The lead of the movement was entrusted to Wayne. His instructions, in Washington's handwriting, are given in Dawson, in fac-simile (p. 18). His orders are dated July 15 (Niles, Principles, 1876, p. 495; Essex Inst. Hist. Coll., v. 7). Wayne's first report of his successful attack to Washington is given in fac-simile in Armstrong's Wayne, Dawson, and Lossing (ii. 179); and his longer account of the next day is in Sparks's Washington, vi. 537; and in Ibid. vi. 298, is Washington's report to Congress. H. B. Dawson's Assault on Stony Point (Morrisania, 1863) is an elaborate monograph. H. P. Johnston has a special paper in Harper's Monthly lix. 233 (July, 1879), and J. W. De Peyster another in the N. Y. Mail, July 15, 1879, while a controversy of Johnston and De Peyster is in the Monmouth Inquirer. "Who led the forlorn hope at Stony Point?" is discussed in the Penna. Mag. of Hist., Oct., 1885, p. 357. Cf. Armstrong's Wayne; Dawson's Battles; Moore's Diary, ii. 192; Penna. Archives, vii.; Marshall's Washington, iv. ch. 2; Irving's Washington, iii. 465; Hull's Rev. Services, ch. 16; Reed's Reed, ii. 110; Kapp's Steuben, ch. 11; Hamilton's Republic, i. 443; acc. of Col. Febiger in Mag. Amer. Hist., March, 1881; Duncan's Royal Artillery, 3d ed., ii. 353; Pattison in N. Y. Hist. Soc. Coll., 1875, p. 95; and Gen. Joseph Hawley's Centennial Address, July 16, 1879. The British later reoccupied the post (Sparks's Corresp. of Rev., ii. 328).
The chief map of the attack is a Plan of the Surprise of Stoney Point, 15 July, 1779, from surveys of Wm. Simpson, Lt. 17th Regt. and D. Campbell, Lt. 42d Regt., by John Hills, Lt. 23d Regt., London, Faden, March 1, 1784. There is a fac-simile in the N. Y. Calendar of Hist. MSS., p. 347, and in Dawson. It needs the following Key: 1, Two companies of the 17th regiment. 2, Ditto. 3, Sixty of the loyal Americans. 4, Two grenadier companies of the 17th regiment. 5, A detachment of the royal artillery. A, Ruins of a block-house erected and destroyed by the Americans. B, A temporary magazine. C, One 24 and one 18 pounder, ship guns. D, Ditto. E, One iron 12-pounder. F, One 8-inch-howitzer. G, One brass 12-pounder. H, One short brass 12-pounder. I, One long brass 12-pounder. Cf. plans in Hull's Revolutionary Services, ch. 16; Sparks's Washington, vi. 304; Guizot's Washington, Atlas; Lossing's Field-Book, ii. 175. The medals given to Wayne, De Fleury, and Stewart are described in Loubat. (Cf. Lossing, ii. 180, 181.) A rude view of the capture in Bickerstaff's (Boston) Almanac, 1780, is reproduced in Mag. Amer. Hist., xvi. 592.
A few weeks later (Aug. 19), Major Henry Lee emulated Wayne in a sudden attack on Paulus Hook (Jersey City). We have reports on both sides. That of the British, General Pattison's, is in Duncan's Royal Artillery, ii. 355, and his letter to Townshend in N. Y. Hist. Coll., 1875, p. 79. On the American side we have accounts in Sparks's Washington, vi. 317, 326, 332-336, 376; Lowell (Hessians, 228) says that R. E. Lee's statement (in H. Lee's Memoirs) that Paulus Hook was captured by a stratagem is not borne out by Marshall (Washington, iv. 87) or by the German accounts (Ewald, ii. 295). Cf. Moore's Diary, ii. 206; Irving's Washington, iii. 475; Dawson's Battles; Quincy's Shaw, 65; Reed's Reed, ii. 125; Duer's Stirling, 204; Bancroft, x. 229; J. W. De Peyster in N. Y. Mail, Aug. 18, 1879; and S. A. Green in Hist. Mag., Dec., 1868 (2d ser., iv. 264). George H. Farrier prepared a Memorial of the centennial celebration of the battle of Paulus Hook, Aug. 19th, 1879 (Jersey City, 1879), which has an appendix of documents.
Loubat and Farrier give an account of the medal presented to Lee.
The annexed sketch, "Paulus Hook", is from a draft of an original Hessian map in the library at Cassel, furnished by Mr. Edward J. Lowell (cf. his Hessians, p. 228), with the following Key: A, Covering force of the attacking Americans. B, Line of attack on the block-houses (1, 2, 3) and fort (C), which mounted seven six-pounders, which were not used. D, Barracks in which one hundred and ten prisoners were taken. E, Work occupied by a Hessian captain, one officer and twenty-five men, possessed at the time the Americans retired, at daybreak. (Cf. plan in Lossing, ii. 828.) Farrier gives a plan from an original in the library of Congress.
The winter of 1779-80 was an exceptionally severe one in the North (Jones's N. Y., i. 320; Greene's Greene, ii. 184; Leake's Lamb; Almon's Remembrancer, ix.) After Clinton had gone South to attack Charleston, Knyphausen was left in command in New York (Eld's journal in Mass. Hist. Soc. Proc., xviii. 73; Eugene Lawrence on life in N. Y. in Hist. Mag., i. 37; Jones's N. Y. during the Rev., vol. ii.).