The Cozv-boys were a set of people, mostly, if not wholly, refugees, belonging to the British side, and engaged in plundering cattle near the lines, and driving them to New York. The name indicates their vocation. There was another description of banditti, called Skinners, who lived, for the most part, within the American lines, and professed attachment to the American cause; but, in reality, they were more unprincipled, perfidious and inhuman than the Cow-boys themselves; for these latter exhibited some symptoms of fellow feeling for their friends, -- whereas, the Skinners committed their depredations equally upon friends and foes.

By a law of the State of New York, every person refusing to take as oath of fidelity to the State was considered as forfeiting his property. The large territory between the American and British lines, extending

a Ibid. 217.

b This was not a Dntch woman, as the historian supposes ; but Mrs. Sarah rnderhlll, wife of Isaac rmlerhill, of Yorktown, whose grandson, Edward Borough rnderhlll, still owns tne iiouse.-- Editor.

THE TOWN OF GREENBURGH.

3°7

nearly thirty miles from north to south, and embracing Westchester county, was populous and highly cultivated. A person living within that space, who took the oath of fidelity, was sure to be plundered by the Cmv-boys; and if he did not take it, the Skinners would come down upon him, call him a tory, and seize his property as confiscated by the State. Thus the execution of the laws was assumed by robbers, and the innocent and guilty were involved in a common ruin.