History of Westchester County, New York, Vol. I
The Congress declared, as its opinion, "that Colonel Gilbert Drake sustained a loss, which "accrued in receiving and paying out tlie public " money, in purchasing Pork, by order of the late " Provincial Congress," without, however, assuming the loss referred to ; and then it voted the gallant Colonel, " the sum of seventy pounds, as a compensa- " tion for his services, expenses, and commissions, in " purchasing the said Pork, as aforesaid," and leaving him officially "whitewashed," with twenty pounds and what, besides, he had made in the operations, snugly secured in his pocket-book. It was proven, in that instance, that influence was u.-eful, even among " patriots ; " and the Chairman of Westchestercouuty's County Committee, in the same instance, found it well to have been a Drake.*
As we have already stated,-" the third Provincial Congress was alarmed by theentrance of General Howe into the harbor of New York, and precipitately disbanded, without a formal adjournment, although it had previously provided for a reassembling of the Deputies, at the Court House, in the White Plains, on the following Tuesday, [July 2, 1776.] As it did n(»t thus resume its work, it ceased to exist; and, whether for good or for evil, the third Provincial Congress and all which it did and all which it failed to do became subjects of history.
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The latter half of the year 1776 was one of the most eventful periods in the history of America, if not in that of the entire civilized world ; and in the great drama of political and military events, teeming with immediate interest and with ultimate importance, and occupying only that short half-year, Westchester-couuty, in New York, and those who were, then, within the limits of that ancient County -- the peaceful and industrious farmers whose homes were there, as well those strangers, armed or unarmed, who had gone into the County, uo matter for what purpose -- occupy places which were, then, as conspicuous as, since the close of that period, they have been well-known, from one extreme of Christendom to the other.