Others, attacliing themselves to the Britisli side, were known as " Cowboys," and were engaged in plundering the people between the lines, of their cattle and other property. Others again, were known as " Skinners," and professing allegiance to the American side, lived chiefly within the patriot lines. Both of them, Cowboys and Skinners, were treacherous, rapacious and cruel. No region in the United States was so harassed and trampled down as this debatable ground. Hostile armies marched and countermarched over it, and its ruined condition eloquently portrayed the horrid desolation of war. In almost every family of

THE MILLER HOUSE. Wasliington's Headquarters, White Plains.

the old residents there linger traditions that vividly illustrate the perils, torture and trials of that gloomy period.

The distress and suffering of the i)eople, however, was not all inflicted by the " Cowboys" and "Skinners ; " the soldiers of the regular army were also guilty of plundering the inhabitants in the neighborhood of the camp. AVhen Colonel Aaron Burr assumed command of the forces at White Plains, in the autumn of 1778, he established strict discipline within and security without the camp. Soon after his arrival, some soldiers had made their tent more comfortable by beds and bedding taken from the house of

N. Y. : " The northern part composed of rocks, stones, hills and valleys ; the southern part the hills are less frequent but more tlat and extensive ; the surface much broken, with large bodies of solid rock rising a little above the earth and running nearly parallel to it ; the side of which is cold, wet and heavy ; the whole much worn and e.\hau*ted, and overrun with two species of pernicious and prolific weeds, very unfavorable to the interests of the proprietoi-s. "