Colonel Samuel Drake's Regiment, referred to in this Order, was the skeleton Regiment of Westchester-county Minute-men, which whs then in the Continental Service, and posted at Hoern's Hook, on the Island of Manhattan, at the mouth of the Harlem-river, and opposite to Hell-gate, where was one of the passes to Long Island.

We have not found any record of the three Companies which were thus drawn from Westchester-county, if they were drawn.

"> Journal of the Provincial Congress, " Die Solis, 10 ho., A.M., Feb. 18, "1776."

u Journal of the Committee of Safety, "Die Veneris, A.M., April 19, "1776;" The Committee of Safety to the Committee of Westchester-county, " In Committee of Safety, New York, April 19, 1776."

WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

which might have been certainly foreseen and easily prevented, had those who were immediately concerned in preventing it possessed the foresight and caution which are usually attributed to intelligent men.

We have already noticed the fact that, at the beginning of the active revolutionary movements which followed the receipt of intelligence that General Gage had unwisely commenced active military operations in the field, many of the Cannon which belonged to private individuals, in the City of New York, were drawn to Kingsbridge ; * and, subsequently, as the political feeling became more intense, every gun in the City, no matter how useless for any other purpose than for old metal it might have been, was ordered to the same place. 2

It is not clear what good was expected to be derived from those movements of the guns ; but it is very clear that, before the close of the year 1775, between three and four hundred Cannon, of all calibres, grades, and conditions -- some of them good and serviceable ; others, less valuable and less useful ; the greater number, honeycombed and worthless, unless for old iron ; and all of them, unmounted and without carriages -- were accumulated in three large gatherings, one, of about fifty guns, being at " John Wil- "liams's," 3 the Williams-bridge of the present day; one, " at or near Kingsbridge ; " and the third, or larger, parcel within two hundred and fifty yards of Isaac Valentine's house, the Valentine's-hill of that period, as well as of this. 4 They were entirely unguarded ; and it is very evident that they were lying side by side, presenting an apparently formidable array, notwithstanding their actually existing harmlessness.