At length, all the necessary preparations having been completed, early in the morning of Monday, the twenty-eighth of October, the Royal Army struck its tents, in the encampment, at Scarsdale, which it had occupied since the preceding Friday; and, iu two columns, right in front, it moved towards the White Plains. 1 The right column, which was composed mostly of British troops, was commanded by Lieutenant-general Sir Henry Clinton ; '* the left column, with whom was General Howe, 3 was com- , posed mostly of German troops, and was commanded by Lieutenant-general Heister. 4

The American pickets were driven in, by the Light Infantry, of the right column, and by the Chasseurs, of the left column ; 5 and when the moving columns reached HartVcorners -- now known by the name of Hartsdale -- they encountered a body of New England ■troops, composed of a "part of General Wadsworth's " Brigade, with some other Regiments," 6 the whole under the command of Major-general Spencer, 7 and numbering not far from twenty-six hundred Officers and effective men, * whom General Washington had

its arrival at the White Plains, at ten o'clock on the following morning, were in entire harmony with what was stated by the British Officer, through The Middlesex Journal.

1 General Howe to Lord George Germame, " New-York, 30 November, "1776 ;" [Hall's] History of the Civil War in America, i., 207 ; Stedman's History of the American War, i., 212 : Gordon's History of the American Revolution, ii., 340; Marshall's Life of George Washington, ii., 503 ; etc.