It was the militia and the levies that enabled the commanding general to throw reinforcements into the scale of battle when his little army of regulars was hard ])ressed. The\' were to the British always an unknown riuantity, and set calculations at naught. When Gates needed a larger force of men to oppose to Burgoyne, Clinton sent him the farmer-soldiers of Ulster County -- men of mingled Dutch and German blood -- to complete the auxiliary force. On the sole occasion upon which the war-shi])s of the British penetrated the Highlands and for a short time controlled the whole of the navigable i:)art of the Hudson in 1777, their commander held in his hands the destiny of America. Had Sir Henrv Clinton succeeded in establishine a

4o8 The Hudson River

conjunction with Burgo}'ne, or in hemming Gates between the force he had brought to bay at Saratoga and the victorious army from the south, the wisest generalship and the most hardy valour would hardly have sufficed to save the American cause. Even with the foregone defeat of Burgoyne, Clinton must have retired with deep regret, for he could not have been l3lind to the supreme importance of retaining the mastery that had been won by his expedition against the forts. From a military standpoint, that expedition, though brilliant in execution, was productive of no permanent results. Yet it would have been worth almost an\' effort or sacrifice to have held the river. Granting the numerical superiority of the Americans on shore, it does not seem impossible that a man of greater genius than Sir Henr}^ Clinton might haA^e maintained an effectual blockade with his fleet U]3on the river. Upon the military road of which the Newburgh ferry was so important a feature, not only troops, but waggon-trains and artillery were continually being moved.