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October 19th Lydia Vail of Somers. (?) "When the house of my grandfather Richardson Davenport was attacked in May 1781, I was a girl ten or eleven years old or thereabouts. I was at Davenport's house a few minutes after the Refugees left. Part of them approached in front of the building and part by the road from the Croton, which road then passed by the rear of the house, that is, on the north and north west of it. Greene, Flagg, and a young Lieutenant whose name I don't remember occupied a large bedroom in the north west corner of the second story which communicated directly with the ground by an outer door at the rear or north end of the house. In consequence of being built upon ground which rises in the rear Davenport house was then two stories
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high in front, and but one in the rear. This is partly the case at present. My grandfather was in the adjoining apartments and overheard all the conversation of the three offi- -cers. The rashness and folly of the young Lieutenant was the cause of the disaster, as my grandfather to his family always said - at least so far as relates to the bloodshed. This was their account which I heard at the time and often afterwards. When the Refugees came up they fired a volley to signalize their friends in the orchard near Pine's Bridge, and ap- -proached the house without making fur- -ther use of their arms calling upon the inmates to surrender. The young lieutenant always slept with a pair of loaded pistols upon a stand at the head of his bed, and when he heard