1. Maj. Gen. James Grant’s West Indies expedition sailed from Sandy Hook on 3 November.

2. For Lt. Gen. Charles Cornwallis’s foraging expedition to New Jersey from 22 Sept. to 15 Oct., see George Baylor to GW, 23 Sept., n.1. That movement was coordinated with the advance on 23 Sept. of a detachment of about five thousand men commanded by Lt. Gen. Wilhelm von Knyphausen into Westchester County, N.Y., on the east side of the Hudson River. Gen. Henry Clinton explained his strategy in his letter to George Germain of 8 Oct.: “on the return [to New York] of the troops from the expedition to [New] Bedford [Mass.] etc., I proposed taking a forward position with the army, as well to procure a supply of forage which we were much in want of as to observe the motions of the rebel army and to favour an expedition to Egg Harbour, at which place the enemy had a number of privateers and prizes and considerable salt-works.

“Accordingly on the 22nd of last month I requested Lord Cornwallis to take a position between Newbridge on the Hackinsack River in Jersey and Hudson’s River, and Lieut.-General Knyphausen one between Wipperham [in Yonkers, N.Y.] on the last of those rivers and the Brunx.

“In this situation, with the assistance of the flatboats, we could assemble the army on either side of the North [Hudson] River in twenty-four hours, and by our having the command of that river as far as the Highlands Mr Washington could not assemble that of the rebels in ten days; to have done it in Jersey he must have quitted his mountains and risked a general action in a country little favourable to him.

“As by the move beforementioned the provinces of Jersey and New York were opened, we received a considerable supply of provisions and a number of [Loyalist] families came in.

“General Washington did not seem to show the least disposition to assemble his army and the militia kept at a distance” (Davies, Documents of the American Revolution description begins K. G. Davies, ed. Documents of the American Revolution, 1770–1783; (Colonial Office Series). 21 vols. Shannon and Dublin, 1972–81. description ends , 15:210–11).

Clinton elaborated on his strategy in his postwar narrative: “should he [GW] be tempted to quit his mountains to interrupt our foraging in the Jersies or support any detachments sent thither for that purpose, I had a good chance of having a fair stroke at him, the probability being very great that by such a move he must have risked a general action. . . . Mr. Washington, however, would not be moved from North Castle, where he continued in perfect security. . . . my views with respect to him were by that means disappointed” (Willcox, American Rebellion description begins William B. Willcox, ed. The American Rebellion: Sir Henry Clinton’s Narrative of His Campaigns, 1775–1782, with an Appendix of Original Documents. New Haven, 1954. description ends , 105).

3. The previous Sunday was 13 September. Guy Johnson, superintendent of Indian affairs in the northern department, wrote to George Germain from New York on 10 Sept.: “I am this day to embark for Quebec from whence (if I am fortunate enough to escape the cruisers) I propose to write more at large” (Davies, Documents of the American Revolution description begins K. G. Davies, ed. Documents of the American Revolution, 1770–1783; (Colonial Office Series). 21 vols. Shannon and Dublin, 1972–81. description ends , 15:199–200).