1. Ambrose Serle, who was on Lord Howe’s flagship Eagle off Staten Island, writes in his journal entry for this date: “In the Afternoon the Renown of 50 Guns and the Flora of 32 Guns, with 22 Sail of Convoy, came into the Harbor. We have had so many Arivals of late, that the Rebel Commanders, we learn, give out to their People, that we send Ships down in the Night, which come up in the Course of the next Day, as a manoeuvre to intimidate them” (Tatum, Serle’s Journal description begins Edward H. Tatum, Jr., ed. The American Journal of Ambrose Serle: Secretary to Lord Howe, 1776–1778. San Marino, Calif., 1940. description ends , 54). The transports in the convoy carried mostly Highlanders of the 42d and 71st regiments but included some Hessians (see Marriot Arbuthnot to Lord George Germain, 8 July 1776, in Clark and Morgan, Naval Documents description begins William Bell Clark et al., eds. Naval Documents of the American Revolution. 12 vols. to date. Washington, D.C., 1964–. description ends , 5:966–68; see also GW’s second letter to Hancock of 7 Aug.).

2. Gowanus Bay, a cove on the eastern shore of Long Island, is flanked on the north by Red Hook and on the south by Yellow Hook (now called Owl Head). Yellow Hook lay directly across the Narrows from the Watering Place on Staten Island where most of the British fleet was anchored.

3. This return has not been identified.