George Washington Papers

Intelligence Report from Captain David Hopkins, 31 August 1777

Intelligence Report from Captain David Hopkins

9. OClock Sunday Evening [31 August 1777]1

The party I mentioned by the last man returned this evening to their camp at Bohema Church & brought with them about 500 head of Cattle.

In the mean time there was landed a body of Troops at Cecil Court house under the command of Genl Gray & Nephouson upwards of five thousand with 35 or 40 pieces of Artilery none above 4 pounders they say they are to march tomorrow and form a line cross from one bay to the other,2 this was said by one of their Majors—To a Gentle[man] who he took for a friend. their encampment covers about a Mile Square. they have waggons but cant say how many Horses in bad Condition—This I got from three Gentlemen who were in the Camp all day & I met them as they came out, their Inteligence is to be depended on—one of them I knew before I shall watch them tomorrow.

David Hopkins Capt. L.D.

Copy, in John Fitzgerald’s writing, enclosed in GW to Hancock, 1 Sept. 1777, DNA:PCC, item 152; copy, DNA:PCC, item 169.

GW’s aide-de-camp Richard Kidder Meade wrote Hopkins on 1 Sept.: “His Excellency [GW] desires me to acknowledge your favor of this date, and return you thanks for the intelligence transmitted, he has nothing to recomend to you, but a continuance of your attention to the Enemies motions and an early information should any circumstance come within your knowledge worthy of communication” (DNA: RG 156, Office Chief of Ordnance).

1The context of this document indicates that it was written on Sunday, 31 August.

2General Howe sent this corps to the east side of the Elk River to protect the right flank of his main force on its planned march east from Head of Elk and to collect as many cattle and horses as possible for use of the army. The British 3d Brigade and three troops of the 16th Regiment of Light Dragoons, all under the command of Gen. Charles Grey, crossed the river from Elk Ferry on the west bank to Cecil Court House on the opposite shore early on the morning of 30 Aug. and marched four miles east to Bohemia (or Cecil) Church at present-day St. Augustine, Md., where they camped. A battalion of the 71st Regiment of Foot joined Grey’s detachment at Bohemia Church that evening, and on 31 Aug. General Knyphausen crossed the Elk with the rest of the corps and marched to the church (see André, Journal description begins John André. Major André’s Journal: Operations of the British Army under Lieutenant Generals Sir William Howe and Sir Henry Clinton, June 1777 to November 1778. 1930. Reprint. New York, 1968. description ends , 39–42; Baurmeister, Revolution in America description begins Carl Leopold Baurmeister. Revolution in America: Confidential Letters and Journals, 1776–1784, of Adjutant General Major Baurmeister of the Hessian Forces. Translated and annotated by Bernhard A. Uhlendorf. New Brunswick, N.J., 1957. description ends , 100–101; Scull, Montresor Journals description begins G. D. Scull, ed. The Montresor Journals. New York, 1882. In Collections of the New-York Historical Society, vol. 14. description ends , 444–45; and Muenchhausen, At General Howe’s Side description begins Friedrich von Muenchhausen. At General Howe’s Side, 1776–1778: The Diary of General William Howe’s Aide de Camp, Captain Friedrich von Muenchhausen. Translated by Ernst Kipping. Annotated by Samuel Smith. Monmouth Beach, N.J., 1974. description ends , 28).

About four o’clock on the morning of 31 Aug., Lt. Col. John Bird of the 15th Regiment of Foot led a party of 150 men south from Bohemia Church to surprise an American militia detachment said to be in the area and “to proceed to Middleneck, between the forks of the Bohemia River, to drive in cattle.” Not finding the militia, Bird’s party marched to Middle Neck and began collecting livestock. “From the want of expertness in the drivers,” Maj. John André says in his journal, “only 350 sheep, fifty-five horned cattle and about twenty-four horses or mules were brought in.” Bird returned to Bohemia Church about four o’clock in the afternoon (André, Journal description begins John André. Major André’s Journal: Operations of the British Army under Lieutenant Generals Sir William Howe and Sir Henry Clinton, June 1777 to November 1778. 1930. Reprint. New York, 1968. description ends , 41–42; see also Baurmeister, Revolution in America description begins Carl Leopold Baurmeister. Revolution in America: Confidential Letters and Journals, 1776–1784, of Adjutant General Major Baurmeister of the Hessian Forces. Translated and annotated by Bernhard A. Uhlendorf. New Brunswick, N.J., 1957. description ends , 101, and Scull, Montresor Journals description begins G. D. Scull, ed. The Montresor Journals. New York, 1882. In Collections of the New-York Historical Society, vol. 14. description ends , 445).

On 2 Sept. the whole corps under Gen. Knyphausen’s command marched from Bohemia Church five miles northeast to Carson’s Tavern near present-day Summitt Bridge, Del., and on 3 Sept. it marched four miles north to Aiken’s Tavern at present-day Glasgow, Del., near which it joined Howe’s main force (see GW to Hancock, 3 Sept.; see also André, Journal description begins John André. Major André’s Journal: Operations of the British Army under Lieutenant Generals Sir William Howe and Sir Henry Clinton, June 1777 to November 1778. 1930. Reprint. New York, 1968. description ends , 42; Baurmeister, Revolution in America description begins Carl Leopold Baurmeister. Revolution in America: Confidential Letters and Journals, 1776–1784, of Adjutant General Major Baurmeister of the Hessian Forces. Translated and annotated by Bernhard A. Uhlendorf. New Brunswick, N.J., 1957. description ends , 101–2; Scull, Montresor Journals description begins G. D. Scull, ed. The Montresor Journals. New York, 1882. In Collections of the New-York Historical Society, vol. 14. description ends , 445–46).

Charles Grey (1729–1807), who had entered the British army as an ensign at age 14, served in Europe and the West Indies during the Seven Years’ War, and at the end of the war in 1763 he was put on half-pay as a lieutenant colonel. In 1772 Grey obtained promotion to colonel and appointment as an aide-de-camp to King George III, and in March 1777 he became colonel of the 28th Regiment of Foot and received orders to go to America as an acting major general. Arriving at New York on 3 June 1777, Grey soon assumed command of the 3d Brigade, which he led until 5 Oct., the day after the Battle of Germantown when he took command of the 4th Brigade. On the night of 20–21 Sept. 1777 Grey’s troops, using only bayonets, surprised Gen. Anthony Wayne’s division near Paoli, Pa., and inflicted a devastating defeat on the Americans. Having been given permanent rank as major general in August 1777, Grey continued to distinguish himself in the campaign of 1778. In early September 1778 he led successful raids on New Bedford, Fairhaven, and Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts, and later that month he conducted a surprise bayonet attack on Col. George Baylor’s 3d Continental Light Dragoons at Old Tappan, N.J., severely wounding Baylor and killing many of his men. In November 1778 Grey sailed to England, where he stayed for the remainder of the war. His appointment as commander in chief of the British forces in America in December 1782 came too late in the war to be meaningful, and his commission was withdrawn the following April before he could return to America. Grey did retain the promotion to lieutenant general and the knighthood that accompanied that appointment. He was elevated to the peerage in 1801, and he became the first Earl Grey in 1806.

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