Varick transcript, DLC:GW. See the general orders for 7 March, source note.

Sgt. Ebenezer Parkman, Jr., who served with the artificers then at Fishkill, N.Y., wrote in his diary entry for this date that “St Partricks Day” was celebrated at that place. He then wrote in his diary entry for 18 March: “The Sabbath also does not Escape being Celebrated by the Wor[s]hipers of St Partrick—Which might have been better Spent According to the Commandment. The good Lord pardon all Our Sins!” (both entries from Parkman’s diary in MWA: Parkman Family Papers).

Maj. Gen. William Heath wrote GW’s aide-de-camp David Humphreys from West Point on 17 March: “The last evening I received a Letter from Major Maxwell Who Commands on the Lines, in which he among other things writes as follows ‘I have this Day (15 Inst) been informed that there is an embarkation of troops now carrying on at New York, and that there was a Party of the Enemy at Mile Square with Some artillery the Day before yesterday, whether this a Foraging party or whether their design is against Some of our Posts I can not yet learn.’ When I obtain further Intelligence it shall be communicated” (MHi: Heath Papers). When Maj. Hugh Maxwell wrote Heath from Crom Pond, N.Y., on 15 March, he also communicated appeals from residents for protection from “a banditti” that “pattrols and Ravages the Country” and enclosed “two New York papers” (MHi: Heath Papers).

Humphreys presumably replied to Heath when he wrote that general from New Windsor on this date: “I am honored with your Letter of this day, for which I pray you will accept my thanks.

“The Proceedings of a General Court Martial of John Collins, the Returns of the Depy Commissy of Issues, and a Letter for the Board of War, have safely been handed me, by the Bearer of this. … P.S. I have heard nothing of His Excellency, but shall expect him every hour” (MHi: Heath Papers). For GW’s confirmation of the sentence given John Collins, see General Orders, 23 March. The returns and the letter to the Board of War, probably from Heath, have not been identified.

Heath again wrote Humphreys from West Point on this date: “The Letter addressed to his Excellency the Commander in Chief is this moment sent to me by Major General Parsons, I believe it is on a very momentuous Subject I have this Day had a hint that his Excellency is now or is expected very Soon to be at Albany, If you a[re] Certain of it I think it will be best to Send off an Express to him immediately with the Letter, to Conceal the General being at Albany the Letter may be put under cover addressed to Genl Schuyler or Clinton, as you may think best” (MHi: Heath Papers).

Humphreys replied to Heath from New Windsor on this date: “I am extremely obliged to you, My Dear Sir, for your unremitting attention in forwarding the Dispatches for His Excellency, by the most expeditious conveyance. I am not certain the General has gone, or will go to Albany before he returns to this place—and therefore think it will be best to delay the Letter of Maj. Genl. Parsons (for fear of missing him) untill I have ascertained that matter, or heard farther from him.

“An Express has arrived from Philadelphia, with Dispatches for the Count De Rochambeau, but brings no intelligence from the Southward” (MHi: Heath Papers). The letter from Maj. Gen. Samuel Holden Parsons to GW, dated 14 March, reported his findings from an investigation into a Loyalist plot in Connecticut. GW was returning to New Windsor from Rhode Island and did not travel to Albany, where he would have joined his wife then visiting the Schuyler family (see GW to Rochambeau, 16 March, n.1; see also GW to Catharine Littlefield Greene, 22 March, and n.6).