A century of hate is more than enough; and there is surely now no possible danger to republican doctrines, in an unprejudiced examination of the attending and extenuating circumstances of loyalty to the Crown in 1776.

I have not been insusceptible, either, to the sentiment that it is not less praiseworthy to moderate national than individual prejudice, or to do justice to the memory of a class, than to the injured character of a person.

If I have therefore said anything to soften the asperities of national rancor, or to relieve from antipathy a class of citizens respectable for private virtues, and only obnoxious for exercising the inalienable right of political and religious opinions, I shall feel a sufficient compensation for the long hours of search and labor, which a more facile pen, and a better judgment, might have abridged.

The

That the narrative of warfare on Long Island might be made as complete as possible, every available source of information has been examined. mythic details of tradition, and the meagre outlines of official documents, have been investigated and compared, to secure fidelity to historic truth. Parliamentary records, and Congressional reports, journals of Provincial assemblies and committees of safety, private letters and public documents, narra

tives of private soldiers, and reports of general officers, histories, subsequent and contemporaneous, have all been earnestly studied, in order that every incident of value or interest might be combined into a continuous narration.

Most of these sources of information form a part of this volume, and are printed entire in its closing part.

It only remains for me to render my acknowledgments to those who truly deserve credit, for most of what may be deemed meritorious in this work. The first suggestion of it is due to Mr. Henry Onderdonk, Jr., of Jamaica, whose life has been devoted to the preservation of the incidents of partisan warfare on our Island. It is not too much to say that the work could not have been accomplished, except for the aid of his labors and research. His work, on the Revolu tionary Incidents of Long Island, has preserved, or indicated the existence of, sufficient material to form several volumes like the present. The generosity of the earnest scholar, and the true gentleman, was never more apparent, than in the hearty satisfaction shown on seeing his own life-task merged into this present work.

I cannot permit this preface to close without expressing my surprise at the tenderness and generosity with which the Executive Committee of the Historical Society have treated what now seems to me to have

been so feeble and incomplete an exposition of the interesting subject it seeks to elucidate. How much the work owes to the Rev. Dr. R. S. Storrs, Jr., who performed the tedious service of correcting and revising the proofs, happily none but the printer and the author can ever know.

Through the attention of Mr. William L. Stone, I was able to procure from Germany an original manuscript map of the battle-ground, by a Hessian officer, which affords us some new and interesting particulars. By the photo-lithographic process this memento of that disastrous day has been perfectly reproduced, in fac simile.

THOMAS W. FIELD.

BROOKLYN, N. Y.

August 28, 1869.

INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE.

CHAPTER I.

REVOLUTIONARY MEASURES RESISTED.

The influence of national and social characteristics, in promoting or retarding the progress of revolutionary sentiments, was strikingly illustrated by the events occurring on Long Island in the year 1775. The tide of emigration which had peopled the plains of Suffolk county, had flowed from the New England shores. Almost midway of the Island, it had been met by the advancing wave of population from New York, when the New England current was deflected, and passed along the northern shore of Queens county. The wave from New England reached as far as Flushing; while that from New York swept past that point, upon the southern plains, to the east of Hempstead. turbulent and the placid streams of population never mingled, and even at this day retain the characteristics of the sources from which they sprang, or of the lands through which they flowed.

The

The strong impulses of the Puritan were moderated by education, and restrained by a somewhat unnatural selfcontrol; yet his spirit was at times revealed in a fierce energy, that scorned and overleaped these artificial bonds.