Note 1394 — Chapter VIII · (continued 2)

Quotations from Haldimand's correspondence and speeches are given elsewhere. The openness of Clinton's movements seemed to Washington such a complete betrayal of the whole scheme that on the 1st of July he wrote to Sullivan that Clinton "had transported, and by last accounts was transporting, provisions and stores for his whole brigade three months, and two hundred and twenty or thirty batteaux to receive them; by which means, in the place of having his design concealed till the moment of execution, and forming his junction with you, in a manner by surprise, it is announced" (Sparks's Washington, vi. p. 281). During the whole of this hazardous proceeding Clinton was not molested, nor did Haldimand seem to derive any conception of what it meant. Yet Washington was so far right in saying that the intention of the movement was "announced" that on the 5th of July the following appeared in the Boston Gazette and Country Journal: "The stores are all arrived, and the greatest exertions are made by Gen. Clinton to transport them unto Lake Otsego, over a carrying-place of about thirty miles. Everything will be then ready to go down the Susquehanna and join Gen. Sullivan."