Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 June 1894 — CRADLE OF FINAL VICTORY. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

CRADLE OF FINAL VICTORY.

Headquarter* Washington at Dobbs rerry. The historic associations which duster about the old house at Dobbs Fe ry which Washington made his headquarters are such that the celebration, which wai held last week by the New York Society of the S. ns of the American devolution, becomes of special interest. Dobbs Ferry is one of the many charming suburbs of New York, One hundred and thirteen years ago it was a place of much importance. Washington was there with his army of half clothed, half-starved Continental soldiers, while a ong the Greenburgh hills were the giittcrtng uniforms of the French under Hoohambeau It was a critical time in the war of independence. It was necessary to make a final strike for victory, which might result in defeat. Washington and Rochambeau met in the mansion of Van Brugh Livingston, and thoro planned the campaign that closed the war. Thfi tbipie la still standing, and has been in no.-session of only one owner between Van Brugh Livingston and the pre-ent proprietor. Dr, Joseph Hasbrouck. It has been called the “Cradle of Final Victory," On Hag day, or the anniversary of the adoption of the stars and stripes as the national standard of the United States the society decided that this day should be commemorated by laying the baso stone of a monument io mark the house in whioh the Yorktown campaign was idunned, in which the American and British coinmandors-in-ohief arranged for the evacuation of American soil by the British, and opposite which the British sloop-of-war that brought Sir Guy Carleton to Dobbs F'erry fired a saluto of seventeen guns in honor of Uon. Washington, the first salute by Great Britain t.> the United States of America. The monument will be of a plain square oap design ten feet in height, and of granite. The oltizona of Dobbs Ferry are planning to orown this monument with a statue of Roohambeau. The site is very near Dr. Hasbrouok’s bouse. It is a aemi circular bit of ground taken from the lawn and bordering upon the roadway. Washington was ut Dobbs Ferry for nearly six weeks before he decided upon the Yorktown campaign. The

outlook for Independence was very gloomy. The colonial army had met many reverses In the South; the treasury was exhausted and there was mutiny in the army. This was the condition of affairs May 1, 1781. A month later the prospects wero brighter. By the middle of June Lafayette was in hot chase after Cornwallis and Washington was planning with Roohambeau to effect the capture of New York City. On July 4, 1781, their foroos met at Dobbi F'erry. Washington removed his headquarters from tho house of Joseph Appleby, which then st >od a few miles from the Hudson, on what was later called Washington's Hill, to the Van Brugh LJvingston mansion. There ho held itoftiiy conferences with Rocharabeau and the leaders of the Continental Congress. When Washington learned that the fleet of the French commander, the Conte de Grasse, was headed tor the Chesapeake, he determined to abandon the movement against New York, join 1 afayetto at the York peninsula, and force the end of the war by compelling the surrender of Cornwallis. By a curious chance the ccinmandors-in-chief of the two armies met in the Van Brugh Livingston mansion a year and a half after the battle ot Yorktown to arrange for the evacuation of American soil by the British.

“THE CRADLE OF FINAL VICTORY.”