156 The Story of The Bronx 



them to capture him ; but he was always too wary or too for- 

 tunate for his enemies, and he always escaped them. Upon 

 one occasion in 1777, he rode to West Farms to visit his aged 

 mother. His thoroughbred stallion True Briton was tied to 

 a fence, where it was seen by some American scouts, who 

 recognized its value and stole it. The horse was taken to 

 White Plains and sold to an enterprising Yankee from Con- 

 necticut, who used him for breeding purposes and thus began 

 the famous line of Morgan horses. 



On January 25, 1777, some Americans attacked the block- 

 house erected by De Lancey at West Farms; but the attempt 

 was unsuccessful; for, though some of the loyalists were 

 wounded, none was killed or captured. 



On January 5, 1777, Washington, believing the post at New 

 York to be weak on account of the main British army being 

 in New Jersey and many detached for duty in Rhode Island, 

 directed Heath to approach Kingsbridge, and, if circumstances 

 promised success, to attack the fortifications there. It was 

 hoped that, even if the forts could not be taken, the movement 

 would oblige the British to detach large bodies of men from 

 New Jersey or Rhode Island for the reinforcement of New 

 York, thus threatened by attack. In accordance with these 

 instructions, on the seventeenth, Heath began a concerted 

 movement in force against Fort Independence. 



General Lincoln advanced by the Albany Post-road to the 

 heights above Van Cortlandt Park; General Scott came from 

 Scarsdale to the vicinity of the Valentine house on the Boston 

 Road, between Williamsbridge and Kingsbridge, and Generals 

 Wooster and Parsons marched from New Rochelle over the 

 Boston Road to the same neighborhood. On the morning of 

 the eighteenth, the three divisions arrived at the enemy's out- 

 posts just before sunrise. Lincoln captured the outpost in his 



