24S HISTORY OF THE COUNTY OF WESTCHESTER. 



cent Jr., was the only member of his family at home (his father Gilbert 

 having gone below) when the party arrived at the Smithy ; and he pos- 

 itively declined to shoe the horse — not only as a matter of conscience, but 

 on the ground that he was out of coal. This was considered, by his un- 

 reasonable foes, an insufficient excuse ; and some of the West Chester 

 guides who accompanied the French officer, knowing that Gilbert's father 

 and brother were strong Tories, determined that the want of coal was 

 a mere pretext to avoid doing a service for the upper party (as the 

 Americans and their allies were termed) and so they endeavored to 

 compel the young man to do the work by force ; resistance was nat- 

 urally offered, whereupon a scuffle ensued, and at length one of the 

 dragoons drew a pistol and shot Vincent dead on the spot ; while others 

 say that the officer himself becoming enraged at the reply, drew his 

 sword and struck the unoffending blacksmith to the ground — when his 

 brother Elijah Vincent, who belonged to De Lancey's Refugee corps, 

 heard of the outrage, he vowed revenge on the murderer; and the bet- 

 ter to accomplish his purpose, determined to lay in wait and watch the 

 French scouting parties as they passed to and fro from Scarsdale to 

 their encampment on the Greenburgh hills. For several nights, he 

 watched in vain ; but at length the opportune moment for revenge ar- 

 rived. It so happened that a party of the Duke of Lauzune's patrols 

 were passing the very spot where Vincent lay, concealed behind the 

 bushes ; he immediately rose and fired upon the unsuspecting company, 

 and a captain of the Hussars fell from his horse mortally wounded. 

 Favored by the darkness of the night Vincent fled into the woods and 

 made the rest of his way to West Farms, where he arrived early the 

 following morning; after the war, he removed to Canada and died 

 there." 



It was along the high ridge of Scarsdale, north-west of the post road, 

 that the British forces, led by Generals Clinton and De Heister, march- 

 ed on the very day of the battle of While Plains, 28th of October, 1776. 

 The late Francis Secor, of Scarsdale, was in the habit of telling, " how 

 that he had often heard his father describe the march of the British army 

 on the day of the Battle at White Plains. He stood, as they passed, un- 

 der the great tree in front of their house ; marching along the ridge which 

 runs north of the post road, he suspected them to be the right column of 

 the British army. As they moved steadily forward, they drove before them 

 a force which constituted the advanced guard of Washington's army. 

 The enemy were preceded by a strong body of pioneers, who tore down 



a Mac DoiiaM MSS. in posession of Geo. II. Moore, Lib. N. Y.,IIist Soc. Conversation 

 of William Barker of White Plains, Oct. 23-25, 1S44-5; also John Williams of the County House, 

 agedSK;, Oct. 17, 1S14-5. , 



