George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 10

[505] twenty-four hours, destroying public stores on the

Chap. XXV.} 1781. June.

way; but the assembly, having received warning, had adjourned, and Jefferson had gone to the mountains on horseback. The dragoons overtook seven of the legislature. Otherwise the expedition was fruit less.

Steuben had transported his magazine across the Fluvanna, and was safe, the water being too deep to be forded; but Simcoe, who was sent against him, made him believe that the whole British army was in pursuit of him; and he fled, leaving behind him some part of his stores.

The two detachments rejoined the camp of Cornwallis, which extended along the James river from the Point of Fork to a little below the mouth of Byrd creek. Tarleton had suffered nothing of Jefferson's at Monticello to be injured. At Elk Hill, under the eye of Cornwallis, all the barns and fences were

25.

burned; the growing crops destroyed; the fields laid absolutely waste; the throats cut of all the horses that were too young for service, and the rest carried off. He took away about thirty slaves, but not to give them freedom. The rest of the neighborhood was treated in like manner, but with less of destructive fury.

In the march of the British army from Elk Hill down the river to Williamsburg, where it arrived on the twenty-fifth of June, all dwelling-houses were plundered. The trusty band of Lafayette hung upon its rear, but “could not prevent its depredations. The Americans of that day computed that Cornwallis in his midsummer marchings up and down Virginia destroyed property to the value of three million ”