ABSTRACT
Prior to the battle on the 7th, Horatio Gates had ordered Brigadier-General John Fellows to march his 1300 militiamen up the east bank of the Hudson to Battenkill, and to cross to the west bank at Saratoga. General Sir John Burgoyne sent Lieutenant-Colonel Nicholas Sutherland, with the 47th and 9th Regiments, to reconnoitre the road to Saratoga. General von Riedesel also criticized Burgoyne, unfairly it seems, for delaying the retreat; for, he says, the army could have marched the entire night and reached Saratoga at daybreak, where a bridge could have been begun without molestation from the enemy. On reaching Saratoga, Burgoyne had established himself in General Philip Schuyler’s mansion, and he remained within its warmth and confort, while his army lay on the ground, soaked through and hungry. Burgoyne’s delaying tactics infuriated Gates, who feared to precipitate a renewal of hostility, for that morning he had heard of the burning of Esopus.
