in the neighbourhood of Philadelphia, equally distant from the
Delaware above and below that city; and there to construct huts, in
the form of a regular encampment, which might cover the army during
the winter. A strong piece of ground at Valley Forge, on the west side
of the Schuylkill, between twenty and thirty miles from Philadelphia,
was selected for that purpose; and some time before day on the morning
of the 11th of December, the army marched to take possession of it. By
an accidental concurrence of circumstances, Lord Cornwallis had been
detached the same morning at the head of a strong corps, on a foraging
party on the west side of the Schuylkill. He had fallen in with a
brigade of Pennsylvania militia commanded by General Potter, which he
soon dispersed; and, pursuing the fugitives, had gained the heights
opposite Matron's ford, over which the Americans had thrown a bridge
for the purpose of crossing the river, and had posted troops to
command the defile called the Gulph, just as the front division of the
American army reached the bank of the river. This movement had been
made without any knowledge of the intention of General Washington to
change his position, or any design of contesting the passage of the
Schuylkill; but the troops had been posted in the manner already
mentioned for the sole purpose of covering the foraging party.

Washington apprehended, from his first intelligence, that General Howe
had taken the field in full force. He therefore recalled the troops
already on the west side, and moved rather higher up the river, for
the purpose of understanding the real situation, force, and designs of
the enemy. The next day Lord Cornwallis returned to Philadelphia; and,
in the course of the night, the American army crossed the river.

[Sidenote: General Washington goes into winter quarters.]