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Life and Times of Washington, Volume 2 - Revised, Enlarged, and Enriched by Benson John Lossing;John Frederick Schroeder
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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.

Here the Commander-in-Chief communicated to his army in general orders
the manner in which he intended to dispose of them during the winter.
He expressed in strong terms his approbation of their conduct,
presented them with an encouraging state of the future prospects of
their country, exhorted them to bear with continuing fortitude the
hardships inseparable from the position they were about to take, and
endeavored to convince their judgments that those hardships were not
imposed on them by unfeeling caprice, but were necessary for the good
of their country.

The winter had set in with great severity, and the sufferings of the
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