hour in making preparations. They could not have had much time for sleep, when at two o'clock in the morning of that day a British fleet, which had sailed from New York on Saturday, anchored off West-Haven. Alarm guns were fired, and the mili tia were called to arms. A portion of the inhabitants made haste to remove their families, and whatever of their household goods was most valuable. Others were slow to believe that any great danger was impending, and flattered themselves with the hope that the fleet would sail in the morning. But not long after sunrise, those who were watching with a telescope on the tower of the college chapel, (the building now known as the Athenæum) saw distinctly boats putting off from the shipping for the shore, and there was no longer room for the most incredulous or the most hopeful to doubt what were the intentions of the enemy. Of the adult male population, a large portion armed themselves and went forth to meet the invaders. Another portion left the town with those of the women and children who were removed to places of safety. Others, to the number of ninety or a hundred, remainedat home, "partly tories, partly timid whigs," as President Stiles describes them. The land force designed for the destruction of New Haven was two thousand six hundred men, as officially reported. One division, under the command of Gen. Garth, was landed, and as soon as that operation was completed the fleet sailed to the other side of the harbor, where the landing of the other division, under the immediate command of Gen. Tryon, was speedily effected. The inhabitants of East Haven and the adjoining towns found occupation for Gen. Tryon and his troops, while the available force of New Haven, amounting to not more than two hundred men, with two field pieces, went out to encounter Gen. Garth. Hezekiah Sabin, who was a lieutenant colonel in the militia, seems to have been the recognized commander of the little force extemporaneously raised. The two pieces of artillery were stationed at West Bridge, where some slight defences were hastily raised in a position to command not only the bridge but the long causeway by which it is approached from the west. "Captain Hillhouse," says President Stiles, "with twenty or thirty brave young men, together with many others, crossed the bridge over to Milford Hill, and within a hundred yards or a quarter of a mile of the [West Haven] meeting house, where the enemy were paraded. Upon their beginning the march, Captain Hillhouse fired upon the advanced guard so as to drive them in upon the main body. But coming in force, the enemy proceeded. Others be

sides Hillhouse's party had by this time passed the bridge and reached the hill, to perhaps one hundred and fifty men. These kept up a galling fire on especially their outguards extending perhaps forty or fifty rods on each side the column.* Our artillery at the bridge was well managed by Captain [Phineas] Bradley, threw shot successfully across to Milford Hill, and prevented the enemy from passing the causeway and so into town that way." Thus baffled at that point the enemy continued their march northward to what is now the Westville Bridge, annoyed and harassed on their march by a party of the New Haven men on their left under the leadership of Aaron Burr, who happened to be with some of his relatives in New Haven at that time, and who after carrying a young daughter of his uncle, Pierpont Edwards,† to a place of safety in North Haven, had returned in time to partake in the fight. Meanwhile Captain Hillhouse and the remainder of the little force on Milford Hill returned over West Bridge, and with Col. Sabin and the two field pieces went across the fields to meet the enemy at the Westville Bridge. There the enemy effected

*It was "at the second mile-stone," just where the road to West Haven diverges from the Milford road, that the Rev. Dr. Daggett, Professor of Divinity in Yale College, (and the acting President for nine years before the accession of Dr. Stiles) encountered the enemy. He had come from the town "riding furiously on his old black mare, with his long fowling piece in his hand." At the bridge he had addressed a few "patriotic and earnest words" to the little company that was to serve the artillery. Rushing by the company of young men under Capt. Hillhouse, several of them students, he was greeted with cheers. As they turned southward toward West Haven, they saw him ascending a little to the west, and taking his station deliberately in a little copse of woods. When the young men, having driven back the advanced guard and encountered the main body of the enemy, were making their hasty retreat to regain the other side of the river, the professor, who never had learned to "advance backward," kept his station with characteristic fearlessness and tenacity, waiting for the enemy. As the British column came up, several successive shots from the hill side arrested their attention, and the sturdy form of the professor in his clerical costume was easily discovered by the party sent to the spot whence the firing proceeded. "What are you doing there, you old fool, firing on His Majesty's troops ?" was the exclamation of the officer. 66 Exercising the rights of war," replied the professor. The oddity of such an answer, proceeding from such a person, probably arrested the shot or the bayonet that might have killed him on the instant; and the question was put whether, if his life was spared, he would be likely ever to do such a thing again. "Nothing more likely," said he, " I rather think I should." He was permitted to surrender himself; but was cruelly pierced with bayonets, and driven at the head of their column till they reached the town. For a month afterwards his life was in danger from the wounds and injuries which he had received, and indeed, his death, which took place in the following year, was hastened by those sufferings. See the article on Prof. Daggett in Dr. Sprague's Annals of the American Pulpit, Vol. I.

†The late Mrs. Johnson, of Stratford.

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their passage, partly over the bridge and partly by fording the river. But as they came up the hill from the river, and took the road towards the town, the force commanded by Col.. Sabin and Captain Hillhouse, "gave them a heavy fire and took a number of prisoners." By this time, too, they began to be annoyed by The New Haven parties of militia from Derby and other towns. men kept up their firing as they retreated toward their homes. Just at the entrance of the town as it then was, near where the junction of Dixwell street and Whalley avenue now is, there was something like a battle for a little while, and a number were killed on both sides. The enemy entered the town at a little before one o'clock p. m., greatly exhausted with the extreme heat of the day as well as with their long march and the annoyances they had met by the way.

This bold defense of New Haven against a force so greatly superior, answered its main purpose. It gave time not only for the escape of a large portion of the alarmed defenseless population, but also for the removal and concealment of much property that would otherwise have been destroyed or carried off by the enemy; and it saved the town from the fate which immediately afterwards fell upon Fairfield and Norwalk. "From the first entrance till eight in the evening, the town was given up to ravage and plunder, from which only a few houses were protected." Mrs. Hillhouse, the widow of James Abraham Hillhouse, was a member of the Church of England, and her political sympathies were with the British. Hers, therefore, was one of the few houses to be protected from pillage. Some of the British officers were quartered there, and were received with the courtesy due to men who bore His Majesty's commission. Yet the loyal lady was in great danger from the imputation of her nephew's patriotism. It happened that the newspaper containing Captain Hillhouse's patriotic call for recruits came under the notice of the officers almost as soon as they entered the house which was to be protected for its loyalty. The house and its contents would have been immediately given up to the plundering soldiers, had not the lady, with a dignified frankness which repelled suspicion, informed her guests that though the young man whose name was subscribed to that call was a near and valued relative of hers, and was actually resident under that roof, the property was entirely her own; and that the part which he had taken in the conflict with Great Britain, was taken not only on his own responsibility, but in opposition to her judgment and her sympathies.

Gen. Tryon's official report shows that the conflagration of the town was intended, and that the purpose was relinquished because it became necessary to hasten the re-embarkation of the troops. The intended junction of the division which landed on the East Haven side with that which landed at West Haven, could not be effected. Squads and companies of militia from the neighboring towns were beginning to gather on every side like angry clouds portending a tempest. The invaders found themselves in a dangerous position; and at the earliest morning hour they called in their guards, and were glad to find that they were permitted to embark without molestation. The result of their expedition was that they had killed twenty-seven Americans, (including those who were slain in their own houses) and had wounded nineteen, while they themselves had lost about eighty in killed and wounded; that they had carried away some tories who dared not stay behind, and a few prisoners (including some whose only offense was that they were respected and trusted by their fellow-citizens); that they had destroyed about seventy thousand dollars worth of private property; and that they had effectually extirpated whatever sentiment of loyalty toward the British crown had lingered till then among the more conservative sort of people.

In May, 1780, the roll of the House of Representatives in the State legislature shows the name of "Captain James Hillhouse" as the second representative from the town of New Haven. The next year he was first representative; and thenceforward he was frequently reëlected by his townsmen to this trust, till the people of the whole State in 1789 called him to a seat in the Council. In 1786, and again in 1787, he was elected by the people at large a delegate to the Congress of the old confederation; but he did not serve in that capacity. It is believed that no other instance can be found in which so young a man has been so trusted and honored by the people of Connecticut.

In 1782, he was elected Treasurer of Yale College, and he held that office through all the remainder of his life, just fifty years. Nor did it become to him a merely honorary office, when other public trusts and duties required him to be absent from New Haven for a large part of every year. An Assistant Treasurer was employed by the corporation to relieve him of the executive details of the business; but he himself, through all that long term of service, superintended the finances of the institution, and was ever active and watchful to promote its interests. He loved it not only because of his personal relation to it as an alumnus, but also be

cause, in his estimation, its continued efficiency and the enlargement of its means of usefulness were essential to the welfare and the political and social advancement of his native Connecticut. Few names in the history of Yale College are more worthy than his to be had in perpetual and grateful remembrance.

In October, 1790, Mr. Hillhouse was elected one of the five representatives from Connecticut in the second Congress of the United States. His colleagues in the representation were Jonathan Sturges, Jonathan Trumbull, Jeremiah Wadsworth, and Amasa Learned. The published debates (see Benton's Abridgement) give ample evidence of his activity and influence as a member of the House of Representatives. Many important questions in relation to the working of the government under the Federal Constitution were to be considered and decided; for though the first Congress, in its three laborious sessions, had organized the judiciary and the various departments of executive administration, had provided a revenue for the Federal treasury, had re-established the public credit, had enacted a rule of naturalization, had made the necessary regulations for the sale and settlement of the public lands, and by the wisdom of their measures had secured for the new gov. ernment the widest confidence in its stability and efficiency, there remained other great questions incidental to the newness of the constitution. We find Mr. Hillhouse taking part in almost every great debate; and his speeches show not only his ability as a debater, but his blunt and fearless honesty, his unfailing good humor, and his sagacious and large-minded patriotism. His first speech, as given in the Abridged Debates, was on the ratio of representation. Next he takes part in the discussion on a provision for declaring what officer shall act as President in case of a vacancy in the office both of President and Vice President. In the second session of that Congress, we find him speaking, first against a proposed reduction of the army at a time when the United States were at war with powerful tribes of Indians, and, next, in the great and protracted debate on the official conduct of the Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton. In the third Congress, the repre. sentation of Connecticut being increased by the new apportionment, his colleagues were Learned, Trumbull and Wadsworth, of the former delegation, together with Joshua Coit, Zephaniah Swift, and Uriah Tracy. In the fourth Congress he had three new colleagues in the places of Learned, Trumbull and Wadsworth, namely, Chauncey Goodrich, Roger Griswold, and Nathaniel Smith. The first session of that Congress was signalized by two