of savages in the west, will probably render the ensuing campaign exceedingly active, and particularly call forth the exertions of this state. It is our duty to look forward in time and to make proper division of our force between these two objects.

It was under these trying circumstances that the blow of invasion fell on Virginia. Some eighteen hundred men in twenty-seven ships commanded by the traitor Benedict Arnold appeared suddenly in Chesapeake Bay. We can do no better than to transcribe a few sentences on the event from Jefferson's own diary:

Saturday, Dec. 30, 1780. Eight o'clock a.m. Received first intelligence that twenty-seven sail were, on the morning of Dec. 29, just below Willoughby's Point. Sent General Nelson with full powers.

Jan. 1, 1781. No intelligence.
Jan. 2d, ten o'clock a.m.

Information from N. Burwell that their advance was at Warrasqueak Bay. Gave orders for militia, a quarter from some, a half from other counties. Assembly rose.

Thursday, Jan. 4th, five o'clock a.m. Called whole militia from adjacent counties. I was then anxious to know whether they would pass Westover or not, as that would show the side they would land. . . . Five o'clock p.m. Learned by Capt. De Ponthere that at 2 o'clock p.m. they were drawn up at Westover. Then ordered arms, stores etc. to be thrown across the river at Richmond; and at half-past seven o'clock p.m. set out to the foundry and Westham . . . to see everything waggoned from the magazine and laboratory to Westham and

there thrown over [the river] to work all night. The enemy encamped at Four-Mile Creek.

Jan. 5. . . . Went myself to Westham; gave orders for withdrawing ammunition and arms (which lay exposed on the bank to the effect of artillery from the opposite shore) behind a point. Then went to Manchester. Had a view of the enemy. My horse sank under me with fatigue. Borrowed one, went to Chetwoods, appointed by Baron Steuben as a rendezvous and head-quarters. The enemy arrived at Richmond at one o'clock p.m. One regiment of infantry and thirty horse proceeded without stopping to the foundry, burned that and the magazine. They returned that evening to Richmond. Sent me a proposition to compound for property. fused.

Re

Jan. 6. In the morning they burned certain houses and stores, and at 12 o'clock that day left Richmond.

Jan. 7. Rained excessively the preceding night and continued to do so till about noon. Gibson has one thousand [militia], Steuben eight hundred, Davis two hundred, Nelson two hundred and fifty.

Jan. 9. The enemy remain in their last encampment, except embarking their horse.

Jan. 10. At one o'clock p.m. They embark infantry and fall down the river.

Jefferson has received unmerciful censure for permitting this raid of Arnold's. Henry Lee ("Legion Harry") in his Memoir of the War in the Southern Department of the United States, declared that Virginia was not defended in 1781 because her public spirit was paralyzed by the "timidity and impotence of her rulers," and that a soldier of genius could

have preserved the State from insults and injuries "with 300 horse, 300 musketry, and a battalion of infantry." John Marshall, in his Life of Washington, upbraided Jefferson for neglect of warning: "So early as the 9th of December, 1780, a letter from Gen'l Washington announced to the Governor [Jefferson] that a large embarkation, supposed to be destined for the South, was about taking place at New York." And, following the lead of Lee and Marshall, modern historians have characterized Jefferson's behavior as "culpably remiss," "weak and vacillating," and "stupid." J. T. Morse even dismisses Jefferson's desperate efforts during four days to collect militia and save stores and lives with the sneering remark that "the enemy cared little for all his prancing to and fro on blooded steed or raw colt."

Jefferson was certainly not a "soldier of genius," but that he did all in his power to raise a defensive force of militia in the sorely drained State, as soon as he knew that the British ships were in the Chesapeake, no one who reads his letters to General Nelson or Baron Steuben or the county lieutenants can doubt: "That there may not be an instant's delay, let them come in detached parties, as they can be collected: every man who has arms bring them." The legislature adjourned January 2, in spite of his message to them the day before asking their advice. The members of the council went to their homes.

Jefferson was left alone to cope with the situation. He spent over eighty hours in the saddle ("prancing to and fro"), directing measures of safety which were wise and necessary. The militia, dispersed over a large tract of country, with wretched equipment and inadequate means of transportation, came in but slowly. Jefferson wrote to the president of Congress later that on the day the enemy reached Richmond "only 200 [militia] were embodied. They were of this town and too few to do anything." As the militia increased the enemy withdrew. “To what place they will point their next exertions we cannot conjecture," wrote Jefferson to Congress: "The whole country on the tide-waters and some distance from them is equally open to similar insult."

As to the "warning" Jefferson received from Washington, it was only a general circular letter sent to the various executives, and not at all, as Marshall's language implies, a special message to Jefferson that Virginia was about to be attacked. In fact, Washington had no idea what the destination of the rumored "embarkation " was. He wrote Baron Steuben on December 10: "It is reported from New York that the enemy are about to make another detachment . . . their destination conjectured to be southward." Certainly not a very urgent warning to the man who commanded the military forces of the State, under the governor, and

who was responsible for such defense as it could offer in case of invasion.

But the final justification of Jefferson's conduct is in the approbation of the commander-in-chief himself. Washington was not slow to discover and rebuke the slightest dereliction of duty. His wrath fell like a thunderbolt on everything that he considered cowardice or "culpable remissness." Yet he wrote Jefferson a few weeks after Arnold's invasion as follows: "It is mortifying to see so inconsiderable a party committing such extensive depradations with impunity, but considering the situation of your State, it is a matter of wonder that you have hitherto suffered so little molestation. I am apprehensive you will experience more in the future; nor should I be surprised if the enemy were to establish a post in Virginia till the season for opening the campaign here. But as the evils you have to apprehend from these predatory excursions are not to be compared to the common cause from the conquest of the States to the southward of you, I am persuaded the attention to your immediate safety will not divert you from the measures intended to stop the progress of the enemy in that quarter. The late accession of force makes them too powerful to be resisted without powerful succors from Virginia, and it is certainly her policy, as well as the interest of America, to keep the weight of war at a distance from her. There is no doubt that a