d fifty
each, of select militia marksmen, were placed under command of Majors
Call, Willis, and Dick of the continental line. La Fayette's cavalry
comprised only the remnant of Armand's corps, sixty in number, and a
troop of volunteer dragoons under Captain Carter Page, late of Baylor's
Regiment. General Weedon, not now in service, owing to a diminution in
the number of officers, was requested to collect a corps of militia to
protect a manufactory of arms at Falmouth, opposite Fredericksburg.
Tarleton patroled from Petersburg as far as Warwick, and, surprising a
body of militia, captured fifty of them. In the mean while General
Leslie arrived at the mouth of the James with a re-enforcement sent by
Clinton from New York. Cornwallis, upon receiving intelligence of it,
ordered Leslie to repair to Portsmouth with the 17th British Regiment,
two battalions of Anspach, and the 43d, to join the main army. His
lordship now proceeded with his forces to Macocks, on the James,
opposite to Westover, where, being joined by the 43d, he crossed over,
the passage occupying nearly three days, the horses swimming by aid of
boats, the river there being two miles wide.

Arnold obtained leave to return to New York, "where business of
consequence demanded his attendance." The British officers had found it
irksome to serve under him. Cornwallis afterwards told La Fayette that
as soon as he joined the army in Virginia, he took the first occasion to
send Arnold down to Portsmouth, and expressed disgust at associating
with a person of his character.

The force concentrated by Cornwallis amounted to eight thousand. La
Fayette, hearing of this movement of the enemy, crossed the Chickahominy
and retreated toward Fredericksburg, with a view of protecting the
arsenal at Falmouth and of meeting Wayne. Cornwallis pursued with
celerity, but finding La Fayette beyond his reach, gave out the chase,
and encamped on the banks of the North Anna, in Hanover. La Fayette, who
had been hotly pursued by Tarleton, retreated precipitately beyond
Fredericksburg; and it was on this occasion that Cornwallis, in a
letter, said of La Fayette: "The boy cannot escape me." The Marquis de
Chastellux says: "All I learnt by a conversation with Mr. Bird[728:A]
was that he had been pillaged by the English when they passed his house
in their march from Westover in pursuit of Monsieur de la Fayette, and
in returning to Williamsburg, after endeavoring in vain to come up with
him.