As it was now seen that there was to be a serious conflict with Great Britain, the army gathered about Boston was adopted as the beginning of the forces to be assembled and was termed the Continental Army, and George Washington was appointed commander-in-chief.

[Illustration:  East River Shore, 1750, from an Old Print.]

Knowing that they would soon need guns and powder, the Sons of Liberty seized those held by the royal troops in New York.  There was quite a quantity in a storehouse at Turtle Bay, a quiet little cove three miles above the town, that curved into a wild and rocky part of the East River shore.  Nowadays the city extends for miles and miles above it.  If you go to Forty-ninth Street and the East River you will see all that remains of it.  Although the houses are built thick about it, there is still an air of seclusion.  Everywhere else along the shore are piers and bath-houses and wharves and ships and shipping.

So at this Turtle Bay, far from the town, the royal troops had a storehouse for their arms.  A small band of the Sons of Liberty, one dark night, floated down the river, guided their vessel into the bay, overpowered the guards before they were fairly aroused, and loaded their boat with the enemy’s powder and guns.  Then they made off, and before the morning dawned had placed the stores safe in the hands of the patriots.

Then the War of the Revolution broke in full fury.

CHAPTER XXIV

The war of the Revolution

In this month of June, in the year 1775, there were quite a number of British soldiers in the city, and many of the patriots believed that they should be made prisoners.  But the Provisional Assembly decreed that the orders of the Second Continental Congress must be obeyed.  And these orders were not to molest the soldiers as long as they did not try to build fortifications or remove powder and guns from the city.

But early in this month of June it was learned that the soldiers were about to go to Boston.  More than that, it was known that there was a secret order under which they were to take guns and powder with them.

The Sons of Liberty were hastily called to a meeting.  One of them, Marinus Willett, was hurrying through Broad Street toward the Coffee-House where the meeting was to be held, when he came upon the soldiers moving silently along with five carts loaded with chests of arms.  Alone, and without an instant’s hesitation, Willett clutched at the bridle of the first horse.  The company stopped.  There was an angry parley, the officers claiming the right to leave the city with the arms, and making an effort to do so without raising a general alarm.  But friends of Willett came to his assistance.  The five carts were driven away by the patriots and the soldiers went on but without the arms.  Long years afterward a bronze tablet was placed on a house in Broad Street close by Beaver (and is there now), to mark the spot where the brave Willett stopped the ammunition wagons.