November 27.-This morning we hoisted & stood up towards Ticonderoga That fortress being 15 miles from Crownpoint-It being calm we row’d the vessells up. At 3 in the afternoon we arriv’d under the Fort & saluted it with 13 guns-landed & waited on General Schuyler.

Though General Schuyler had withdrawn from the army, he was still active in the cause of his country, and the British and Tories were anxious to get possession of his person. He was aware of the fact, and a guard of six soldiers had been furnished him, three of whom were on duty at a time. Nevertheless, a bold ruffian named Waltermeyer, accompanied by a gang of Tories, Canadians, and Indians, made the hazardous attempt. Just at twilight on a sultry August day the general and his family were collected in the front hall of his house in the suburbs of Albany. The three guards off duty were asleep in the basement; the others were lying on the grass outside and not very vigilant. A servant announced that a stranger wished to speak with the general at the back gate. A trap was at once suspected, the doors were instantly barred, the family ran up-stairs, and the general sprang for his arms. Waltemeyer's gang surrounded the house, the three guards who were barred out fled, and the doors were soon broken in. The three soldiers below rushed up to the back hall where they had left their arms, but these had been removed by some of the family, and they were quickly overpowered.

At that moment it was discovered that the infant Catrina was asleep in its cradle in the basement. Margarita, the general's third daughter (then a brave girl of twenty-two, afterwards the wife of the celebrated patroon, General Stephen Van Rensselaer), instantly rushed down the two flights of stairs, snatched up the child, and bore it to the upper rooms. As she fled up-stairs one of the cut-throats flung a tomahawk at the heroic girl. It whizzed past the head of little Catrina, slightly cut the dress of Margarita, and was buried in the railing of the stair. A moment after Waltermeyer met her, but supposing her to be a servant allowed her to pass, exclaiming, “Hello, wench, where is your master?"