Marching through Bayonne on the 15th of May, the regiment proceeded to Bourdeaux, embarked on the 29th at Pauillac on the river Garonne, under the command of Major Alured D. Faunce, and quitted the coast of France in the early part of June. The expedition consisted of the fourth and forty-fourth, about eight hundred bayonets each; the eighty-fifth, about six hundred bayonets; with a brigade of artillery and a detachment of sappers and miners: the whole under the command of that very gallant and experienced leader, Major-General Patrick Ross: the navy, consisting of one seventy-four, two sixty-fours, five frigates, and two bomb-vessels, was under the orders of Rear-Admiral Malcomb. After twenty days' sailing, the fleet approached the Azores, and the high land of St. Michael's appeared like a blue cloud rising out of the water: as the shipping drew near, the troops were delighted with the view of the numerous villages, seats, and convents which ornamented the beach, and the lofty mountains adorned with groves of orange trees and green pasturage rising behind. After remaining a short time at this pleasant island to take in provisions, the fleet again put to sea, and anchored on the evening of the 24th of July opposite the tanks in the island of Bermuda in the West Indies, where the expedition was joined by the twenty-first fusiliers, mustering nine hundred bayonets. The fleet remained at Bermuda, taking in stores, and establishing a magazine for the future supply of the expedition, until the 3d of August, when it once more put to sea, and directing its course towards North America, entered the bay of Chesapeake, where reinforcements joined, and Rear-Admiral Cockburn took charge of the navy. On the arrival of this squadron, a powerful American flotilla fled for refuge up the Patuxent river, and was followed by the British fleet. In order to insure the destruction of the enemy's vessels, the troops were directed to land: on the 19th of August the stream was suddenly covered with boats crowded with soldiers, and by three o'clock in the afternoon the army was in position about two miles above the village of St. Benedict, on the right bank of the Patuxent. The troops were divided into three brigades; the first, consisting of the eighty-fifth regiment, with the light companies of the FOURTH, twenty-first, and forty-fourth, a company of marines, and a party of disciplined negroes, was commanded by Colonel Thornton; the second, consisting of the FOURTH and forty-fourth regiments, was commanded by Colonel Brooke; and the third, consisting of the twenty-first fusiliers, and a battalion of marines, was commanded by Colonel Patterson; for want of horses only one six-pounder, and two small three-pounders were brought on shore.