After the American forces under General William H. Winder had been defeated by the British at Bladensburg in August of that year, it was apparent that the capture of Washington was highly probable. Madison's Secretary of State, James Monroe, had been in the camp of General Winder, closely studying with him the enemy's movements and seeking to appraise the ability of the Americans to successfully defend the Capital. That he was not reassured by what he thus learned is shewn by the letter he sent to President Madison wherein he advised him to remove from Washington the government's more important records. The President recognized, none too soon, the imminence of the danger. The more valuable of the government archives were ordered to be taken from Washington and Stephen Pleasanton, then a clerk in the State Department, was placed in charge of their removal. He caused to be made a large number of linen bags in which were placed the government's books and documents, including the _Declaration of Independence_ and the Constitution. It is said that the painting of Mrs. Dolly Madison, hanging in the White House, was cut from its frame and accompanied the government's records. Some accounts aver that, so numerous were the archives, twenty-two two-horse wagons were used in their transportation from Washington; others who have written of the incident say that four four-horse wagons only were used, while still others claim the method of transportation to have been by ox-teams. However they were carried, they left Washington across the old Chain Bridge and sought their first safety in the grist mill of Edward Patterson on the Virginia side of the Potomac two miles above Georgetown. So threatening was the British advance, however, that it was deemed prudent to carry the precious cargo further up-country; the wagons were duly reloaded and the caravan continued to Leesburg, where the sacks were placed for one night in the courthouse according to some writers or, on the authority of others, in a vacant building in the town, the key of which was given to a certain Rev. Mr. Littlejohn, a young clergyman then recently ordained. The next day the sacks were again placed in the wagons and driven to the nearby plantation of Rokeby where in its vaults they were stored for two weeks until it was safe to return them to Washington. During those two weeks President Madison was a guest of Ludwell Lee at Belmont, whence he directed National affairs; and ever since that time it has been a primary and essential asseveration in the credo of every true Leesburger that the town was, during that stirring fortnight, the de facto Capital of the United States.