These preparations were immediately communicated to Washington who was confident that Clinton meditated an attack on the forts in the Highlands or designed to take a position between those forts and Middlebrook, in order to interrupt the communication between the different parts of the American army, to prevent their reunion and to beat them in detail. Measures were instantly taken to counteract either of these designs. The intelligence from New York was communicated to Generals Putnam and M'Dougal, who were ordered to hold themselves in readiness to march, and on the 29th of May (1779) the army moved by divisions from Middlebrook toward the Highlands. On the 30th the British army commanded by Clinton in person and convoyed by Sir George Collier proceeded up the river, and General Vaughan at the head of the largest division, landed next morning about eight miles below Verplanck's. The other division under the particular command of General Patterson, but accompanied by Clinton, advancing further up, landed on the west side within three miles of Stony Point. That place being immediately abandoned, General Patterson took possession of it on the same afternoon. He dragged some heavy cannon and mortars to the summit of the hill in the course of the night (June 1, 1779), and at five next morning opened a battery on Fort Fayette at the distance of about 1,000 yards. During the following night two galleys passed the fort and anchoring above it prevented the escape of the garrison by water while General Vaughan invested it closely by land. No means of defending the fort or of saving themselves remaining the garrisons became prisoners of war. Immediate directions were given for completing the works at both posts and for putting Stony Point in particular in a strong state of defense. Washington determined to check any further advance of the enemy, and before Clinton was in a situation to proceed against West Point, General M'Dougal was so strengthened and the American army took such a position on the strong grounds about the Hudson that the enterprise became too hazardous to be further prosecuted.