Bancroft (vol. ix.) does not hold Schuyler free from the responsibility of the ill success of the campaign up to this time; but he is controverted by G. W. Schuyler in his _Correspondence and Remarks upon Bancroft's History of the Northern Campaign_; by Lossing in his _Schuyler_; and by J. W. De Peyster in the _Mag. of Amer. Hist._ (February, 1877, vol. i. 134).[846] Burgoyne meanwhile (August 26) was writing to Germain that the campaign was looking badly, and the loyalists not as helpful as he hoped. The conflict which Schuyler thought impending took place September 19, and is variously known as the battle of Freeman's Farm, or Stillwater, or the first battle of Bemis's Heights. Gates had already appealed to the Green Mountain boys for assistance, as the records of the Vermont Council of Safety show (Stevens, _Bibl. Geog._, 1870, no. 693). Gen. Glover's letters to James Warren during Aug. and Sept. are in the _Sparks MSS._ (no. xlvii.) and in Upham's _Glover_, and his account of the battle of the 19th is in _Essex Institute Hist. Coll._ (v. no. 3). Col. Varick's letter to Schuyler is in the _Sparks MSS._, lxvi. Wilkinson gives the best account of any participant (i. ch. 6), and his letter of Sept. 20 is in Dawson (i. 301). Gates's letter to Congress, Sept. 22, is also in Dawson (i. 301). Gordon gives the American loss.[847] The question of Arnold's participancy in the battle of the 19th, while the left wing—his own command—was engaged, has been the subject of controversy.[848] The attempt of an American force to cut Burgoyne's line of communications by the lakes is described in the "Fight at Diamond Island", Sept. 24, by De Costa, who gives the official report of Col. Brown (_N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg._, 1872, p. 147). These evidences come mainly from the Gates Papers, and are recapitulated in Stone's _Campaign of Burgoyne_ (App. 10). Respecting the action of Oct. 7, the earliest official accounts are in Glover's letter of Oct. 9, and in Gates's to Congress, of Oct. 18,—both of which are reprinted by Dawson (i. 302, 303). James Wilkinson's letter of Oct. 9 is in the New York Archives, with various other letters of the campaign (_Sparks MSS._, no. xxix.). A letter of Oliver Wolcott from Bemis's Heights is in the _Trumbull MSS._ (vol. vii.). The lives of Arnold (by I. N. Arnold, ch. 10, etc.) indicate his important influence on the field, where he was wounded.[849] On the action of Col. Brooks in the field see _Mass. Hist. Soc. Proc._ (vii. 478). There is an account by Samuel Woodruff, an eye-witness, in the appendix of _An account of Burgoyne's Campaign and the memorable battles of Bemis's Heights, Sept. 19th, and October 7th, 1777, from the most authentic resources of information, including many incidents connected with the same_, by Charles Neilson (Albany, 1844).[850]