would not do to go back with and tell in Hartford;" and his friends Mr. Halsey and Mr. Bull declared they would go back for no story till they had seen the fort for themselves.[60] It was decided that the attempt to capture the fort should not be abandoned. Two agents were dispatched to Albany to purchase and forward provisions for the troops, and trusty men were sent to waylay all the roads leading from the Grants to Skenesborough, Lake George, and the Champlain forts, to prevent any intelligence of the movement from reaching those points. Then, going on to Castleton, the committee, of which Captain Mott was chairman, arranged there the plan of operations. A party of thirty men under Captain Herrick were to go to Skenesborough and capture Major Skene and his men, and go down the lake in the night with his boats to Shoreham to transport the men assembled there across the water; while Captain Douglass was sent to Crown Point to concoct a scheme with his brother-in-law, who lived there, to hire the king's boats, on some plausible pretense, to assist in getting the men over to the New York shore. Meanwhile Captain Phelps of Connecticut had gone to spy out the condition of Ticonderoga. In the guise of a simple backwoodsman, he easily gained admission to the fort on the pretext of getting shaved, and, after taking careful note of all that could be seen in the place, returned to Castleton and reported to his friends. Agreeable to a promise made to the men when engaged that they should be commanded by their own officers, Colonel Ethan Allen was given the command of the force which was to attack Ticonderoga. After receiving his orders from the committee, and dispatching Major Gershom Beach of Rutland to rally the Green Mountain Boys, he went on to Shoreham, where they were to assemble.