The next day came. The British army was by itself. During the night, Washington had retired in good order, five miles, to North Castle Heights, from which the entire British army could not dislodge him. Such was the historical battle of White Plains, more properly, the Battle of Chatterton’s Hill, where the fighting took place. Howe immediately abandoned New Rochelle as his base, left White Plains on the fifth, encamped at Dobb’s Ferry on the sixth, and thus gained communication with his ships on the Hudson. On the same day, the sixth, Washington advised Congress that “he expected a movement of General Howe into New Jersey.” He called a Council of War, under that conviction, the same afternoon, and decided to throw a considerable body of troops into that Province. The retention of Fort Washington was a question of much embarrassment. Even its capture by Howe would not be a compensation to him, or to Great Britain, for the escape of Washington’s army. On the twenty-ninth of October, General Greene prepared a careful itinerary for a march through New Jersey, minutely specifying the proposed distance for each day’s progress, and the requisite supplies for each. That itinerary furnishes a remarkable model of good Logistics. Washington wrote to Congress, that “General Howe must do something to save his reputation; that he would probably go to New Jersey”; and then urged, “that the militia be in readiness to supply the places of those whose terms of service would soon expire.” To Greene he wrote: “They can have no other capital object, unless it be Philadelphia.” It was then known that General Carleton retired from Crown Point November second, so that there was no danger of a British movement up the Hudson. He again wrote to Greene as to Fort Washington: “If we cannot prevent vessels from passing up, and the enemy are in possession of the surrounding country, what valuable purpose can it answer to hold a post from which the expected benefit cannot be had? I am therefore inclined to think that it will not be prudent to hazard the men and stores at Fort Washington; but as you are on the spot, leave it to you to give such orders as you deem best, and, so far revoking the order to Colonel McGee, to defend it to the last.”