Washington, accompanied by General Heath, finally sailed up the river in 1776, and General Heath tells us that “a glance at West Point without going on shore evinced that this post was not to be neglected.” Meanwhile the Revolution dragged on into its third year, 1778, but still no fortifications at West Point. Due to Washington’s persistence, work was begun there early in January, 1778. General Parsons with his brigade arrived at West Point on the 20th of January and began the erection of defenses. The weather was extremely cold, provisions were scarce, the men inadequately clothed, and the troops poorly supplied with the proper implements to carry on their labor. Altogether, a very depressing and discouraging situation confronted Parsons’s men as they debouched upon the Plain and surveyed their surroundings. If any thought could have given them courage it must have been the reflection that at least they were somewhat better off than their comrades in arms down at Valley Forge, who, despite their wretched condition, were bravely keeping alive the patriotic fires of the Revolution. What a contrast was that first sight of West Point to Parsons’s troops to that offered today! Instead of the beautiful level parade ground surrounded by fine granite buildings they found an undulating plain covered by a growth of yellow pines ten or fifteen feet high, without house or habitation. The only point of similarity was the snow, waist high. After strenuous efforts to get logs from the neighboring hills, a few rude huts were hastily thrown together, and then, at the end of three weeks, the soldiers fell to work with a will, building Fort Clinton under the direction of a splendid young French engineer by the name of de la Radière. The cold was most intense, but the men went up the river, cut the timber for the Fort, and assembled it so that when the river was open, it might be floated down to the Point. Their hard daily toil was not relieved by any diversions in the evening, for West Point was a veritable wilderness. General Parsons, in writing to Colonel Wadsworth, said of West Point, “to a contemplative mind that delights in a lonely retreat from the world ’tis as beautiful as Sharon, but affords to the man who loves the society of the world a prospect nearly allied to the shades of death.... News arrives here by accident only.” The poor soldiers had to repair night after night to their little log huts and get what pleasure they could from one another’s society.