On this day 250 years ago in Elizabeth Town, New Jersey, Brig. Gen. William Livingston wrote to General Washington that

I sent a Spy last Night on Staten Island to obtain Intelligence of the movements of the Enemy, as many Things apparently new was seen from our Lines—He has this Moment returned in safety—The Substance of his Information I must give you in short—He went on the Island about Midnight and got undiscovered to the House of the Person to whom he was sent, who informed him—That the whole Force of the Enemy of every kind was 35000 Men, 15000 of whom were left on the Island, but all the rest Embarqued.

That they expected to attack every Hour, he thinks this Night at farthest—It was to be on Long Island, & up the North River— . . .

He has heard the Orders read & heard the Generals talk of it—The Waggons are all laid out & ready—That they appear very determined & will put all to the Sword— . . .

All the field Pieces are taken on Board except two—The Informant may be depended on, being employed by the General and carries his Baggage— . . . —That the Tories on the Island are very illy treated lately, so that the Inhabitants who at first were so pleased, would now be willing to poison them all—They take from them every Thing they choose, and no one has any Thing they can call their own.

As usual the intelligence was mixed as the British had embarked about 15,000 troops on to transport ships on this day and the previous day although they would ferry over more troops in the next few days bringing their total forces on Long Island to 20,000 when they attacked the Americans. And the British destination was just Long Island (in today’s Brooklyn) and not up the North (or Hudson) River.

The British and Americans in New York Harbor and New York City had the “most terrible Evening of Thunder, Lightning, Wind & Rain, the most vehement I ever saw, or that has been known here by the Inhabitants for many years” according to one British diarist. American soldier Ambrose Benedict recorded that

A captain and two lieutenants belonging to McDougall’s regiment were killed by one thunderbolt; the points of their swords melted off, and the coin melted in their pockets. Their bodies appeared as if they had been roasted, so black and crisped was the skin. Ten men camped outside the fort near the river . . . were killed in a single flash.

I have not located the names of these 13 American soldiers who died in service on that day from lightning strikes but honor their sacrifice for American liberty as I do those who would die in combat in the biggest battle of the American Revolution a week later.

Sources: Schecter at 123-25; McCulloch, David, 1776 at ; “Brigadier General William Livingston to George Washington, 21 August 1776,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-06-02-0088. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 6, 13 August 1776 – 20 October 1776, ed. Philander D. Chase and Frank E. Grizzard, Jr. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1994, pp. 98–100.]; https://stormtrack.org/threads/revolutionary-war-supercell-august-21-1776.31741/; The American Journal of Ambrose Serle, Secretary to Lord Howe, 1776-1778, San Marino, California: The Huntington Library (1940) accessed at https://archive.org/details/americanjournalo0000ambr/page/70/mode/2up; https://revolutionyc.com/2014/06/21/08211776/;