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Rh to consider himself subordinate to Schuyler. The scheme for superseding the latter general only slumbered, however, and in the summer of 1777 it was carried out in the midst of the panic pro- duced by the rapid advance of Burgoyne. On 2 Aug., Gates was appointed to command the northern department. He has been suspected of a lack of personal courage, a suspicion that is strengthened by his conduct during the battle of 7 Oct., 1777 (see Burgoyne, John) ; for while Bur- goyne was in the thickest of the fight, receiving three bullets through his clothes. Gates, two miles away, was looking forward to a possible retreat. Scarcely had the action begun when, by his com- mand, the baggage-trains were loaded, and team- sters placed at the horses' heads, in readiness to move at a moment's notice, Gates ordering them to move on or halt alternately, as the news from the battle-field was favorable or adverse. Indeed, the same incapacity that afterward was so apparent in Gates, during his unfortunate southern campaign, was manifested from the time of his assuming the command of the northern army until the surren- der. The laurels won by him should really have been worn by Schuyler and Arnold. Not only had the army of "Burgoyne been essentially disabled by the defeat at Bennington before the arrival of Gates, but the overthrow of St. Leger at Fort Stanwix had deranged the plans of the British general, while safety had been restored to the western frontier, and the panic thus caused had subsided. After the surrender, the bearing of Gates toward the commander-in-chief was far from respectful. He did not even write to the latter on that occasion ; nor was it until the second day of November that he deigned to communicate to Washington a word upon the subject, and then only incidentally, as though it were a matter of secondary importance. Congress, in the first flush of gratitude, passed a vote of thanks to Gates and his army, and presented him with a gold medal having on one side a bust of the general, with the words " Horatio Gates, duel strenuo," and on the reverse a representation of Burgoyne delivering up his sword. In November, 1777, he was made president of the new board of war and ordnance, and during the following winter sought, with the aid of the^lisreputable clique known as the " Con- way cabal," to supplant Washington in the chief command of the army. His falsehoods in a series of intriguing letters having been exposed by Wash- ington, he fell into some discredit, and in the spring of 1778 it became evident that his ambitious schemes had miscarried. In the course of this affair he became involved in a quarrel with Wil- kinson, his former adjutant, which led to a duel, the details of which may be found in the " Boston Evening Post and General Advertiser " for 17 Oct., 1778. He retired from active service, and lived for some time on his estate in Virginia, until he was appointed, 13 June, 1780, to the command of the army in North Carolina designed to check the progress of Lord Cornwallis. In the battle near Caniden, S. C, 16 Aug., he was defeated, and his army nearly annihilated. He was soon afterward superseded by Gen. Greene, and suspended from duty. A court of inquiry was appointed to inves- tigate his military conduct, and he was not acquit- ted or reinstated 'until 1782; so that the battle of Camden virtually ended his military career. At the close of the war he retired to his estate in Vir- ginia, where he lived until 1790, when he removed to New York city. In 1800 he was elected to the state ]egislature,"but for political reasons resigned soon after taking his seat. His death occurred, after a long illness, at his house, now the corner of 22d street and 2d avenue, then the Bloomingdale pike. Gates was a man of great plausibility and address, of a handsome person and fair education, and a great lion in society. Though having many faults, the chief of which was an overweening con- fidence in his own ability combined with arrogance and untruthfulness, he had also some noble traits. Before removing to New York from Virginia, he emancipated his slaves, providing for such of them as could not take care of themselves. In his do- mestic relations he was an affectionate husband and father, and, during the last years of his life, a sincere Christian. He married Mary, only child of James Valence, of Liverpool, who, at her father's death, before the Revolutionary war, emigrated to this country, bringing with her |450,000. In the struggle for independence Mrs. Gates freely expended nearly all of her fortune in a lavish hos- pitality upon her husband's companions in arms, especially those that were in indigent circum- stances; and many of the Revolutionary heroes were participants in her bounty, particularly Thaddeus Kosciusko, who, when wounded, lay six months at her house, tenderly nursed by herself and her husband. Mrs. Gates, who survived her husband, left the residue of her fortune (|90,000) to several relatives, whose de- scendants are still living in New York and Philadelphia. The Saratoga monument, shown in the accompanying illustration, was ei'ected to commemorate the surrender of Gen. Burgoyne to Gen. Gates, and is in the village of Schuylerville, N. Y. It is 155 feet in height, and stands within the lines of Burgoyne's intrenchments, on a bluff 350 feet above Hudson river and overlook- ing the surrender grounds. A staircase of bronze leads from the base to the top, whence can be seen the en- tire region between Lake George,"the Green mountains, and the Catskills. On each of three sides of the monu- ment is a niche containing

heroic statues of Gens. Gates, Schuyler, and Mor- gan, while the fourth is left vacant, with the name of Arnold inscribed underneath. Within the monument, and lining its two stories, are alto rilievo decorations in bronze, representing his- torical and allegorical scenes connected with the campaign of Burgoyne. The corner-stone of this structure was laid on 17 Oct., 1877, when poems and addresses were delivered by Horatio Seymour, George William Curtis, James Grant Wilson, Al- fred B. Street, and William L. Stone. See Stone's "Campaign of Lieut.-Gen. Burgoyne" (Albany, 1877), and Bancroft's "History of the United States " (6 vols., New York, 1884).

GATES, Seth Merrill, lawyer, b. in Winfield, Herkimer co., N. Y., 10 Oct., 1800 ; d. in Warsaw, N. Y., 24 Aug., 1877. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1827, and began practice in Le Roy. He was elected to the state legislature in 1832, but declined a re-election. During this session he was instrumental in procuring a charter for the first railroad in western New York, being a portion of the present New York Central. In 1838 he purchased the " Le Roy Gazette," which he edited for