The First Brigade of the French army followed one day behind the Continental Army. It left its camp at Haverstraw on Sunday, August 25, 1781, for Suffern, its nineteenth camp since departure from their first camp in Providence, Rhode Island, on June 18, 1781. While some of the officers stayed at John Suffern’s Tavern, the men of the First Brigade and the Wagon Train camped west of the Mahwah River on the west side of Washington Avenue to about half-way to the bridge on August 25. The next day, August 26, the Second Brigade occupied the same ground.