![Jefferys, Thomas, -1771. “A plan of the town and Fort of Carillon at Ticonderoga.” Map. London: Thos. Jefferys, [1758]. Norman B. Leventhal Map & Education Center, https://collections.leventhalmap.org/search/commonwealth:9s1618735 (accessed April 29, 2025).](https://www.thenmusa.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/fort-ti.jpg)
Mount Defiance (also called “Sugar Loaf”) towered over American fortifications at Ticonderoga and Mount Independence, as well as the footbridge across Lake Champlain that connected them. Inexplicably, Patriot commanders failed to fortify Mount Defiance. The British were not so careless; a reconnaissance party went out on 4 July 1777 to learn if artillery could be emplaced on the mountain. It could.
"[The] mountain had the entire command of the works and buildings both of Ticonderoga and Mount Independence, at a distance of about 1,400 yards from the latter, that the ground might be leveled so as to receive cannon, and the road to convey them, though difficult, might be made practicable in as little as twenty-four hours." Indeed, Twiss's reconnaissance led to the hasty retreat of all Patriot forces once American commanders observed their enemy building a road for artillery up the side of Mount Defiance."
1Lt. William TwissJohn Luzader. “Saratoga: A Military History of the Decisive Campaign of the American Revolution.” El Dorado Hills, CA: Savas Beatie, 2008, p. 163.