True to the Old Flag (Historical Novels - American Cycle). G. A. Henty

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СКАЧАТЬ of the rest. Soon parties arrived carrying wounded; but it was not until an hour and a half after the engagement began, that the main body of the column were seen marching, in good order, back through the forest.

      By this time the hasty defences were well-nigh completed, and all the men were employed in cutting down the thick brushwood outside, so as to clear the ground as far as possible, and so prevent the enemy from stealing up, under shelter, to the felled trees.

      Three cannon were planted, to sweep the road that descended through the pines. Another was dragged up to the ridge of the hill. Two hundred and fifty men were now placed on each flank of the camp, the main body stood behind the waggons or lay flat behind the logs and boats, the Massachusetts men on the right, the Connecticut men on the left.

      "Now, my lads," Johnson shouted, in his cheery voice, "you have got to fight. Remember, if they get inside not one of you will ever go back to your families to tell the tale, while if you fight bravely you will beat them back sure enough."

      In a few minutes, ranks of white-coated soldiers could be seen moving down the roads, with their bayonets showing between the boughs. At the same time, Indian war whoops rose loud in the forest, and then dark forms could be seen, bounding down the slope through the trees towards the camp in a throng.

      There was a movement of uneasiness among the young rustics, few of whom ever heard a shot fired in anger before that morning; but the officers, standing pistol in hand, threatened to shoot any man who moved from his position.

      Could Dieskau have launched his whole force at once upon the camp at that moment, he would probably have carried it, but this he was powerless to do. His regular troops were well in hand; but the mob of Canadians and Indians were scattered through the forest, shouting, yelling, and firing from behind trees.

      He thought, however, that if he led the regulars to the attack, the others would come forward, and he therefore gave the word for the advance. The French soldiers advanced steadily, until the trees grew thinner. They were deployed into line, and opened fire in regular volleys. Scarcely had they done so, however, when Captain Eyre, who commanded the artillery, opened upon them with grape from his three guns, while from waggon, and boat, and fallen log, the musketry fire flashed out hot and bitter, and, reeling under the shower of iron and lead, the French line broke up, the soldiers took shelter behind trees, and thence returned the fire of the defenders.

      Johnson received a flesh wound in the thigh, and retired to his tent, where he spent the rest of the day. Lyman took the command, and to him the credit of the victory is entirely due.

      For four hours the combat raged. The young soldiers had soon got over their first uneasiness, and fought as steadily and coolly as veterans. The musketry fire was unbroken. From every tree, bush, and rock the rifles flashed out, and the leaden hail flew in a storm over the camp, and cut the leaves in a shower from the forest. Through this Lyman moved to and fro among the men, directing, encouraging, cheering them on, escaping as by a miracle the balls which whistled round him. Save the Indians on the English side, not a man but was engaged, the waggoners taking their guns and joining in the fight.

      The Mohawks, however, held aloof, saying that they had come to see their English brothers fight, but, animated no doubt with the idea that, if they abstained from taking part in the fray, and the day went against the English, their friends the Iroquois would not harm them.

      The French Indians worked round on to high ground, beyond the swamp on the left, and their fire thence took the defenders in the flank. Captain Eyre speedily turned his guns in that direction, and a few well-directed shells soon drove the Indians from their vantage ground. Dieskau directed his first attack against the left and centre; but the Connecticut men fought so stoutly, that he next tried to force the right, where the Massachusetts regiments of Titcomb, Ruggles, and Williams held the line. For an hour he strove hard to break his way through the intrenchments, but the Massachusetts men stood firm, although Titcomb was killed and their loss was heavy.

      At length Dieskau, exposing himself within short range of the English lines, was hit in the leg. While his adjutant Montreuil was dressing the wound, the general was again hit in the knee and thigh. He had himself placed behind a tree, and ordered Montreuil to lead the regulars in a last effort against the camp.

      But it was too late. The blood of the colonists was now up, and, singly or in small bodies, they were crossing their lines of barricade, and working up among the trees towards their assailants. The movement became general, and Lyman, seeing the spirit of his men, gave the word, and the whole of the troops, with a shout, leaped up and dashed through the wood against the enemy, falling upon them with their hatchets and the butts of their guns.

      The French and their allies instantly fled. As the colonists passed the spot where Dieskau was sitting on the ground, one of them, singularly enough himself a Frenchman, who had ten years before left Canada, fired at him and shot him through both legs. Others came up and stripped him of his clothes, but, on learning who he was, they carried him to Johnson, who received him with the greatest kindness, and had every attention paid to him.

      Chapter 11:

       Scouting.

       Table of Contents

      It was near five o'clock before the final rout of the French took place; but, before that time, several hundreds of the Canadians and Indians had left the scene of action, and had returned to the scene of the fight in the wood, to plunder and scalp the dead. They were resting, after their bloody work, by a pool in the forest, when a scouting party from Fort Lyman, under Captains M'Ginnis and Folsom, came upon them and opened fire.

      The Canadians and Indians, outnumbering their assailants greatly, fought for some time, but were finally defeated and fled. M'Ginnis was mortally wounded, but continued to give orders till the fight was over. The bodies of the slain were thrown into the pool, which to this day bears the name, "the bloody pool."

      The various bands of French fugitives reunited in the forest, and made their way back to their canoes in South Bay, and reached Ticonderoga utterly exhausted and famished, for they had thrown away their knapsacks in their flight, and had nothing to eat from the morning of the fight until they rejoined their comrades.

      Johnson had the greatest difficulty in protecting the wounded French general from the Mohawks, who, although they had done no fighting in defence of the camp, wanted to torture and burn Dieskau in revenge for the death of Hendrick and their warriors who had fallen in the ambush. He, however, succeeded in doing so, and sent him in a litter under a strong escort to Albany. Dieskau was afterwards taken to England, and remained for some years at Bath, after which he returned to Paris. He never, however, recovered from his numerous wounds, and died a few years later.

      He always spoke in the highest terms of the kindness he had received from the colonial officers. Of the provincial soldiers he said that, in the morning they fought like boys, about noon like men, and in the afternoon like devils.

      The English loss in killed, wounded, and missing was two hundred and sixty-two, for the most part killed in the ambush in the morning. The French, according to their own account, lost two hundred and twenty-eight, but it probably exceeded four hundred, the principal portion of whom were regulars, for the Indians and Canadians kept themselves so well under cover that they and the provincials, behind their logs, were able to inflict but little loss on each other.

      Had Johnson followed up his success, he might have reached South Bay before the French, in which case the whole of Dieskau's column must have fallen into his hands; nor did he press forward against Ticonderoga, which he might easily have captured. СКАЧАТЬ