1777. fenting, Arnold and a' part of the left platoon pass through

together. The enemy retire firing, and gain their tents about thirty or forty yards from the works; but finding the affault is general, they give one fire, and either retreat to the British camp or throw down their arms. By this last fire Arnold is wounded, and a fergeant of Jackfon's regiment, ftanding near the general, killed. Orders are given by Burgoyne for the recovery of the intrenchments of the German referve; but they are not executed, and the Americans remain in poffeffion of an opening on the right and rear of the royal arıny. The night puts an end to the action.

The heat of it, with fmall arms, lafted about forty minutes; but the cannonading continued after the royal detachment had given way. In the course of it, a fhot paffed through gen. Burgoyne's hat, and another tore his waistcoat. A battalion of Brunswickers ran, though not one of them was killed, and would never come on again. To this mifbehaviour fome may be ready to afcribe the want of fuccefs on the fide of the British, and as a confequence of it, the lofs of the whole army. Whatever fuch misbehaviour might contribute toward the event, the bravery of the Americans had certainly a very confiderable fhare in it. The royal detachment was driven by them near upon two miles, and had fcarce entered the camp, when it was ftormed by them with great fury; for they rufhed on to the lines under one of the heaviest cannonades of artillery, grape fhot, and rifle fire ever beheld, and never gave way till they met the British grenadiers. Some of the British officers were aftonished at hearing the fire of the American musketry

* Captain Money's declaration in the house of commons.

kept up with fuch vigor and conftancy, after undergo- 1777ing fo heavy a fire of artillery *. One of the braveft of them is ready to declare, that, whenever he has been. opposed to the Americans, they have fought with courage and obftinacy. He found it fo in the above action. Gen. Arnold was next to military mad. He appeared, in the heat of the engagement, fo befide himself as fcarce to know what he did. He ftruck feveral of the officers with his fword, without any apparent reason; and when they told him of it the next day, meaning to remonstrate and require fatisfaction, he declared he recollected nothing at all of it, and was forry if it was fo. Some of his orders were exceedingly rash and injudicious, and argued thoughtlessnefs rather than courage ‡. His attack upon the British, varied fo from eftablished military maxims, that the royal officers inferred from it, that gen. Gates did not perfonally command in the action. Gates remained for the moft part in the camp, as on the 19th of September, that he might the better guide the general operations, and give the neceffary directions as they were wanted. Arnold's left-handed variation, might however contribute greatly toward obtaining the victory. The British have been at length taught by experience, that neither American attacks, nor resistance, are to be defpifed.

Nothing could easily exceed the diftrefs and calamity of the royal army, when the day was clofed. The Americans halted half a mile in the rear of them; and between twelve and one o'clock at night, gen. Lincoln (who, during the action, was in the centre of the

$777 encampment, commanding within the works) marched with his divifion to relieve the troops that had been engaged, and to poffefs the ground they had gained. The fituation of the British made a total change of position neceffary to fecure them from certain deftruction. It was executed during the night, with a great degree of coolness, filence, order and intrepidity. It was a general remove of the whole army, of the camp and artillery, from its late ground, to the heights above the hospital ; with the defign, by an entire change of the front, of reducing the Americans, if poffible, to the neceffity of forming a new difpofition. This remove was accomplished without any lofs whatever. The day of action proved fatal to numbers. The officers fuffered exceedingly. Several, who had been grievoufly wounded in the former action, and disdained abfence from danger, were again wounded. Befide gen. Frazer, Sir James Clarke Burgoyne's aid de camp, was mortally wounded and taken prifoner. Major Williams of the artillery, and major Ackland, were also taken, the latter being wounded. Lieut. col. Breyman was killed when the intrenchment where he commanded was forced. The lifts of killed and wounded, though avowedly imperfect, and not including the Germans, are very confiderable. The lofs of the Americans was trifling both in men and officers. They took officers and privates, to the amount of rather more than 200; befide 9 pieces of brafs artillery, and the encampment of a German brigade with all their equipage. But what was of the utmost confequence, they obtained a large fupply of ammunition from among the fpoils of the field, under an exceffive fcarcity of which they had long labored. The fame troops were

engaged as on the 19th of September, with detached 1777 regiments, from gens. Glover and Paterfon's brigades, together with a strong brigade of New Hampshire militia, and Green Mountain boys, alias Vermont militia.

of

The royal troops were under arms the whole day of Oct. the 8th, in continual expectation of an action, and were cannonaded during the greatest part of it: but all that happened was a fucceffion of fkirmishes, which occafioned lofs on both fides. Gen. Lincoln was wounded in his leg by a random fhot of the enemy, as riding in company with gen. Gates. About fun fet, the corpse gen. Frazer was brought up the hill, attended only by the officers who had lived in his family, for he defired it might be carried, without parade, by the foldiers of his corps to the great redoubt, and there buried. It neceffarily paffed within view of both armies: gens. Phillips, Reidesel and Burgoyne, standing together, were ftruck with the humility of the proceffion. Their conforming to that privacy which had been requested, might. be conftrued into neglect. They could neither endure that reflection, nor reftrain their natural propenfity to pay their last attention to his remains. They followed the corpfe to the grave. The inceffant cannonade during the folemnity: the steady attitude, and unaltered voice with which the chaplain officiated, though frequently covered with duft, thrown up on all fides of him by the fhot: the mute but expreffive mixture of fenfibility and indignation upon every countenance :-together with the growing duskiness of the evening, may be hereafter defcribed by the pen of the British commander, as marking a character of that juncture, which makes one of the finest subjects for the pencil of a mafter, that the

1777. field ever exhibited *. But had gen. Burgoyne acquainted the American commander with the intended proceffion, the fcenery would have been varied; for Gates, instead of admitting the cannonade, would rather have ordered minute guns to have been fired in honor to the deceased; and could he have gained in time the knowledge of what was going forward, would undoubtedly have filenced the former.

General Gates, previous to the action, pofted 1400 Americans on the heights oppofite the ford of Saratoga, and 2000 in the rear to prevent a retreat to Fort Edward; afterward on the 8th, he posted 1500 at the ford higher up. Gen. Burgoyne, having received intelligence of it, and apprehending that Gates meant to turn his right, which when effected would have enclosed him completely, refolved on an immediate retreat to Saratoga. The army began to move at nine o'clock at night, and the movement was made without loss; but the hofpital with the fick and wounded, was neceffarily abandoned. In this inftance, as well as in every other which occurred in the course of these transactions, Gates behaved with fuch attention and humanity, to all whom the fortune of war threw into his hands, as does honor to his character. The badness of the roads, and the ftarving condition of the cattle for want of forage, together with one inceffant rain, like a continued thunder shower from about eight in the morning of the 9th till long after the day closed, and other difficulties, prevented the army's reaching Saratoga, though no more than about fix miles diftant, before night, and then worn down with exceffive fatigue. During the rain a body of militia Burgoyne's State.