At this moment Kichline and his riflemen, De Haas and his battalion, and Captain Carpenter, with two field-pieces, arrived. Grant advanced and took post in an orchard, * within one hundred and fifty yards of Stirling, and a severe skirmish ensued. Grant had also two field-pieees, but neither party made much use of their cannons. In that position the belligerents remained, without severe fighting, until eleven o'clock in the forenoon, ** when events on the left wing of the American army changed the whole aspect of affairs.
While Grant and Stirling were thus engaged, De Heis-ter and his Hessians moved from Flatbush, and cannonaded the works at the Flatbush pass, where Sullivan was in command with the regiments of Colonels Williams and Miles.
In the mean while, Clinton had descended from the wooded hills and attacked the extreme left of the Americans on the plain at Bedford. The firing was understood by De Heister, who immediately ordered Count Donop to storm the redoubt at the pass, while he pressed forward with the main body of the Hessians. A fierce and bloody combat ensued,3 when Sullivan, perceiving the peril of his little army (for Clinton was rapidly gaining his rear), ordered a retreat to the lines at Brooklyn. The opportunity was gone, and on descending the rough slope from Mount Prospect, they were met by Clinton's light infantry and dragoons, who drove them back in confusion upon the Hessian bayonets. Sullivan and his ensnared soldiers fought desperately, hand to hand, with the foe, while driven backward and forward between the full ranks of the assailants. Many broke through the gleaming fence of bayonets and sabers, and
* A few trees of this orchard yet remain in the southwest part of Greenwood Cemetery.
** During the morning the Roebuck frigate approached Red Hook and cannonaded the battery there. This, like the movement of Grant, was intended to divert the Americans from the operations of Clinton on their left.