[446-5] The letter addressed to Lieutenant-governor Hamilton read as follows:
“Sir:—In order to save yourself from the impending storm that now threatens you, I order you immediately to surrender yourself, with all your garrison, stores, etc. For, if I am obliged to storm, you may depend on such treatment as is justly due to a murderer. Beware of destroying stores of any kind or any papers or letters that are in your possession, or hurting one house in town: for, by heavens! if you do, there shall be no mercy shown you.
(Signed) G. R. CLARK.”
In reply the British officer sent the following:
“Lieutenant-governor Hamilton begs leave to acquaint Colonel Clark that he and his garrison are not disposed to be awed into any action unworthy British subjects.”
[452-7] Clark was a man of action, not a scholar; and the errors of which his writings are full may well be overlooked, so full of interest is what he says. The selections above have been slightly changed, principally, however, in spelling and the use of capital letters.
Hamilton was sent in irons to Virginia and was kept in close confinement, at Williamsburg, till nearly the end of the Revolution. Washington wrote, as a reason for not exchanging the British prisoner, that he “had issued proclamations and approved of practices, which were marked with cruelty towards the people that fell into his hands, such as inciting the Indians to bring in scalps, putting prisoners in irons, and giving men up to be the victims of savage barbarity.”