Rolf in the Woods

by Ernest Thompson Seton

The farthest effective range of rifle fire in those days was reckoned at a hundred yards. The Americans were ordered to hold their fire till the enemy reached the oaks, a grove one hundred yards from the main bridge—on the other bank.

The British came on in perfect review-day style. Now a hush fell on all. The British officer in command was heard clearly giving his orders. How strange it must have been to the veterans of wars in Spain, France, and the Rhine, to advance against a force with whom they needed no interpreter.

McGlassin's deep voice now rang along the defences, “Don't fire till I give the order.”

The red-coats came on at a trot, they reached the hundred-yard-mark.

“Now, aim low and fire!” from McGlassin, and the rattle of the Yankee guns was followed by reeling ranks of red in the oaks.

“Charge!” shouted the British officer and the red-coats charged to the bridge, but the fire from the embankment was incessant; the trail of the charging men was cluttered with those who fell.

“Forward!” and the gallant British captain leaped on the central stringer of the bridge and, waving his sword, led on. Instantly three lines of men were formed, one on each stringer.

They were only fifty yards from the barricade, with five hundred rifles, all concentrated on these stringers. The first to fall was the captain, shot through the heart, and the river bore him away. But on and on came the three ranks into the whistling, withering fire of lead. It was like slaughtering sheep. Yet on and on they marched steadily for half an hour. Not a man held back or turned, though all knew they were marching to their certain death. Not one of them ever reached the centre of the span, and those who dropped, not dead, were swallowed by the swollen stream. How many hundred brave men were sacrificed that day, no one ever knew. He who gave the word to charge was dead with his second and third in command and before another could come to change the order, the river ran red—the bloody Saranac they call it ever since.

The regiment was wrecked, and the assault for the time was over.

Rolf had plied his rifle with the rest, but it sickened him to see the horrible waste of human valour. It was such ghastly work that he was glad indeed when a messenger came to say he was needed at headquarters. And in an hour he was crossing the lake with news and instructions for the officer in command at Burlington.