[CHAPTER XXXI.]
In October of the same year, a numerous body of Americans, principally troops of the line, had been collected under the orders of General Van Rensselaer, and advantage was taken of an extremely dark night to push them across the river, with a view to the occupation of the commanding heights above the village of Queenston. In this, favored by circumstances, the enemy were eminently successful. They carried the batteries, and at day-break the heights were to be seen covered with their battalions, before whom were thrown out a considerable body of riflemen. At the first alarm, the little detachment stationed at Queenston marched out to dislodge them; but such was the impatient gallantry of General Brock, who had succeeded to the command on this line of frontier, that without waiting for the main body from Fort George to come up, he threw himself at the head of the flank companies of the Forty-Ninth, and moving forward in double quick time, soon came within sight of the enemy.
Among the General's aides-de-camp, was Henry Grantham, who, having succeeded in making his escape at the fatal defeat of the Moravian Village, with a few men of his company, had in the absence of his regiment (then prisoners of war), and from considerations of personal esteem, been attached as a supernumerary to his staff. With him at this moment was the light-hearted De Courcy, and as the young men rode a little in rear of their Chief, they were so rapt in admiration of his fine form and noble daring (as he still kept dashing onward, far in advance even of the handful of troops who followed eagerly and rapidly in his rear), that they utterly forgot the danger to which he was exposed.
On arriving at the ascent, the General for a moment reined in his charger, in order to give time to the rear to close in, then removing and waving his plumed hat.
"Hurrah, Forty-Ninth!" he exclaimed, in language suited to those he addressed. "Up these heights lies our road—on ourselves depends the victory. Not a shot till we gain the summit—then three cheers for old England—a volley—and the bayonet must do the rest!"
So saying, he resumed his hat; and wheeling his horse, once more led his gallant little band up the hill.
But it was not likely that the Americans would suffer the approach of so determined an enemy without attempting to check their progress in the most efficient manner. Distinguished from those around him by his commanding air, not less than by the military insignia that adorned him, the person of the General was at once recognised for one bearing high rank, and as such became an object of especial attention to the dispersed riflemen. Shot after shot flew past the undaunted officer, carrying death into the close ranks that followed noiselessly in his rear, yet without harming him. At length he was seen by his aides-de-camp, both of whom had kept their eyes upon him, to reel in his saddle. An instant brought the young men to his side, De Courcy on his right and Grantham on his left hand. They looked up into his face. It was suffused with the hues of death. A moment afterwards and he fell from his horse, with his head reclining upon the chest of Henry Grantham. There was a momentary halt in the advancing column; all were dismayed at the dreadful event.
De Courcy and Grantham, having abandoned their horses, now bore their beloved leader to the side of the road, and sought some spot out of reach of the enemy's fire, where he might breathe his last moments in peace.
As Henry Grantham glanced his eye towards an old untenanted building, that lay some fifty yards off the road, and which he conceived fully adapted to the purpose, he saw the form of a rifleman partly exposed at a corner of the building, whose action at the moment was evidently that of one loading his piece. The idea that this skulking enemy might have been the same who had given the fatal death-wound to his beloved Chief, added to the conviction that he was preparing to renew the shot, filled him with the deepest desire of vengeance. As the bodies of several men, picked off by the riflemen, lay along the road (one at no great distance from the spot on which he stood), he hastened to secure the nearest musket, which, as no shot had been fired by the English, he knew to be loaded.