"He bade his men wait, reserving their fire till the enemy was within twenty yards. Then they poured in a deadly volley. Every shot told. Howe was wounded in the foot, and several of his officers were killed besides the common soldiers. But they pressed on to the now nearly silent redoubt, for the American fire had slackened and begun to die away.
"And now there was only a ridge of earth between the combatants, and the first of the British who reached it were assailed with a shower of stones. Then some of them scaled the parapet and were shot down in the act. One of these was Major Pitcairn, who had led the troops at Lexington. As he mounted the parapet he cried out, 'Now for the glory of the marines!' and was answered by a shot from a negro that gave him a mortal wound. His son carried him to a boat, conveyed him to Boston, and there he soon died."
"Oh!" exclaimed Gracie, "I hope that brave Colonel Prescott didn't get killed, Papa!"
"No; he escaped unhurt, though his coat and waistcoat were pierced and torn in several places by the bayonets of the British, which he parried with his sword.
"It was now a hand-to-hand fight, British and Americans mingled together, our men walking backward and hewing their way out, dealing deadly blows with their muskets.
"Fortunately the British were too much exhausted to use their bayonets with vigour; and so intermingled were they and the Americans that the use of firearms would have been dangerous to their own men as well as to ours."
"Oh," sighed Rosie, "I have always been so sorry that our men didn't have plenty of gunpowder! I don't think there's a doubt that if they had been well supplied with it, they would have won a grand victory."
"Yes; they did wonders considering all they had to contend with," said the Captain. "Their courage, endurance, and skill as marksmen astonished the British, and were never forgotten by them during the long war that followed.
"The number engaged in the battle of Bunker Hill was small, all taken together not more than fifteen hundred of the Americans,—less than seven hundred in the redoubt,—while of the British there were, according to Gage, more than two thousand; other and accurate observers said, 'near upon three thousand.'