The force divided into two parts. The foremost 105 blocked the road, near a turning, so as to remain unseen by the approaching rebels until almost the moment of collision. The second force stayed some rods behind the first, forming in two lines, one along each side of the road. As to each force, some were armed with sabres and cavalry pistols, but most, being mounted yagers of Van Wrumb’s battalion, with rifles.
As for the little detachment of Lee’s Light Horse that was now galloping along the Mile Square road, under Harry Peyton’s command, the arms were mainly broadswords and pistols, but some of the men had rifles or light muskets.
The troop went forward at a gallop against the wind, there being just sufficient light for keen eyes to make out the road ahead. Harry Peyton was inwardly deploring the loss of time at Philipse Manor-house, and fearing that the prey would reach its covert, when suddenly the moon appeared in a cloud-rift, the troops passed a turn in the road, and there stood a line of Hessians barring the way.
Ere Peyton could give an order, came one loud, flaming, whistling discharge from that living barrier. Harry’s horse—Elizabeth Philipse’s Cato—reared, as did others of his troop. Some of the men came to a quick stop, others were borne forward by the impetus of their former speed, but soon reined in for orders. No man fell, though one groaned, and two cursed.
Harry got his horse under control, drew his broadsword with his right hand, his pistol with his left,—which held also the rein,—and ordered his men to charge, to fire at the moment of contact, then to cut, slash, and club. So the little troop, the well and the wounded alike, dashed forward.
But the line of Hessians, as soon as they had fired, turned and fled, passing between the two lines of the second force, and stopping at some further distance to reform and reload. The second force, being thus cleared by the first, wheeled quickly into the road, and formed a second barrier against Peyton’s oncoming troop.
Peyton’s men, intoxicated by the powder-smell that filled their nostrils as they passed through the smoke of the Hessians’ first volley, bore down on this second barrier with furious force. They were the best riders in the world, and many a one of them held his broadsword aloft in one hand, his pistol raised in the other, the rein loose on his horse’s neck; while those with long-barrelled weapons aimed them on the gallop.
The Hessians and Peyton’s foremost men fired at the same moment. The Hessians had not time to turn and flee, for the Americans, unchecked by this second greeting of fire, came on at headlong speed. “At ’em, boys!” yelled Peyton, discharging his pistol at a tall yager, who fell sidewise from his horse 107 with a fierce German oath. The light horse men dashed between the Hessians’ steeds, and there was hewing and hacking.
A Hessian officer struck with a sabre at Peyton’s left arm, but only knocked the pistol from his hand. Peyton then found himself threatened on the right by a trooper, and slashed at him with broadsword. The blow went home, but the sword’s end became entangled somehow with the breast bones of the victim. A yager, thinking to deprive Peyton of the sword, brought down a musket-butt heavily on it. But Peyton’s grip was firm, and the sword snapped in two, the hilt in his hand, the point in its human sheath. At that instant Peyton felt a keen smart in his left leg. It came from a second sabre blow aimed by the Hessian officer, who might have followed it with a third, but that he was now attacked elsewhere. Peyton had no sooner clapped his hand to his wounded leg than he was stunned by a blow from the rifle-butt of the yager who had previously struck the sword. Harry fell forward on the horse’s neck, which he grasped madly with both arms, still holding the broken sword in his right hand; and lapsed from a full sense of the tumult, the plunging and shrieking horses, the yelling and cursing men, the whirr and clash of swords, and the thuds of rifle-blows, into blind, red, aching, smarting half-consciousness.