12th Mar.

On the 12th March General Lindsay arrived from St. Lucia (which as yet was still quiet) with 150 men of the 9th and 68th Foot, and on the 17th attacked the insurgents, who forthwith retired to an impregnable position. Then the tropical rain came down and put a stop to all further operations. There are not many roads in Grenada now, and there were still fewer then—mere narrow, cobble-paved tracks, hardly wide enough for any wheeled vehicle. In fact these West Indies are miserable places to fight in, as this poor handful of British soldiers now discovered. Soaked with rain, exhausted by the stifling heat, and broken down by fever, the men had to tramp back as best they could. 1795. General Lindsay in the delirium of fever committed suicide, and his successor saw that without a stronger force it was useless to attack the rebels. Meanwhile the head of the insurgents, a ruffianly mulatto named Fédon, issued a proclamation threatening death to all who helped the English, and announcing openly that he would retaliate for any measures of repression by slaughtering his prisoners. As a natural consequence the negroes flocked to his standard in thousands, and laid the whole island waste.

1st April.

On the 1st of April there arrived a weak reinforcement of the 25th and 29th Foot, probably about 400 men, from Barbados. With these and a few blue-jackets Brigadier Campbell attacked the insurgent stronghold on the 8th, but was repulsed. The rebel position was of extraordinary strength, well chosen, well fortified by abattis and other obstacles, and strongly manned. The British troops did all that men could do, with everything—numbers, climate, and tropical rain—against them; but they were compelled to retreat with the loss of 100 killed and wounded. Fédon then brought out his prisoners and cut the throat of every one.

Then, as usual, together with the rains came the yellow fever. The British troops suffered frightfully. “The 25th and 29th begin to fall down fast,” says the General in a letter of 11th May. “Twenty died last week and six were carried off yesterday.” So things went from bad to worse. No reinforcements could be obtained from the other islands, for one and all (excepting Barbados) were in a worse position than Grenada. St. Lucia had been evacuated; St. Vincent, after desperate fighting, was at the last gasp. In fact it seemed as if the West Indies were lost to England. By December the insurgent force in Grenada amounted to 10,000 men, well armed, furnished with artillery, and led by trained white French officers. The British troops, outnumbered on every side, were compelled to abandon the ports which they had tried to hold on the coast, and retire to St. George’s. The rebels, or brigands as they were called, threatened to attack them even there. 1795. Nothing but the capture of the capital was wanting to give them absolute possession of the whole island.

1796.

But at last the tide began to turn. The long-awaited reinforcements from England had arrived at Barbados, and the relief of Grenada was at hand. On the 4th March 588 men from the 10th, 25th, and 88th Foot, under Brigadier Mackenzie, arrived at St. George’s. They had lost 45 men in the course of a two days’ passage; but their arrival was timely, for it compelled the insurgents to retire from before the capital. A week later further reinforcements from the 3rd, 8th, and 63rd Foot and the Seventeenth Light Dragoons landed at Sauteurs, at the extreme north point of the island. What were the numbers of the Seventeenth I have not been able to ascertain. One account says two troops, and I am inclined to think that this is correct. Whence these troops came, whether from England or Martinique, it is impossible to say. On the 24th March, pursuant to the designs of Brigadier Campbell, the forces at Sauteurs, 700 men in all, and those from St. George’s, converged—the former by land, the latter by sea—upon the new position which the rebels had entrenched at Port Royal or Grenville. The troops, having been landed, worked during the night at the construction of a three-gun battery, and opened fire at daybreak next morning. But before attacking the main position on the principal heights, it was necessary first to clear some secondary heights adjoining them. 25th Mar. For this duty the detachment of the 88th was detailed; but such was the difficulty of the ground that it was two hours before the 88th could even get near the enemy, and when they reached them it was only to be driven back. With great reluctance Campbell, who had made his dispositions not only to drive the rebels out, but to cut them off on every side, was compelled to bring up the 8th Foot to support their attack. Just at that moment a few of the rebels sneaked round to the rear of the British and set fire to the stores on the beach; and the conflagration was hardly extinguished when two French schooners anchored in the bay and began to land troops under cover of their artillery fire. Campbell saw that no time was to be lost. 1796.Under a heavy cross fire from the rebel batteries ashore, and the guns of the schooners afloat, the Seventeenth charged down the beach and swept it clean, cutting down every soul. They then rallied and took post under cover of a hill. Meanwhile Campbell, quickly concentrating his infantry, led them straight to the assault, and, not without a severe struggle, carried the entrenchments by storm. The insurgents fled in all directions, but they did not get off scot free; for, as they emerged upon the low ground, the Seventeenth swooped upon them and did great execution. Three hundred brigands, mostly sans-culottes from Guadeloupe, are said to have met their fate at the hands of the regiment that day. No prisoners were taken: it was not a time for taking prisoners; and the survivors of the pursuit took refuge in their original stronghold opposite Charlottetown. The total British loss was 12 officers and 135 men killed and wounded. The Seventeenth lost but 4 men wounded, one horse killed, and two horses wounded; but the detachment, together with its commander Captain John Black, was highly commended both in orders and despatches for its behaviour in the action.

After this engagement nothing more was done for a time, owing to the general confusion caused by the revolt. The Seventeenth was moved to St. George’s and quartered in Government House, much to the disgust of the new Governor, who arrived in April and wanted the house to himself. 17th Mar. Meanwhile the main expedition under Sir Ralph Abercromby had at last arrived from England and was concentrating at Barbados. He turned his attention first to St. Lucia, which was recaptured on the 24th May, and then to St. Vincent, which was finally relieved on the 10th June. 19th June. A few days later he sent a force to Grenada, which landed at Charlottetown and advanced upon Morne Quaqua, the great rebel stronghold, from the west, while a second column moved against it from the east. This Morne Quaqua was a remarkable position. The rebel camp was on a height at a considerable elevation, and above it rose a rocky precipice accessible only by a narrow path, which path, together with the lower ground beneath it, was commanded by a field-gun and several swivels and wall-pieces. Above this rose another bluff with another gun in position, and finally above this again, at the head of a very steep ascent, came the summit. Felled trees and abattis made good any points that nature might have left unstrengthened. Nevertheless, the French commandant, when he saw the advance of the British columns, lost heart and surrendered. Fédon and the desperate faction thereupon led out their English prisoners, some twenty in number, stripped them, bound them, and murdered them. They then fled to the jungle, where they were hunted down by the troops and hanged in twos and threes. Fédon alone, most unfortunately, was never caught.

So ended the relief of Grenada, wherein the Seventeenth took decidedly a leading part. How long the detachment remained in the island it is impossible to discover, but probably not for very long; for by August, so far as can be gathered from scattered notices, five troops of the regiment were at St. Domingo and three at Jamaica. It is to these three latter that a muster-roll taken in December 1796 most probably refers,—a ghastly document wherein, unfortunately, the place of muster is not mentioned. It shows that between 25th June and 24th December 1796, of—