My lords, with your leave,
An account I will give,
Which deserves to be written in metre;
How the rebels and I
Have been pretty nigh,
Faith, 'twas almost too nigh for Sir Peter!
De'il take 'em! their shot
Came so swift and so hot,
And the cowardly dogs stood so stiff, sirs,
That I put ship about
And was glad to get out,
Or they would not have left me a skiff, sirs.
With much labor and toil
Unto Sullivan's Isle,
I came, swift as Falstaff, or Pistol;
But the Yankees, od rat 'em—
I could not get at 'em,
They so terribly maul'd my poor Bristol.
Behold, Clinton, by land,
Did quietly stand,
While I made a thundering clatter;
But the channel was deep,
So he only could peep,
And not venture over the water.
Now, bold as a Turk,
I proceeded to York,
Where, with Clinton and Howe, you may find me:
I've the wind in my tail,
And am hoisting my sail,
To leave Sullivan's Island behind me.
But, my lords, do not fear,
For, before the next year,
Although a small island should fret us,
The continent, whole,
We will take, by my soul,
If the cowardly Yankees will let us.
The victory at Charleston was the last success which American arms were to achieve for many months. The British had decided to capture and hold the line of the Hudson in order to cut the colonies in two. Howe, with a trained army of twenty-five thousand men, prepared to attack New York, while, to oppose him, Washington had only eighteen thousand undisciplined levies. Half this force was concentrated at Brooklyn Heights, which was strongly fortified, and here, on August 27, 1776, Howe delivered his attack. Overwhelming superiority of numbers enabled the British to press back their opponents to their works on the heights. Not daring to storm, the British prepared to lay siege to this position. Washington had no way to withstand a siege, which must have resulted in the loss of his whole army, and after nightfall of August 29, he succeeded in ferrying the entire force, with their cannon, arms, ammunition, horses, and larder, over to the New York side.
[August 27, 1776]