“Never doubt the brave continentals here, colonel,” I replied, “they are only four hundred, but we shall teach yon braggarts a lesson, before to-day is over, which they shall not soon forget.”
“Bravo, my gallant young friend! With my twenty-six eighteen and twenty four pounders, plenty of powder, and a few hundred fire-eaters like yourself I would blow the whole fleet out of water. But after all,” said he with good-humored raillery, “though you’ll not glory in rescuing Miss Derwent to-day, you’ll fight not a whit the worse for knowing that she is in Charleston, eh! But, come, don’t blush—you must be my aid—I shall want you, depend upon it, before the day is over. If those red-coats here, behind us, attempt to take us in the rear, we shall have hot work,—for by my hopes of eternal salvation, I’ll drive them back, man and officer, in spite of Gen. Lee’s fears that I cannot. But ha! there comes the first bomb.”
Looking upward as he spoke, I beheld a large, dark body flying through the air; and in the next instant, amidst a cheer from our men, it splashed into the morass behind us, simmered, and went out.
“Well sent, old Thunderer,” ejaculated the imperturbable colonel, “but, faith, many another good bomb will you throw away on the swamps and palmetto logs you sneer at. Open upon them, my brave fellows, as they come around, and teach them what Carolinians can do. Remember, you fight to-day for your wives, your children, and your liberties. The Continental Congress forever against the minions of a tyrannical court.”
The battle was now begun. One by one the British men-of-war, coming gallantly into their respective stations, and dropping their anchors with masterly coolness, opened their batteries upon us, firing with a rapidity and precision that displayed their skill. The odds against which we had to contend were indeed formidable. Directly in front of us, with springs on their cables, and supported by two frigates, were anchored a couple of two-deckers; while the three other men-of-war were working up to starboard, and endeavoring to get a position between us and the town, so as to cut off our communications with Haddrell’s Point.
“Keep it up—run her out again,” shouted the captain of a gun beside me, who was firing deliberately, but with murderous precision, every shot of his piece telling on the hull of one of the British cruizers, “huzza for Carolina!”
“Here comes the broadside of Sir Peter’s two-decker,” shouted another one, “make way for the British iron among the palmetto logs. Ha! old yellow breeches how d’ye like that?” he continued as the shot from his piece, struck the quarter of the flag-ship, knocking the splinters high into the air, and cutting transversely through and through her crowded decks.
Meanwhile the three men-of-war attempting to cut off our communications, had got entangled among the shoals to our right, and now lay utterly helpless, engaged in attempting to get afloat, and unable to fire a gun. Directly two of them ran afoul, carrying away the bowsprit of the smaller one.
“Huzza!” shouted the old bruiser again, squinting a moment in that direction, “they’re smashing each other to pieces there without our help, and so here goes at smashing their messmates in front here—what the devil,” he continued, turning smartly around to cuff a powder boy, “what are you gaping up stream for, when you should be waiting on me?—take that you varmint, and see if you can do as neat a thing as this when you’re old enough to point a gun. By the Lord Harry I’ve cut away that fore-top-mast as clean as a whistle.”
Meantime the conflict waxed hotter and hotter, and through the long summer afternoon, except during an interval when we slackened it for want of powder, our brave fellows, with the coolness of veterans, and the enthusiasm of youth, kept up their fire. A patriotic ardor burned along our lines, which only became more resistless, as the wounded were carried past in the arms of their comrades. The contest was at its height when General Lee arrived from the mainland to offer to remove us if we wished to abandon our perilous position.