“Spare that officer, my gallant comrades, he is my friend; do you not remember our affectionate meeting at the exchange of prisoners?”
This appeal from the favorite old chief was successful, and Small retired unmolested.
This anecdote, poetical as it appears, is attested by undoubted authority.
General Howe, undaunted by the second repulse, felt determined to venture a third attack, but thought best to adopt a more judicious plan than before. He this time concentrated his whole force upon the redoubt and breastwork, instead of directing a portion of it against the rail-fence.
He also directed his men to reserve their fire, and trust wholly to the bayonet. He had discovered the vulnerable point in the American defenses, and pushed forward his artillery to the opening between the redoubt and breastwork, where it turned our works and enfiladed the whole line. By this time the Americans were nearly reduced to the last extremity. Their ammunition was exhausted; they had no bayonets; no reinforcements appeared. Colonel Gardiner, who had been stationed with his regiment at Charlestown Neck, but had received no orders to march, reached Bunker’s Hill with three hundred men. He had no sooner reached the lines, when he received a wound from a musket ball, which afterward proved fatal. As his men were carrying him from the field, his son, a youth of nineteen, second lieutenant in Trevett’s artillery company, which had just come up, met and recognised his father. Distracted at seeing him in this condition, he offered to aid in conducting him from the field.
“Think not of me,” replied the gallant patriot, “think not of me—I am well. Go forward to your duty!”
The son obeyed his orders, and the father retired from the field to die.
The Americans awaited with desperate resolution the onset of the British, prepared to repel them, as best they could, with the remaining charges of powder and ball, with the stocks of their muskets, and with stones.
Having reached the works, the foremost of the British attempted to scale them. Richardson, a private in the Royal Irish regiment, was the first to mount the parapet. He was shot down at once. Major Pitcairn followed him, and as he stepped on the parapet was heard to exclaim, “The day is ours!” But the words had no sooner escaped his lips, than he was shot through the body; his son caught him in his arms as he fell, and carried him from the hill.
He led the detachment which first encountered our troops upon Lexington Green, on the 19th of April; he had a horse shot under him on that day, and was left upon the field for dead. General Pigot, who had mounted the redoubt by means of a tree left standing there, was the first person to enter the works. He was followed by others. The Americans, however, still held out, till the principal of their officers were badly wounded. Perceiving, at length, that further resistance would be a wanton and useless sacrifice of valuable life, Colonel Prescott ordered a retreat. The Americans left the hill with very little molestation. General Warren had come upon the field, as he said to learn the art of war from a veteran soldier. He had offered to take Colonel Prescott’s orders, and it was with extreme reluctance that he quitted the redoubt. He was slowly retreating from it, only a few rods distance, when the British obtained full possession, which exposed his person to imminent danger. Major Small, whose life, as has been mentioned in the preceding chapter, had been saved in a similar emergency, by the interference of General Putnam, attempted to requite the service by rendering one of a like character to Warren. He called out to him by name from the redoubt, and begged him to surrender, at the same time ordering his men around him to suspend their fire. On hearing the voice of Major Small, Warren turned his head, but the effort was too late. While his face was directed toward the works, a ball struck him on the forehead, and inflicted a wound which was instantly fatal. The magnanimous champion of liberty had fallen.