“Admit that,” he responded with a smile, “you nevertheless did your work so well you deserve this acknowledgment from me. I am glad one of you is a native of this colony, and that the other is from the colony of Massachusetts. It shows that the same intrepid spirit is to be found in our patriots whether they come from the north or from the south. It is the hope of our final success in this struggle for our independence.”
I know my own face flushed with pleasure at his words, and I am equally sure that the face of Master Haines did.
“I called you here, however,” the governor went on, “not only to thank you for what you have done, but to ask you to do something else.”
“We are ready,” we replied together.
“I wish you to destroy Fort Johnson,” he said, and paused to mark the effect of his words upon us.
We looked at each other. Both of us knew why this request was made. The entrenchment of the British at Ashley River and their erection of batteries across Wappoo Creek had rendered the fortification untenable. A three-sided fort, with parapets only on the north and east and west, it left the south—the side on which the enemy had appeared—wholly unprotected. So the commander had promptly withdrawn, bringing away, however, his men, his guns, and his stores in safety.
But for some reason, possibly his haste, he had left the fortress intact, and now the enemy were arranging to occupy it. Already a small detachment of soldiers had been placed within it, and cannon were on the way across the island to re-fortify it. Once furnished with an armament, the red-coats would be able to drive our ships from their present station, and protect their own vessels whenever they attempted to enter the upper bay by the south channel. Its destruction meant a continuation of our control over the entrance to the inner harbor.
It was a very different undertaking from our previous one—a place easier to reach; a work harder to do; and one that would require a much larger force of men.
Still, as I gazed into Lieutenant Haines’s eyes, I knew he was willing to undertake it, and I was as willing to accompany him as I had been on the night we destroyed the Beacon House Light. So we repeated together the words we had already used:
“We are ready.”