True to the Old Flag: A Tale of the American War of Independence, G. A. Henty [classic novels for teens TXT] 📗

a royal subject of the king he is entitled to fight for him. He saw to-day many lads not older than himself in the rebel ranks, and he has pleaded strongly for permission to go with me. To this I have agreed. Which would you prefer, Mary—to stay quietly here, where I imagine you would not be molested on account of the part I take, or will you move into Boston and stop with your relations there until the struggle has ended one way or the other?"

As Mrs. Wilson had frequently talked over with her husband the course that he would take in the event of civil war actually breaking out, the news that he would at once offer his services to the British authorities did not come as a shock upon her. Even the question of Harold accompanying his father had been talked over; and although her heart bled at the thought of husband and son being both engaged in such a struggle, she agreed to acquiesce in any decision that Harold might arrive at. He was now nearly sixteen, and in the colonies a lad of this age is, in point of independence and self-reliance, older than an English boy. Harold, too, had already shown that he possessed discretion and coolness as well as courage, and although now that the moment had come Mrs. Wilson wept passionately at the thought of their leaving her, she abstained from saying any word to dissuade them from the course they had determined upon. When she recovered from her fit of crying she said that she would accompany them at once to Boston, as in the first place their duties might for some time lie in that city, and that in any case she would obtain far more speedy news there of what was going on throughout the country than she would at Concord. She would, too, be living among her friends and would meet with many of the same convictions and opinions as her husband's, whereas in Concord the whole population would be hostile.

Captain Wilson said that there was no time to be lost, as the whole town was in a tumult. He therefore advised her to pack up such necessary articles as could be carried in the valises, on the horses' backs.

Pompey and the other servants were to pack up the most valuable effects and to forward them to a relation of Mrs. Wilson's who lived about three miles from Boston. There they would be in safety and could be brought into the town, if necessary. Pompey and two other old servants were to remain in charge of the house and its contents. Jake, an active young negro some twenty-three or twenty-four years old, who was much attached to Harold, whose personal attendant and companion he had always been, was to accompany them on horseback, as was Judy, Mrs. Wilson's negro maid.

As evening fell the five horses were brought round, and the party started by a long and circuitous route, by which, after riding for nearly forty miles, they reached Boston at two o'clock next morning.

CHAPTER V. BUNKER'S HILL.

The excitement caused by the news of the fight at Concord was intense and, as it spread through the colonies, the men everywhere rushed to arms. The fray at Lexington was represented as a wanton outrage, and the fact wholly ignored that the colonists concerned in it were drawn up in arms to oppose the passage of the king's troops, who were marching on their legitimate duty of seizing arms and ammunition collected for the purpose of warring against the king. The colonial orators and newspaper writers affirmed then, as they have affirmed since, that, up to the day of Lexington, no one had a thought of firing a shot against the Government. A more barefaced misstatement was never made. Men do not carry off cannon by scores, and accumulate everywhere great stores of warlike ammunition, without a thought of fighting. The colonists commenced the war by assembling in arms to oppose the progress of British troops obeying the orders of the Government. It matters not a whit on which side the first shot was fired. American troops have, many times since that event, fired upon rioters in the streets, under circumstances no stronger than those which brought on the fight at Lexington.

From all parts of New England the militia and volunteers poured in, and in three days after the fight, twenty thousand armed men were encamped between the rivers Mystic and Roxburgh, thus besieging Boston. They at once set to work throwing up formidable earthworks, the English troops remaining within their intrenchments across the neck of land joining Boston with the mainland.

The streets of Boston were crowded with an excited populace when Captain Wilson and his party rode into it at two in the morning. No one thought of going to bed, and all were excited to the last degree at the news of the battle. All sorts of reports prevailed. On the colonial side it was affirmed that the British, in their retreat, had shot down women and children; while the soldiers affirmed that the colonists had scalped many of their number who fell in the fight. The latter statement was officially made by Lord Percy in his report of the engagement.

Captain Wilson rode direct to the house of his wife's friends. They were still up, and were delighted to see Mary Wilson, for such exaggerated reports had been received of the fight that they were alarmed for her safety. They belonged to the moderate party, who saw that there were faults on both sides and regretted bitterly both the obstinacy of the English Parliament in attempting to coerce the colonists and the determination of the latter to oppose, by force of arms, the legitimate rights of the mother country.

Until the morning the events of the preceding day were talked over; a few hours' repose was then taken, after which Captain Wilson went to the headquarters of General Gage and offered his services. Although Boston was the headquarters of the disaffected party, no less than two hundred men came forward as volunteers in the king's service, and Captain Wilson was at once appointed to the command of a company of fifty men. Before leaving the army he had taken part in several expeditions against the Indians, and his knowledge of forest warfare rendered him a valuable acquisition. Boston was but poorly provisioned, and, as upon the day when the news of Lexington reached New York two vessels laden with flour for the use of the troops at Boston were seized by the colonists and many other supplies cut off, the danger of the place being starved out was considerable. General Gage, therefore, offered no opposition to the exit from the city of those who wished to avoid the horror of a siege, and a considerable portion of the population made their way through to the rebel lines. Every day brought news of fresh risings throughout the country; the governors of the various provinces were powerless; small garrisons of English troops were disarmed and made prisoners; and the fortress of Ticonderoga, held only by fifty men, was captured by the Americans without resistance. In one month after the first shot was fired the whole of the American colonies were in rebellion.

The news was received in England with astonishment and sorrow. Great concessions had been made by Parliament, but the news had reached America too late to avoid hostilities. Public opinion was divided; many were in favor of granting at once all that the colonists demanded, and many officers of rank and position resigned their commissions rather than fight against the Americans. The division, indeed, was almost as general and complete as it had been in the time of our own civil war. In London the feeling in favor of the colonists was strong, but in the country generally the determination to repress the rising was in the ascendant. The colonists had, with great shrewdness, dispatched a fast-sailing ship to Europe upon the day following the battle of Lexington, giving their account of the affair, and representing it as a massacre of defenseless colonists by British troops; and the story thus told excited a sympathy which would not, perhaps, have been extended to them had the real facts of the case been known. Representatives from all the colonies met at Philadelphia to organize the national resistance; but as yet, although many of the bolder spirits spoke of altogether throwing off allegiance to England, no resolution was proposed to that effect.

For the first six weeks after his arrival at Boston, Captain Wilson was engaged in drilling his company. Harold was, of course, attached to it, and entered with ardor upon his duties. Captain Wilson did not attempt to form his men into a band of regular soldiers; accuracy of movement and regularity of drill would be of little avail in the warfare in which they were likely to be engaged. Accuracy in shooting, quickness in taking cover, and steadiness in carrying out any general orders were the principal objects to be attained. Most of the men had already taken part in frontier warfare. The majority of them were gentlemen—Englishmen who, like their captain, had come out from home and purchased small estates in the country. The discipline, therefore, was not strict, and, off duty, all were on terms of equality.

Toward the end of May and beginning of June considerable re-enforcements arrived from England, and, as a step preparatory to offensive measures, General Gage, on June 12, issued a proclamation offering, in his Majesty's name, a free pardon to all who should forthwith lay down their arms, John Hancock and General Adams only excepted, and threatening with punishment all who should delay to avail themselves of the offer. This proclamation had no effect whatever.

Near the peninsula of Boston, on the north, and separated from it by the Charles River, which is navigable and about the breadth of the Thames at London Bridge, is another neck of land called the Peninsula of Charlestown. On the north bank, opposite Boston, lies the town of Charlestown, behind which, in the center of the peninsula, rises an eminence called Bunker's Hill. Bunker's Hill is sufficiently high to overlook any part of Boston and near enough to be within cannon-shot. This hill was unoccupied by either party, and about this time the Americans, hearing that General Gage had come to a determination to fortify it, resolved to defeat his resolution by being the first to occupy it.

About nine in the evening of June 16 a detachment from the colonial army, one thousand strong, under the command of Colonel Prescott, moved along the Charlestown road and took up a position on a shoulder of Bunker's Hill, which was known as Breed's Hill, just above the town of Charlestown. They reached this position at midnight. Each man carried a pick and shovel, and all night they worked vigorously in intrenching the position. Not a word was spoken, and the watch on board the men-of-war in the harbor were ignorant of what was going on so near at hand. At daybreak the alarm was given, and the Lively opened a cannonade upon the redoubt. A battery of guns was placed on Copp's Hill, behind Boston, distant twelve hundred yards from the works, and this, also, opened fire. The Americans continued their work, throwing up fresh intrenchments; and, singularly, only one man was killed by the fire from the ships and redoubt. A breastwork was carried down the hill to the flat ground which, intersected by fences, stretched away to the Mystic. By nine o'clock they had completed their intrenchments.

Prescott sent off for re-enforcements, but there was little harmony among the colonial troops. Disputes between the contingents of the various provinces were common; there was no head of sufficient authority to enforce his orders upon the whole; and a long delay took place before the re-enforcements were sent forward.

In the meantime the English had been preparing to attack the position. The Fifth, Thirty-eighth, Forty-third, and Fifty-second regiments, with ten companies of the grenadiers and ten of the light infantry, with a proportion of field artillery, embarked in boats, and, crossing the harbor, landed on the outward side of the peninsula, near the Mystic, with a view of outflanking the American position and surrounding them. The force was under the command of Major General Howe, under whom was Brigadier General Piggott.

Upon seeing the strength of the American position, General Howe halted, and sent back for further re-enforcements. The Americans improved the time thus given them by forming a breastwork in front of an old ditch. Here there was a post-and-rail fence. They ran up another by the side of this and filled the space between the two with the new-mown hay, which, cut only the day before, lay thickly over the meadows.

Two battalions were sent across to re-enforce Howe, while large re-enforcements, with six guns, arrived