The boy's book of battle-lyrics a collection of verses illustrating some notable events in the history of the United States of America, from the Colonial period to the outbreak of the Sectional War |
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THE BATTLE OF BENNINGTON.
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 | The boy's book of battle-lyrics |  |
THE BATTLE OF BENNINGTON.
BAUM'S EXPEDITION.
When Burgoyne was making the descent from Canada which ended in his capture, he began to fall short of provisions. Having learned that the colonists had a store of cattle, he despatched Lieutenant-colonel Baum, with a force of Hessians, loyalists, and savages, to capture the stock and drive it into camp. There were other ostensible objects, such as feeling the opinion of the country and recruiting the corps of loyalists; but the main object was the capture of the cattle. Baum received a sort of roving commission. He was ordered “to scour the country from Rockingham to Otter Creek,” to go down the Connecticut to Brattleborough, return by the Albany road, and rejoin Burgoyne, and to impress people with the belief that his force was the advance guard of Burgoyne's army on its way to Boston. He was to arrest all officers or men of the enemy who were found to live off the country, and to impress all the horses in the way, “with as many saddles and bridles as can be found.” There were to be thirteen hundred horses, at least, taken, tied in tens for convenience. In short, Baum was to plunder.
The command marched, and on the next day, the 14th of August, 1777, they arrived at the
People were uncertain as to the real destination of Burgoyne. He had partially succeeded in convincing many that he meant to march on Boston. The Green Mountain men sent word to Exeter imploring aid. The Provincial Assembly of New Hampshire was called hastily together, and its speaker, John Langdon, offered a subsidy of several thousand dollars in hard money to raise and equip troops, and suggested that John Stark should take command. Langdon's words aroused his hearers. Two brigades were raised, one under Whipple and the other under Stark. The latter was then at home. He had distinguished himself at Trenton and Princeton, and had been sent home to direct recruiting. While there, Congress promoted several junior officers, and left his name off. He resigned, but kept up active efforts in behalf of the cause. He accepted the command offered, with the stipulation that he should act at his own discretion; and a part of the brigade raised for him, and a part of Whipple's, was at once placed under his separate command. Men flocked to his support, and at Manchester, twenty miles north of Bennington, he was joined by Colonel Warner, with the remnant of the Vermont men from the disastrous field of Hubbardton. At the same time General Lincoln, who had been ordered to conduct these new forces to the Hudson River, made his appearance. But Stark refused to yield the command, notwithstanding Congress had passed a resolution that the agreement made between him and New Hampshire was “highly prejudicial to the common cause.” He held his position. Hearing of the skirmish at Cambridge, he sent a detachment to meet them. Learning of Baum's advance, he collected all the additional forces possible, and on the morning of the 14th he set forward to support the advance detachment. He soon met the retreating advance under Gregg, and found the enemy posted upon high ground near the Walloomscoick, where they were throwing up hasty intrenchments. Stark fell back to wait for support and plan his action; and Baum, alarmed at the number of the Americans, sent an express to Burgoyne asking for reinforcements. It resulted in Brayman being sent with five hundred men; but they came too late to be of use.
The next day there was a heavy rain, and both sides merely made ready for the fight. The main part of Baum's forces were posted on the high ground, and intrenched as we have stated; but a strong party, principally of Rangers, guarded the ford where the Bennington road crossed. The loyalists, under Peters, had a breastwork on the south side of the river, and a few chasseurs at the mouth of a small water-course. Stark's main body was encamped on the Bennington road.
There had been skirmishing on the 15th, but the rain prevented any active movement. The next morning was clear and bright, and Stark at once proceeded with his plan. It involved a simultaneous attack of various parties on the intrenchments of the enemy, while the main body under Stark drove the Tories upon the fortified Hessians, and the latter out of their fortified hold. The battle lasted two hours, and in spite of the obstinate bravery of Reidesel's dragoons, led by Baum in person, was
The story of the stirring scenes which I can remember well—
The battle-day of Bennington, and what thereon befell.
Yes! we were in the stubble where the hands had gone at dawn,
When, riding swiftly down the road, his dappled gray upon,
Whose flanks were marked with blood and foam, I saw my brother John.
His face was bright, his eyes alight, his bearing proud and high—
“Ho! whither do you speed so fast? Why do you hurry by,
While friends are eager for the news, John Manchester?” said I.
Now Stark has come to Bennington, to lead us in the fray,
Where we may smite these Hessian wolves who babes and women slay?
Let baser men remain at toil, as such have done before,
Let women spin and children play before the farm-house door;
But till these knaves are driven hence I till the ground no more.
Come you and join me in the strife that Lexington began;
And as the foe comes down on us, and dares us man to man,
Let you and I acquit ourselves as stout Vermonters can.”
The blood in wilder current coursed through artery and vein;
An impulse there to do and dare went swiftly through each brain.
Our sight and hearing keener grew before his voice's tone—
We saw the cottage roof aflame, the corn-crib overthrown;
We heard the widow's woful wail, the famished orphan's moan.
We thrilled from heart to finger-tip; the very air grew red;
And casting by the tools of toil, off to the house we sped,
To wipe the chambers of our guns and mould the deadly lead.
“If you, my youngest born, should fall, what would become of me?
And then, a boy in such a fight of little use can be—”
And added—“It was but in June you reached your sixteenth year;
So, while your brother is away, remain to guard us here.
These Hessians whom the king has sent, a hireling war to wage
On children as on bearded men, are ruthless in their rage;
Then go not hence to fall in fight, child of your mother's age.”
In years a boy, I know, but then a man in heart am I;
My country needs me in the fight—I cannot more than die.
I come of Abner Manchester, who never knew a fear;
And though as much as any one I hold my mother dear,
I may not on this day of days remain a laggard here.
To herd with women while the fight for freedom is unwon,
While he has sight to mark a foe and strength to bear a gun,
Suits not a stout Green Mountain Boy, nor yet my father's son.”
“But take yon firelock from the hooks—it was your father's pride—
He bore it well against the French, nine years before he died—”
As thus she spoke my mother's voice grew tremulous in tone—
“And when you use it, lest your foe in lingering anguish moan,
Sight at a point two fingers' length beneath the collar-bone.
Now, go! my heart, as thus we part, thrills with a mother's pain;
To save you from a single pang, its latest drop I'd drain;
But—show the courage of your sire, or come not here again!”
And found the forces drawn in line, at two o'clock that day,
In front of where, on Walloomscoick, intrenched the foemen lay.
Bold Stark rode slowly down the ranks, with proud, uncovered head—
So quiet we that on the turf we heard his horse's tread—
And at the centre drew his rein, and these the words he said—
“Boys! yonder are the red-coat troops, and, mark me every one,
We win this fight for truth and right, before the day be done,
Or Molly Stark's a widow at the setting of the sun!”
A murmur, for they felt it long until the fight began,
Although they knew the tardiness was from a well-formed plan.
That Herrick with three hundred men should march upon their right,
And Nichols on the left with more spared from our scanty might,
To join their forces in the rear, and there assault begin,
While we upon their front advanced at signal of the din;
And then let those who dealt their blows with fiercest vigor win.
While like a statue on his steed so motionless sat Stark,
When suddenly, with finger raised, the general whispered—“Hark!”
We stood as silent as the grave, and as we bent to hear,
Above the silence far away there came a lusty cheer;
Some shots were fired—we knew our friends had joined upon their rear—
“Now, hearts so warm, move like the storm!” said Stark, and led the way;
“Green Mountain Boys, acquit yourselves like mettled men to-day!
Take careful aim and waste no lead! the wolves are brought to bay!”
I heard a whizzing sound go past—down fell a comrade near—
There was a throbbing in my breast that seemed almost like fear—
A shock, to see a stout young man, in all his youth and pride,
One who had left the day before a fond and blooming bride,
Thus done to death, the scarlet blood slow trickling from his side;
And doubly strange that fearful sight to one who ne'er before,
Amid the shouting of the hosts, and the cannon's deadly roar,
Had seen a fellow-mortal lie thus lifeless in his gore.
Uprose grim wrath and bitter hate, and bitterer disdain.
I longed to add a leaden drop unto that whizzing rain—
The tenderness of youth I found forevermore had gone.
My cheek was leaned upon my gun, the sight was finely drawn.
Upon a gold-laced officer who cheered the Hessians on;
And, trembling in my eagerness to strike for home a blow,
I sent the lead, as mother said, two fingers' length below
The ridge that marked the collar-bone, and laughed when fell the foe.
And on the breastwork ridge take line, a dark and threatening troop—
Compact they form, with sabres drawn, upon our force to swoop.
We newly load and careful prime our firelocks for the curs—
For well we know their uniform, those Brunswicker chasseurs!
They come at last whose doom was past long, weary months before—
They come to meet the death that we to deal upon them swore
When first the bearded robbers came for plunder to our shore.
Right gracefully and gallantly they sit their horses brown,
Then rowel-deep they drive their spurs, and thunder madly down.
But as the ground is shaking round before their horses' tread,
A sheet of fire their sabres lights, high waving overhead,
And of the hundred men who charge full forty-eight lie dead.
Those who survive in vain they strive; they may not fight nor run—
We pass them quickly to the rear, our captives every one.
And so we serve the Brunswicker that day at Bennington.
As when a dam gives way, and leaves the waters uncontrolled—
Sweeping to break the square of steel in centre of their hold.
No peal of trump nor tap of drum our eager footsteps timed;
With firelocks clubbed or knife in hand, our faces powder-grimed,
Fatigue unfelt and fear unknown, the ridge of earth we climbed;
Down from its crest we fearless plunged amid the smoke clouds dun,
But struck no blow upon the foe—resistance there was none—
Down fell their arms, uprose the white, and Bennington was won.
And, leaning on our firelocks, heard the tales that soldiers tell
How comrades whom they little knew had done their duty well,
And how amid the hosts in fight no coward had been found;
Then gazed upon the foemen slain that lay in heaps around,
And said, in bitter hate and scorn, they well became the ground—
So evermore by sea and shore might those invaders be,
Who came with chains for limbs of men who by their birth were free—
A pang shot sharply through my brain—my brother! where was he?
His feet were pointed to the ridge, his back was to the plain,
And round him in a curving row a dozen Hessians slain.
Strown like a swathe of grass before some lusty mower's sweep—
Of those whose souls had fled their forms through bloody wounds and deep.
I placed his corse upon his horse, and gently homeward led
The wearied steed that ne'er before was ridden by the dead;
And we buried the corse in the meadow with a white stone at its head.
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