The Republican journal., 1916-02-10

ers, which had been placed on the shore.
Tuesday, the 9th, was marked by more
of the same desultory firing in which q
boat from the American fleet was sunk.
On Wednesday, July 18th. the morning
was calm and misty. At o'clock the
American fleet was in line up and down
the bay, Just out of musket shot of the
defenders. Four hundred men were Or
dered into the boats. A landing was
made on the precipitous side of the pen
insuia.
The Assault.
The shore just north of Dyce's head is
line of steep. rocky cliffs. No landing
could be made there, but further on the
cliffs are succeeded by long, lofty bluff,
very steep indeed, but capable of being
climbed from the shore. Here at point
where great granite boulder lies upon
the beach, the Americans landed. just
as the boats touched the single heavy
fire was opened upon them through the
mist from the top of the bluff. An
American captain, Hinckley, leaped to
the top of the boulder on the beach and,
waving his sword, called to his men to
scale the bluff. He was mortally wound
ed and fell there. Israel TrasK, fifer
boy, crouched behind the rock for shelter
and played his fife Justify to cheer his
companions as they came under the lire
from the bluff. Trask visited the scene
OF the landing in after years, and 1t is to
him that we owe our knowledge of the
exact spot at which it was made and 9TH
er details of the attack. 1t was. soon
clear that the bluff was too steep at this
point for direct assault. The attacking
party divided, therefore, one party re-
naming on the beach to divert the at
tention of the British by an ir cessant rifle
fire, while two others sought better ap-
proach to the heights. The right hand
party captured a small British battery
situated on knoll at the highest point of
the ridge, but the left, although they
gained the top of the bluff, did not sue
coed in encircling the enemy. The latter
escaped, leaving thirty men killed or
wounded. The whole engagement lasted
only twenty minutes, but was brilliant
one in the fact that the ascent of an al
most precipitous bluff was made in the
open under heavy fire from troops en-
trenched above behind rocks and trees.
Indeed, it may we'll be called of the
most brilliant affairs of the whole war.
and had the expedition been finally sue
cessful would probably have become one
of the historic events of the Revolution.
The final defeat of the Americans result
ed in the effacement of all recollection of
this heroic assault. The capture of the
battery permitted the Americans to move
their fleet further in shore. The landing
party took possession of the heights aid
set out to reduce the fort, which lay
about mile further inland.
1t is one of the interesting episodes of
this siege that Sir John Moore, who was
later to die at Corunna, and to be one OF
the heroes of schoolboy defamation, was
a young lieutenant with the defending
forces. He himself tells of the affair in
his letters. He says, with no superfiuity
of modesty, of the conduct of his COM
rades at the taking of the battery:
IL was the only officer who did not
leave his post too soon. >"
IL was due to his fiery resolution that
the Americans were held at bay for a
time.
"Will the Hamiltons leave me?" he
cried. "Stand, and behave like soldiers. ="
In spite of his efforts the British were
forced to retreat. For several days
nothing of Importance was accomplished.
There was more or less skirmishlng and
cannonading, but little advance was
made. However, from their vantage
ground on the bluff, the Americans, under
General Lowell, gradually worked their
way nearer the fort. until they were
within seven hundred yards of it. 1t was
proposed to demand the surrender of the
fort, and if the demand was refused to
assault it directly. Probably this would
have resulted in lite capture.
Americans Retreat.
But Commodore Saltonstall seems to
have had little stomach for his work. He
refused to allow the marines to partlci-
pate in such an assault on the ground
that they had suffered much. He did
send some whaleboats back to Boston for
assistance. By August Is, however.
General Lowell, with such forces as he
had, made an attack upon the fort, and
succeeded in reaching the rear of it, al
though he was unable to enter. Forced
to fall back, intelligence was received the
same day that large British force was
approaching from Halifax. A general
retreat was ordered at once. During the
night of the 18th of August, the Ameri.
cans silently removed their cannon from
the peninsula and embarked.
Early the next morning party landed
and spiked the guns landed upon NAUTILUS
island. They had hardly gotten away
after the performance of this dangerous
duty when the British fleet appeared in
the ofing. 1t was vastly superior fore !
to that of the Americans and carried over
fifteen hundred men. Commodore Sal
tonstal formed his ships into a crescent
and made an attempt to resist the enemy
Sir George Collier, the British commander,
attacked with great energy and speedily
scattered the American vessels. One
ship was captured, but all the others
were burnt, or run ashore, with all sails
standing by their crews, who escaped to
land and returned to Massachusetts on
foot. So ended in failure and disgrace
the "Penobscot Expedition" as it was
called. The fact that for twenty one
days a small garrison with only three
sbips. held out against q large expedi-