aptain, Van Keuren, who for some cause was not in the fight, with his
minister, Rev. Andrew King, and many other neighbors--a house
full,--some to congratulate Van Arsdale on his escape, others, with
anxious faces to inquire after missing friends, and others still to
learn the particulars of the battle. The account he gave of what
happened after leaving home for the scene of conflict, was briefly as
follows:

A walk of several hours brought them to a little stream at the foot of
the hill upon which Fort Montgomery stood, and where they had intended
to stop and eat their dinner; but hearing a great deal of noise and
bustle in the fort, they only took a drink from the brook, and hastened
up into the works, when they soon learned that a large body of the enemy
had landed below the Dunderbergh, and were advancing by a circuitous
route to attack the fort in the rear. About the middle of the afternoon
the British columns appeared, and pressed on to the assault with
bayonets fixed. But our men poured down upon them such a destructive
fire of bullets and grape shot that they fell in heaps, and were kept at
bay till night-fall, when our folks, being worn out by continued
fighting, and overpowered by numbers, were obliged to give way. Then
Gov. Clinton told them to escape for their lives, when many fought their
way out, or scrambled over the wall, and so got away. It must have fared
badly with the rest, as the enemy after entering the fort continued to
stab, knock down and kill our soldiers without pity. Favored by the
darkness, Tunis attempted to escape through one of the entrances, though
it was nearly blocked up by the assailing column, and the heaps of
killed and wounded; but presently, as an English soldier held a
militiaman bayoneted against the wall, Tunis, stooping down, slipped
between the Briton's legs, and escaped around the fort toward the river.
He said he had gone but a little way, when a cry of distress, evidently
from a young person, arrested his attention. A poor boy, in making his
escape, had fallen into a crevice in the rocks, and was unable to
extricate himself. Tunis, at no little risk, crept down to where the lad
was and drew him out, but in doing so hurt himself quite badly, by
scraping one of his legs on a sharp rock. He then gained the river and
found a skiff, in which he and two or three others crossed over. Then a
party of them travelled in Indian file, through the darkness and cold
drizzling rain, stop