fire, and waited for reinforcements. For
almost two hours this desultory firing continued. With the cessation of
the storm and arrival of broad daylight, six more boats attempted to
reach the Queenston landing. One boat was sunk by a discharge of grape
from Dennis's howitzer; another, with Colonel Fenwick, of the U.S.
artillery, was swept below the landing to a cove where, in the attack by
Cameron's volunteers that followed, Fenwick, terribly wounded, was, with
most of his men, taken prisoner. Another boat drifted under Vrooman's,
and was captured there, while others, more fortunate, landed two
additional companies of the 13th, forty artillerymen and some militia.
The shouts of the fighters and screams of the wounded were heard by the
hundreds of spectators who were parading the river bank at Lewiston, all
ready to witness "the humiliation of Canada."

General Van Rensselaer had commanded that the "Heights had to be taken."
Wool, a gallant soldier, only twenty-three, suffering from a bullet that
had passed through both his thighs--no superior officer coming to his
support--volunteered for the duty. He expressed his eagerness to make
the attempt. Gansfort, a brother officer of Wool's, had been shown by a
river guide a narrow, twisting trail, used at times by fishermen,
leading to the summit. This he pointed out to Wool as a possible pathway
to the Heights, where a force of determined men might gain the rear of
the British position. Wool, at the same time, had also been informed
that Williams, hitherto on the Heights, had been ordered to descend the
hill to assist Dennis--which was Brock's first command on reaching the
redan. Followed by Van Rensselaer's aide, who had orders "to shoot every
man who faltered," Wool at once commenced the ascent, leaving one
hundred of his men to protect the landing.

Picked artillerymen led the way. Concealed by rock and thicket, and
unobserved by the British--the trail being regarded as impassable--they
reached the hill-top, only thirty yards in rear of the solitary gun in
the redan. The noise of their movements was drowned by the crash of the
batteries, which reduced Hamilton's stone house to ruins and drove
Crowther and his small gun out of range. The shells from the enemy's
mortars rained upon the village, and his field-pieces subjected the
gardens and orchards of Queenston to a searching inquisition.

On reaching the summit, Wool, when the last straggler had arrived,
formed his men,