y exploits. Five officers and thirty-six
men were killed and wounded, and seven officers and six dragoons
taken, with horses, arms and equipments. Colonels White, Washington
and Jamieson, with other officers and men, threw themselves in the
river and escaped by swimming; while some who followed their example,
perished.

The arrival of a reinforcement of three thousand men from New York
enabled Sir Henry Clinton to throw a powerful detachment under Lord
Cornwallis, to the east of Cooper River, to complete the investment of
the town and cut off all retreat. Fort Moultrie surrendered. The
batteries of the third parallel were opened upon the town. This fire
was kept up for two days. The besiegers crossed the canal; pushed a
double sap to the inside of the abatis, and prepared to make an
assault by sea and land. All hopes of successful defence were at an
end. The works were in ruins; the guns almost all dismounted; the
garrison exhausted with fatigue, the provisions nearly consumed. The
inhabitants, dreading the horrors of an assault, joined in a petition
to General Lincoln and prevailed upon him to offer a surrender on
terms which had already been offered and rejected. These terms were
still granted, and the capitulation was signed on the 12th of May. The
garrison were allowed some of the honors of war.

The loss of the British in the siege was seventy-six killed and one
hundred and eighty-nine wounded; that of the Americans nearly the
same. The prisoners taken by the enemy, exclusive of the sailors,
amounted to five thousand, six hundred and eighteen men; comprising
every male adult in the city. The Continental troops did not exceed
two thousand, five hundred of whom were in the hospital; the rest were
citizens and militia.

Sir Henry Clinton considered the fall of Charleston decisive of the
fate of South Carolina. To complete the subjugation of the country, he
planned three expeditions into the interior; one, under
Lieutenant-colonel Brown, was to move up the Savannah River to
Augusta, on the borders of Georgia; another, under Lieutenant-colonel
Cruger, was to proceed up the southwest side of the Santee River to
the district of Ninety-Six,{2} a fertile and salubrious region,
between the Savannah and the Saluda rivers: while a third, under
Cornwallis, was to cross the Santee, march up the northeast bank, and
strike at a corps of troops under Colonel Buford, which were
retreating to North Carolina with artillery and a n