FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144  
145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   >>   >|  
Clinton. It was evident from the beginning that the city must fall, and it has been a point much discussed whether Lincoln should have attempted to defend it, whether it would not have been better for the cause that he should withdraw his troops, and besiege the British from the open country. This was what afterward took place when the conquerors were reduced almost to starvation. An accident which happened to Marion has been esteemed a piece of singular good fortune to the cause, in saving him from surrender. He was in command of the small body of light troops, outside of the city, when he was called to aid in the defence. During the first days of the very deliberate investment, he was dining with some friends in the town, when, according to a custom not unusual in those hard-drinking times, the door was locked that no one should avoid his share of the conviviality. Determined to escape the infliction, he threw himself from the window into the street. The fall fractured his ankle and incapacitated him from service. In obedience to an order of Lincoln, commanding all officers unfit for duty to retire from the city, he left while the country was still open, and took refuge in his native region of St. John. His freedom was thus preserved for the service of his country. Now came the incursions of Tarleton and the devastating warfare of Cornwallis--a policy of savage extermination which would have driven a people with less capability of exertion to despair. But it happened, as it has before, that the very means employed to crush, excited the spirit of resistance, and deliverers were raised up for the oppressed. It was a peculiar species of warfare which was now entered upon, requiring novel resources both for attack and defence. A thinly inhabited country was the scene of operations, cut up in all directions by rivers and their branches, and innumerable swamps. Large bodies of troops could move only with difficulty; it was a service for small parties of cavalry always in movement, making up by rapidity for want of numbers. On the side of the British, Lieutenant-Colonel Tarleton, an officer of spirit, whose fiery youth has been vividly handed down to us in the portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds, was the leading representative of this method of warfare, harrying the land with his mounted troops, and overcoming by his activity and unscrupulousness. Success added terror to his name, as he gained victory after victory, and seeme
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144  
145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
troops
 

country

 

service

 

warfare

 

Tarleton

 
spirit
 
defence
 

happened

 
Lincoln
 

victory


British

 

entered

 
terror
 

peculiar

 
directions
 

species

 
oppressed
 
requiring
 

attack

 

thinly


inhabited

 

operations

 

resources

 

resistance

 

people

 

capability

 

exertion

 

driven

 

extermination

 

Cornwallis


policy

 
savage
 

despair

 

excited

 

gained

 
deliverers
 

employed

 
raised
 

swamps

 
handed

activity
 

vividly

 
officer
 
unscrupulousness
 

portrait

 

method

 
harrying
 

mounted

 
representative
 

Joshua