Bunker Hill

by Howard Fast

  Prescott took Feversham aside. “Doctor,” he said, “you’re English, and you have a British army record. They’ll hear it in your speech, and as sure as God, they’ll hang you.”

  “Only if they defeat you.” Feversham smiled and rubbed his bloodshot eyes. “I’m tired and cranky, Colonel, but I’m filled with admiration for you and your demented farmers.”

  “And who is more sane? Those bastards who have left their dead like a carpet on the hillside? Go with the wounded, Doctor.”

  Feversham shook his head. “It would set a poor example for that man,” he said softly, nodding at Gonzales and smiling bitterly. “He’s a Jew out of Providence. Would you have a Christian gentleman take off, where he is willing to stay? Only one favor from you, Colonel, and I know the burden you carry. I have a wife in Ridgefield in Connecticut, and I have a letter to her in my pocket. If you live and I die, will you see that it reaches her?”

  “That I will.”

  Prescott strode off, eager to get away from the moans and whimpers of the wounded. But he had no feeling that he would live through this day, and he passed Feversham’s letter on to Dr. Warren.

  JUNE 17, 4:00 P.M.

  A lighter, pulling alongside Vindicator, informed Captain Woodly that Sir William’s grenadier guardsmen had been practically wiped out. An officer on the lighter commandeered the eight marines stationed on board Captain Woodly’s ship for reinforcements onshore. It fell to Lieutenant Threadberry to bring the news to Mrs. Loring.

  The two women, Elizabeth Loring and Prudence Hallsbury, had been watching the battle on Breed’s Hill with interest and mounting excitement. The view from their place on board Vindicator was interrupted only by the clouds of smoke from the gunfire, the smoke from burning Charlestown blowing away from the battleground and toward the Charles River. At this distance, the lines of soldiers in their bright red uniforms were quite unreal. The encounter of the light infantry, which attacked the American left flank, defended by the New Hampshire riflemen, was hidden from their view by a fold of ground. The charge of the grenadiers was hidden in part by brush and gunsmoke from the riflemen. The main attack against the redoubt and the breastworks held by Colonel Prescott and his militiamen was in full view. The ladies cheered and clapped and toasted the exciting toylike soldiers until the attack was sent reeling back, after which both women became silent.

  However, Mrs. Loring’s faith in the prowess of Sir William was unshaken until Lieutenant Threadberry appeared with the bitter news. She asked him why they were taking away the eight marines.

  “Well, ma’am,” he said uneasily, “they be wanting all the reinforcement they can find.”

  “Are we losing the battle, then?”

  “Oh, good heavens, no. The battle’s only begun.”

  “And what of Sir William? What news do they bring of him?”

  “Well, ma’am—”

  “‘Well, ma’am, well, ma’am.’ I asked you a question!”

  “Not easily answered, ma’am.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  “It’s hard to say.”

  “Please say it!” she snapped.

  “Well, ma’am, the grenadiers have suffered, yes, they’ve suffered deplorably—”

  “Go on.”

  Threadberry sighed and shook his head. “They’ve been wiped out, more or less.”

  “Wiped out?”

  “Killed and wounded,” Threadberry replied unhappily.

  “And Sir William?”

  “We don’t know—”

  Mrs. Loring did what was expected of a woman in such circumstances. She fainted, but slowly enough for Lieutenant Threadberry to catch her and ease her abundant body onto the deck. Prudence immediately searched in her bag for smelling salts, and the lieutenant, taking advantage of his position and the emergency, allowed one hand to cover her breast, the better to hold her as he lowered her. Her eyes fluttered, but she did not ask him to remove his hand. Prudence came to her aid with the smelling salts, and Threadberry had quick visions of what the future might hold if the commander in chief passed out of the picture.

  “I am all right now,” Mrs. Loring whispered. “Please help me up.”

  Lieutenant Threadberry helped her back to her chair, and she did not chide him for his loose hands.

  “You must find out,” she begged him. “I will die a thousand deaths if you don’t find out.”

  “Well, ma’am, unless a boat comes from shore…Well, I don’t know how.”

  “You have signal flags.”

  “But that’s an odd one to signal. I don’t really know how to put it into flags, but I’ll try.”

  Burgoyne and Clinton had picked up over a hundred men by the time they reached the mass of retreating light infantry and marines from the burning houses of Charlestown to Morton’s Point. Their broken ranks were spotted with wounded men in bloodstained uniforms, men on the ground, groaning and weeping with pain, men trying to stanch the flow of blood. In all his years of war in Europe, Burgoyne had never witnessed a scene like this one, an army smashed and disorganized so quickly. And there was Howe, alive, unhurt—and ready to embrace Burgoyne.

  “We must go back,” Howe shouted. “Now! We must attack again.”

  Burgoyne grabbed him by both arms. “Steady, sir. Steady. Of course, we must go back.”

  Major Pitcairn joined them. “We lost most of our officers. The bastards picked them off. If we are to attack again, General Burgoyne, you and Sir Henry must lead us. There’s Captain Freddy with the Irish Guards and Templeton with the marines. Maybe half a dozen other officers.”

  “Good man,” Howe said generously. “Good thinking, Pitcairn. Go with the marines. Henry, you command the light infantry. I’ll lead.”

  “What’s our point?” Pitcairn asked, quivering with excitement.

  “The redoubt, left and right flank,” Howe said. “Sir Henry, you agree?”

  The question gave Clinton leadership, and he did not hesitate to accept it. “Absolutely. The redoubt and that damn barricade. Now, these are the orders. All men are to drop their packs. We go in with bayonets. No stopping to reload. We go up in four columns, four abreast, no pause, no mercy, no quarter. We mount the hill slowly, save our strength. We’ll each of us head a column. No turning back.” He turned to Admiral Graves, who had just appeared. “Admiral, I want every gun you can give us on the Charleston Neck!” He took out his watch. It was four o’clock. “An hour from now, gentlemen, we’ll have this cursed peninsula, and this rebellion will be over.”

  There were no more bandages or dressings. The catgut was gone. The rum and water had been used up. Gonzales and Feversham had treated thirty-two wounded men as best as they could. The dead and those wounded who could not walk were on their way to the Charlestown Neck. Two mule-drawn carts had appeared. One was loaded with dead bodies; the other, with the badly wounded. Feversham had put his bloody instruments in his bag.

  From the waterside, at the foot of the hill, the British drumbeat began. The guns on the ships in the Charles River stopped firing as they began the process of being warped toward Charlestown Neck. In the strange silence that ensued, the tattoo sounded clear and sharp. Overhead, the afternoon sun was hidden behind one of the fluffy white clouds that sailed slowly through the burnished blue sky, and a cool shadow covered the men behind the barricade. The fire in Charlestown village, which had eagerly consumed the dry wooden houses like an angry, ravishing dragon, began to die down.

  “If they hold,” Gonzales said to Feversham, “we can help. But if the British break through—”

  “Which is why I say you should go.”

  “I understand that, Dr. Feversham.”

  “Damn it,” Feversham said, “I don’t know why I’m here. Chances are we’ll both be dead before this day is out. What’s your stake here?”

  “My great-grandfather, Dr. Feversham, was driven out of Cuba by the Inquisition. He came to Providence a hundred years ago, and I am the third generation in this land. That’s m
y stake here. And now I think the attack is beginning.”

  Gonzales rose and walked to the barricade. Feversham walked with him. Even with the addition of Stark’s New Hampshire men and the few hundred Connecticut volunteers who had been with Knowlton, Prescott’s line was no thicker than it was before the first attack. At least two hundred men were missing, slipped away for want of powder or excess of fear—or wounded or dead.

  There was no need now to pretend that the barricade was undefended. The line of militia and riflemen watched in silence as the four columns of light infantry, royal marines, and even a small cluster of the surviving grenadiers, in their big bearskin shakos, began their slow, deliberate approach up Breed’s Hill.

  “My God,” Knowlton said to Prescott. “Give the bastards their due.”

  “That’s Burgoyne leading them,” Prescott said.

  Walking along the position his riflemen had taken, John Stark said quietly, “If you have powder, start picking them off at two hundred yards.”

  The sun glinted from the bayonets of the advancing soldiers.

  Here and there, along the American line, men turned and ran. Prescott ignored them. From the redoubt, Gridley shouted to Prescott, “Colonel, can you spare us a few men?”

  “Any volunteers for the redoubt?” Prescott called.

  The bleakness of it struck Feversham. Why had they ever built that cursed redoubt? It was a death trap.

  Half a dozen men left the line, walked to the redoubt, and climbed over the entry port.

  Feversham thought, More courage than I can understand. He tried to comprehend them—Prescott and Gridley and Stark and Warren and Putnam and the hundreds of men crouching behind the barricade.

  Prescott paused by Feversham. “We have two shots, Doctor. Will they run again?”

  “No. They’ll come in with their bayonets.”

  Now the New Hampshire riflemen were beginning to fire, a ragged shooting, and here and there a British soldier collapsed, but the pace of the advance neither slowed nor quickened. Clinton led one column; Burgoyne, another. Sir William Howe and Pitcairn marched before the marines. At fifty paces, they surged into a run, screaming at the top of their lungs, and the farmers and riflemen behind the barricade and in the redoubt fired their volley. The front ranks of the four columns went down, but those behind them leaped over their bodies and swarmed over the barricade and into the redoubt. The Americans clubbed their guns and swung savagely. Some of them beat back the light infantrymen, and others were skewered with bayonets, stabbed again and again by the hated and fear-crazed British soldiers, and over all a screaming, wailing sound of pain and terror.

  Feversham saw a bayonet coming at him. He had no memory of the man who held it or how he was able to dodge the blade, but suddenly, he was on the ground, struggling with the British soldier for his weapon, and then a militiaman swung his musket against the soldier’s throat. With all the sound, Feversham heard the man’s neck snap, and he scrambled to his feet, dazed as the battle surged around him. He saw Prescott, standing on the barricade, swinging his sword, and all along the barricade, the same wild struggle.

  Later, dressing Gridley’s wounds, Feversham heard the story of the fight in the redoubt. A young fellow from Amesbury, name of Currier, took command with Gridley after Dr. Warren was killed, shot through the head as the first marines leaped over the wall, led by Major Pitcairn. The Negro slave—Gridley knew him only by the name of Robert—shot Pitcairn and killed him, a sort of grim justice, since Pitcairn had been in command of the troops that shot down the minutemen at Lexington two months before. Gridley had laid about him with his sword, and three other marines were either killed or wounded, which halted the attack on the redoubt long enough for the rest of the men there to leap over the rear wall, giving up the redoubt and running down the road to Bunker Hill.

  Prescott saw this pell-mell retreat from the redoubt. Knowing that now his right flank was undefended, he realized that the less than two hundred men fighting the bayonets of the light infantry on the barricade were getting the worst of it. He shouted for them to retreat.

  Putnam, amazingly calm, yelled, “Follow me!” Along with Knowlton, he led the wild scramble down behind the redoubt toward Bunker Hill, while Stark’s New Hampshire men formed a sort of line, facing the British, their long rifles presented, Stark at one end of the line, Prescott at the other end. About a dozen of the New Hampshire men, their rifles still loaded, fired at the light infantry, and six of the British soldiers fell. The British paused, and the New Hampshire men, in an incredible display of calm and discipline, moved backward, their rifles still presented. The ground between them and the barricade was littered with the dead Connecticut and Massachusetts militiamen. General Howe, standing on the wall of the redoubt, screamed, “Onward! Onward! Charge the fuckin’ bastards!”

  Still, the British held back.

  Then Burgoyne and Clinton burst through to the barricade, waving their swords wildly, and Prescott yelled, “Run! Run!”

  The riflemen poured down the slope behind Breed’s Hill, the light infantry after them. Feversham, who had witnessed this scene from a dozen paces behind the riflemen, ran with them, desperately fighting not to stumble and fall. One of the riflemen fell, and British bayonets stabbed into his back.

  The distance between the base of Breed’s Hill and the barricade Putnam had ordered built that morning on the slope of Bunker Hill was no more than 150 paces. As he ran down the hill behind the redoubt, Feversham saw, to his amazement, a line of sixty-five men standing in open order and facing the oncoming British. They stood like rocks, allowing the men racing away from the British to pass through their line and forcing the oncoming mass of light infantry and marines to halt their pursuit. The men running down from Breed’s Hill slowed, stopped, and turned. The calm, stolid courage of these sixty-five men had an electric effect on the militiamen who had been driven off Breed’s Hill and out of the redoubt. The riflemen who had powder left reloaded with desperate speed, as did those of the militia who had powder for their muskets, in all perhaps two dozen of the Americans. They moved up Bunker Hill, walking slowly backward. Another hundred or so men, who had been waiting as a second line of defense on Bunker Hill, took courage and left their stone wall and advanced down the hillside.

  Feversham realized that the British had only their bayonets now. They had never stopped to reload. The sixty-five men, he would learn later, were a well-drilled, well-trained little company from the town of Ipswich. It was a demonic, incredible display of courage and madness on both sides. Already almost half of the entire British army had been killed or wounded, and Breed’s Hill was littered with bodies of the American dead. Now a few hundred Americans, most of them without ammunition, still presented so terrifying a face that the British hesitated to advance.

  Yet they did advance, Howe and Clinton leading them with utter indifference to the burst of flame from the Ipswich guns. Then the combat was hand to hand as the Americans retreated up to Bunker Hill and the stone walls Putnam had fortified earlier in the day.

  There was a pause now. Halfway up the slope of Bunker Hill, the British stopped to reorganize, just out of musket range. The riflemen were out of ammunition, and almost half of the Ipswich contingent had died under the British bayonets, along with at least twenty of the militia and riflemen.

  Panting, bloodstained, and exhausted, Prescott conferred with Gridley and Putnam and Knowlton. It was up to Prescott, and he said flatly that it was over. “We did what we could do. We have no ammunition, and we can’t fight bayonets with clubs. Tell me, General Putnam, tell me why that bastard Artemus Ward left us here to die. Why didn’t he send ammunition? Why didn’t he reinforce us?”

  Gray-faced, so exhausted that he could hardly speak, old Putnam only shook his head.

  Colonel Little, who led the Ipswich men, said, “The neck is still open. The British ships are warping back with the tide. We can still get across.”

  Prescott called to Feversham, who, with Gonzales, was tyin
g wounds with strips of torn shirts. “Feversham, leave off! We’ll carry those who can’t walk. We’re going to run for the Charlestown Neck.”

  The orders were passed along. As the British prepared to renew their assault, what was left of the American force that had defended Breed’s Hill and the redoubt formed ranks and marched down Bunker Hill, carrying their dead and wounded across the Charlestown Neck.

  JUNE 17, 5:00 P.M.

  At five o’clock, in the early evening of June 17th, in the year 1775, Sir William Howe, supreme commander of His Majesty George III’s troops in America, stood on Bunker Hill, on the Charlestown peninsula, and watched the last of the American defenders cross the Charlestown Neck.

  He said to Clinton, quietly, “Henry, put what is left of the Thirty-eighth and the Fifth on guard across the Charlestown Neck. Have the rest of the light infantry fortify the top of this hill. Take two field guns down to the neck and load with grape, just in case those bastards have a notion to return.”

  Too tired to stand, Howe sat down on the stone wall. The sky in the west turned pink as the sun began to sink behind a cluster of cumulus clouds. A cool breeze broke the heat of the day.

  “Major Wilkens,” he called out to the only marine officer left unwounded.

  “Sir?”

  “Have the marines pick up the wounded and take them down to the ferry landing. The surgeons from Somerset are waiting at the dock. I want a burying detail.”

  “The American dead, sir?”

  “Bury them.”

  “And our dead?”

  “Shroud them and dig a pit at Morton’s Point. Tell Hallsbury we shall want a service tomorrow. For the officers.”

  General Pigot appeared. “We have thirty-one prisoners, most of them wounded.”

  “Put them in Boston jail.”

  “They’re almost all of them wounded, some badly. Can we spare a surgeon?”