XVIII
ORISKANY
It is due, no doubt, to my limited knowledge of military matters and tomy lack of practical experience that I did not see the battle ofOriskany as our historians have recorded it; nor did I, before or duringthe affair, notice any intelligent effort towards assuming the offensiveas described by those whose reports portray an engagement in which,after the first onset, some semblance of military order reigned.
So, as I do not feel at liberty to picture Oriskany from the pens ofabler men, I must be content to describe only what I myself witnessed ofthat sad and unnecessary tragedy.
For three days we had been camped near the clearing called Oriska, whichis on the south bank of the Mohawk. Here the volunteers and militia ofTryon County were concentrating from Fort Dayton in the utmost disorder,their camps so foolishly pitched, so slovenly in those matterspertaining to cleanliness and health, so inadequately guarded, that Isaw no reason why our twin enemies, St. Leger and disease, should notmake an end of us ere we sighted the ramparts of Stanwix.
All night long the volunteer soldiery had been in-subordinate andriotous in the hamlet of Oriska, thronging the roads, shouting, singing,disputing, clamoring to be led against the enemy. Popular officers werecheered, unpopular officers jeered at, angry voices raised outsideheadquarters, demanding to know why old Honikol Herkimer delayed theadvance. Even officers shouted, "Forward! forward! Wake up Honikol!" Andspoke of the old General derisively, even injuriously, to their ownlasting disgrace.
Towards dawn, when I lay down on the floor of a barn to sleep, theuproar had died out in a measure; but lights still flickered in the campwhere soldiers were smoking their pipes and playing cards by the flareof splinter-wood torches. As for the pickets, they paid not theslightest attention to their duties, continually leaving their posts tohobnob with neighbors; and the indiscipline alarmed me, for what couldone expect to find in men who roamed about where it pleased them,howling their dissatisfaction with their commander, and addressing theirofficers by their first names?
At eight o'clock on that oppressive August morning, while writing aletter to my cousin Dorothy, which an Oneida had promised to deliver, hebeing about to start with a message to Governor Clinton, I wasinterrupted by Jack Mount, who came into the barn, saying that a companyof officers were quarrelling in front of the sugar-shack occupied asheadquarters.
I folded my letter, sealed it with a bit of blue balsam gum, and badeMount deliver it to the Oneida runner, while I stepped up the road.
Of all unseemly sights that I have ever had the misfortune to witness,what I now saw was the most shameful. I pushed and shouldered my waythrough a riotous mob of soldiers and teamsters which choked thehighway; loud, angry voices raised in reproach or dispute assailed myears. A group of militia officers were shouting, shoving, andgesticulating in front of the tent where, rigid in his arm-chair, theGeneral sat, grim, narrow-eyed, silent, smoking a short clay pipe. Boltupright, behind him, stood his chief scout and interpreter, a superbOneida, in all the splendor of full war-paint, blazing with scarlet.
Colonel Cox, a swaggering, intrusive, loud-voiced, and smartly uniformedofficer, made a sign for silence and began haranguing the old man,evidently as spokesman for the party of impudent malcontents groupedabout him. I heard him demand that his men be led against the Britishwithout further delay. I heard him condemn delay as unreasonable andunwarrantable, and the terms of speech he used were unbecoming toan officer.
"We call on you, sir, in the name of Tryon County, to order us forward!"he said, loudly. "We are ready. For God's sake give the order, sir!There is no time to waste, I tell you!"
The old General removed the pipe from his teeth and leaned a littleforward in his chair.
"Colonel Cox," he said, "I haff Adam Helmer to Stanvix sent, mit deropject of inviting Colonel Gansevoort to addack py de rear ven ve addackpy dot left flank.
"So soon as Helmer comes dot fort py, Gansevoort he fire cannon; und sosoon I hear cannon, I march! Not pefore, sir; not pefore!"
"How do we know that Helmer and his men will ever reach Stanwix?"shouted Colonel Paris, impatiently.
"Ve vait, und py un' py ve know," replied Herkimer, undisturbed.
"He may be dead and scalped by now," sneered Colonel Visscher.
"Look you, Visscher," said the old General; "it iss I who am here toanswer for your safety. Now comes Spencer, my Oneida, mit a pelt, whosvears to me dot Brant und Butler an ambuscade haff made for me. Vat Ido? Eh? I vait for dot sortie? Gewiss!"
He waved his short pipe.
"For vy am I an ass to march me py dot ambuscade? Such a foolishness issdot talk! I stay me py Oriskany till I dem cannon hear."
A storm of insolent protest from the mob of soldiers greeted hisdecision; the officers gesticulated and shouted insultingly, shovingforward to the edge of the porch. Fists were shaken at him, cries ofimpatience and contempt rose everywhere. Colonel Paris flung his swordon the ground. Colonel Cox, crimson with anger, roared: "If you delayanother moment the blood of Gansevoort's men be on your head!"
Then, in the tumult, a voice called out: "He's a Tory! We are betrayed!"And Colonel Cox shouted: "He dares not march! He is a coward!"
White to the lips, the old man sprang from his chair, narrow eyesablaze, hands trembling. Colonel Bellinger and Major Frey caught him bythe arm, begging him to remain firm in his decision.
"Py Gott, no!" he thundered, drawing his sword. "If you vill haff it so,your blood be on your heads! Vorwaerts!"
It is not for me to blame him in his wrath, when, beside himself withrighteous fury, he gave the bellowing yokels their heads and swept onwith them to destruction. The mutinous fools who had called him cowardand traitor fell back as their outraged commander strode silentlythrough the disordered ranks, noticing neither the proffered apologiesof Colonel Paris nor the stammered excuses of Colonel Cox. Behind himstalked the tall Oneida, silent, stern, small eyes flashing. And nowbegan the immense uproar of departure; confused officers ran aboutcursing and shouting; the smashing roll of the drums broke out, beatingthe assembly; teamsters rushed to harness horses; dismayed soldierspushed and struggled through the mass, searching for their regimentsand companies.
Mounted on a gaunt, gray horse, the General rode through the disorder,quietly directing the incompetent militia officers in their tasks ofcollecting their men; and behind him, splendidly horsed and caparisoned,cantered the tall Oneida, known as Thomas Spencer the Interpreter, calm,composed, inscrutable eyes fixed on his beloved leader and friend.
The drums of the Canajoharie regiment were beating as the drummers swungpast me, sleeves rolled up to the elbows, sweat pouring down theirsunburned faces; then came Herkimer, all alone, sitting his saddle likea rock, the flush of anger still staining his weather-ravaged visage,his small, wrathful eyes fixed on the north.
Behind him rode Colonels Cox and Paris, long, heavy swords drawn,heading the Canajoharie regiment, which pressed forward excitedly. Theremaining regiments of Tryon County militia followed, led by ColonelSeeber, Colonel Bellenger, Majors Frey, Eisenlord, and Van Slyck. Thencame the baggage-wagons, some drawn by oxen, some by four horses; and inthe rear of these rode Colonel Visscher, leading the Caughnawagaregiment, closing the dusty column.
"Damn them!" growled Elerson to Murphy, "they're advancing withoutflanking-parties or scouts. I wish Dan'l Morgan was here."
"'Tis th' Gineral's jooty to luk out f'r his throops, not Danny Morgan'sor mine," replied the big rifleman in disgust.
The column halted. I signalled my men to follow me and hastened alongthe flanks under a fire of chaff: "Look at young buckskins! There goMorgan's macaronis! God help the red-coats this day! How's the scalptrade, son?"
Herkimer was sitting his horse in the middle of the road as I came up;and he scowled down at me when I gave him the officer's salute and stoodat attention beside his stirrup.
"Veil, you can shpeak," he said, bluntly; "efery-body shpeaks but me!"
I said that I and my riflemen were at his di
sposal if he desired leadersfor flanking-parties or scouts; and his face softened as he listened,looking down at me in silence.
"Sir," he said, "it iss to my shame I say dot my sodgers command me, notI my sodgers."
Then, looking back at Colonel Cox, he added, bitterly:
"I haff ordered flanking-parties and scouts, but my officers, who knowmuch more than I, haff protested against dot useless vaste of time. Ithank you, sir; I can your offer not accept."
The drums began again; the impatient Palatine regiment moved forward,yelling their approval, and we fell back to the roadside, while theboisterous troops tramped past, cheering, singing, laughing in theirexcitement. Mechanically we fell in behind the Caughnawagas, who formedthe rear-guard, and followed on through the dust; meaning to go withthem only a mile or so before we started back across country with thenews which I was now at liberty to take in person to General Schuyler.
For I considered my mission at an end. In one thing only had I failed:Walter Butler was still free; but now that he commanded a company ofoutlaws and savages in St. Leger's army, I, of course, had no furtherhope of arresting him or of dealing with him in any manner save on thebattle-field.
So at last I felt forced to return to Varick Manor; but the fear of thedread future was in me, and all the hopeless misery of a hopelesspassion made of me a coward, so that I shrank from the pain I mustsurely inflict and endure. Kinder for her, kinder for me, that we shouldnever meet again.
Not that I desired to die. I was too young in life and love to wish fordeath as a balm. Besides, I knew it could not bring us peace. Still, itwas one solution of a problem otherwise so utterly hopeless that I,heartsick, had long since wearied of the solving and carried my hurtburied deep, fearful lest my prying senses should stir me to disinterthe dead hope lying there.
Absence renders passion endurable. But at sight of her I loved I knew Icould not endure it; and, uncertain of myself, having twice nigh failedunder the overwhelming provocations of a love returned, I shrank fromthe coming duel 'twixt love and duty which must once more be foughtwithin my breast.
Nor could my duty, fighting blindly, expect encouragement from her Iloved, save at the last gasp and under the heel of love. Then, only, atthe very last would she save me; for there was that within her whichrevolted at a final wrong, and I knew that not even our twin passioncould prevail to stamp out the last spark of conscience and slay oursouls forever.
Brooding, as I trudged forward through the dust, I became aware that thedrums had ceased their beating, and that the men were marching quietlywith little laughter or noise of song.
The heat was intense, although a black cloud had pushed up above thewest, veiling the sun. Flies swarmed about the column; sweat poured frommen and horses; the soldiers rolled back their sleeves and plodded on,muskets a-trail and coats hanging over their shoulders. Once, very faraway, the looming horizon was veined with lightning; and, after a longtime, thunder sounded.
We had marched northward on a rutty road some two miles or more fromour camp at Oriska, and I was asking Mount how near we were to the oldAlgonquin-Iroquois trail which runs from the lakes across the wildernessto the healing springs at Saratoga, when the column halted and I heardan increasing confusion of voices from the van.
"There's a ravine ahead," said Elerson. "I'm thinking they'll havetrouble with these wagons, for there's a swamp at the bottom and only alog-road across."
"Tis the proper shpot f'r to ambuscade us," observed Murphy, craning hisneck and standing on tiptoe to see ahead.
We walked forward and sat down on the bank close to the brow of thehill. Directly ahead a ravine, shaped like a half-moon, cut the road,and the noisy Canajoharie regiment was marching into it. The bottom ofthe ravine appeared to be a swamp, thinly timbered with tamarack andblue-beech saplings, where the reeds and cattails grew thick, andlittle, dark pools of water spread, all starred with water-lilies,shining intensely white in the gloom of the coming storm.
"There do be wild ducks in thim rushes," said Murphy, musingly. "Sure Icount it sthrange, Jack Mount, that thim burrds sit quiet-like an' ascreechin' rigiment marchin' acrost that log-road."
"You mean that somebody has been down there before and scared the ducksaway?" I asked.
"Maybe, sorr," he replied, grimly.
Instinctively we leaned forward to scan the rising ground on theopposite side of the ravine. Nothing moved in the dense thickets. Aftera moment Mount said quietly: "I'm a liar or there's a barked twigshowing raw wood alongside of that ledge."
He glanced at the pan of his rifle, then again fixed his keen, blueeyes on the tiny glimmer of white which even I could distinguish now,though Heaven only knows how his eyes had found it in all that tangle.
"That's raw wood," he repeated.
"A deer might bark a twig," said I.
"Maybe, sorr," muttered Murphy; "but there's divil a deer w'ud nibblesheep-laurel."
The men of the Canajoharie regiment were climbing the hill on the otherside of the ravine now. Colonel Cox came galloping back, shouting:"Bring up those wagons! The road is clear! Move your men forward there!"
Whips cracked; the vehicles rattled off down hill, drivers yelling,soldiers pushing the heavy wheels forward over the log-road below whichspurted water as the bumping wagons struck the causeway.
I remember that Colonel Cox had just drawn bridle, half-way up theopposite incline, and was leaning forward in his saddle to watch theprogress of an ox-team, when a rifle-shot rang out and he tumbled cleanout of his saddle, striking the shallow water with a splash.
Then hell itself broke loose in that black ravine; volley on volleypoured into the Canajoharie regiment; officers fell from their horses;drivers reeled and pitched forward under the heels of their plungingteams; wagons collided and broke down, choking the log-road. Louder andlouder the terrific yells of the outlaws and savages rang out on ourflanks; I saw our soldiers in the ravine running frantically in alldirections, falling on the log-road, floundering waist-deep in the waterand mud, slipping, stumbling, staggering; while faster and fastercracked the hidden rifles, and the pitiless bullets pelted them from theheights above.
"Stand! Stand! you fools!" bawled Elerson. "Take to the timber! Everyman to a tree! For God's sake remember Braddock!"
"Look out!" shouted Mount, dragging me with him to a rock. "Close up,Elerson! Close up, Murphy!"
Straight into the stupefied ranks of the Caughnawaga company cameleaping the savages, shooting, stabbing, clubbing the dazed men,dragging them from the ranks with shrieks of triumph. I saw onehalf-naked creature, awful in his paint, run up and strike a soldierfull in the face with his fist, then dash out his brains with adeath-maul and tear his scalp off.
Murphy and Mount were loading and firing steadily; Elerson and I keptour rifles ready for a rush. I was perfectly stunned; the spectacle didnot seem real to me.
The Caughnawaga men, apparently roused from their momentary stupor, fellback into small squads, shooting in every direction; and the savages,unable to withstand a direct fire, sheered off and came bounding past usto cover, yelping like timber-wolves. Three darted directly at us; ayoung warrior, painted in bars of bright yellow, raised his hatchet tohurl it; but Murphy's bullet spun him round like a top till he crashedagainst a tree and fell in a heap, quivering all over.
The two others had leaped on Mount. Swearing, threatening, roaring withrage, the desperate giant shook them off into our midst, and cut thethroat of one as he lay sprawling--a sickening spectacle, for the poorwretch floundered and thrashed about among the leaves and sticks,squirting thick blood all over us.
The remaining savage, a chief, by his lock and eagle-quill, had fastenedto Elerson's legs with the fury of a tree-cat, clawing and squalling,while Murphy dealt him blow on blow with clubbed stock, and finally wasforced to shoot him so close that the rifle-flame set his greasedscalp-lock afire.
"Take to the timber, you Tryon County men! Remember Braddock!" shoutedColonel Paris, plunging about on his wounded horse; while from ever
ytree and bush rang out the reports of the rifles; and the steady streamof bullets poured into the Caughnawaga regiment, knocking the men downthe hill-side into the struggling mass below. Some dropped dead wherethey had been shot; some rolled to the log-road; some fell into themarsh, splashing and limping about like crippled wild fowl.
"Advance der Palatine regiment!" thundered Herkimer. "Clear avay dotoxen-team!"
A drummer-boy of the Palatines beat the charge. I can see him yet, acurly-haired youngster, knee-deep in the mud, his white, frightened facefixed on his commander. They shot his drum to pieces; he beat steadilyon the flapping parchment.
Across the swamp the Palatines were doggedly climbing the slope in theface of a terrible discharge. Herkimer led them. As they reached thecrest of the plateau, and struggled up and over, a rush of men in greenuniforms seemed to swallow the entire Palatine regiment. I saw thembayonet Major Eisenlord and finish him with their rifle-stocks; theystabbed Major Van Slyck, and hurled themselves at the mounted Oneida.Hatchet flashing, the interpreter swung his horse straight into theyelling onset and went down, smothered under a mass of enemies.
"Vorwaerts!" thundered Herkimer, standing straight up in his stirrups;but they shot him out of his saddle and closed with the Palatines,hilt to hilt.
Major Frey and Colonel Bellenger fell under their horses, Colonel Seeberdropped dead into the ravine, Captain Graves was dragged from the ranksand butchered by bayonets; but those stubborn Palatines calmly dividedinto squads, and their steady fusillade stopped the rush of the RoyalGreens and sent the flanking savages howling to cover.
Mount, Murphy, Elerson, and I lay behind a fallen hemlock, awaiting theflank attack which we now understood must surely come. For our regimentswere at last completely surrounded, facing outward in an irregularcircle, the front held by the Palatines, the rear by the Caughnawagas,the west by part of the Canajoharie regiment, and the east by a fractionof unbrigaded militia, teamsters, batt-men, bateaux-men, and half adozen volunteer rangers reinforced by my three riflemen.
The scene was real enough to me now. Jack Mount, kneeling beside me, wasattempting to clean the blood from himself and Elerson with handfuls ofdried leaves. Murphy lay on his belly, watching the forest in front ofus, and his blue eyes seemed suffused with a light of their own in thedeepening gloom of the gathering thunder-storm. My nerves were alla-quiver; the awful screaming from the ravine had never ceased for aninstant, and in that darkening, slimy pit I could still see a swayingmass of men on the causeway, locked in a death-struggle. To and fro theyreeled; hatchet and knife and gun-stock glittered, rising and falling inthe twilight of the storm-cloud; the flames from the riflesflashed crimson.
"Kape ye're eyes to the front, sorr; they do be comin'!" cried Murphy,springing briskly to his feet.
I looked ahead into the darkening woods; the Caughnawaga men werefalling back, taking station behind trees; Mount stepped to the shelterof a big oak; Elerson leaped to cover under a pine; a Caughnawagabateaux-man darted past me, stationing himself on my right behind thetrunk of a dapple beech. Suddenly an Indian showed himself close infront; the Caughnawaga man fired and missed; and, quicker than I canwrite it, the savage was on him before he could reload and had brainedhim with a single castete-stroke. I fired, but the Mohawk was too quickfor me, and a moment later he bounded back into the brush while theforest rang with his triumphant scalp-yell.
"That's what they're doing in front!" shouted Elerson. "When a soldierfires they're on him before he can reload!"
"Two men to a tree!" roared Jack Mount. "Double up there, youCaughnawaga men!"
Elerson glided cautiously to the oak which sheltered Mount; Murphy creptforward to my tree.
"Bedad!" he muttered, "let the ondacent divils dhraw ye're fire an'welcome. I've a pill to purge 'em now. Luk at that, sorr! Shteady!Shteady an' cool does it!"
A savage, with his face painted half white and half red, stepped outfrom the thicket and dropped just as I fired. The next instant he cameleaping straight for our tree, castete poised.
Murphy fired. The effect of the shot was amazing; the savage stoppedshort in mid-career as though he had come into collision with a stonewall; then Elerson fired, knocking him flat, head doubled under hisnaked shoulders, feet trailing across a rotting log.
"Save ye're powther, Dave!" sang out Murphy. "Sure he was clean kilt ashe shtood there. Lave a dead man take his own time to fall!"
I had reloaded, and Murphy was coolly priming, when on our right therifles began speaking faster and faster, and I heard the sound of menrunning hard over the dry leaves, and the thudding gallop of horses.
"A charge!" said Murphy. "There do be horses comin', too. Have theydhragoons?--I dunnoa. Ha! There they go! 'Tis McCraw's outlaws or I'm aDootchman!"
A shrill cock-crow rang out in the forest.
"'Tis the chanticleer scalp-yell of that damned loon, Francy McCraw!" hecried, fiercely. "Give it to 'em, b'ys! Shoot hell into thedommed Tories!"
The Caughnawaga rifles rang out from every tree; a white man camerunning through the wood, and I instinctively held my fire.
"Shoot the dhirrty son of a shlut!" yelled Murphy; and Elerson shot himand knocked him down, but the man staggered to his feet again, clutchingat his wounded throat, and reeled towards us. He fell again, got on hisknees, crawled across the dead leaves until he was scarce fifteen yardsaway, then fell over and lay there, coughing.
"A dead wan,"' said Murphy, calmly; "lave him."
McCraw's onset passed along our extreme left; the volleys grew furious;the ghastly cock-crow rang out shrill and piercing, and we fired at longrange where the horses were passing through the rifle-smoke.
Then, in the roar of the fusillade, a bright flash lighted up theforest; a thundering crash followed, and the storm burst, deluging thewoods with rain. Trees rocked and groaned, dashing their tops together;the wind rose to a hurricane; the rain poured down, beating the leavesfrom the trees, driving friend and foe to shelter. The reports of therifles ceased; the war-yelp died away. Peal on peal of thunder shook theearth; the roar of the tempest rose to a steady shriek through which theterrific smashing of falling trees echoed above the clash of branches.
Soaked, stunned, blinded by the awful glare of the lightning, I crouchedunder the great oak, which rocked and groaned, convulsed to its beddedroots, so that the ground heaved under me as I lay.
I could not see ten feet ahead of me, so thick was the gloom with rainand flying leaves and twigs. The thunder culminated in a series offearful crashes; bolt after bolt fell, illuminating the flying chaos ofthe tempest; then came a stunning silence, slowly filled with the steadyroar of the rain.
A gray pallor grew in the woods. I looked down into the ravine and saw amuddy lake there full of dead men and horses.
The wounded Tory near us was still choking and coughing, dying hard outthere in the rain. Mount and Elerson crept over to where we lay, and,after a moment's conference, Murphy led us in a long circle, swinginggradually northward until we stumbled into the drenched Palatineregiment, which was still holding its ground. There was no firing oneither side; the guns were too wet.
On a wooded knoll to the left a group of dripping men had gathered.Somebody said that the old General lay there, smoking and directing thedefence, his left leg shattered by a ball. I saw the blue smoke of hispipe curling up under the tree, but I did not see him.
The wind had died out; the thunder rolled off to the northward,muttering among the hills; rain fell less heavily; and I saw wounded mentearing strips from their soaking shirts to bind their hurts. Detailsfrom the Canajoharie regiment passed us searching the underbrush fortheir dead.
I also noticed with a shudder that Elerson and Murphy carried two freshscalps apiece, tied to the belts of their hunting-shirts; but I saidnothing, having been warned by Jack Mount that they considered it theirprerogative to take the scalps of those who had failed to take theirs.
How they could do it I cannot understand, for I had once seen the bodyof a scalped man, with the ski
n, released from the muscles of theforehead, hanging all loose and wrinkled over the face.
With the ceasing of the rain came the renewed crack of the rifles andthe whiz of bullets. We took post on the extreme left, firingdeliberately at McCraw's renegades; and I do not know whether I hit anyor not, but five men did I see fall under the murderous aim of Murphy;and I know that Elerson shot two savages, for he went down into theravine after them and returned with the wet, red trophies.
The sun was now shining again with a heat so fierce and intense that theearth smoked vapor all around us. It was at this time that I,personally, experienced the only close fighting of the day, whichbrought a sudden end to this most amazing and bloody skirmish.
I had been lying full length behind a bush in the lines of the Palatineregiment, eating a crust of bread; for that strange battle-hunger hadbeen gnawing at my vitals for an hour. Some of the men were eating, somefiring; the steaming heat almost suffocated me as I lay there, yet Imunched on, ravenous as a December wolf.
I heard somebody shout: "Here they come!" and, filling my mouth withbread, I rose to my knees to see.
A body of troops in green uniforms came marching steadily towards us,led by a red-coated officer on horseback; and all around me thePalatines were springing to their feet, uttering cries of rage, cursingthe oncoming troops, and calling out to them by name.
For the detachment of Royal Greens which now advanced to the assaultwas, it appeared, composed of old acquaintances and neighbors of thePalatines, who had fled to join the Tories and Indians and now returnedto devastate their own county.
Lashed to ungovernable fury by the sight of these hated renegades, theentire regiment leaped forward with a roar and rushed on the advancingdetachment, stabbing, shooting, clubbing, throttling. Mutual hatredmade the contest terrible beyond words; no quarter was given on eitherside. I saw men strangle each other with naked hands; kick each other todeath, fighting like dogs, tooth and nail, rolling over the wet ground.
The tide had not yet struck us; we fired at their mounted officer, whomElerson declared he recognized as Major Watts, brother-in-law to SirJohn Johnson; and presently, as usual, Murphy hit him, so that the youngfellow dropped forward on his saddle and his horse ran away, flinginghim against a tree with a crash, doubtless breaking every bone inhis body.
Then, above the tumult, out of the north came booming threecannon-shots, the signal from the fort that Herkimer had desired towait for.
A detachment from the Canajoharie regiment surged out of the woods witha ringing cheer, pointing northward, where, across a clearing, a body oftroops were rapidly advancing from the direction of the fort.
"The sortie! The sortie!" shouted the soldiers, frantic with joy. Murphyand I ran towards them; Elerson yelled: "Be careful! Look at theiruniforms! Don't go too close to them!"
"They're coming from the north!" bawled Mount. "They're our own people,Dave! Come on!"
Captain Jacob Gardinier, with a dozen Caughnawaga men, had alreadyreached the advancing troops, when Murphy seized my arm and halted me,crying out, "Those men are wearing their coats turned inside out!They're Johnson's Greens!"
At the same instant I recognized Colonel John Butler as the officerleading them; and he knew me and, without a word, fired his pistol atme. We were so near them now that a Tory caught hold of Murphy and triedto stab him, but the big Irishman kicked him headlong and rushed intothe mob, swinging his long hatchet, followed by Gardinier and hisCaughnawaga men, whom the treachery had transformed into demons.
In an instant all around me men were swaying, striking, shooting,panting, locked in a deadly embrace. A sweating, red-faced soldierclosed with me; chin to chin, breast to breast we wrestled; and I shallnever forget the stifling struggle--every detail remains, his sunburnedface, wet with sweat and powder-smeared; his irregular teeth showingwhen I got him by the throat, and the awful change that came over hisvisage when Jack Mount shoved the muzzle of his rifle against thestruggling fellow and shot him through the stomach.
Freed from his death-grip, I stood breathing convulsively, handsclinched, one foot on my fallen rifle. An Indian ran past me, chased byElerson and Murphy, but the savage dodged into the underbrush,shrieking, "Oonah! Oonah! Oonah!" and Elerson came back, waving hisdeer-hide cap.
Everywhere Tories, Royal Greens, and Indians were running into thewoods; the wailing cry, "Oonah! Oonah!" rose on all sides now.Gardinier's Caughnawaga men were shooting rapidly; the Palatines, masterof their reeking brush-field, poured a heavy fire into the detachment ofretreating Greens, who finally broke and ran, dropping sack and rifle intheir flight, and leaving thirty of their dead under the feet of thePalatines.
The soldiers of the Canajoharie regiment came up, swarming over a woodedknoll on the right, only to halt and stand, silently leaning ontheir rifles.
For the battle of Oriskany was over.
There was no cheering from the men of Tryon County. Their victory hadbeen too dearly bought; their losses too terrible; their triumphsterile, for they could not now advance the crippled fragments of theirregiments and raise the siege in the face of St. Leger's regulars andWalter Butler's Rangers.
Their combat with Johnson's Greens and Brant's Mohawks had been fought;and, though masters of the field, they could do no more than hold theirground. Perhaps the bitter knowledge that they must leave Stanwix to itsfate, and that, too, through their own disobedience, made the bettersoldiers of them in time. But it was a hard and dreadful lesson; and Isaw men crying, faces hidden in their powder-blackened hands, as thedying General was borne through the ranks, lying gray and motionless onhis hemlock litter.
And this is all that I myself witnessed of that shameful ambuscade andmurderous combat, fought some two miles north of the dirty camp, and nowknown as the Battle of Oriskany.
That night we buried our dead; one hundred on the field where they hadfallen, two hundred and fifty in the burial trenches atOriskany--thirty-five wagon-loads in all. Scarcely an officer of rankremained to lead the funeral march when the muffled drums of thePalatines rolled at midnight, and the smoky torches moved, and thedead-wagons rumbled on through the suffocating darkness of a starlessnight. We had few wounded; we took no prisoners; Oriskany meant death.We counted only thirty men disabled and some score missing.
"God grant the missing be safely dead," prayed our camp chaplain at theburial trench. We knew what that meant; worse than dead were thewretched men who had fallen alive into the hands of old John Butler andhis son, Walter, and that vicious drunkard, Barry St. Leger, who hadoffered, over his own signature, two hundred and forty dollars a dozenfor prime Tryon County scalps.
I slept little that night, partly from the excitement of my firstserious combat, partly because of the terrible heat. Our outposts, nowpainfully overzealous and alert, fired off their muskets at everyfancied sound or movement, and these continual alarms kept me awake,though Mount and Murphy slept peacefully, and Elerson yawned on guard.
Towards sunrise rain fell heavily, but brought no relief from the heat;the sun, a cherry-red ball, hung a hand's-breadth over the forests whenthe curtain of rain faded away. The riflemen, curled up in the hay onthe barn floor, snored on, unconscious; the batt-horses crunched andmunched in the manger; flies whirled and swarmed over a wheelbarrowpiled full of dead soldier's shoes, which must to-day be distributedamong the living.
All the loathsome and filthy side of war seemed concentrated around thebarn-yard, where sleepy, unshaven, half-dressed soldiers were burningthe under-clothes of a man who had died of the black measles; while agreat, brawny fellow, naked to the waist and smeared from hair to ankleswith blood, butchered sheep, so that the army might eat that day.
The thick stench of the burning clothing, the odor of blood, the piteousbleating of the doomed creatures sickened me; and I made my way out ofthe barn and down to the river, where I stripped and waded out to washme and my clothes.
A Caughnawaga soldier gave me a bit of soap; and I spent the morningthere. By noon the fierce heat of the sun had dried
my clothes; by twoo'clock our small scout of four left the Stanwix and Johnstown road andstruck out through the unbroken wilderness for German Flatts.
The Maid-At-Arms: A Novel Page 20
