Complete Works of Stephen Crane

by Stephen Crane

  The men rested their guns on the rail fence to fire. The officers were used as targets — many of the handsome coats were laid low. So hot was the reception they met that in a few moments Howe’s men were obliged to fall back. One of them said afterwards, “It was the strongest post that was ever occupied by any set of men.”

  There was wild exultation within the American lines, congratulation and praises, for just fifteen minutes; and then Pigot and Howe led the attack again. But the second repulse was so much fiercer than the first that the British broke ranks and ran down hill, some of them getting into the boats.

  “The dead,” said Stark, “lay in front of us as thick as sheep in a fold.”

  Meantime Charlestown had been set on fire by Howe’s orders, and the spectacle was splendidly terrible to the watchers in Boston. The wooden buildings made a superb blaze, and through the smoke could be seen the British officers striking and pricking their men with their swords in the vain hope of rallying them, while cannon, musketry, crashes of falling houses, and the yells of the victors filled up the measure of excitement to the spectators.

  Twice, now, the Americans had met the foe and proved that he was not invincible. The women in Boston thought the last defeat final — that their men-folk had gained the day. But Prescott knew better; he was sure that they would come again, and sure that he could not withstand a third attack.

  If at this juncture strong reinforcements and supplies of ammunition had reached him, he might well have held his own. But such companies as had been sent on would come no farther than Bunker Hill, in spite of Israel Putnam’s threats and entreaties. There they straggled about under hay-cocks and apple-trees, demoralised by the sights and sounds of battle, with no authorised leader who could force them to the front.

  As for their commander-in-chief, Ward, he would not stir from his house all day, and kept the main body of his forces at Cambridge.

  When General Clinton saw the rout of his countrymen from the Boston shore, he rowed over in great haste. With his assistance, and the fine discipline which prevailed, the troops were re-formed within half an hour. Clinton also proposed a new plan of assault. Accordingly, instead of diffusing their forces across the whole American front, the chief attack was directed on the redoubt. The artillery bombarded the breastwork, and only a small number moved against the rail fence.

  “Fight! conquer or die!” was the watchword that passed from mouth to mouth as the tall, commanding figure of Howe led on the third assault. To his soldiers it was a desperate venture — they felt that they were going to certain death. But inside the redoubt few of the men had more than one round of ammunition left, though they shouted bravely:

  “We are ready for the redcoats again!”

  Again their first fire was furious and destructive, but although many of the enemy fell, the rest bounded forward without returning it. In a few minutes the columns of Pigot and Clinton had surrounded the redoubt on three sides. The defenders of the breastwork had been driven by the artillery fire into the redoubt, and balls came whistling through the open passage.

  The first rank of redcoats who climbed the parapet was shot down. Major Pitcairn met his death at this time while cheering on his men. But the Americans had come to the end of their ammunition, and they had not fifty bayonets among them, though these were made to do good service as the enemy came swarming over the walls.

  Pigot got up by the aid of a tree, and hundreds followed his lead. The Americans made stout resistance in the hand-to-hand struggle that followed, but there could be only one ending to it, and Prescott ordered a retreat. He was almost the last to leave, and only got away by skilfully parrying with his sword the bayonet thrusts of the foe. His banyan was pierced in many places, but he escaped unhurt. —

  The men at the rail fence kept firm until they saw the forces leaving the redoubt; they fell back then, but in good order.

  A great volley was fired after the Americans. It was then that Warren fell, as he lingered in the rear — a loss that was passionately mourned throughout New England.

  During their disordered flight over the little peninsula the Americans lost more men than at any other time of the day, though their list of killed and wounded only amounted to four hundred and forty-nine. The heavy loss of the enemy — ten hundred and fifty-four men — had the effect of checking the eagerness of their pursuit; the Americans passed the Neck without further molestation.

  General Howe had maintained his reputation for solid courage, and his long white silk stockings were soaked in blood.

  The speech of Count Vergennes, that “if it won two more such victories as Bunker Hill, there would be no more British Army in America,” echoed the general sentiment in England and America as well as in France. So impressed were the British leaders with the indomitable resolution shown by the Provincials in fortifying and defending so desperate a position as Breed’s Hill, that they made no attempt to follow up their victory. General Gage admitted that the people of New England were not the despicable rabble they had sometimes been represented.

  Among the Grand Army itself many recriminations and courts-martial followed the contest. But Washington soon drilled it into order.

  The most important thing to be remembered of Bunker Hill is its effect upon the colonies. The troubles with the mother country had been brewing a long time, but this was the first decisive struggle for supremacy. There was no doubt of the tough, soldierly qualities displayed by the Colonials; the thrill of pride that went through the country at the success of their arms welded together the scattered colonies and made a nation of them. The Revolution was an accomplished fact. “England,” said Franklin, “has lost her colonies for ever.”

  Contextual Pieces

  Brede Place, East Sussex, England — where Crane lived before passing away at a health spa in Badenweiler, Germany

  LIST OF ESSAYS AND REVIEWS

  Compiled by Fred Burwell

  CONTENTS

  Biographical Pieces

  THE TRUE STORY OF STEPHEN CRANE. (Modern Culture, V.XII No.2 October, 1900)

  STEPHEN CRANE: A “WONDERFUL BOY.” (The Literary Digest V. XX, No.25, June 23, 1900)

  SYRACUSE CHAPTER HOUSE’S UNIQUE MEMORIAL by Lew Collings

  STEPHEN CRANE — A Note Without Dates, 1919

  Stephen Crane – A Soldier of Fortune by Hamlin Garland

  A NOTE ON STEPHEN CRANE. (The Bookman, V. XIII, April 1901)

  A MEMORIAL TO STEPHEN CRANE.

  The Critic, V. XXXVIII, No. 3m, March 1901

  Stevie Crane (Selected Writings of Elbert Hubbard, Wm. H. Wise & Co., 1922)

  GENERAL GOSSIP OF AUTHORS AND WRITERS. (Current Literature, V. XVIII, No.1, July 1895)

  Frank Leslie’s Popular Monthly, V. LVI, No. 5, September 1903

  STEPHEN CRANE’S REGRET THAT REAL WARFARE DID NOT EQUAL HIS DESCRIPTION IN “THE RED BADGE OF COURAGE.” (Munsey’s Magazine, V. XXIII, No. 5, August 1900)

  Life, No. 799, April 2, 1898

  STEPHEN CRANE by Charles Lewis

  Stephen Crane: A Genius Born in a Methodist Parsonage by Carl F. Price

  Obituary (The Bookseller, July 1900)

  STEPHEN CRANE DEAD. (The Lafayette Weekly)

  YOUNG MR. STEPHEN CRANE. (The Review of Reviews, V. XV, No. 6, June 1897)

  The Author of “The Red Badge”. (The Critic, No. 733, March 7, 1896)

  The Darkest Hour in the Life of Stephen Crane. (The Criterion, February 1901)

  Excerpts from: “Henry James, Stephen Crane and the Main Stream”

  The Critic, V. XXXVII, No. 1, July 1900

  MEMORIES OF STEPHEN CRANE. (The Argonaut, V. XLVII, No. 1216, July 2, 1900)

  Book Notes, New Series, V. 1, No. 1, June 1898

  The Critic, V. XXVII, No. 791, April 17, 1897

  REMINISCENCE OF STEPHEN CRANE. (The Lafayette, V. XXVII, No. 3, October 5, 1900)

  The Editor, V. V, No. 3, March 1897

  The Publisher’s Circular, V. 66, No. 1595, January 23, 1897

>   The Academy, No. 1309 – New Series, June 5, 1897

  The Book Buyer, V. XIV, No. 5, June 1897

  The Month in Literature, Art and Life, V. I, No. 3, March 1897

  Stephen Crane Dead. (The New York Times, June 6, 1900)

  “When I Knew Stephen Crane” by Willa Cather (under the pseudonym, Henry Nicklemann)

  Harper’s Weekly, V. XLV, No. 2269, June 16, 1900

  STEPHEN CRANE. (The Academy, No. 1289, January 16, 1897)

  Criticism and Commentary

  STEPHEN CRANE: AN ESTIMATE by Vincent Starrett

  “The Rise of Stephen Crane”. Godey’s Magazine V.CXXXIII No.795 September 1896

  Stephen Crane. (The New Republic, V. IV, No. 45, September 11, 1915)

  THE GENIUS OF STEPHEN CRANE. (The Harvard Monthly, V. XXI, No. 2, November 1900)

  “Stephen Crane from an English Standpoint” by H. G. Wells

  STEPHEN CRANE. Excerpted from “The Over-rated” by Ella Costillo Bennett

  W. D. HOWELL’S APPRECIATION OF STEPHEN CRANE. (The Delta Upsilon Quarterly, V. XIX, No. 2, March 1, 1901)

  STEPHEN CRANE AS THE AMERICAN PIONEER OF THE FREE VERSE ARMY. (Current Opinion, V. LXII, No. 3, March 1917)

  THE NEW FICTION (excerpt) by H. D. Traill

  OF MR. STEPHEN CRANE (The Book Buyer, V. XIV, No. 6, July 1897)

  THE PROSE OF THE LATE STEPHEN CRANE. (Williams Literary Monthly, V. XVI, No. 7, February 1901)

  STEPHEN CRANE AND HIS WORK by Edward Garnett

  The New Bohemian, V. II, No.6, June 1896

  STEPHEN CRANE. (Book News, V. XV, No. 169, September 1896)

  The Chautauquan, V. XXXI, No. 4, July 1900

  STEPHEN CRANE. (The Academy, No. 1466, June 9, 1900)

  The Bookman, V. II, No. 6, February 1896

  STEPHEN CRANE AND HIS WORK. (The Social Gospel, No. 38, New Series 9, April 1901)

  IN PRAISE OF STEPHEN CRANE. (The Literary Digest, V. XII, No. 24, April 11, 1896)

  Extract from A Parody Anthology by Carolyn Wells

  Our Correspondents in the East by R-DY-RD K-PL-NG

  STEPHEN CRANE AND HIS SLUM STORIES. (Munsey’s Magazine, V. XV, No. 5, August 1896)

  The Bookman, V. LV, No. 6, August, 1922

  NEW YORK LETTER. (The Literary World, V. XXVI, No. 22, November 2, 1895)

  Reviews

  A REVIEWER’S NOTEBOOK. (The Freeman, V. IV, No. 97, January 18, 1922)

  IN THE SCHOOL OF BATTLE: THE MAKING OF A SOLDIER. (The Saturday Review, V. 81, No. 2098, January 11, 1896)

  Whilomville Stories.

  Maggie: A Girl of the Streets. (The Literary News, V. XVII, No. 7, July 1896)

  New York Letter (Active Service ) by John D. Barry

  The Open Boat and Other Stories by Stephen Crane

  Mr. Stephen Crane’s: Last Book: Great Battles of the World. (Literature, No. 196, July 20, 1901)

  Wounds in the Rain by Stephen Crane

  Bowery Tales by Stephen Crane

  The Red Badge of Courage: An Episode of the American Civil War. By Stephen Crane. 12mo, pp. 333. New York: D. Appleton & Co. II.

  The O’Ruddy — An unfinished novel by the late Stephen Crane, brought to a close by, Robert Barr.

  The Monster and Other Stories by Stephen Crane. New York. Harper & Bros., il. $1.25.

  Whilomville Stories (The Critic, V. XXXVII, No. 4, October 1900)

  Comments on New Books (The Red Badge of Courage)

  Excerpted from “Six Books of Verse”

  LAST WORDS - The Spectator, No. 3,850, April 12, 1902

  A REMARKABLE BOOK

  Excerpted from “The Idlers’ Club,” by Robert Barr

  A BIT OF WAR PHOTOGRAPHY

  Roundabout Readings. “The Red Badge of Courage”

  The Open Boat and Other Tales of Adventure by Stephen Crane

  NEW BOOKS. THE NOVELS OF TWO JOURNALISTS.

  THE RED BADGE OF HYSTERIA. (To the Editor of The Dial.)

  “THE RED BADGE OF COURAGE.” — A CORRECTION.

  A RED BADGE OF BAD ENGLISH.

  MR. STEPHEN CRANE AND HIS CRITICS.

  The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane. D. Appleton & Co.: New York.

  Longman’s Magazine, V. XXVIII, No. CLXIV, June 1896

  Book Review September 1-4 and 8, 1896

  The Nation, V. 64, No. 1667, June 10, 1897

  The Open Boat by Stephen Crane

  The Literary Digest, V. XXI, No. 22, December 1, 1900

  The Red Badge of Courage. (Overland Monthly, V. XXVIII, No. 164, August 1896)

  Hamilton Literary Magazine, New Series, V. I, No. 1, June 1896

  THE PSYCHOLOGY OF WAR.

  Great Battles of the World by Stephen Crane

  Crane: Wounds in the Rain by Stephen Crane

  STEPHEN CRANE’S NEW STORY.

  The Nation, V. 63, No. 1618, July 2, 1896

  A PROMISING AMERICAN REALIST.

  “An Ambitious French Novel and a Modest American Story” by Hamlin Garland

  ANOTHER VIEW OF “MAGGIE.” by H. G. Wells

  Wounds in the Rain: Stories Relating to the Spanish-American War by Stephen Crane

  Whilomville Stories by Stephen Crane. (Harper. 6s.)

  The Monster by Stephen Crane

  The Academy, No. 1504, March 2, 1901

  Active Service by Stephen Crane. (Heinemann. 6s.)

  SOME RECENT VOLUMES OF VERSE by Harry Thurston Peck

  The Athenaeum, No. 3617, February 20, 1897

  The Little Regiment — The Book Buyer, V. XIII, No. 12, January 1897

  The Little Regiment, and other Episodes of the American Civil War by Stephen Crane.

  MR. STEPHEN CRANE’S NEW BOOK — The Third Violet (Heinemann.)

  The Third Violet by Stephen Crane. (The Critic, June 26, 1897)

  The Book Buyer, May 1898

  MR. STEPHEN CRANE’S NEW BOOK — The Outlook, V. 1, No.14, May 7, 1898

  Biographical Pieces

  From: Modern Culture, V.XII No.2 October, 1900, p. 143-145

  THE TRUE STORY OF STEPHEN CRANE. (Modern Culture, V.XII No.2 October, 1900)

  One of the thousand minor annoyances of that speed of life to which we are driven by our latter-day utilitarianism is its effect upon our scanty literary traditions. Of old, people were content to let such traditions grow into maturity slowly and naturally, and the results were the tales which, in spite of all our iconoclasts, will forever remain bona fide incidents in the biographies of Parnassus, from Homer to Petrarch and from Dante to Shakespeare. But to-day our intellectual malaprops must have a constantly fresh tid-bit. They are continually concocting new gossip about living authors, and thus we have had the Whitman, Swinburne, and Kipling myths, for example, during the lifetime of their respective subjects. The only change which takes place at the author’s death is a general exaggeration of the original tales, the premature growth of which has brought about in them a fantastic degree of bad taste that would be hard to equal in any other century.

  Few of these myths have been so annoying to their hero and his friends as that concerning Stephen Crane. One writer gravely told a large public that “The Red Badge of Courage” was his first book, and that it was written in nine days with lead pencil, on pulpy copy-paper in a Mills Hotel. Another states that this, “his one notable book, was originally printed as a serial in a Philadelphia publication, the editor of which bought it for a song, while the boy-author was doing (‘summer resort work’ on the New Jersey sands,” and adds that, “printed in Philadelphia, the story slumbered — naturally enough, though the young man who accepted it has since become something of a figure in New York newspaperdom.” In yet another instance, it is related that the book “was the result of a wager made by Crane with a friend, a well-known artist, during the heat of an argument over a war-story in a monthly magazine which Crane roundly condemned, declaring that he, who had never seen even a sham battle between State militiamen and did not know a Maxim from a Krag-Jorgensen, could write a better.” Severa
l critics have said that the battle described was that actually fought at Chancellorsville; one declares that the author got for it but $190 in all, while particularly wide circulation has been given the report — especially in the literary magazines — that “Maggie” was first published at the author’s expense after Crane had “lived on bread and water to make the necessary money.” Lastly, fully a score of articles have said that several newspaper syndicates at first refused “The Red Badge “; and that after its first appearance it languished in Mr. Cleveland’s “innocuous desuetude” until “discovered by a London publisher, who put it into good shape and so introduced it here and in England.”

  I know that the gossip I have above touched upon is quite groundless, and I am prepared to narrate the real story of this author’s introduction to the public.

  Stephen Crane was born at 14 Mulberry Street, Newark, N. J., November 1, 1871. His ancestor and namesake came from England to Massachusetts in 1635. During the Revolution his family was prominent in New Jersey, but there is no trace of a literary heritage in its history unless one seeks it in the education of the novelist’s father, the Rev. J. I. Crane. Stephen went to Lafayette College and to Syracuse University. At the former, he spent his time watching the life of the city square and at the latter in playing baseball. He had written stories, however, since he was eight years old and soon left college without a degree, lured by the journalistic mirage to Park Row. “I could never do what I didn’t feel like doing — not even writing,” he once said, “but as I felt more often and more intensely like writing than like anything else, I thought I’d better try newspaper work.”

  For some time the experiment was disastrous. Since his seventeenth year he had done summer correspondence from Asbury Park and other places, but he now attempted the more ambitious task of submitting what we know as “Sunday Specials” and taking about stray bits of fiction to the syndicate offices. Again and again his work was refused. But this was because at that time it generally merited refusal, and although too proud to let his relatives know of his circumstances, Crane managed to earn enough to live upon quite as well as most beginners. It was only from the failures of his higher efforts that he really suffered; but therein his agony was indeed intense. He afterwards called the lot of the intellectual free-lance, of all imaginable ones, the most discouraging and hopeless. But in his case the travail was not unavailing, and the child that was finally born of his pains was “The Red Badge of Courage.”