Part 12 (1/2)

Prescott came off unhurt. Those who saw him said that he ”stepped long, with his sword up.” He saved his life by parrying the bayonets which were thrust at him, although some of them pierced his clothes.

That more were not killed in the pursuit was due to two factors. The first was the exhaustion of the soldiers, who, tired with carrying heavy loads in the unwonted heat (and an American summer is like the tropics to an Englishman), were winded with their last charge up the hill. They were therefore in no good condition to follow up their victory, and the fugitives were soon away beyond Bunker Hill. Yet that the pursuit was so poor was due partly to the defenders of the rail fence. These men, more like veteran regiments than fragments of many commands, withdrew in a body, continually threatening those who offered to close in from behind.

The end of the fight was as honorable to them as its beginning.

But there was much loss. A number were killed in the redoubt, and the slopes of Bunker Hill were dotted with slain, killed by bullets and cannon shot. At the Neck some few more were killed. The total of dead, according to Ward's record, was 115, of the wounded 305, of the captured 30. Slightly varying totals are reported.[101]

The great personal loss on the part of the Americans was in the death of Warren. There had been no need of his coming, and his value for higher services--he was president of the provincial congress and had just been appointed a major-general--was greater than at the post of actual conflict. But his fiery spirit, of which we have seen so much, would not be denied. That day he waked with a headache, but on learning of the expected battle he declared himself well. Friends tried to detain him, but he replied with the Latin phrase, ”It is sweet and becoming to die for one's country.” On reaching the field he met Putnam, who offered to take his orders. But Warren had come as a volunteer, and asked where he should go. Putnam showed him the redoubt, saying, ”There you will be covered.”

”Don't think,” said Warren, ”that I come to seek a place of safety; but tell me where the onset will be most furious.”

Putnam still sent him to the redoubt. ”That is the enemy's object.”

Warren went to the redoubt, where the men received him with cheers, and Prescott offered him command. But Warren still declined, took a musket, and fought with the men. There is no doubt that part of the credit of the stout defence belongs to him. When the retreat was ordered he withdrew unwillingly, and was among the last to leave the redoubt.

After he had gone but a little way in the open field he was shot in the head, and died instantly. Once, when the British questioned the courage of the Americans, he had said, ”By Heavens, I hope I shall die up to my knees in blood!” He had had his wish.

Warren's death at the time was not certainly known to either friend or foe; his body was buried on the field, and was disinterred and identified only after the evacuation. Of the Boston leaders, he was the only one who gave his life for the cause. He was sadly missed, a man of keen intellect and excellent political sense, of deep sympathies, and high honor. A magnetic leader, he could ill be spared.

The last figure on the battle-field was Putnam's. At the unfinished fortification on Bunker Hill he implored the fugitives to rally and ”give them one shot more.” The profanity which he used on this occasion he afterwards penitently acknowledged in church. He retired only when the pursuers were close behind, but went no further than Prospect Hill.

There, seizing on the chance which so long had been denied him, without orders he collected men and commenced another redoubt. The next day he was found there, unwashed, still digging, and ready for another battle.

Prescott returned to Cambridge, reported at headquarters, and offered if given sufficient troops to retake the hill. But Ward was afraid of his own position, and would not sanction the attempt.

The British loss was very heavy, about one thousand and fifty, of whom a quarter were killed, while ninety-two among the dead were officers.

Pitcairn was carried to Boston, and died there. Colonel Abercrombie was killed, and many others of lesser note. As soon as it was possible the wounded officers were conveyed to Boston for medical attendance, and we have in Major Clarke's narrative a dismal picture of one sad procession.

”In the first carriage was Major Williams, bleeding and dying, and three dead captains of the fifty-second regiment. In the second, four dead officers; then another with wounded officers.”

The Americans, at first discouraged by their defeat, in the course of time came to regard it as a victory. This it certainly was not, yet it had all the moral effect of a British defeat. The regulars learned that the provincials would stand up to them. ”d.a.m.n the rebels,” was the current phrase; ”they would not flinch.”[102] Many of the officers felt called upon to explain, in letters home, the reason for the defeat. The American rifles, argued one, were ”peculiarly adapted to take off the officers of a whole line as it advances to an attack.” They reasoned that the redoubt, whose perfection when examined was astonis.h.i.+ng, must have been the work of days. As to the comparative uselessness of the British cannon, it was explained by the nine-pound shot (some say twelve) sent for the six-pounders. Said one newspaper: ”It naturally required a great while to ram down such disproportioned shot; nor did they, when discharged, fly with that velocity and true direction they would have done, had they been better suited to the size of the cannon.”[103]

But aside from a few such absurdities, the body of the army and the British public recognized at last that they had formidable antagonists.

This was no such fight as that on the 19th of April, when the s.h.i.+fting provincials gave the regulars nothing to strike at. This was a pitched battle, and the farmers had all but won it. The British were amazed by the stubborn defence, and the rapidity and accuracy of the American fire. The proportion of killed among the officers was greater than any before known, and veterans admitted that the slaughter was worse than at Minden, the deadliest of recent European battles. It is with reason, then, that Boston still celebrates Bunker Hill. It was the first signal proof of American courage, and forecast the success of the siege.

Indeed, it is not too much to say that Bunker Hill battle had influence in deciding the outcome of the war. Howe, destined to be the leader of the British forces, never forgot the lesson of the redoubt on Breed's Hill, or of the flimsy fence of rails and hay. It was seldom that he could resolve to send his men against a rebel entrenchment.

FOOTNOTES:

[92] Frothingham's ”Siege,” 123.

[93] Frothingham's ”Siege,” 126, and Sabine's ”Loyalists,” 707.

[94] Reports vary from eighty to three hundred feet.

[95] Dearborn's account of the battle, _Historical Magazine_ for 1864.

[96] Bancroft, v, 612.

[97] Ross's ”Life of Cornwallis,” quoted in Fonblanque's ”Burgoyne,”

159.