e
and dangerous task. He gained his point and returned in a state of
exuberant satisfaction, exclaiming to his major, "We have it! We have
it!" So Lafayette assigned Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Hamilton to
lead the advance corps, to be assisted by Colonel de Gimat. In all
there were four hundred men under Lafayette for this storming
adventure.

It was eight o'clock on the evening of October 14. The storming of the
two redoubts had been carefully planned even down to the least
details; but so energetic was the work of the men, so dashing was
their valor, that when the time really came, the attack lasted but a
few minutes.

Lafayette's redoubt was taken in a mere flash of time--in less than
ten minutes, some close observers said; others made it eight minutes.
The six shells, the signal agreed upon, were fired. The men started
the march. Rock Redoubt loomed before them in the thick dusk of
twilight. They advanced in good order with their bayonets fixed and in
utter silence, as they had been commanded. But when the first volley
of musketry came down from the top of the redoubt, they broke their
silence and huzzaed with all their power. Then they rushed forward,
charging with their bayonets as they ran, and in almost no time they
were within the redoubt, with the defending officer and forty-five men
their prisoners. Not a shot had been fired; and so swift was the
action that few of the Americans were lost.

The not ungenerous rivalry between the groups of men who took the two
redoubts is one of the most picturesque incidents of the American
Revolution. If it had not been for the fact that the French detachment
had paused to have the abatis cut through in regular order, they would
probably have been in their redoubt before the Americans under
Lafayette were in theirs; for when they were once on the height, they
occupied but six minutes in making themselves masters of their redoubt
and in manning it again for action.

One move follows another quickly at such a time, and when Lafayette
had entered his redoubt, he looked over the parapet and saw that the
men on the other height were still struggling for the possession of
theirs. It happened that a certain General Viomesnil had expressed a
doubt as to the efficiency of the American troops, therefore Lafayette
welcomed this opportunity to show their valor. He instantly sent an
aid to announce to General Viomesnil, with a flourish of compliments,
that the American troops wer