he fugitives
being thus huddled together, the slaughter became terrific.

"Nothing," writes a young British officer, who was engaged in the
_melee_, "could be more shocking than the carnage that followed the
storming of this work. We tumbled over the dead to get at the living,
who were crowding out of the gap of the redoubt, in order to form under
the defences which they had prepared to cover their retreat." Prescott
was one of the last to quit the scene of slaughter. Although more than
one British bayonet had pierced his clothes, he escaped without a wound.

That night the British intrenched themselves on the heights, lying down
in front of the recent scene of contest. The loss in killed and wounded
was ten hundred fifty-four. According to the American account their loss
was one hundred forty-five killed and three hundred four wounded; of
their six pieces of artillery, they only succeeded in carrying off one.

Such was the result of the famous Battle of Bunker Hill, a contest from
which Great Britain derived little advantage beyond the credit of having
achieved a brilliant passage of arms, but which, on the other hand,
produced the significant effect of manifesting, not only to the
Americans themselves, but to Europe, that the colonists could fight with
a steadiness and courage which ere long might render them capable of
coping with the disciplined troops of the mother-country.

JAMES GRAHAME

About the latter part of May, a great part of the reenforcements ordered
from Great Britain arrived at Boston. Three British generals, Howe,
Burgoyne, and Clinton, whose behavior in the preceding war had gained
them great reputation, arrived about the same time. General Gage, thus
reenforced, prepared for acting with more decision; but before he
proceeded to extremities, he conceived it due to ancient forms to issue
a proclamation, holding forth to the inhabitants the alternative of
peace or war. He therefore offered pardon, in the King's name, to all
who should forthwith lay down their arms and return to their respective
occupations and peaceable duties: excepting only from the benefit of
that pardon "Samuel Adams and John Hancock, whose offences were said to
be of too flagitious a nature to admit of any other consideration than
that of condign punishment." He also proclaimed that not only the
persons above named and excepted, but also all their adherents,
associates, and correspondents, should be deemed guilty of treason