rtillery; on the 15th of September a junction was formed between the
French and General Lincoln,[22] and with the utmost confidence of
success.[23]

They determined to take the town by siege rather than by storm in the
first instance.[24]

On the 16th of September they demanded, in a very confident and haughty
tone, the surrender of the town to the arms of the King of France; but
General Prevost declined surrendering on a general summons, and
requested a specific statement of the terms of it. The Count replied
that it was for the besieged to propose the terms. General Prevost
requested and obtained twenty-four hours' suspension of hostilities to
prepare his answer. Before the twenty-four hours had elapsed,
Lieutenant-Colonel Maitland, with several hundred men who had been
stationed at Beaufort, made their way through inland channels and
swamps, and joined the royal standard at Savannah; and General Prevost
gave his answer of no surrender. The French and Americans, who formed a
junction the evening after, resolved to besiege the town, and consumed
several days in preparing for it, while the works of the garrison were
hourly strengthened by great labour and skill. From the 24th of
September to the 4th of October a heavy cannonade on both sides was kept
up; but the allied army, finding that they could make little or no
impression on the works of the besieged, resolved on a bombardment, with
a stronger cannonading than ever. On the 4th of October the besiegers
opened on the town three batteries, with nine mortars, thirty-seven
pieces of cannon from the land side, and fifteen from the water. The
firing from these batteries lasted, with little intermission, during
five days; but the damage they did was confined mostly to the town,
where some houses were destroyed and some women and children killed.
Soon after the commencement of the cannonade, General Prevost requested
permission to remove the women and children out of the town to a place
of safety; but this request was refused in offensive terms on the part
of Count D'Estaing, by the advice of General Lincoln, on the pretext
that a desire of secreting the plunder lately taken from the South
Carolinas was covered under the veil of humanity, but the real reason
was that the surrender of the town would be expedited by keeping the
women and children in it.[25]

Count D'Estaing, finding that his five days' cannonading made no
impression on the defensive works of the city, and