every age, and
to either sex. The hope was now fondly indulged that these scenes, at
least in the northern and middle colonies, were closed forever.

* * * * *

=_John Armstrong,[28] 1759-1843._=

From the Life of General Wayne.

=_103._= STORMING OF STONY POINT.

Wayne, believing that few things were impracticable to discipline and
valor, after a careful reconnoissance, adopted the project, and hastened
to give it execution. Beginning his march on the 15th from Sandy Beach,
he at eight o'clock in the evening took a position within a mile and
a half of his object. By the organization given to the attack, the
regiments of Febiger and Meigs, with Hull's detachment, formed the
column of the right; and the regiment of Butler and Murfey's detachment,
that of the left. A party of twenty men furnished with axes for pioneer
duty, and followed by a sustaining corps of one hundred and fifty men
with unloaded arms, preceded each column, while a small detachment was
assigned to purposes merely of demonstration.

At half after eleven o'clock, the hour fixed on for the assault, the
columns were in motion; but from delays made inevitable by the nature of
the ground, it was twenty minutes after twelve before this commenced,
when neither the morass, now overflowed by the tide, nor the formidable
and double row of _abattis_, nor the high and strong works on the summit
of the hill, could for a moment damp the ardor or stop the career of
the assailants, who, in the face of an incessant fire of musketry and
a shower of shells and grape-shot, forced their way through every
obstacle, and with so much concert of movement, that both columns
entered the fort and reached its centre, nearly at the same moment. Nor
was the conduct of the victors less conspicuous for humanity than for
valor. Not a man of the garrison was injured after the surrender; and
during the conflict of battle, all were spared who ceased to make
resistance.

The entire American loss in this enterprise, so formidable in prospect,
did not exceed one hundred men. The pioneer parties, necessarily the
most exposed, suffered most. Of the twenty men led by Lieutenant Gibbons
of the Sixth Pennsylvania Regiment, seventeen were killed or wounded.
Wayne's own escape on this occasion was of the hair-breadth kind. Struck
on the head by a musket-ball, he fell; but immediately rising on one
knee, he exclaimed, "March on, carry me into the fort; for sh