Into the breastwork, which was commanded by Colonel Sutton of Clarendon, who had constructed it, were packed 250 men, in addition to negroes, being those of the several regiments that had come in during the night. Beeston tells us that the fort was ill-made and worse contrived. “On the south was the sea, on the west a large river [the Rio Minho], and on the east they had left a wood standing,” which formed a natural covert for the enemy. They also failed to lay in provisions for either man or horse. By daylight on the morning of the 19th the enemy had landed about 1400 or 1500 men about a mile and a half to the east of the breastwork, where the small guard, after firing on them, retreated to the breastwork, which the French attacked so hotly that the defenders had to retreat over the river, not, however, before they had fought bravely and killed many of the enemy. Just as the French forced the breastwork three or four companies of the St. Catherine regiment and one of the St. Elizabeth and some horse came in, weary, footsore and hungry with their march of about thirty-six miles from Spanish Town. Yet they fell on bravely on the right of the enemy and charged them so warmly that they not only prevented them from pursuing the party that had crossed the river, but made them retire. Nothing but skirmishes took place till Sunday the 22nd, when the French marched upwards till they came to the house of a certain Mr. Hubbard, which was garrisoned with twenty men and well provisioned. Local tradition says that this stood where Gales, a hamlet now occupied by the Coolie barracks on Amity Hall estate, now is. Bridges, in his “Annals,” writing in 1828, said: “The brick house in which so gallant a stand was made, remains with the shot visible in its walls, and a solitary cotton tree in the road from the Abbey [_sic_, Alley] to Carlisle Bay still marks the rallying-point of the English and the grave of many a valiant soldier.” An attack on this house by the French resulted in the loss of several of their best officers, as the besieged were aided by a detachment from the Bay. On hearing that a more determined attack was intended on the morrow, Major Richard Lloyd, who was chosen to command, put fifty men into the house and prepared an ambuscade. But the French, finding that they had lost so many of their officers and men, and that they could not penetrate further into the country, contented themselves with firing the small town of Carlisle, spiking the guns and doing what mischief they could, and then retreated to their ships. On Tuesday, 24th, the whole fleet sailed—Du Casse and two or three ships going straight back to San Domingo, the rest staying only to put into Port Morant to wood and water and land prisoners. And thus ended the most serious attempt at the capture of Jamaica ever made upon its shores during the English occupation.