Sustained honor: The Age of Liberty EstablishedMusick, John R. (John Roy)
History
Sustained honor: The Age of Liberty Established
Musick, John R. (John Roy)
United States -- History -- War of 1812 -- Fiction
It was so dark that little could be seen, until just about the time the
battle ceased. The morning had dawned, but the dense fog and thick smoke
obscured the sun. The Kentuckians did not seem to appreciate their
danger, but loaded and fired, and swore, laughed and joked as though it
were a frolic. All ranks and sections were soon broken and after the
first volley every man loaded and fired at will. Sukey did not fire as
often as some of the others, but at every shot he went up to the
breastwork, looked over until he could see a redcoat, and then taking
aim blazed away. After each shot he paused to write in his book.
Lieutenant Ashby, who had had a brother killed at the River Raisin,
seemed frantic with rage and fiendish glee. He ran up and down the
line yelling:
"We'll pay you now for the River Raisin! We'll give you something to
remember the River Raisin!" When the British came up on the opposite
side of the breastwork, having no gun, he picked up a rifle barrel which
had been broken from the stock and threw it over at them. Then finding
an iron bar he leaped upon the breastwork and threw it at the mass of
heads crowding forward to scale their works.
While the conflict was at its height, when Packenham was leading the
last grand charge against the earthworks. Major Stevens' attention was
directed by repeated and vociferous shouts to "come down," to an object
on his right. Turning his eyes in that direction, he saw Sukey, standing
coolly on the top of the breastwork peering into the darkness for
something to shoot at. The balls were whistling as thick as hail around
him, and cutting up the dirt at his feet.
"Come down, Sukey, come down!" Fernando commanded. Sukey turned round
and, holding up the flap of his old, broad-brimmed hat with one hand, to
see who was speaking to him, answered:
"Oh, never mind, Fernando--here's Sukey--I don't want to waste my
powder, and I'd like to know how I'm to shoot until I see something. I'm
watching for that man on the big white horse."
It was not long until Sukey got his eye on the man on the big white
horse, and leveling his rifle pulled the trigger. At that instant
Packenham fell, bleeding and dying, into the arms of Sir Duncan
McDougall, his favorite aid, who performed a similar service for General
Ross when he was mortally wounded a few months before. Sukey coolly
descended from the breastwork and, sitting down at the root of a tree,
took out his book and said:
"I've balanced the score. They flogged me; but, by the eternal, I'm more
than even."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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