“promised three Danish soldiers who lay under sentence of death, their lives and a reward if they would attempt fording the river, which they gladly accepted, and at noonday put on armour, and entered the river a little below the bridge, and went at some distance from each other; the enemy took them for deserters, and we from our trenches fired seemingly at them, but over their heads at the enemy; when they had passed the depth of the water, and almost on the other side, they turned back, which when the enemy perceived they fired at them as hard as they could, but our cannon which was reserved for that purpose, as also our small shot, fired so briskly upon them that they could not hold up their heads to take aim at the men, by which they were saved, two being only slightly wounded. The General finding the river fordable (which it had not been for many years) resolved to try and pass it, upon which he gave orders for 40 Grenadiers from each company and 80 choice men out of each Battalion of the whole army to march as privately as possible into the trenches, and the whole army to be under arms to sustain the attack should there be occasion. “On the 20th June[12] the detachments marched into the trenches (I being one of the Captains who commanded ours) with all the privacy we could, but notwithstanding all our caution, St Ruth had notice of our motion and design by the appearance of crowds of people on the hills to see the action, upon which he marched down his whole army to the bank of his part of the town, and filled the Castle and trenches with as many men as it could well hold; our General perceiving this, put off the attack till another time, ordering our detachments back to Camp, but at the same time gave private orders that not a man should stir from his Regiment, or be put on any other duty, but to be all ready at a minute’s warning. St Ruth seeing us draw off, was persuaded that our General dare not pass the River at this time, and in this security marched his Army back to Camp, leaving only a slight body of men to guard their works and the Castle. The next day a soldier of our Army (whether sent by the General, or he went of himself, I can’t say) went over to the enemy and was carry’d before St Ruth, and told him that the common report in our Camp was that the General finding it was not practicable to pass the River at this time resolved to try what he could do at Banagher which lay ten miles down the River, and that everything was getting ready for the march. St Ruth, easily persuaded with this notion, and finding all things very quiet in our Camp, made a splendid entertainment for all the Ladies and Gentlemen, the Officers of the Town, and the Camp. The same day, being 22nd June, our General sent private orders along the Line for all the detachments to march directly into the trenches, and to