"Toward evening the two detachments marched to the assault. Colonel Alexander Hamilton, who had commanded a battery of light artillery during this campaign, led the advance corps of the Americans, assisted by Colonel Gimat, Lafayette's aide; while Colonel Laurens, with eighty men, turned the redoubt, in order to intercept the retreat of the garrison. "At a given signal the troops rushed furiously to the charge without firing a gun, the van being led by Captain Aaron Ogden. Over the abattis and palisades they leaped, and with such vehemence and rapidity assaulted and entered the works, that their loss was inconsiderable. One sergeant and eight privates were killed; seven officers and twenty-five non-commissioned officers and privates were wounded. Major Campbell, who commanded the redoubt, and some inferior officers, with seventeen privates, were made prisoners. Eight privates of the garrison were killed in the assault, but not one was injured after the surrender. "The redoubt stormed by the French was garrisoned by a greater force, and was not so easily overcome. It was defended by a lieutenant-colonel, and one hundred and fifty men. After a combat of nearly half an hour, the redoubt was surrendered. Eighteen of the garrison were killed, and forty-two were made prisoners. The French lost in killed and wounded about one hundred men. "During the night of the fourteenth these redoubts were included in the second parallel, and by five o'clock the next afternoon some howitzers, which had been placed in them, were opened upon the British works. "The situation of Cornwallis was now becoming dangerous. Beleaguered on all sides by a superior force, his strongest defenses crumbling or passing into the possession of the besiegers, and no tidings from General Clinton to encourage him, the British commander was filled with the gloomiest apprehensions. "Knowing that the town would be untenable when the second parallel should be completed, he sent out a detachment under Lieutenant-Colonel Abercrombie, to make a sortie against the two almost completed batteries guarded by French troops. They made a furious assault at about four o'clock in the morning and were successful; but the guards at the trenches soon drove the assailants back, and their enterprise was fruitless of advantage. "Cornwallis, confident that he could not maintain his position, determined to make a desperate effort at flight. His plan was to leave the sick and his baggage behind; cross over to Gloucester, and, with his detachment there, disperse the French troops; mount his infantry on horses taken from the duke's legion, and others that might be seized in the neighborhood; by rapid marches gain the forks of the Rappahannock and the Potomac, and, forcing his way through Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, form a junction with the army in New York.