Again the enemy made the first hostile movement, and from a powerful battery opened a terrible fire, but without effect. To this the Americans made no reply. Burgoyne then ordered the woods to be cleared by the bayonet, and soon, across the open field, column after column of infantry steadily advanced toward the patriot lines. The Americans kept close within their intrenchments until the enemy fired a volley and pressed onward to the charge, when they sprang upon their assailants with a force that drove them far back across the clearing. Like the ebbing and flowing of the tide, the contending armies alternately advanced and retreated, and for more than three hours the conflict was severe and the result doubtful. And it was not until the sun went down and darkness came upon them, that the warriors ceased their horrid strife. Even amid the gloom of evening there were furious contentions. Just at dusk, Lieutenant-colonel Marshall, with the tenth Massachusetts regiment, encountered some British grenadiers and infantry on a rise of ground a little west of Freeman's cottage, and a brisk but short action ensued. * The commander of the enemy was killed, and the troops fled in confusion. Lieutenant-colonel Brooks, of the eighth Massachusetts regiment, remained upon the field until eleven o'clock at night, and in the course of the evening he had a skirmish on the extreme left with some of Breyman's riflemen, whom he knew as such only by the brass match-cases upon their breasts. He was the last to leave the field of action. The conflict at length ended. The Americans retired within their lines, and the British rested on their arms all night upon the field of battle. ** The loss of the Americans was, officers included, sixty-four killed, two hundred and seventeen wounded, and thirty-eight missing; in all, three hundred and nineteen. *** The British lost, in killed, wounded, and prisoners, "rather more than less than five hundred." **** Both parties claimed the honor of victory. The British, it is true, remained masters, or, at least, possessors, of the field, but this was not their ultimate object. It was to _advance_, and that they failed to do; while the Americans were intent only upon maintaining their ground, and this they accomplished. The advantage, therefore, was certainly on the side of the republicans. Very few battles have been marked by more determined bravery and patient endurance on both sides than this. Phillips and Riedesel, who had served in the wars in Flanders and other parts of Europe, said they never knew so long and hot a fire; and Burgoyne, in his defense before Parliament, remarked, "few actions have been characterized by more obstinacy in attack or defense." The number of Americans engaged in the action was about two thousand five hundred, and of the British about three thousand. The whole British army in camp and on the field numbered about five thousand, and that of the American about seven thousand.