{382}sion Sullivan now attached himself, and, with Stirling and La Fayette, engaged personally in the hottest of the battle. To this point Cornwallis directed his energies. His artillery made dreadful breaches in their ranks, and strewed the earth with the slain. * Resistance was vain, and, when hope no longer encouraged the contending patriots of the center, they, too, wheeled, and joined their comrades in their flight. Two of Sullivan s aids were killed; and La Fayette, who had leaped from his horse, and, sword in hand, was endeavoring to rally the yielding patriots, was wounded in the leg by a musket-ball, and fell. Gimat, his aid, helped him on a horse, and he escaped. ** Despair seized the troops, and every effort to rally them was, for a time, vain. They fled to the woods in the rear, pursued by the victorious enemy. Some of them were rallied half a mile northward of Dilworth, and a brief encounter ensued between the fugitives and the pursuing party of the left wing of the enemy. The conflict was short, and the Americans again fled. The British right wing got entangled in the woods, and did not participate in the subsequent engagement, when Greene checked the pursuers. On receiving intelligence of the approach of the British, Washington, with Greenes division of Virginians and Pennsylvanians, pushed forward to the support of Sullivan, leaving General Wayne at Chad's Ford to oppose the passage of Knyphausen. When the first cannon-peals from the Birmingham meeting-house broke over the country, Greene pressed forward to the support of the right wing. His first brigade, under General Weedon, *** took the lead, and so rapid was their march that they traveled four miles in forty minutes. *** Between Dilworth and the meeting-house they met the flying Americans, closely pursued by the British. Greene, by a skillful movement, opened his ranks and received the fugitives, then, closing them again, he covered their retreat and checked the pursuers by a continual