The left flank began to give way before the desperate and persistent foe.
Ross Douglas and Bright Wing were fighting side by side, in that quarter.
A half-dozen warriors sprang through the broken lines, brandishing their
arms and yelling fiendishly. Four of them fell dead in their tracks.
Douglas and his comrade engaged in a hand-to-hand combat with the other
two. The Wyandot quickly dispatched his opponent, but Ross was not so
fortunate. His foot slipped upon the blood-soaked sod, and he fell
prostrate. His savage foe, with raised tomahawk, was upon him. The young
scout closed his eyes, expecting death. But the next moment the Indian
lay gasping for breath, with Duke’s keen fangs buried in his throat.
“Ugh! Duke him here at right time!” grunted Bright Wing, as he rammed
home another charge.
The ends of the broken line swung into place—and still the battle raged.
The rain ceased to fall; the sky began to clear. Darkness gave place to
dawn. The commander ordered a charge all along the lines. Inch by inch
the savages gave way—in spite of the bravery of their chiefs, and the
inspiration of Tenskwatawa’s war-song. At last they could stand the cold
steel of the bayonets no longer. They broke and fled. Down the slope and
across the boggy prairie, toward their town, they hastened, carrying many
of their dead and wounded with them. Victory had perched upon Harrison’s
banner; and the palefaces had won the battle of Tippecanoe.
The victorious troops pursued the fleeing savages, until the yielding
surface of the wet prairie compelled the mounted riflemen to halt. Then
the whole force returned to camp. The whites had lost one hundred and
eighty in killed and wounded; the Indians, probably, had lost an equal
number.
At sunrise squads of soldiers were engaged in burying the dead and
carrying the wounded to the surgeon’s quarters. Joe Farley was on the
detail. At the southwestern angle of the camp, he came upon the body
of a tall and lank militiaman. The man lay upon his side—a contorted,
blood-stained heap. His head rested upon his arm, and his face was
partially concealed. Supposing that the poor fellow was dead, Farley
caught him by the shoulder, to turn him over. The dying man moaned
feebly. Bending over him, Joe said tenderly:
“I didn’t mean to be rough, friend, I thought you was—was—are you hurt
bad?”
The blue lips moved—and these words were breathed into Farley’s face:
“I left my children in ol’ Kaintuck,
In the cabin with the’r mother;
And now the’r pap has got his death—
An’ they’ll—never git—an-oth-er!”
The faint voice ended in a whispering quaver. Joe sprang erect, his limbs
trembling, his face as white as chalk.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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