Bunker Hill (25 page)

Feversham
realized that the British had only their bayonets now. They had never stopped
to reload. The sixty-five men, he would learn later, were a well-drilled,
well-trained little company from the town of Ipswich. It was a demonic,
incredible display of courage and madness on both sides. Already almost half of
the entire British army had been killed or wounded, and Breed’s Hill was
littered with bodies of the American dead. Now a few hundred Americans, most of
them without ammunition, still presented so terrifying a face that the British
hesitated to advance.

Yet they
did advance, Howe and Clinton leading them with utter indifference to the burst
of flame from the Ipswich guns. Then the combat was hand to hand as the Americans
retreated up to Bunker Hill and the stone walls Putnam had fortified earlier in
the day.

There was
a pause now. Halfway up the slope of Bunker Hill, the British stopped to
reorganize, just out of musket range. The riflemen were out of ammunition, and
almost half of the Ipswich contingent had died under the British bayonets,
along with at least twenty of the militia and riflemen.

Panting,
bloodstained, and exhausted, Prescott conferred with Gridley and Putnam and
Knowlton. It was up to Prescott, and he said flatly that it was over. “We did
what we could do. We have no ammunition, and we can’t fight bayonets with
clubs. Tell me, General
Putnam,
tell me why that
bastard Artemus Ward left us here to die. Why didn’t he send ammunition? Why
didn’t he reinforce us?”

Gray-faced,
so exhausted that he could hardly speak, old Putnam only shook his head.

Colonel
Little
, who led the Ipswich men, said, “The neck is still
open. The British ships are warping back with the tide. We can still get
across.”

Prescott called
to Feversham, who, with Gonzales, was tying wounds with strips of torn shirts.
“Feversham, leave off! We’ll carry those who can’t walk. We’re going to run for
the Charlestown Neck.”

The orders
were passed along. As the British prepared to renew their assault, what was
left of the American force that had defended Breed’s Hill and the redoubt
formed ranks and marched down Bunker Hill, carrying their dead and wounded
across the Charlestown Neck.

A
t five o’clock, in the early evening of June 17th, in
the year 1775, Sir William Howe, supreme commander of His Majesty George III’s
troops in America, stood on Bunker Hill, on the Charlestown peninsula, and
watched the last of the American defenders cross the Charlestown Neck.

He said to
Clinton, quietly, “Henry, put what is left of the Thirty-eighth and the Fifth
on guard across the Charlestown Neck. Have the rest of the light infantry
fortify the top of this hill. Take two field guns down to the neck and load
with grape, just in case those bastards have a notion to return.”

Too tired
to stand, Howe sat down on the stone wall. The sky in the west turned pink as
the sun began to sink behind a cluster of cumulus clouds. A cool breeze broke
the heat of the day.

“Major
Wilkens,” he called out to the only marine officer left unwounded.

“Sir?”

“Have the
marines pick up the wounded and take them down to the ferry landing. The
surgeons from Somerset are waiting at the dock. I want a burying detail.”

“The American dead, sir?”

“Bury them.”

“And our dead?”

“Shroud
them and dig a pit at Morton’s Point. Tell Hallsbury we shall want a service
tomorrow.
For the officers.”

General
Pigot appeared. “We have thirty-one prisoners, most of them wounded.”

“Put them
in Boston jail.”

“They’re
almost all of them wounded, some badly. Can we spare a surgeon?”

“Leave
that to Captain Loring. The little swine’s our jailer now, and if he can find a
surgeon in Boston, let him tend them. We can’t spare a surgeon. What is our
toll, Pigot? Do you have any kind of a count?”

“Not yet.
I’ll make a guess. Almost three hundred dead and perhaps a thousand wounded,
most badly. You don’t live with a bullet in the gut. We’ve taken almost fifty
percent casualties.”

Howe
closed his eyes for a moment and shook his head. “The grenadiers?” he
whispered.

“Seven of
them survived unwounded.”

“I
wonder,” Howe said, almost to
himself
, “has there ever
been a battle like this?”

“It’s a
victory,” Clinton said flatly.

Burgoyne
joined them and said, “I’ll write the report. They don’t count the dead in
London. They’ll have torchlight parades.” And to Clinton, half-mockingly: “Sir
Henry, you’ll be Lord Henry before your knighthood arrives.”

“Go to
hell,” Clinton said.

“Get on with it,” Sir
William told them harshly. “I want the wounded out of here before dark.”

Colonel
Prescott and General Putnam organized a defense line across the Charlestown
Neck, about two hundred yards from the British line. Like the British, Prescott
ordered the single cannon available to be loaded with grape to face the enemy.
But on neither side was there any plan or desire to attack. The battle was
over. The British held Charlestown peninsula, and Prescott’s feeling was: Good
riddance and be damned!

Prescott’s
body cried out for rest, but he had one more task before this day was over. He
found his horse, thanked the young militiaman who had taken the responsibility
for the officers’ horses, and rode to Clement House on Willis Creek, where, he
had been told, the Committee of Safety was meeting. Prescott stormed into the
holding room of Clement House, where he found Artemus Ward seated at a table
with Dr. Benjamin Church and Thomas Gardner, maps spread out in front of them,
and a young clerk at the end of the table.

They all
looked up in astonishment at the appearance of Prescott, the big man covered
with blood and dirt, his shirt hanging in shreds, three days’ growth of beard
on his face. He stalked over to the table, leaned across it, grabbed Artemus
Ward by his jabot, and snarled, “You filthy, scabrous bastard. I ought to kill
you.”

“Let go of
me, sir.” Ward’s voice was a squeak of anger mixed with fear. “How dare you.”

Prescott
flung Ward back in his seat.

“What is
the meaning of this?” Gardner cried. “Have you lost your senses, Colonel
Prescott?”

“Come to
them, come to them!” And to Ward: “Why did you do it, you lousy wretch? Who
paid you? What price did you get for our blood? Three hundred of the best men
in this army—men whose boots you’re not fit to lick—are dead on Breed’s Hill.
We pleaded for help, and you let us die.”

“Get hold
of
yourself
, sir,” Dr. Church said. “You are talking
to your commanding general.”

“You fuckin’ little toad!”
Prescott snarled, turning on Church.
“Sitting here on your
ass while my men bleed to death!
Get out of here and do your duty before
I kill you.
Out!”
He dragged Church from his chair and
flung him across the room. Church fought for his footing and then fled through
the door.

“Oh, this
is unseemly, sir,” Gardner cried.

“I had to
think of my army,” Ward pleaded, cowed now. “My army came first. Supposed the
British had attacked us at Roxbury? What then?”

“You dare
to say that to me. The whole damned British army was there on Breed’s Hill. And
you dare to plead the defense of Roxbury. Well, sir, I am not finished with
you. Be thankful that I don’t draw my pistol and kill you where you sit. More
will be said on this subject.”

“I am your
superior officer,” Ward wailed.

“You are shit, sir,”
Prescott told him, and then Prescott turned on his heel and left.

“We must
find you a horse,” Feversham said to Gonzales as the wounded were being laid,
as gently as possible, in carts that had been brought to the Charlestown Neck.
Two houses in Cambridge had been converted into hospitals, and Feversham had
been told that there were eight doctors already present and waiting to help.

“Yes,”
Feversham told Gonzales, “just as there were
twelve thousand
militia waiting for a few hundred men to hold the British
. It’s an
interesting world, Doctor.” They walked down the road to where a group of boys
had tended to the officers’ horses. Feversham found his horse and explained the
situation.

“Lieutenant
Berry from Marblehead, he’s dead,” one of the boys said. “We’ll be sending his
horse back home, but if the doctor here needs a horse, he can have it and
deliver it to Marblehead when he’s finished with it. Jack Berry. They’ll know
him there.”

“We’ll get
it to Marblehead,” Feversham assured him.

Both
Feversham and Gonzales were stripped to the waist, having torn their shirts into
bandages. Head to foot, they were covered with blood and dirt, both of them
with their instrument bags hanging from their shoulders. In the milling crowd
of militiamen who had crossed the Charlestown Neck, sweating, most of them
naked to the waist, they brought a worshiping respect from the boys. Women were
present with bottles of water and pots of coffee. News and details of the
battle had already spread through the area around Boston. The tired, limping
Americans were the heroes of the moment, and as the sun began to set, people
with torches lit up the area around Willis Creek, talking excitedly, asking
questions.

Major
Knowlton sought out the two doctors and shook Gonzales’s hand warmly. “We’ll be
making an army out of this, Doctor,” he said. “This is no time for details, but
if I have a command, I want you with me.”

Gonzales
nodded. Evidently the thought of a regular army had never occurred to him.
After he mounted Jack Berry’s horse and rode alongside of Feversham on the road
to Cambridge, he spoke of the offer to Feversham. “What do you think?” he asked
Feversham. “Will they make an army?”

“Who
knows? They don’t appear to have any leader who knows what to do now.”

“Prescott?”

Feversham
shrugged. He had trouble keeping his eyes open, and a moment or two later, he
dozed off. Their horses didn’t need guidance. They moved along with the crowd
of carts and men on foot headed toward Cambridge. As night fell, men with
torches joined the procession, lighting the way. The summer night air was warm
and benign, so neither man suffered from his nakedness.

Awakened
from his doze, Feversham gave into the man’s need to speak.

“You were
sleeping,” Gonzales apologized.

“I could fall off my horse. It’s happened to me.”

“No. You
ride too well. Feversham, I never saw a man killed before. I never saw a
battle.”

“The first time is hard.”

“You’ve seen battles?”

“Yes.”

“Like this one?”

Feversham
thought about it before he replied. “No. Not like this one.”

“Someone wins, someone loses.”

“So they say.”

“Feversham,
who won and who lost?” And when Feversham rode on without replying, Gonzales
said, “Did they win?”

“I don’t know.”

“I stood
behind Major Knowlton’s line when the men with the great hats attacked.”

“The grenadiers.”

“I
couldn’t take my eyes away. They marched up to us, and we shot them down. Then
the next rank stepped forward, and we shot them down. Then they walked over the
bodies of the dead, and we shot them down. Then the whole place in front of us
was covered with their bodies, and they walked over the bodies of their own
men, and we shot them down.”

Feversham could think of nothing to say.

“I have been trying to understand,” Gonzales said,
almost plaintively.

“There’s
no understanding,” Feversham said. “When our men were frightened and ran,
Prescott let them run.”

“Yes.”

“But the grenadiers.
They didn’t.”

“No, Doctor,” Feversham said
tiredly, “if the grenadiers had turned their backs on us, they would have been
shot by their own men.”

Israel Putnam walked slowly
along the Cambridge Road, leading his horse and debating with himself whether
it would be reasonable to strangle Artemus Ward with his naked hands. He didn’t
climb into the saddle, for he was convinced that if he tried to ride, he would
fall asleep and fall out of the saddle and break his neck. The adulation of the
militiamen who recognized him in the darkness was pleasant, but he would have
preferred at this time to be left alone. He knew that he should be doing
something to pull the Connecticut volunteers together into some kind of order,
but he couldn’t bring himself to take any positive action. He was naked to the
waist, his shirt having gone the way of other shirts, and the night air was
cool. Finally, he tethered his horse to one hand, took his field blanket from
the saddle, wrapped himself in it, and stretched out on the roadside. In a few
moments, he was asleep.

Gridley
found Elizabeth Warren, Dr. Warren’s wife, at the Palmers’ house. She was a
good-looking woman of thirty years, with bright blue eyes and a head of soft,
honey-colored hair. She and her husband had a house in Boston, now occupied by
the British. She pleaded with Gridley for a shred of hope.

“It’s no
use to hope, Mrs. Warren,” Gridley told her. “I was there beside him.”

“And you
saw it?”

“Yes.”

“Then tell me. I must know.”

“Isn’t it
enough to know that he died?”

She shook
her head. She whispered, “Why was he there when he was so sick?”

“He had to
be there.”

“I must know, Colonel Gridley.”

Gridley,
tired, weak from loss of blood, said unhappily, “He was shot in the head. I
killed the man who killed him. He died without pain.”

“But where
is his body?”

“In the redoubt, ma’am, where he fell.”

“You left
him there?”

“We were
overwhelmed. They poured into the redoubt, and it was either get out or be
killed. We had shot away our ammunition, and they came at us with their
bayonets. We were only a handful.”

“But how
can I bury him?”

“We’ll try to take that up
with General Gage. I trust someone will, tomorrow.”

Jacob
Bother, fifteen years old, and Levi Goodson, fourteen, were both Boston boys,
distantly related to Dr. Warren. At ten o’clock on the night of the
seventeenth, they took an old rowboat that was beached on the Mystic River and
quietly paddled to the shore of the Charlestown peninsula, landing on the rocky
ledge where John Stark and his New Hampshire riflemen had made their line of
defense. Their intention, as they afterward confessed, was to find the body of
Joseph Warren and bring it back for burial. Since they were well aware that
their mission would have been forbidden, they told no one of their intention.