Desperate fighting ensued, and when
time for reloading failed, it was rifle butt and bayonet against
tomahawk and scalping knife in hand-to-hand combat. For two hours
the battle raged in the darkness, and only when daylight came
were the troops able to charge the redskins, dislodge them from
behind the trees, and drive them to a safe distance in the
neighboring swamp. Sixty-one of Harrison's officers and men were
killed or mortally wounded; one hundred and twenty-seven others
suffered serious injury. The Governor himself probably owed his
life to the circumstance that in the confusion he mounted a bay
horse instead of his own white stallion, whose rider was shot
early in the contest.
The Indian losses were small, and for twenty-four hours
Harrison's forces kept their places, hourly expecting another
assault. "Night," wrote one of the men subsequently, "found every
man mounting guard, without food, fire, or light and in a
drizzling rain. The Indian dogs, during the dark hours, produced
frequent alarms by prowling in search of carrion about the
sentinels.
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