On the 9th the trenches
were completed, and the Americans began the bombardment of the town and
of the British frigates in the river. It continued for nearly
twenty-four hours, and so persistent and terrific was the cannonading,
that the British, being unfortunate in their embrasures, withdrew most
of their cannon and made infrequent reply. On the night of the 11th new
trenches were begun within two and three hundred yards of the British
works. While they were completing, the enemy opened new embrasures, from
which their fire was far more effective than at first. Two redoubts
flanked this second parallel and desperately annoyed the men in the
trenches. It was determined to carry them by assault, and the American
light infantry and De Viomenil's grenadiers and chasseurs were ordered
to hold themselves in readiness for the attack. Laurens, with eighty
men, was to turn the redoubt in order to intercept the retreat of the
garrison, but Hamilton, for the moment, saw his long-coveted
opportunity glide by him. Washington had determined to give it to our
hero's old Elizabethtown tutor, Colonel Barber, conceiving that the
light infantry which had made the Virginia campaign was entitled to
precedence.
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