Wesley Corpus

“Ever since the 22d of July, our army and the French have lain so close, and marched so close together, that we have expected them to come upon us almost every night, and have had, for many nights, strict orders not to take off our accoutrements, but to be ready to turn out ata minute’s warning. And almost every day, some of our out guards have had skirmishes with them. On September 29, at night, Prince Charles had intelligence that they designed to fall upon us with all their force.. So we had orders to be ready, and at break of day our regiment and Graham’s were ordered to march in the front of the army, with two Hessian, two Hanoverian, and a part of the Dutch. We marched a mile forward into little parks and orchards, a village being between us and our army: in this posture we remained abeut three hours, while their right wing was engaged with the Dutch, the cannon playing every where all this time. But we were all endued with strength and courage from God, so that the fear of death was taken away from us. And when the French came upon us, and overpowered us, we were troubled at our regiment’s giving way, and would have stood our ground, and called to the rest of the regiment, to stop and face the enemy, but to no purpose. In the retreat we were broke; yet after we had retreated about a mile, we rallied twice and fired again. When we came where we thought the army was, they were call gone. So we marched good part of the night; and the next day, about four o’clock, we came to this camp. We left our brother Mark Bend in ithe field; whether he be alive or dead we cannot tell; but the last of our ‘brothers that spoke to him, after he was wounded, found him quite resigned to the will of God. We that he has spared a little longer, desire you to return thanks to God for all his mercies to us.” JOURNAL.--No. VII.