Smarting under this defeat, the British commanders immediately planned the destruction of Hampton, eighteen miles from Norfolk, which they supposed would cut off communication between the latter place and the upper part of Virginia.
At daylight on the 25th, two thousand five hundred soldiers, commanded by Sir Sydney Beckwith, were landed several miles below Hampton, and marched on the town. At the same time, a squadron of boats, commanded by Admiral Cockburn and protected by the sloop-of-war _Mohawk_, drew up before the place and fired in rockets, shells, and solid shot. The entire garrison of the place consisted of six hundred and thirty-six men, com{ 174}manded by Major Crutchfield, who had seven pieces of artillery.
As Cockburn's barges approached the town, fire was opened upon them with two twelve-pounders, which did so much execution that the Admiral found it discreet to draw off and take position behind a point of land where the American gunners could not see him. From this shelter he fired rockets and shells for an hour, but so wildly that not the slightest damage was effected by them.
Crutchfield sent a company of riflemen, under Captain Servant, with orders to conceal themselves in the woods near the road where Beckwith's column would pass in approaching the town, to annoy and delay it as much as possible. This was done so skilfully as to inflict considerable loss upon the enemy; and when Crutchfield saw that the barges would not approach the town again till it was in the possession of Beckwith, he marched with the greater part of his force to the assistance of the riflemen, leaving Captain Pryor with a few men to manage the battery and keep off the barges.
Crutchfield's column was fired upon just as the British column had been, by riflemen concealed in a wood; and as he wheeled to charge upon the hidden foe, he was greeted by a sudden fire from two six-pounders and a discharge of rockets. The { 175}enemy's artillery was so well handled that Crutchfield's column was broken up, and a portion of it driven from the field. The remainder made its way through a defile, all the while under fire, to a junction with Servant's riflemen. At the same time Captain Cooper, with what few cavalrymen the Americans had, was annoying the enemy's left flank.