"How did Uncle Horace and Master Earle escape from the Yankees?"
"They were set free," Fred replied. "Father thinks it was because they had no spare men for guards. The rebels are so afraid of being whipped by the king's troops that they are turning out to the last man."
When the sun rose on the morning of the fifteenth, it disclosed the Continental forces gathered on the opposite bank of the river and along the road to Bennington. Believing an attack near at hand, Colonel Baum arranged his forces in three lines, the Indians first, behind them the Tories, and his own troops in the rear. With the first skirmishing the redskins, unaccustomed to fighting pitched battles, began to slip away. Alarmed by this fact, the commander, knowing his young scout was familiar with the savage tongue, sent him off to stay, if possible, the flight of the fugitives, and, if unsuccessful in that, to go down the road toward the fort and hasten the coming of reinforcements.
This enabled Ira to refrain from fighting against his friends. He was an interested spectator, however, of what took place on that day and the next.
Content with an occasional skirmish, Colonel Stark allowed the first day to pass without decisive action, in the hope that another regiment of militia, which was hourly expected, might arrive. But early on the morning of the sixteenth he decided to wait no longer. Calling his men together he addressed them in words which have since become memorable:
"There are the red-coats. We must beat them to-day, or to-night my wife sleeps a widow."
He then sent detachments on both flanks to gain, if possible, the British rear. He led the front attack himself, and after two hours broke the line of the few remaining Indians, who fled, crying:
The center of the attack now fell upon the Tories, who were driven back upon the Hessians, and the entire British force, yielding slowly, was at length pushed across the stream on their left.
Colonel Baum now attempted to retrieve himself by heading a new attack in person, but with no better success. He was mortally wounded, his troops routed, and his artillery captured.
Meanwhile a reinforcement of five hundred Hessians, under Lieutenant-Colonel Breyman, was coming to his aid. The messenger, asking for help, had reached the fort promptly, but for some reason the second force of regulars was not started for Bennington until the following morning, and Dan Cushing had ample time to get word to General Schuyler of the new movement. Therefore when Colonel Breyman left Fort Edward, Colonel Seth Warner, with a force of fresh militia, was close at his heels.