Page:A history of the military transactions of the British nation in Indostan, Volume 1.djvu/332

324 and were likewise taken on each flank by two pieces of cannon, as well as by the fire of some parties of Sepoys posted on the main rampart on each hand of the gateway. Thus galled, unable to retreat, and finding that resistance served only to expose them more, they desisted from firing, and every man endeavoured to shelter himself as he could; some in the embrasures of the battery, others behind a cavalier contiguous to it, and the rest in the interval between the two walls; the garrison, nevertheless, trusting to no appearances of security, continued to fire upon all such places in which they suspected them to be concealed. At length the day, long wished for by both sides, appeared; when the French, flinging down their arms, asked for quarter, which was immediately granted. The officers from the rampart ordered them to assemble in the interval between the two walls, from whence they were conducted, in small bodies at a time, by a party of Europeans into the city, through the gateway they had assaulted. Three hundred and sixty Europeans were thus made prisoners, of which number sixty-seven were wounded; thirty-seven were found killed upon the battery and in the rest of the works: those who escaped by leaping down were taken up by their own troops waiting on the outside of the ditch; but the French themselves confessed, that of the whole number, which was near one hundred, every man was much disabled; and some few were killed. Thus ended this assault, which after exposing the city of Tritchinopoly to the greatest risque it had run during the war, ended by impairing the French force more than any other event since the capture of Seringham, nevertheless we do not find that lieutenant Harrison received any recompence for his gallant and sensible conduct in this hazardous and important service: he died some time after, without being promoted from the rank in which he served when he saved the city.

The filing was heard by the outguards at Coiladdy, where the next evening a messenger arrived from the city, upon which major Lawrence immediately detached a party to reinforce the garrison, and prepared to follow with the rest of the army, but heavy rains prevented him from arriving before the 3d of December. In the mean time the enemy on the third night after the assault crossed the river again, with all the Mysore cavalry, eight thousand men dismounted,