Page:Tupper family records - 1835.djvu/122

 100 MEMOIR OF COLONEL TUPPER.

defend himself ; but being surrounded, an Indian from behind ran him through the body with his lance, when he fell, and a few sabre cuts soon terminated his sufferings. One of the barbarians immediately severed a finger, on which the victim wore a ring, and conveyed it to his commander as a proof that one they so much dreaded, would trouble them no more. A Captain Garcia, of Baquedano's regiment, who was also promoted after the battle, stood by during this barbarous murder, without interfering to prevent it. The corpse was sought out the next day by a friend, and interred in the spot on which the deceased breathed his last. # Another brave Englishman, Cap- tain Bell, of the Chilian navy, was also butchered in the pursuit. It was the general opinion, even of the natives themselves, that had Colonel Tupper commanded the army either on the 14th of December, near Santiago, or on this unfortunate day, a very different result would have awaited the constitutional cause. A private letter written by a gentleman in Chile, the charge d'affaires of the United States of America, and which was never intended to meet the eye of the family, as it was addressed to a British officer commanding a ship on the South American

being conveyed to the capital for interment ; but being found in an extraor- dinary state of preservation, it was, for the convenience of carriage, con- sumed to ashes, which, on the 1st of February, 1833, were deposited in a plain monument raised to his memory in the pantheon of Santiago, with the following simple inscription : —
 * Nearly three years after, the corpse was exhumed for the purpose of

A LA MEMORIA

DEL CORONEL

GUILLERMO DE VIC TUPPER,

NACIO EN Gl'ERNSEY, EL XXIX DE ABRIL, M.DCCC,

MURIO EL XVII DE ABRIL, M.DCCC. XXX.

"patriae infelici fidelis," were to have been added, but some of the rival party having declared that they would deface this motto, it was neces- sarily omitted by the widow, although she was strongly importuned by many to inscribe it.

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