161 
as the Chronicle of Thursday, the 2nd July, published early in the 
morning could not contain news of that morning, it must have 
gone to press sometime late on wednesday. The duel took 
place then on the 1st July, not the 2nd, as usually stated. 
Gathering now the facts, the combatants and their seconds met 
at the White Hart Hotel, where chaises were to be ready at three 
o'clock in the morning of wednesday, the 1st July, 1772*; they 
next drove to the top of Kingsdown, where at four o’clock they 
encountered. It was agreed that each might have a friend as 
his second, but it was further specially agreed that neither 
second was to interfere under any circumstances “ whatever 
_ might be the consequences.”t Sheridan’s friend was a Mr. or 
Captain Paumier; Mathews had Mr. Barnett. Thus the 
intention is clear this fight was for both a life struggle, one 
was to die. Arrived on the top of Kingsdown a fierce fight 
commenced, which for “intense animosity and frantic violence” 
thas hardly been paralleled.t Mathews had a conviction that 
Sheridan would rush him as before, and he proposed that pistols 
‘should be used ; but this Sheridan declined drew and called on 
Mathews to do so. At first Sheridan was baffled, and Mathews 
] the advantage. Then, again, forgetting rule, Sheridan 
attempted his first plan, rushed on Mathews,§ closed, and both 
stumbling both fell, and the swords of both were broken in 
the fall. Sheridan, the first to make the move, at first was 
uppermost, or as Mr. Sheridan papa wrote—at first my son 
had the advantage, having thrown Mathews down,|| but 
Mathews, seven or eight years the elder, and so the 
heavier man, getting the top could not be removed. 
Ww hilst struggling thus, both hacked at each other with the 
piece or hilt end of the sword which he had _ retained, 
heridan’s being the shorter piece could not be very effective, 
* Chronicle. + Craftsman, 10th October, 1772. 
¢ Octogenarian. § Lefanu. Rae, p.197. _ || Rae, p. 204. 
