24 Memoirs of John Shipp. [ Marcu, 
lay completely blind for several days. This, added to our disastrous defeat, 
threw me into a fever, and nearly cost me my life; but, with the aid ofa 
kind Providence, and the advantage of a strong and unimpaired constitution, 
1 soon recovered. : 
Of the third and fourth, he says— 
“* When this strange rencounter had subsided, the storming-party was 
ordered for twelve o’clock. Reader, imagine my disappointment when my 
doctor most positively forbade me my being employed on this occasion, as my 
wound in the forehead was still in such a state that, should I get heated or 
catch cold, he feared an inflammation of the brain would take place. I could 
have thrown what few brains I had in his face, but I was obliged to obey. 
The forlorn hope was led by Lieutenant Templer, of the 76th regiment, as 
brave a little fellow as ever wore a red coat. I looked on at a short distance 
from the scene of action, and a desperate hard struggle it was. No sooner 
did our brave boys gain the top of the breach, than the well-directed fire 
from the fort swept them off. Footing they had none; they literally hung on 
the bosom of the bastion. A third retreat was the result; leaving behind 
them upwards of five hundred dead and wounded: indeed, they might all be 
said to be dead, for death was inevitable. The enemy again manned the 
breach in swarms, shouting victory! It would have been better for me had 
I been there, for I am sure I fought and struggled as hard as any one engaged. 
I cannot describe my feelings and those of the other spectators of this dread- 
ful scene ; but what can eight or ten men a-breast do against a legion, posted 
aloft, and protected by walls, bastions, &c., and where every possible engine 
is in requisition for their destruction? Thus exposed, there was never any 
real chance of success. The whole circumference of the bastion, if lined with 
men, would not have contained. more than fifteen or twenty men a-breast ; 
and the whole means of the fort were levelled on this small space, to their 
certain defeat and destruction. All that was in the power of mortal man to 
do was done, but all our efforts were in vain. 
“ The storming-party was again ordered for the following day. I suffered 
an excruciating headache, but said nothing of the .badness of my wound, 
which at that time bore a most frightful appearance, resolved to die rather 
than give up my past honour. I assured my doctors that I was well, and 
felt quite adequate to take my station, and entreated that they would not 
stand between me and glory. At last they consented, and I made the most 
of the short period between that and the storm, in supplicating the divine 
protection, and in penning a letter to my only relation, on account of arranging 
my little affairs. I had made up my mind that I could not, in all human 
probability, escape a third time: but He alone who created life can destroy 
it. In the evening I left my tent, to seek in solitude that consolation for my 
troubled bosom which the drunken and tumultuous riot of a camp could but | 
ill afford. 
** ‘Two o'clock in the afternoon of the next day was ordered for the assault. 
I forgot my aches and wounds, and was at my old post. Lieutenant Templer, 
of His Majesty’s 76th Regiment (he was but a little man, but he possessed the — 
heart of a lion), accompanied me on this occasion, with a small Union Jack, 
to plant on the enemy’s bastion. He gave me his hand, and, smilingly,- said, 
— Shipp, Iam come to rcb you of part of your glory ; you are a regular 
monopolist of that commodity.’ He continued, ‘I will place Old England’s 
bamer on their haughty bastion, or die in the attempt!’ He fell a victim to 
his zeal, having first planted his colour on the bastion. i 
“ The storming-party marched out in the usual steady order; yet, from 
our recent calamitous defeats, there was not that spirit amongst the men — 
which I had witnessed on former occasions. We had already experienced 
three disastrous repulses from this fort, and there now seemed a cloud on 
every brow, which proceeded, I have no hesitation in assserting, from a well-_ 
x 
grounded apprehension that this, our fourth assault, would be concluded by — 
