The Battle of Brandywine

Wayne had more than a thousand men who before that day had been under fire to resist the passage of the creek by the enemy. Knyphausen, taking advantage of the smoke from his own and the American cannon, for they had been firing for some time, marched his column, under the immediate command of Maj.-Gen. Grant, into the stream, and, notwithstanding Proctor's guns and the artillery with Wayne, plowed gaps in the advancing ranks, so that for days afterwards "the farmers were fishing dead bodies from the water,"¹ the crossing was made, and the redoubt captured. "Mad Anthony" knew that a retreat was inevitable, but his pugnacious nature, and that of the Pennsylvania line in his command, was loath to retire before an enemy, but the appearance of a large body of English troops from Cornwallis' division, on his right, compelled a hasty and disorderly retreat, in which he and Maxwell were compelled to abandon the greater part of their artillery and stores. The handsome black horse which Col. Proctor rode that day was shot from under him, but subsequently the State of Pennsylvania, in consideration of his bravery on that occasion, remunerated him for the loss he had sustained. The Pennsylvania militia, under Gen. Armstrong, which had taken no active part in the battle, fled with the rest of the American soldiers, and joined the demoralized body, which then almost choked the Concord road with a struggling mass of panic-stricken men hastening wildly in the direction of Chester.

Washington, when he received positive information that the British left wing had made its circuitous march from Kennett Square to Jefferies' Ford, the first part of the route under the guidance of Joseph Parker, whom Sir William Howe had compelled to point out the most direct road to Trimble's, and from Jefferies' Ford by Emmor Jefferies, and had already turned Sullivan's flank, started across the country for the scene of conflict, as already mentioned. He had immediately commanded Greene's division, consisting of Weedon's and Muhlenberg's brigade, to advance to the support of the right wing. With the promptitude ever noticeable in Greene's movements, the latter immediately put his division in motion. Weedon's brigade was on the advance, and at trail arms, the men, guided by the noise of battle, and knowing that Sullivan could have no line of retreat "but towards Dilworthtown, as the British right wing had outflanked it to the left, and intervened between it and Chad's Ford," double-quicked nearly to Dilworthtown, four miles in forty-five minutes, and then by a wheel to the left of a half-mile, he was enabled to occupy a position where, opening his ranks, he let the retreating, discomfited battalions pass through while he held the pursuing British in check and saved the American artillery.

Previous, however, to Greenes coming to their relief, a number of Americans were induced to make a stand, and rallied on a height to the north of Dilworthtown, where, under the personal command of Washington, who had reached the field, accompanied by Lafayette, the latter for the first time under fire in America, a stout resistance was made. It was here that the marquis was wounded. He stated that a part of the American line had broken, while the rest still held its ground; and to show the troops that he "had no better chance of flight" than they, he ordered his horse to the rear, and dismounted, he was endeavoring to rally the disorganized column, when he was struck in the left foot by a musket-ball, which "went through and through." The fact that Lafayette was wounded was immediately carried to Washington, "with the usual exaggerations in such cases." The surgeon endeavored to dress the injured foot on the battle-field, but the firing was so sharp that the attempt was abandoned, and the young Frenchman mounted his horse and galloped to Chester, where, becoming faint from loss of blood, he was "carried into a house and laid on a table, where my (his) wound received its first dressing."² Before he permitted his injuries to be cared for, Lafayette stationed a guard at the old decayed drawbridge at Chester Creek (the site of the present Third Street bridge) to arrest stragglers and return them to their regiments. The Baron St. Ovary, who was aiding Lafayette in the endeavor to rally the American soldiers, was not so fortunate as the marquis, for he was captured by the English, and to be consigned to the tender mercies of that fiend, William Cunningham, provost-marshal of the royal army, was certainly less to be desired than a wound which healed kindly in two months.

The enemy meanwhile pressed the Americans backward until Weedon's brigade came in sight, and Sullivan joining him with some of his men, the battle continued until many of the fugitives had succeeded in effecting their retreat. At a place then called Dilworth's Path, now known as Sandy Hollow, the American army made its final stand. It is said by Irving that Washington, when riding in the neighborhood previous to the battle, had called Greene's attention to that locality, suggesting that if the army should be driven from Chad's Ford there was a point well calculated for a secondary position, and here Greene was overtaken by Col. Pinckney, an aid of the commander-in-chief, ordering him to occupy that place. Be that as it may, Greene formed there; Weedon's brigade, drawn up in the narrow defile, flanked on either side by woods, and commanding the road, while Greene, with Muhlenberg's - the fighting parson - brigade formed on the road on the right. The English troops, flushed with success, for it is idle to say they were not the victors of the day, came on, and were surprised at the unexpected resistance they