Battle of Stony Point

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Wayne’s larger column, meanwhile, struggled up a slope that was, in the words of an officer present, almost perpendicular in places. There was a brief backup at the inner abatis, where the axmen had been only partially successful in chopping openings. Finally, the men just swarmed ahead, clawing and pulling themselves past the barrier. They lived up to their elite status by promptly re-forming before pressing on to summit redoubts. North of them, Butler’s men, penetrating the outer abatis, overran the brass twelve-pounder and two mortars positioned in Flèche No. 3 before they could be fired. In the center, where Murfree’s diversionary force continued to blaze away, Colonel Johnson arrived with the first of his reinforcements. Sergeant Henry Gillott recalled hearing Johnson caution the men to be sparing with their ammunition and not fire unless there was an object in sight. Captain William Darby, then posted on the southern flank, heard Johnson first order the men to fire and afterwards to stop firing as one of the picquets who was coming in called out that they were friends.

Johnson’s impulsive rush to the center left Lieutenant William Armstrong, holding a section of the inner abatis, uncertain whether the troops he heard moving in his front were friend or foe. I halted the fire for fear we would kill our own people whom I supposed to be amongst them, he later testified. He also realized that there were not enough men available to fully man the inner abatis, so he concentrated those with him to cover the sally port. Most of the men crowding up to and then through the inner abatis were Americans with the gallant de Fleury leading the way and Anthony Wayne nearby. Suddenly Wayne felt a blinding blow to his head and he went down, certain his premonition had been fulfilled. Forward, my brave fellows, forward! he gasped as the world reeled around him. When his aides caught him, he said: Carry me into the fort. If I am to die, I want to die at the head of the column.

The fighting had been roiling for perhaps thirty minutes, and both the north and south ends of the upper defensive line were covered with Americans. The men made free use of the bayonet, said Major Hull. We were compelled to continue the dreadful slaughter owing to the fierce and obstinate resistance of the enemy. In a dramatic gesture, Colonel de Fleury went to the main flagstaff and hauled down the British ensign flying over Stony Point. Once the men and officers of the English garrison realized that the enemy was in strength behind them, resistance began collapsing. After nearly being run through by a group of bayonet-wielding Americans, Colonel Johnson raced back to the upper summit only to hear the Americans’ cry, The fort’s our own! Convinced that a very superior force of the enemy now possessed his works, Johnson surrendered to Colonel Febiger, who ordered him to his tent.

Lieutenant Horndon was grimly determined to keep fighting from his position in Flèche No. 1, even if meant reversing the twelve-pounder to fire toward the Table of the Hill. When it became clear that the hillside behind them was swarming with the enemy, Horndon considered a breakout attempt with the twenty-six or so men with him, but two scouts he sent to examine an escape route reported the Rebels were thick on the water side as they could be. Turning to his men, Horndon acknowledged their hopeless situation. My lads, he said, I believe we are prisoners. The last major battle of the Revolutionary War to be fought in the North was over.

Despite the fact that a portion of the captured garrison consisted of what the British called Loyal Americans, and whom the Patriots called Tories, there is no evidence of any acts of retribution, although three soldiers taken who were identified as recent deserters from the Continental Army were hanged. In a final irony, when the American cheers were heard by the sailors on Vulture and the garrison at Verplancks Point, it was assumed that they were British celebrations signaling the repulse of the American attack and were enthusiastically answered, so for a while at least, both sides of the Hudson echoed with cries of victory.

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Tags: 17th - 18th Century, American Revolutionary War, Historical Conflicts