On the night of October 1, the rebels prevented a detachment of 111 British troops from reaching Savannah. The British, under Captain French, had camped on the Ogeechee River. Colonel John White, a Georgia Continental, with only two officers, a sergeant and three privates, tricked French into thinking that the camp was surrounded by a larger force by lighting fires in the woods around the camp, as if a whole army was bivouacked there; White demanded the detachment surrender, and the whole British command was taken prisoner.

At midnight on October 3, French artillery opened fire on Savannah. But according to one officer, The cannoneers being still under the influence of rum, their excitement did not allow them to direct their pieces with proper care. On October 4, 53 heavy cannon and 14 mortars began a five-day bombardment of the town.

The bombardment failed to crack the defenses but caused considerable damage inside the town. An American officer wrote, The poor women and children have suffered beyond description. A number of them in Savannah have already been put to death by our bombs and cannon. One of Prevost’s aides commented, Many poor creatures were killed trying to get to their cellars, or hide themselves under the bluff of the Savannah River.

Loyalist Chief Justice Anthony Stokes described one night of the shelling and its effects: At five I was awakened with a very heavy cannonade from a French frigate to the north of the town, and with a bombardment which soon hurried me out of bed; and before I could get my clothes on, an eighteen-pounder entered the house, stuck in the middle partition, and drove the plastering all about….Whilst we were in the cellar, two shells burst not far from the door, and many others fell in the neighborhood all around us. In this situation a number of us continued in a damp cellar, until the cannonade and bombardment almost ceased, for the French to cool their artillery; and then we ascended to breakfast.

On October 6, Prevost asked that the women and children be allowed to leave Savannah and take refuge in the ships anchored in the river. D’Estaing and Lincoln refused, fearing another delaying tactic.

Time was running out for d’Estaing. A month had been spent in front of Savannah, and the British position seemed no weaker than when operations had begun. The admiral had other worries as well. Hurricanes were a serious concern. And, if a British naval force should suddenly appear, d’Estaing might be cut off from his supply base in the West Indies.

Conditions on board the ships anchored off the coast were described by a French naval officer, who wrote: The navy is suffering everything, anchored on an open coast and liable to be driven ashore by the southeast winds. Seven of our ships have been injured in their rudders, several have lost their anchors, and most of them have been greatly endamaged in their rigging. The scurvy rages with such severity that we throw daily into the sea about thirty-five men….The bread which we possessed, having been two years in store, was so much decayed and worm-eaten, and was so disagreeable to the taste, that even the domestic animals on board would not eat it.

On the morning of October 8, Major Pierce Charles L’Enfant, future architect of Washington, D.C., with a handful of troops, tried to set fire to the abatis of felled trees in front of the British lines; but the wood was too damp and did not catch fire. D’Estaing’s engineers told him they would need at least 10 more days before they could penetrate the British works.

The count decided that the only option left was a direct assault on the town. Otherwise, the siege must be lifted. He proposed a predawn assault on October 9. Lincoln agreed; and the allies prepared for one of the bloodiest attacks in the war.

D’Estaing hoped to exploit a weak point in Savannah’s defenses. Although the town was protected on the north by the Savannah River and shielded on the west by a wooded swamp, a narrow depression along the edge of the swamp afforded a way for the allies to move their troops near the British defenses under cover of night before launching the attack. The allies decided to use this approach route to strike the enemy’s right flank.

Prevost knew of the terrain west of town, however, and anticipated an attack there. A rebel deserter warned him of the allied plans, so Old Bullet Head strengthened his defenses on his right flank and put the skillful Maitland in command there.

Three forts or redoubts protected the British right flank. The most exposed one, Spring Hill Redoubt, was defended by South Carolina Loyalist troops led by Captain Thomas Tawse and the vengeful Lt. Col. Thomas Brown, who once had been tarred and feathered by Georgia rebels. The other redoubts on the right also were held by Loyalist troops. Thus, the bloodiest part of the battle would pit Americans against Americans.

Farther on the British right, Prevost had placed a naval battery of 9-pounders near the river. Another naval battery lay to the east of the Spring Hill Redoubt, supported by British marines and grenadiers of the 16th Foot, to be used to reinforce the redoubt if the allies attacked there.

The allied plan called for a vanguard of 250 French grenadiers to rush the Spring Hill Redoubt, while two strong French assault columns, led by d’Estaing himself and by Colonel Stedingk, attacked the other two forts on the British right. Two American assault columns, under Colonel John Laurens and Brig. Gen. Lachlan McIntosh, would support the French.

The French planned diversionary attacks west of the town near the river and from their trenches near the British center. Brigadier General Isaac Huger, with 500 South Carolina and Georgia militia, would conduct a feint east of the town.

D’Estaing’s 3,500 assault troops were drafted for temporary duty from regiments garrisoning the island colonies in the West Indies: Martinique, Guadeloupe and St. Dominique. They included several hundred free black troops, among them young Henri Christophe, future dictator of Haiti. Formed into provisional units at Savannah, the troops and their officers had never served together before in combat. Now they were to carry out a difficult assault against a forewarned enemy. So far, nearly everything else had gone wrong.

Delays doomed the allied plan. Volunteers who were to guide the troops through the treacherous swamp in the darkness proved unreliable. A French officer wrote that his guide did not know the road and at the first musket shot disappeared. Assault forces were not in position until after daybreak and lost the advantage of the pre-dawn surprise attack. D’Estaing confessed to having a very poor opinion of this attack.

Anxious to begin the attack, French assault troops waited at the edge of the swamp. From the direction of the Spring Hill Redoubt 500 yards away the eerie wail of Scottish bagpipes drifted toward them through the heavy pre-dawn fog. This most sad and most remarkable music, d’Estaing wrote, made a very great impression on the French soldiers; it was as if the enemy wanted us to know their best troops were waiting for us.

At about 5:30, d’Estaing’s troops heard firing from the British lines and realized the diversionary attack by their troops in front of the enemy center had finally begun. A few minutes later, British sentries spotted the assault troops and fired several rounds. Not all the allied troops were in place yet.

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