1814	Capture of Washington	309

to only one colonial marine killed, one master's mate (Jeremiah M'Daniel), two sergeants, and three colonial marines wounded ; making a total of 65 killed and 191 wounded. The officers of the navy and of the marines, who, besides Rear-admiral Cockburn, were present in the battle, appear to have been Captain Edmund Palmer, with his aide-de-camp, midshipman Arthur Wakefield, Lieutenant James Scott, first of the Albion, acting as Rear-admiral Cockburn's aide-de-camp, Lieutenant John Lawrence, of the marine artillery, and Lieutenant of marines Althestan Stephens.

As soon as the troops were refreshed, General Ross and Rear-admiral Cockburn, with about 1000 men, moved forward from Bladensburg, and at 8 p.m. arrived at an open piece of ground, two miles from the federal city. The troops were here drawn up, while Major-general Ross, Rear-admiral Cockburn, and several other officers, accompanied by a small guard, rode forward to reconnoitre. On arriving opposite to some houses, the party halted ; and, just as the officers had closed each other, in order to consult whether or not it would be prudent to enter the heart of the city that night, a volley was fired from the windows of one of two adjoining houses, and from the capitol which volley killed one soldier, and General Ross's horse from under him, and wounded three soldiers. Rear-admiral Cockburn instantly rode back to the detachment stationed in advance, and soon returned with the light companies. The house was then surrounded ; and, after some prisoners had been taken from it, set on fire : the adjoining house fell with it. The capitol, which was continuous to these houses, and which, according to an American writer, was " capable of being made an impregnable citadel against an enemy, with little artillery, and that of the lighter class, " was also set on fire.

We are obliged to pause an instant, in order to correct a very serious mistatement, which, as the book in which it appears with two or three others, lay open before us, we at first took to be the splenetic effusion of an American writer. But we owe an apology to the Americans ; for the statement emanates from the pen of a British naval officer, and here it is: " A little musketry from one of the houses in the town, which killed the general's horse, was all the resistance they met with. This was quickly silenced ; the house burnt, and the people within it put to death." * When it is considered, who are usually the inmates of a dwelling-house, the statement, that " the people within it were put to death " and that for " killing a horse, " is calculated to fill the mind with horror, and to call forth execrations against the monsters who could perpetrate such an act. Fortunately for the fame of the general and admiral who presided. on the occasion, the account we have just given, and the substance of

* Brenton, vol. v., p. 166.

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