Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 12, 2025
They were filled with pitch, tar, and all sorts of combustibles, with shell and grenades mixed up with them, while on their decks were a number of cannon, crammed to the mouth with grapeshot and musketballs. Fortunately for the English, the French naval officer in command lost his nerve, and set fire to his ship half an hour too soon; the other captains following his example.
While leading his men forward Pappenheim fell with two musketballs through his body. While lying there the rumour for the first time reached him that Gustavus had been killed. When upon inquiry the truth of the rumour was confirmed, the eyes of the dying man lighted up.
'You forget there are twelve guns loaded to the muzzle with grape and musketballs all trained upon a point only forty feet across. Would it be possible to land just outside the boom, lad, on one or both sides, and to keep along the edge, or wade in the water to the batteries? "'No, sir, the rock goes straight up from the water both sides.
It was in vain to try to carry the rampart by the bayonet. The soldiers drew up and fired all along their line; but of what avail was it to fire upon an enemy they could not see, whilst they themselves were a target for the grapeshot and musketballs which swept in a deadly cross fire through their ranks? But they would not fall back.
"You see all that? said Obed. "To be sure I do, and I feel something too'; for a sharp rasping jar was repeated in rapid succession three or four times, as so many shot struck our hull, and made the splinters glance about merrily; and the musketballs were mottling our top sides and spars, plumping into the timber, whit whit! as thick as ever you saw schoolboys' plastering a church door with clay pellets.
This, however, was a difficult task, as the natives were entirely concealed, and the men could only fire at the puffs of smoke arising from the grass and bushes. To the Arabs, however, the camp presented a clear mark, and the sharp rap of the musketballs as they struck the wall, or the thud with which they buried themselves among the crowd of kneeling camels, was very frequent.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking