r faith and renew our hope by a glance at the pathway along which our people have travelled.
It is now three days more than 100 years since the adoption of the first written Constitution of the United States —the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union.
The new republic was then beset with danger on every hand.
It had not conquered a place in the family of nations.
The decisive battle of the war for independence, whose centennial anniversary will soon be gratefully celebrated at Yorktown, had not yet been fought.
The colonists were struggling not only against the armies of a great nation, but against the settled opinions of mankind; for the world did not then believe that the supreme authority of government could be safely intrusted to the guardianship of the people themselves.
We cannot overestimate the fervent love of liberty, the intelligent courage, and the sum of common-sense with which our fathers made the great experiment of selfgovernment.
When they found, afte
of the inhabitants fled; the few who could not were willing to trust to the honor and clemency of the British, if they should capture the place.
As they moved upon the village, Crutchfield and his men—infantry, artillery, and cavalry —fought the invaders gallantly; but at length overwhelming numbers, failure of gunpowder, volleys of grape-shot, and flights of Congreve rockets, compelled the
St. John's Church. Americans, who were partially outflanked, to break and flee in the direction of Yorktown.
Thus ended a sharp battle, in which the British lost, in killed, wounded, and missing, about fifty men, and the Americans about thirty.
Of eleven missing Americans, ten had fled to their homes.
The victorious British now entered the village, and Cockburn, who had come on shore, and was in chief command, gave the place up to pillage and rapine.
The atrocities committed upon the defenceless inhabitants, particularly the women, were deeply deplored and condemned by the British authorities
