Captain Ward and his nephew were at the oars when the enemy appeared, and the captain knowing that their safety depended upon their agility to regain the middle of the river, kept his seat firmly, and exerted his utmost powers at the oar, but his nephew started up at sight of the enemy, seized his rifle, and was in the act of leveling it, when he received a ball in the breast, and fell dead in the bottom of the boat.  Unfortunately, his oar fell into the river, and the Captain, having no one to pull against him, rather urged the boat nearer to the hostile shore than otherwise.  He quickly seized a plank, however, and giving his oar to another of the crew, he took the station which his nephew had held, and unhurt by the shower of bullets which flew around him, continued to exert himself until the boat had reached a more respectable distance.  He then, for the first time, looked around him in order to observe the condition of the crew.

His nephew lay in his blood, perfectly lifeless; the horses had been all killed or mortally wounded.  Some had fallen overboard; others were struggling violently, and causing their frail bark to dip water so abundantly as to excite the most serious apprehensions.  But the crew presented the most singular spectacle.  A captain, who had served with reputation in the continental army, seemed now totally bereft of his faculties.  He lay upon his back in the bottom of the boat, with hands uplifted, and a countenance in which terror was personified, exclaiming in a tone of despair, “Oh Lord!  Oh Lord.”  A Dutchman, whose weight might amount to about three hundred pounds, was anxiously engaged in endeavoring to find shelter for his bulky person, which, from the lowness of the gunnels, was a very difficult undertaking.  In spite of his utmost efforts, a portion of his posterior luxuriance appeared above the gunnel, and afforded a mark to the enemy, which brought a constant shower of balls around it.

“In vain he shifted his position.  The hump still appeared, and the balls still flew around it, until the Dutchman losing all patience, raised his head above the gunnel, and in a tone of querulous remonstrance, called out, ‘Oh now! quit tat tamned nonsense, tere, will you!’ Not a shot was fired from the boat.  At one time, after they had partly regained the current, Captain Ward attempted to bring his rifle to bear upon them, but so violent was the agitation of the boat, from the furious struggles of the horses, that he could not steady his piece within twenty yards of the enemy, and quickly laying it aside, returned to the oar.  The Indians followed them down the river for more than an hour, but having no canoes they did not attempt to board; and as the boat was at length transferred to the opposite side of the river, they at length abandoned the pursuit and disappeared.  None of the crew, save the young man already mentioned, were hurt, although the Dutchman’s seat of honor served as a target for the space of an hour; and the continental captain was deeply mortified at the sudden, and, as he said, ‘unaccountable’ panic which had seized him.  Captain Ward himself was protected by a post, which had been fastened to the gunnel, and behind which he sat while rowing."[53]