Various - The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863

The night of Wednesday, the nineteenth, found their vanguard in a deep forest of pines, less than a mile from Fort Caroline, and near the low hills which extended in its rear, and formed a continuation of St. John's Bluff. All around was one great morass. In pitchy darkness, knee-deep in weeds and water, half starved, worn with toil and lack of sleep, drenched to the skin, their provision spoiled, their ammunition wet, their spirit chilled out of them, they stood in shivering groups, cursing the enterprise and the author of it. Menendez heard an ensign say aloud to his comrades,—

"This Asturian corito , who knows no more of war on shore than an ass, has ruined us all. By –, if my advice had been followed, he would have had his deserts the day he set out on this cursed journey!"

The Adelantado pretended not to hear.

Two hours before dawn he called his officers about him. All night, he said, he had been praying to God and the Virgin.

"Señores, what shall we resolve on? Our ammunition and provisions are gone. Our case is desperate." And he urged a bold rush on the fort.

But men and officers alike were disheartened and disgusted. They listened coldly and sullenly; many were for returning at every risk; none were in a mood for fight. Menendez put forth all his eloquence, till at length the dashed spirits of his followers were so far rekindled that they consented to follow him.

All fell on their knees in the marsh; then, rising, they formed their ranks and began to advance, guided by the renegade Frenchman, whose hands, to make sure of him, were tied behind his back. Groping and stumbling in the dark among trees, roots, and underbrush, buffeted by wind and rain, and slashed in the face by the recoiling boughs which they could not see, they soon lost their way, fell into confusion, and came to a stand, in a mood more savagely desponding than before. But soon a glimmer of returning day came to their aid, and showed them the dusky sky, and the dark columns of the surrounding pines. Menendez ordered the men forward on pain of death. They obeyed, and presently, emerging from the forest, could dimly discern the ridge of a low hill, behind which, the Frenchman told them, was the fort. Menendez, with a few officers and men, cautiously mounted to the top. Beneath lay Fort Caroline, three gunshots distant; but the rain, the imperfect light, and a cluster of intervening houses prevented his seeing clearly, and he sent two officers to reconnoitre. Descending, they met a solitary Frenchman, a straggler from the fort. They knocked him down with a sheathed sword, took him prisoner, then stabbed him in cold blood. This done, and their observations made, they returned to the top of the hill, behind which, clutching their weapons in fierce expectancy, all the gang stood waiting.

"Santiago!" cried Menendez. "At them! God is with us!"

And, shouting their hoarse war-cries, the Spaniards rushed down the slope like starved wolves.

Not a sentry was on the rampart. La Vigne, the officer of the guard, had just gone to his quarters, but a trumpeter, who chanced to remain, saw, through sheets of rain, the black swarm of assailants sweeping down the hill. He blew the alarm, and at his shrill summons a few half-naked soldiers ran wildly out of the barracks. It was too late. Through the breaches, over the ramparts, the Spaniards came pouring in.

"Santiago! Santiago! Down with the Lutherans!"

Sick men leaped from their beds. Women and children, blind with fright, darted shrieking from the houses. A fierce gaunt visage, the thrust of a pike or blow of a rusty halberd,—such was the greeting that met all alike. Laudonnière snatched his sword and target, and ran towards the principal breach, calling to his soldiers. A rush of Spaniards met him; his men were cut down around him; and he, with a soldier named Bartholomew, was forced back into the courtyard of his house. Here a tent was pitched, and as the pursuers stumbled among the cords, he escaped behind Ottigny's house, sprang through the breach in the western rampart, and fled for the woods.

Le Moyne had been one of the guard. Scarcely had he thrown himself into a hammock which was slung in his room, when a savage shout, and a wild uproar of shrieks, outcries, and the clash of weapons, brought him to his feet. He rushed past two Spaniards in the door-way, ran behind the guard-house leaped through an embrasure into the ditch, and escaped to the forest.

Challeux, the carpenter, was going betimes to his work, a chisel in his hand. He was old, but pike and partisan brandished at his back gave wings to his flight. In the ecstasy of his terror, he leaped upward at the top of the palisade, and, clutching it, threw himself over with the agility of a boy. He ran up the hill, no one pursuing, and as he neared the edge of the forest, turned and looked back. From the high ground where he stood he could see the butchery, the fury of the conquerors, the agonized gestures of the victims. He turned again in horror, and plunged into the woods. As he tore his way through the briers and thickets, he met several fugitives, escaped like himself. Others presently came up, haggard and wild, like men broke loose from the jaws of fate. They gathered and consulted together. One of them, in great repute for his knowledge of the Bible, was for returning and surrendering to the Spaniards. "They are men," he said; "perhaps when their fury is over they will spare our lives, and even if they kill us, it will only be a few moments' pain. Better so than to starve here in the woods or be torn to pieces by wild beasts."

The greater part of the naked and despairing company assented, but Challeux was of a different mind. The old Huguenot quoted Scripture, and called up the names of prophets and apostles to witness, that, in direst extremity, God would not abandon those who rested their faith in Him. Six of the fugitives, however, still held to their desperate purpose. Issuing from the woods, they descended towards the fort, and as with beating hearts their comrades watched the result, a troop of Spaniards rushed forth, hewed them down with swords and halberds, and dragged their bodies to the brink of the river, where the victims of the massacre were already flung in heaps.

Le Moyne, with a soldier named Grandchemin, whom he had met in his flight, toiled all day through the woods, in the hope of reaching the small vessels anchored behind the bar. Night found them in a morass. No vessels could be seen, and the soldier, in despair, broke into angry upbraidings against his companion,—saying that he would go back and give himself up. Le Moyne at first opposed him, then yielded. But when they drew near the fort, and heard the howl of savage revelry that rose from within, the artist's heart failed him. He embraced his companion, and the soldier advanced alone. A party of Spaniards came out to meet him. He kneeled, and begged for his life. He was answered by a death-blow; and the horrified Le Moyne, from his hiding-place in the thickets, saw his limbs hacked apart, thrust on pikes, and borne off in triumph.

Meanwhile, Menendez, mustering his followers, had offered thanks to God for their victory; and this pious butcher wept with emotion as he recounted the favors which Heaven had showered upon their enterprise. His admiring historian gives it in proof of his humanity, that, after the rage of the assault was spent, he ordered that women, infants, and boys under fifteen should thenceforth be spared. Of these, by his own account, there were about fifty. Writing in October to the King, he says that they cause him great anxiety, since he fears the anger of God, should he now put them to death, while, on the other hand, he is in dread lest the venom of their heresy should infect his men.

A hundred and forty-two persons were slain in and around the fort, and their bodies lay heaped together on the shore. Nearly opposite was anchored a small vessel, called the Pearl, commanded by James Ribaut, son of the Admiral. The ferocious soldiery, maddened with victory and drunk with blood, crowded to the beach, shouting insults to those on board, mangling the corpses, tearing out their eyes, and throwing them towards the vessel from the points of their daggers. Thus did the Most Catholic Philip champion the cause of Heaven in the New World.