Extract of Another Letter from Fort St. John' s

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The 28th ultimo the remainder of our Army on the southwest side of the fort, of which our Regiment composed a part, marched round St˙ John' s, to the north side of it, and encamped there with the main body.

October 29th. I went, in the evening, with two hundred men, and completed a battery within two hundred and fifty yards of the fort; the fort kept a continual fire upon us all night.

October 30th. Four guns and six mortars were mounted on the battery.

October 31st. The Army busily employed in preparing for a cannonade and an assault, if necessary. This day we received news that seven hundred of our men, near Longueil, about eighteen miles from hence, had repulsed Governour Carleton, who intended to raise the siege of St˙ John' s, with eight hundred men. Our Green Mountain Boys did this business. The Governour had twenty-five men killed and fifty wounded, besides several taken prisoners; among whom are two Indians. Carleton retreated to Montreal.

November 1st. Our gun and mortar battery on this side, and the four-gun battery on the east side, kept an incessant fire all day on the garrison, and the garrison kept up a very brisk fire. In the evening General Montgomery sent a flag into the fort, with a letter to Major Preston, by one of the prisoners taken at Longeuil, informing him of Carleton' s defeat, and that he had now no longer any reason to flatter himself with relief from that quarter; and that, therefore, to prevent the further effusion of blood, which a fruitless and obstinate defence would cause, he recommended to him a surrender of the fort. Major Preston, in return to General Montgomery' s letter, sent Captain Stewart, of the Twenty-Sixth, with a drum into our camp; that the General should have a full answer to his letter in the morning; that, in the mean time, hostilities should cease on both sides.

November 2d. Captain Stewart and Captain Williams, of the train, came, about eight o' clock in the morning, with a flag into our camp with an answer from Major Preston to General Montgomery' s letter of yesterday, requesting of the General to wait four days, to see whether no relief could come to the garrison in that time; if not, that then they would make proposals for a surrender. The General returned an answer that, from the advanced season of the year, he could not give the garrison the time it requested, and that they must immediately surrender prisoners of war; otherwise, that if any fatal consequences should ensue from their needless defence in the weak state they were in, they must charge themselves with it.

The General also referred them, for the truth of Carleton' s defeat, to another prisoner on board of our sloop, whom they might have access to to examine; and that when they chose, to renew hostilities, they should give a signal, by firing a cannon without ball. In the evening the above gentlemen returned into our camp from the fort, with articles of capitulation, some of which were agreed to by us, others rejected; which, as amended, were sent back to the fort, and agreed to — the sum of which were, that the garrison should march out of the fort to-morrow morning, with the honours of war, and then lay down their arms, be prisoners of war, and be sent to Connecticut. The articles of capitulation will be published by authority; to which I must refer you. A great quantity of military stores are taken, the detail of which is not yet ascertained; about six hundred men made prisoners. This day, detachments from every Regiment in our Army took possession of the fort, and the prisoners are embarked for the place of their destination.