Gazette Of The United States

December 7.

Among the instances of gallantry and loyalty displayed by the French nobility in the course of the revolution, the following is of a description entirely new, and reminds us of the days of ancient chivalry. Madame de Bennes, of a distinguished family in lower Normandy, made the campaign of 1792 with her husband, in one of the Norman companies. After the retreat of the duke of Brunswick, he entered as a volunteer into the infantry of the Legion of Damas, in the pay of Great Britain. Her husband having been killed in 1793, fighting by her side, the commander of that corps endeavored to persuade her to quit the profession of arms, and the prince stadtholder offered her a pension to live upon in the Netherlands. Her reply was, that having taken up arms in defence of her religion and her king, she could not lay them down at a time when the desire of avenging the death of her husband afforded her an additional motive to proceed in a military career.

Possessed of these heroic sentiments she made the campaigns of 1794 and 1795, respected by the whole regiment on account of the decency and propriety of her conduct, and admired for the intrepid courage which always led her to the most dangerous post. Madame de Bennes followed her regiment in the expedition to Quiberon, and was taken prisoner on the 22d of last July, but escaped just before she was to be shot, although her sex was known to her judges. She reached London last Thursday in the utmost distress, having no clothes, but a drummer's jacket, and two coarse woollen petticoats; no recommendation but certificates of her heroic conduct, and no resource but in the generosity of some of her countrymen.