THE HEROINE OF MATAGORDA.

Patea Mail, 21 April 1882, Page 3

THE HEROINE OF MATAGORDA.

Ihe tempest lasted for thirty hours, and @4 men out of 140 had fallen. The fort was not more than a hundred yards square ; and “here,” says Napier, “ be recorded an action of which it is difficult to say whether it were most feminine or heroic.” The action referred 10, as,detailed in “ The Eventful life of a soldier,” woii the woman for long after in Scotland the sobriquet ‘‘The Heroine of: Matagorda,” She was the wife of Sergeant Heston,, of the Scots Brigade. Under fire she tore up her linen to form bandages for the wounded ; and water being wanted, a drummer boy was ordered to draw some from a well, but the scared child did not seem much inclined to the task, and lingered at the door of a hut with the bucket in his hand. “ Why don’t you go for the water ?” asked the surgeon, angrily. “The pair bairn is frightened,” said Mrs Heston, “ and "'no wonder ; give the bucket to me.” And under all that dreadful storm she proceeded coolly to the well, procuring water for, the wounded. General Napier states that a shot cut the bucket-rope in her hand, but she recovered it and fulfilled her mission. Her attention to the wounded was beyond all praise, says Sergeant Donaldson of the 94th ; she carried sand-bags for the repair of the batteries, and handed ammunition, wine, and water to the men at the guns.

“ I think I see her yet,” he adds, “ while the shot and shell were flying thick around her, bending her body to shield her child from danger by the exposure of her own person,” She died at an old age at Glasgow, without other token to her merit than that accorded by the humble book of her husband’s comrade, —“ British Battles on Land and Sea.”