Thus, at the eleventh hour, the British Navy had shown itself worthy of its reputation, and England regained the supremacy of the seas.
On land the battle was terrific; the struggle was the most fierce and bloody of any during the invasion. The British Regulars holding the high ground along from Crowborough to Ticehurst, and from Etchingham, through Brightling and Ashburnham, down to Battle, advanced in a huge fighting line upon the enemy's base around Eastbourne. The onslaught was vigorously repelled, and the battle across the Sussex Downs quickly became a most wild and sanguinary one; but as the day passed, although the defenders were numerically very weak, they nevertheless gradually effected terrible slaughter, capturing the whole of the enemy's stores, and taking nearly five thousand prisoners.
In Kent the French had advanced from East Grinstead through Edenbridge, extending along the hills south of Westerham, and in consequence of these rapid successes the depôt of stores and ammunition which had been maintained at Sevenoaks was being removed to Bromley by rail; but as the officer commanding the British troops at Eynsford could see that it would most probably be impossible to get them all away before Sevenoaks was attacked, orders were issued that at a certain hour the remainder should be destroyed. The force covering the removal only consisted of two battalions of the Duke of Cambridge's Own (Middlesex) Regiment and half a squadron of the 9th Lancers; but the hills north of Sevenoaks from Luddesdown through Stanstead, Otford, Shoreham, Halstead, Farnborough, and Keston were still held by our Volunteers. These infantry battalions included the 1st and 2nd Derbyshire Regiment (Sherwood Foresters), under Col. A. Buchanan, V.D., and Col. E. Hall, V.D.; the 1st Nottinghamshire, under Col. A. Cantrell-Hubbersty; the 4th Derbyshire, under Lord Newark; the 1st and 2nd Lincolnshire, under Col. J. G. Williams, V.D., and Col. R. G. Ellison; the 1st Leicestershire, under Col. S. Davis, V.D.; the 1st Northamptonshire, under Col. T. J. Walker, V.D.; the 1st and 2nd Shropshire Light Infantry, under Col. J. A. Anstice, V.D., and Col. R. T. Masefield; the 1st Herefordshire, under Col. T. H. Purser, V.D.; the 1st, 3rd, and 4th South Wales Borderers, under Col. T. Wood, Col. J. A. Bradney, and Col. H. Burton, V.D.; the 1st and 2nd Warwickshire, under Col. W. S. Jervis and Col. L. V. Loyd; the 1st and 2nd Welsh Fusiliers, under Col. C. S. Mainwaring and Col. B. G. D. Cooke, V.D.; the 2nd Welsh Regiment, under Col. A. P. Vivian, V.D.; the 3rd Glamorganshire, under Col. J. C. Richardson, V.D.; and the 1st Worcestershire, under Col. W. H. Talbot, V.D.; while the artillery consisted of the 3rd Kent, under Col. Hozier; the 1st Monmouthshire, under Col. C. T. Wallis; the 1st Shropshire and Staffordshire, under Col. J. Strick, V.D.; and the 5th Lancashire, under Col. W. H. Hunt.