Before Lieutenant Graham Smith had reached the barracks, the two divisions of the enemy had taken up their respective positions, and were pouring in unceasing discharges of ball, which penetrated the pimento sticks and raked the building from end to end. The guard, the only men who had ammunition in their possession, returned the fire, and at this moment Lieutenant Smith arrived with Dr. Edge.
Sergeant Belizario, coming forward and asking for ammunition to serve out, reminded Lieutenant Smith that he had left the key of the portable magazine, in which the ammunition was kept, in his quarters. The open space between his quarters and the barrack-room was swept with an unceasing shower of lead; but there was no help for it, and the key had to be fetched. Accompanied by Sergeant Belizario, Lieutenant Smith ran over to his house, seized the key, and ran back. Most marvellously both escaped injury, though the ground all around them was cut up by bullets. The portable magazine was kept in the partitioned end that served as a guard-room, and there was no door of communication between the central portion, where the men lived, and this room. Sergeant Belizario therefore ran out of the barrack-room, along the side of the building, into the guard-room, and endeavoured to drag the portable magazine back with him. He succeeded in moving it outside the guard-room and a little way along the wall, but further he could not drag it. All this time he was exposed to a heavy fire, and every musket-barrel from the stone building on the eastern side of the barrack was pointed at his body. Finding that all his efforts to move the magazine were fruitless, Sergeant Belizario unlocked it, and, taking out the ammunition, passed packet after packet to the men inside, through the opening under the eaves left for ventilation, between the thatched roof and the top of the pimento wall, till the magazine was emptied. This done, he returned to the barrack-room. He seemed to have borne a charmed life, for he was untouched, while the portable magazine was starred with the white splashes of leaden bullets.
A hot fire was now opened by the soldiers, and Lieutenant Graham Smith, taking a rifle, placed himself at the west door of the barracks to try and pick off some of the most daring of the Indians. Whilst there he was struck in the left side, and, at the same instant, Private Robert Lynch, who was standing next him, fell dead, pierced by two shots.