midnight
Then , as soon as the tide ebbed sufficiently , the greater part of Wayne 's little army crossed the morass at the foot of the western declivity of the promontory , no one among the enemy observing them . Three hundred men under General Muhlenburg remained as a reserve in the rear . The troops were divided into two columns -- all with unloaded muskets and fixed bayonets . At a little past midnight the advance parties moved silently to the charge , one on the northern and the other on the southern part of the height . The two main divisions followed them , one led by Wayne himself . The Americans were not discovered by the British until they were within pistol shot of the pickets on the heights , when a skirmish took place between the advance guards and the sentinels . `` The Americans used only their bayonets , as they had been ordered , but the pickets fired several shots ; and those sounds of strife waked the garrison , and the silence of the night was broken by the loud cry ` To arms !