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A Chronicle of 1812
Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada, by William Wood

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Title: The War With the United States
       A Chronicle of 1812
       Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada

Author: William Wood

Editor: George M. Wrong and H. H. Langton

Release Date: January 3, 2005 [EBook #14582]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WAR WITH THE UNITED STATES ***




This etext was produced by Gardner Buchanan.




CHRONICLES OF CANADA
Edited by George M. Wrong and H. H. Langton
In thirty-two volumes

Volume 14


THE WAR WITH THE UNITED STATES
A Chronicle of 1812

By WILLIAM WOOD
TORONTO, 1915




CONTENTS

I.   OPPOSING CLAIMS
II.  OPPOSING FORCES
III. 1812: OFF TO THE FRONT
IV.  1812: BROCK AT DETROIT AND QUEENSTON HEIGHTS
V.   1813: THE BEAVER DAMS, LAKE ERIE, AND CHATEAUGUAY
VI.  1814: LUNDY'S LANE, PLATTSBURG, AND THE GREAT BLOCKADE
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE




CHAPTER I

OPPOSING CLAIMS

International disputes that end in war are not generally
questions of absolute right and wrong. They may quite as
well be questions of opposing rights. But, when there
are rights on both sides; it is usually found that the
side which takes the initiative is moved by its national
desires as well as by its claims of right.

This could hardly be better exemplified than by the vexed
questions which brought about the War of 1812. The British
were fighting for life and liberty against Napoleon.
Napoleon was fighting to master the whole of Europe. The
United States wished to make as much as possible out of
unrestricted trade with both belligerents. But Napoleon's
Berlin Decree forbade all intercourse whatever with the
British, while the British Orders-in-Council forbade all
intercourse whatever with Napoleon and his allies, except
on condition that the trade should first pass through
British ports. Between two such desperate antagonists
there was no safe place for an unarmed, independent,
'free-trading' neutral. Every one was forced to take
sides. The British being overwhelmingly strong at sea,
while the French were correspondingly strong on land,
American shipping was bound to suffer more from the
British than from the French. The French seized every
American vessel that infringed the Berlin Decree whenever
they could manage to do so. But the British seized so
many more for infringing the Orders-in-Council that the
Americans naturally began to take sides with the French.

Worse still, from the American point of view, was the
British Right of Search, which meant the right of searching
neutral merchant vessels either in British waters or on
the high seas for deserters from the Royal Navy. Every
other people whose navy could enforce it had always
claimed a similar right. But other peoples' rights had
never clashed with American interests in at all the same
way. What really roused the American government was not
the abstract Right of Search, but its enforcement at a
time when so many hands aboard American vessels were
British subjects evading service in their own Navy. The
American theory was that the flag covered the crew wherever
the ship might be. Such a theory might well have been
made a question for friendly debate and settlement at
any other time. But it was a new theory, advanced by a
new nation, whose peculiar and most disturbing entrance
on the international scene could not be suffered to upset
the accepted state of things during the stress of a
life-and-death war. Under existing circumstances the
British could not possibly give up their long-established
Right of Search without committing national suicide.
Neither could they relax their own blockade so long as
Napoleon maintained his. The Right of Search and the
double blockade of Europe thus became two vexed questions
which led straight to war.

But the American grievances about these two questions
were not the only motives impelling the United States to
take up arms. There were two deeply rooted national
desires urging them on in the same direction. A good many
Americans were ready to seize any chance of venting their
anti-British feeling; and most Americans thought they
would only be fulfilling their proper 'destiny' by wresting
the whole of Canada from the British crown. These two
national desires worked both ways for war--supporting
the government case against the British Orders-in-Council
and Right of Search on the one hand, while welcoming an
alliance with Napoleon on the other. Americans were far
from being unanimous; and the party in favour of peace
was not slow to point out that Napoleon stood for tyranny,
while the British stood for freedom. But the adherents
of the war party reminded each other, as well as the
British and the French, that Britain had wrested Canada
from France, while France had helped to wrest the Thirteen
Colonies from the British Empire.

As usual in all modern wars, there was much official
verbiage about the national claims and only unofficial
talk about the national desires. But, again as usual,
the claims became the more insistent because of the
desires, and the desires became the more patriotically
respectable because of the claims of right. 'Free Trade
and Sailors' Rights' was the popular catchword that best
describes the two strong claims of the United States.
'Down with the British' and 'On to Canada' were the
phrases that best reveal the two impelling national
desires.

Both the claims and the desires seem quite simple in
themselves. But, in their connection with American
politics, international affairs, and opposing British
claims, they are complex to the last degree. Their
complexities, indeed, are so tortuous and so multitudinous
that they baffle description within the limits of the
present book. Yet, since nothing can be understood without
some reference to its antecedents, we must take at least
a bird's-eye view of the growing entanglement which
finally resulted in the War of 1812.

The relations of the British Empire with the United States
passed through four gradually darkening phases between
1783 and 1812--the phases of Accommodation, Unfriendliness,
Hostility, and War. Accommodation lasted from the
recognition of Independence till the end of the century.
Unfriendliness then began with President Jefferson and
the Democrats. Hostility followed in 1807, during
Jefferson's second term, when Napoleon's Berlin Decree
and the British. Orders-in-Council brought American
foreign relations into the five-year crisis which ended
with the three-year war.

William Pitt, for the British, and John Jay, the first
chief justice of the United States, are the two principal
figures in the Accommodation period. In 1783 Pitt, who,
like his father, the great Earl of Chatham, was favourably
disposed towards the Americans, introduced a temporary
measure in the British House of Commons to regulate trade
with what was now a foreign country 'on the most enlarged
principles of reciprocal benefit' as well as 'on terms
of most perfect amity with the United States of America.'
This bill, which showed the influence of Adam Smith's
principles on Pitt's receptive mind, favoured American
more than any other foreign trade in the mother country,
and favoured it to a still greater extent in the West
Indies. Alone among foreigners the Americans were to be
granted the privilege of trading between their own ports
and the West Indies, in their own vessels and with their
own goods, on exactly the same terms as the British
themselves. The bill was rejected. But in 1794, when the
French Revolution was running its course of wild excesses,
and the British government was even less inclined to
trust republics, Jay succeeded in negotiating a temporary
treaty which improved the position of American sea-borne
trade with the West Indies. His government urged him to
get explicit statements of principle inserted, more
especially anything that would make cargoes neutral when
under neutral flags. This, however, was not possible, as
Jay himself pointed out. 'That Britain,' he said, 'at
this period, and involved in war, should not admit
principles which would impeach the propriety of her
conduct in seizing provisions bound to France, and enemy's
property on board neutral vessels, does not appear to me
extraordinary.' On the whole, Jay did very well to get
any treaty through at such a time; and this mere fact
shows that the general attitude of the mother country
towards her independent children was far from being
unfriendly.

Unfriendliness began with the new century, when Jefferson
first came into power. He treated the British navigation
laws as if they had been invented on purpose to wrong
Americans, though they had been in force for a hundred
and fifty years, and though they had been originally
passed, at the zenith of Cromwell's career, by the only
republican government that ever held sway in England.
Jefferson said that British policy was so perverse, that
when he wished to forecast the British line of action on
any particular point he would first consider what it
ought to be and then infer the opposite. His official
opinion was written in the following words: 'It is not
to the moderation or justice of others we are to trust
for fair and equal access to market with our productions,
or for our due share in the transportation of them; but
to our own means of independence, and the firm will to
use them.' On the subject of impressment, or 'Sailors'
Rights,' he was clearer still: 'The simplest rule will
be that the vessel being American shall be evidence that
the seamen on board of her are such.' This would have
prevented the impressment of British seamen, even in
British harbours, if they were under the American merchant
flag--a principle almost as preposterous, at that particular
time, as Jefferson's suggestion that the whole Gulf Stream
should be claimed 'as of our waters.'

If Jefferson had been backed by a united public, or if
his actions had been suited to his words, war would have
certainly broken out during his second presidential term,
which lasted from 1805 to 1809. But he was a party man,
with many political opponents, and without unquestioning
support from all on his own side, and he cordially hated
armies, navies, and even a mercantile marine. His idea
of an American Utopia was a commonwealth with plenty of
commerce, but no more shipping than could be helped:

   I trust [he said] that the good sense of our country
   will see that its greatest prosperity depends on a
   due balance between agriculture, manufactures, and
   commerce; and not on this protuberant navigation,
   which has kept us in hot water since the commencement
   of our government... It is essentially necessary for
   us to have shipping and seamen enough to carry our
   surplus products to market, but beyond that I do not
   think we are bound to give it encouragement... This
   exuberant commerce brings us into collision with other
   Powers in every sea.

Notwithstanding such opinions, Jefferson stood firm on
the question of 'Sailors' Rights.' He refused to approve
a treaty that had been signed on the last day of 1806 by
his four commissioners in London, chiefly because it
provided no precise guarantee against impressment. The
British ministers had offered, and had sincerely meant,
to respect all American rights, to issue special
instructions against molesting American citizens under
any circumstances, and to redress every case of wrong.
But, with a united nation behind them and an implacable
enemy in front, they could not possibly give up the right
to take British seamen from neutral vessels which were
sailing the high seas. The Right of Search was the
acknowledged law of nations all round the world; and
surrender on this point meant death to the Empire they
were bound to guard.

Their 'no surrender' on this vital point was, of course,
anathema to Jefferson. Yet he would not go beyond verbal
fulminations. In the following year, however, he was
nearly forced to draw the sword by one of those incidents
that will happen during strained relations. In June 1807
two French men-of-war were lying off Annapolis, a hundred
miles up Chesapeake Bay. Far down the bay, in Hampton
Roads, the American frigate _Chesapeake_ was fitting out
for sea. Twelve miles below her anchorage a small British
squadron lay just within Cape Henry, waiting to follow
the Frenchmen out beyond the three-mile limit. As Jefferson
quite justly said, this squadron was 'enjoying the
hospitality of the United States.' Presently the
_Chesapeake_ got under way; whereupon the British frigate
_Leopard_ made sail and cleared the land ahead of her.
Ten miles out the _Leopard_ hailed her, and sent an
officer aboard to show the American commodore the orders
from Admiral Berkeley at Halifax. These orders named
certain British deserters as being among the _Chesapeake's_
crew. The American commodore refused to allow a search;
but submitted after a fight, during which he lost twenty-one
men killed and wounded. Four men were then seized. One
was hanged; another died; and the other two were
subsequently returned with the apologies of the British
government.

James Monroe, of Monroe Doctrine fame, was then American
minister in London. Canning, the British foreign minister,
who heard the news first, wrote an apology on the spot,
and promised to make 'prompt and effectual reparation'
if Berkeley had been wrong. Berkeley was wrong. The Right
of Search did not include the right to search a foreign
man-of-war, though, unlike the modern 'right of search,'
which is confined to cargoes, it did include the right
to search a neutral merchantman on the high seas for any
'national' who was 'wanted.' Canning, however, distinctly
stated that the men's nationality would affect the
consideration of restoring them or not. Monroe now had
a good case. But he made the fatal mistake of writing
officially to Canning before he knew the details, and,
worse still, of diluting his argument with other complaints
which had nothing to do with the affair itself. The result
was a long and involved correspondence, a tardy and
ungracious reparation, and much justifiable resentment
on the American side.

Unfriendliness soon became Hostility after the _Chesapeake_
affair had sharpened the sting of the Orders-in-Council,
which had been issued at the beginning of the same year,
1807. These celebrated Orders simply meant that so long
as Napoleon tried to blockade the British Isles by
enforcing his Berlin Decree, just so long would the
British Navy be employed in blockading him and his allies.
Such decisive action, of course, brought neutral shipping
more than ever under the power of the British Navy, which
commanded all the seaways to the ports of Europe. It
accentuated the differences between the American and
British governments, and threw the shadow of the coming
storm over the exposed colony of Canada.

Not having succeeded in his struggle for 'Sailors' Rights,'
Jefferson now took up the cudgels for 'Free Trade'; but
still without a resort to arms. His chosen means of
warfare was an Embargo Act, forbidding the departure of
vessels from United States ports. This, although nominally
aimed against France as well, was designed to make Great
Britain submit by cutting off both her and her colonies
from all intercourse with the United States. But its
actual effect was to hurt Americans, and even Jefferson's
own party, far more than it hurt the British. The Yankee
skipper already had two blockades against 'Free Trade.'
The Embargo Act added a third. Of course it was evaded;
and a good deal of shipping went from the United States
and passed into Canadian ports under the Union Jack.
Jefferson and his followers, however, persisted in taking
their own way. So Canada gained from the embargo much of
what the Americans were losing. Quebec and Halifax swarmed
with contrabandists, who smuggled back return cargoes
into the New England ports, which were Federalist in
party allegiance, and only too ready to evade or defy
the edicts of the Democratic administration. Jefferson
had, it is true, the satisfaction of inflicting much
temporary hardship on cotton-spinning Manchester. But
the American cotton-growing South suffered even more.

The American claims of 'Free Trade and Sailors' Rights'
were opposed by the British counter-claims of the
Orders-in-Council and the Right of Search. But 'Down with
the British' and 'On to Canada' were without exact
equivalents on the other side. The British at home were
a good deal irritated by so much unfriendliness and
hostility behind them while they were engaged with Napoleon
in front. Yet they could hardly be described as
anti-American; and they certainly had no wish to fight,
still less to conquer, the United States. Canada did
contain an anti-American element in the United Empire
Loyalists, whom the American Revolution had driven from
their homes. But her general wish was to be left in peace.
Failing that, she was prepared for defence.

Anti-British feeling probably animated at least two-thirds
of the American people on every question that caused
international friction; and the Jeffersonian Democrats,
who were in power, were anti-British to a man. So strong
was this feeling among them that they continued to side
with France even when she was under the military despotism
of Napoleon. He was the arch-enemy of England in Europe.
They were the arch-enemy of England in America. This
alone was enough to overcome their natural repugnance to
his autocratic ways. Their position towards the British
was such that they could not draw back from France, whose
change of government had made her a more efficient
anti-British friend. 'Let us unite with France and stand
or fall together' was the cry the Democratic press repeated
for years in different forms. It was strangely prophetic.
Jefferson's Embargo Act of 1808 began its self-injurious
career at the same time that the Peninsular War began to
make the first injurious breach in Napoleon's Continental
System. Madison's declaration of war in 1812 coincided
with the opening of Napoleon's disastrous campaign in
Russia.

The Federalists, the party in favour of peace with the
British, included many of the men who had done most for
Independence; and they were all, of course, above suspicion
as patriotic Americans. But they were not unlike
transatlantic, self-governing Englishmen. They had been
alienated by the excesses of the French Revolution; and
they could not condone the tyranny of Napoleon. They
preferred American statesmen of the type of Washington
and Hamilton to those of the type of Jefferson and Madison.
And they were not inclined to be more anti-British than
the occasion required. They were strongest in New England
and New York. The Democrats were strongest throughout
the South and in what was then the West. The Federalists
had been in power during the Accommodation period. The
Democrats began with Unfriendliness, continued with
Hostility, and ended with War.

The Federalists did not hesitate to speak their mind.
Their loss of power had sharpened their tongues; and they
were often no more generous to the Democrats and to France
than the Democrats were to them and to the British. But,
on the whole, they made for goodwill on both sides; as
well as for a better understanding of each other's rights
and difficulties; and so they made for peace. The general
current, however, was against them, even before the
_Chesapeake_ affair; and several additional incidents
helped to quicken it afterwards. In 1808 the toast of
the President of the United States was received with
hisses at a great public dinner in London, given to the
leaders of the Spanish revolt against Napoleon by British
admirers. In 1811 the British sloop-of-war _Little Belt_
was overhauled by the American frigate _President_ fifty
miles off-shore and forced to strike, after losing
thirty-two men and being reduced to a mere battered hulk.
The vessels came into range after dark; the British seem
to have fired first; and the Americans had the further
excuse that they were still smarting under the _Chesapeake_
affair. Then, in 1812, an Irish adventurer called Henry,
who had been doing some secret-service work in the United
States at the instance of the Canadian governor-general,
sold the duplicates of his correspondence to President
Madison. These were of little real importance; but they
added fuel to the Democratic fire in Congress just when
anti-British feeling was at its worst.

The fourth cause of war, the desire to conquer Canada,
was by far the oldest of all. It was older than
Independence, older even than the British conquest of
Canada. In 1689 Peter Schuyler, mayor of Albany, and the
acknowledged leader of the frontier districts, had set
forth his 'Glorious Enterprize' for the conquest and
annexation of New France. Phips's American invasion next
year, carried out in complete independence of the home
government, had been an utter failure. So had the second
American invasion, led by Montgomery and Arnold during
the Revolutionary War, nearly a century later. But the
Americans had not forgotten their long desire; and the
prospect of another war at once revived their hopes. They
honestly believed that Canada would be much better off
as an integral part of the United States than as a British
colony; and most of them believed that Canadians thought
so too. The lesson of the invasion of the 'Fourteenth
Colony' during the Revolution had not been learnt. The
alacrity with which Canadians had stood to arms after
the _Chesapeake_ affair was little heeded. And both the
nature and the strength of the union between the colony
and the Empire were almost entirely misunderstood.

Henry Clay, one of the most warlike of the Democrats,
said: 'It is absurd to suppose that we will not succeed
in our enterprise against the enemy's Provinces. I am
not for stopping at Quebec or anywhere else; but I would
take the whole continent from them, and ask them no
favours. I wish never to see peace till we do. God has
given us the power and the means. We are to blame if we
do not use them.' Eustis, the American Secretary of War,
said: 'We can take Canada without soldiers. We have only
to send officers into the Provinces, and the people,
disaffected towards their own Government, will rally
round our standard.' And Jefferson summed it all up by
prophesying that 'the acquisition of Canada this year,
as far as the neighbourhood of Quebec, will be a mere
matter of marching.' When the leaders talked like this,
it was no wonder their followers thought that the
long-cherished dream of a conquered Canada was at last
about to come true.




CHAPTER II

OPPOSING FORCES

An armed mob must be very big indeed before it has the
slightest chance against a small but disciplined army.

So very obvious a statement might well be taken for
granted in the history of any ordinary war. But '1812'
was not an ordinary war. It was a sprawling and sporadic
war; and it was waged over a vast territory by widely
scattered and singularly heterogeneous forces on both
sides. For this reason it is extremely difficult to view
and understand as one connected whole. Partisan
misrepresentation has never had a better chance. Americans
have dwelt with justifiable pride on the frigate duels
out at sea and the two flotilla battles on the Lakes.
But they have usually forgotten that, though they won
the naval battles, the British won the purely naval war.
The mother-country British, on the other hand, have made
too much of their one important victory at sea, have
passed too lightly over the lessons of the other duels
there, and have forgotten how long it took to sweep the
Stars and Stripes away from the Atlantic. Canadians have,
of course, devoted most attention to the British victories
won in the frontier campaigns on land, which the other
British have heeded too little and Americans have been
only too anxious to forget. Finally, neither the Canadians,
nor the mother-country British, nor yet the Americans,
have often tried to take a comprehensive view of all the
operations by land and sea together.

The character and numbers of the opposing forces have
been even less considered and even more misunderstood.
Militia victories have been freely claimed by both sides,
in defiance of the fact that the regulars were the really
decisive factor in every single victory won by either
side, afloat or ashore. The popular notions about the
numbers concerned are equally wrong. The totals were far
greater than is generally known. Counting every man who
ever appeared on either side, by land or sea, within the
actual theatre of war, the united grand total reaches
seven hundred thousand. This was most unevenly divided
between the two opponents. The Americans had about 575,000,
the British about 125,000. But such a striking difference
in numbers was matched by an equally striking difference
in discipline and training. The Americans had more than
four times as many men. The British had more than four
times as much discipline and training.

The forces on the American side were a small navy and a
swarm of privateers, a small regular army, a few
'volunteers,' still fewer 'rangers,' and a vast
conglomeration of raw militia. The British had a detachment
from the greatest navy in the world, a very small
'Provincial Marine' on the Lakes and the St Lawrence,
besides various little subsidiary services afloat,
including privateers. Their army consisted of a very
small but latterly much increased contingent of Imperial
regulars, a few Canadian regulars, more Canadian militia,
and a very few Indians. Let us pass all these forces in
review.

_The American Navy_. During the Revolution the infant
Navy had begun a career of brilliant promise; and Paul
Jones had been a name to conjure with. British belittlement
deprived him of his proper place in history; but he was
really the founder of the regular Navy that fought so
gallantly in '1812.' A tradition had been created and a
service had been formed. Political opinion, however,
discouraged proper growth. President Jefferson laid down
the Democratic party's idea of naval policy in his first
Inaugural. 'Beyond the small force which will probably
be wanted for actual service in the Mediterranean, whatever
annual sum you may think proper to appropriate to naval
preparations would perhaps be better employed in providing
those articles which may be kept without waste or
consumption, and be in readiness when any exigence calls
them into use. Progress has been made in providing
materials for 74-gun ships.' [Footnote: A ship-of
the-line, meaning a battleship or man-of war strong enough
to take a position in the line of battle, was of a
different minimum size at different periods. The tendency
towards increase of size existed a century ago as well
as to-day. 'Fourth-rates,' of 50 and 60 guns, dropped
out of the line at the beginning of the Seven Years' War.
In 1812 the 74-gun three-decker was the smallest man-of-war
regularly used in the line of battle.] This 'progress'
had been made in 1801. But in 1812, when Jefferson's
disciple, Madison, formally declared war, not a single
keel had been laid. Meanwhile, another idea of naval
policy had been worked out into the ridiculous gunboat
system. In 1807, during the crisis which followed the
Berlin Decree, the Orders-in-Council, and the _Chesapeake_
affair, Jefferson wrote to Thomas Paine: 'Believing,
myself; that gunboats are the only water defence which
can be useful to us, and protect us from the ruinous
folly of a navy, I am pleased with everything which
promises to improve them.' Whether 'improved' or not,
these gunboats were found worse than useless as a substitute
for 'the ruinous folly of a navy.' They failed egregiously
to stop Jefferson's own countrymen from breaking his
Embargo Act of 1808; and their weatherly qualities were
so contemptible that they did not dare to lose sight of
land without putting their guns in the hold. No wonder
the practical men of the Navy called them 'Jeffs.'

When President Madison summoned Congress in 1811 war was
the main topic of debate. Yet all he had to say about
the Navy was contained in twenty-seven lukewarm words.
Congress followed the presidential lead. The momentous
naval vote of 1812 provided for an expenditure of six
hundred thousand dollars, which was to be spread over
three consecutive years and strictly limited to buying
timber. Then, on the outbreak of war, the government,
consistent to the last, decided to lay up the whole of
their sea-going navy lest it should be captured by the
British.

But this final indignity was more than the Navy could
stand in silence. Some senior officers spoke their minds,
and the party politicians gave way. The result was a
series of victories which, of their own peculiar kind,
have never been eclipsed. Not one American ship-of-the-line
was ever afloat during the war; and only twenty-two
frigates or smaller naval craft put out to sea. In
addition, there were the three little flotillas on Lakes
Erie, Ontario, and Champlain; and a few minor vessels
elsewhere. All the crews together did not exceed ten
thousand men, replacements included. Yet, even with these
niggard means, the American Navy won the command of two
lakes completely, held the command of the third in
suspense, won every important duel out at sea, except
the famous fight against the _Shannon_, inflicted serious
loss on British sea-borne trade, and kept a greatly
superior British naval force employed on constant and
harassing duty.

_The American Privateers_. Besides the little Navy, there
were 526 privately owned vessels which were officially
authorized to prey on the enemy's trade. These were manned
by forty thousand excellent seamen and had the chance of
plundering the richest sea-borne commerce in the world.
They certainly harassed British commerce, even in its
own home waters; and during the course of the war they
captured no less than 1344 prizes. But they did practically
nothing towards reducing the British fighting force
afloat; and even at their own work of commerce-destroying
they did less than one-third as much as the Navy in
proportion to their numbers.

_The American Army_. The Army had competed with the Navy
for the lowest place in Jefferson's Inaugural of 1801.
'This is the only government where every man will meet
invasions of the public order as his own personal
concern... A well-disciplined militia is our best reliance
for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve
them.' The Army was then reduced to three thousand men.
'Such were the results of Mr Jefferson's low estimate
of, or rather contempt for, the military character,' said
General Winfield Scott, the best officer the United States
produced between '1812' and the Civil War. In 1808 'an
additional military force' was authorized. In January
1812, after war had been virtually decided on, the
establishment was raised to thirty-five thousand. But in
June, when war had been declared, less than a quarter of
this total could be called effectives, and more than half
were still wanting to complete.' The grand total of all
American regulars, including those present with the
colours on the outbreak of hostilities as well as those
raised during the war, amounted to fifty-six thousand.
Yet no general had six thousand actually in the firing
line of any one engagement.

_The United States Volunteers_. Ten thousand volunteers
were raised, from first to last. They differed from the
regulars in being enlisted for shorter terms of service
and in being generally allowed to elect their own regimental
officers. Theoretically they were furnished in fixed
quotas by the different States, according to population.
They resembled the regulars in other respects, especially
in being directly under Federal, not State, authority.

_The Rangers_. Three thousand men with a real or supposed
knowledge of backwoods life served in the war. They
operated in groups and formed a very unequal force--good,
bad, and indifferent. Some were under the Federal authority.
Others belonged to the different States. As a distinct
class they had no appreciable influence on the major
results of the war.

_The Militia_. The vast bulk of the American forces, more
than three-quarters of the grand total by land and sea,
was made up of the militia belonging to the different
States of the Union. These militiamen could not be moved
outside of their respective States without State authority;
and individual consent was also necessary to prolong a
term of enlistment, even if the term should come to an
end in the middle of a battle. Some enlisted for several
months; others for no more than one. Very few had any
military knowledge whatever; and most of the officers
were no better trained than the men. The totals from all
the different States amounted to 456,463. Not half of
these ever got near the front; and not nearly half of
those who did get there ever came into action at all.
Except at New Orleans, where the conditions were quite
abnormal, the militia never really helped to decide the
issue of any battle, except, indeed, against their own
army. 'The militia thereupon broke and fled' recurs with
tiresome frequency in numberless dispatches. Yet the
consequent charges of cowardice are nearly all unjust.
The fellow-countrymen of those sailors who fought the
American frigates so magnificently were no special kind
of cowards. But, as a raw militia, they simply were to
well-trained regulars what children are to men.

_American Non-Combatant Services_. There were more than
fifty thousand deaths reported on the American side; yet
not ten thousand men were killed or mortally wounded in
all the battles put together. The medical department,
like the commissariat and transport, was only organized
at the very last minute, even among the regulars, and
then in a most haphazard way. Among the militia these
indispensable branches of the service were never really
organized at all.

Such disastrous shortcomings were not caused by any lack
of national resources. The population o the United States
was about eight millions, as against eighteen millions
in the British Isles. Prosperity was general; at all
events, up to the time that it was checked by Jefferson's
Embargo Act. The finances were also thought to be most
satisfactory. On the very eve of war the Secretary of
the Treasury reported that the national debt had been
reduced by forty-six million dollars since his party had
come into power. Had this 'war party' spent those millions
on its Army and Navy, the war itself might have had an
ending more satisfactory to the United States.

Let us now review the forces on the British side.

The eighteen million people in the British Isles were
naturally anxious to avoid war with the eight millions
in the United States. They had enough on their hands as
it was. The British Navy was being kept at a greater
strength than ever before; though it was none too strong
for the vast amount of work it had to do. The British
Army was waging its greatest Peninsular campaign. All
the other naval and military services of what was already
a world-wide empire had to be maintained. One of the most
momentous crises in the world's history was fast
approaching; for Napoleon, arch-enemy of England and
mightiest of modern conquerors, was marching on Russia
with five hundred thousand men. Nor was this all. There
were troubles at home as well as dangers abroad. The king
had gone mad the year before. The prime minister had
recently been assassinated. The strain of nearly twenty
years of war was telling severely on the nation. It was
no time to take on a new enemy, eight millions strong,
especially one who supplied so many staple products during
peace and threatened both the sea flank of the mother
country and the land flank of Canada during war.

Canada was then little more than a long, weak line of
settlements on the northern frontier of the United States.
Counting in the Maritime Provinces, the population hardly
exceeded five hundred thousand--as many people, altogether,
as there were soldiers in one of Napoleon's armies, or
Americans enlisted for service in this very war. Nearly
two-thirds of this half-million were French Canadians in
Lower Canada, now the province of Quebec. They were loyal
to the British cause, knowing they could not live a
French-Canadian life except within the British Empire.
The population of Upper Canada, now Ontario, was less
than a hundred thousand. The Anglo-Canadians in it were
of two kinds: British immigrants and United Empire
Loyalists, with sons and grandsons of each. Both kinds
were loyal. But the 'U.E.L.'s' were anti-American through
and through, especially in regard to the war-and-Democratic
party then in power. They could therefore be depended on
to fight to the last against an enemy who, having driven
them into exile once, was now coming to wrest their second
New-World home from its allegiance to the British crown.
They and their descendants in all parts of Canada numbered
more than half the Anglo-Canadian population in 1812.
The few thousand Indians near the scene of action naturally
sided with the British, who treated them better and
dispossessed them less than the Americans did. The only
detrimental part of the population was the twenty-five
thousand Americans, who simply used Canada as a good
ground for exploitation, and who would have preferred to
see it under the Stars and Stripes, provided that the
change put no restriction on their business opportunities.

_The British Navy_. About thirty thousand men of the
British Navy, only a fifth of the whole service, appeared
within the American theatre of war from first to last.
This oldest and greatest of all navies had recently
emerged triumphant from an age-long struggle for the
command of the sea. But, partly because of its very
numbers and vast heritage of fame, it was suffering
acutely from several forms of weakness. Almost twenty
years of continuous war, with dull blockades during the
last seven, was enough to make any service 'go stale.'
Owing to the enormous losses recruiting had become
exceedingly and increasingly difficult, even compulsory
recruiting by press-gang. At the same time, Nelson's
victories had filled the ordinary run of naval men with
an over-weening confidence in their own invincibility;
and this over-confidence had become more than usually
dangerous because of neglected gunnery and defective
shipbuilding. The Admiralty had cut down the supply of
practice ammunition and had allowed British ships to lag
far behind those of other nations in material and design.
The general inferiority of British shipbuilding was such
an unwelcome truth to the British people that they would
not believe it till the American frigates drove it home
with shattering broadsides. But it was a very old truth,
for all that. Nelson's captains, and those of still
earlier wars, had always competed eagerly for the command
of the better built French prizes, which they managed to
take only because the superiority of their crews was
great enough to overcome the inferiority of their ships.
There was a different tale to tell when inferior British
vessels with 'run-down' crews met superior American
vessels with first-rate crews. In those days training
and discipline were better in the American mercantile
marine than in the British; and the American Navy, of
course, shared in the national efficiency at sea. Thus,
with cheap materials, good designs, and excellent seamen,
the Americans started with great advantages over the
British for single-ship actions; and it was some time
before their small collection of ships succumbed to the
grinding pressure of the regularly organized British
fleet.

_The Provincial Marine_. Canada had a little local navy
on the Lakes called the Provincial Marine. It dated from
the Conquest, and had done good service again during the
Revolution, especially in Carleton's victory over Arnold
on Lake Champlain in 1776. It had not, however, been kept
up as a proper naval force, but had been placed under
the quartermaster-general's department of the Army, where
it had been mostly degraded into a mere branch of the
transport service. At one time the effective force had
been reduced to 132 men; though many more were hurriedly
added just before the war. Most of its senior officers
were too old; and none of the juniors had enjoyed any
real training for combatant duties. Still, many of the
ships and men did well in the war, though they never
formed a single properly organized squadron.

_British Privateers_. Privateering was not a flourishing
business in the mother country in 1812. Prime seamen were
scarce, owing to the great number needed in the Navy and
in the mercantile marine. Many, too, had deserted to get
the higher wages paid in 'Yankees'--'dollars for shillings,'
as the saying went. Besides, there was little foreign
trade left to prey on. Canadian privateers did better.
They were nearly all 'Bluenoses;' that is, they hailed
from the Maritime Provinces. During the three campaigns
the Court of Vice-Admiralty at Halifax issued letters of
marque to forty-four privateers, which employed, including
replacements, about three thousand men and reported over
two hundred prizes.

_British Commissariat and Transport_. Transport, of
course, went chiefly by water. Reinforcements and supplies
from the mother country came out under convoy, mostly in
summer, to Quebec, where bulk was broken, and whence both
men and goods were sent to the front. There were plenty
of experts in Canada to move goods west in ordinary times.
The best of all were the French-Canadian voyageurs who
manned the boats of the Hudson's Bay and North-West
Companies. But there were not enough of them to carry on
the work of peace and war together. Great and skilful
efforts, however, were made. Schooners, bateaux, boats,
and canoes were all turned to good account. But the inland
line of communications was desperately long and difficult to
work. It was more than twelve hundred miles from Quebec to
Amherstburg on the river Detroit, even by the shortest route.

_The British Army_. The British Army, like the Navy, had
to maintain an exacting world-wide service, besides large
contingents in the field, on resources which had been
severely strained by twenty years of war. It was represented
in Canada by only a little over four thousand effective
men when the war began. Reinforcements at first came
slowly and in small numbers. In 1813 some foreign corps
in British pay, like the Watteville and the Meuron
regiments, came out. But in 1814 more than sixteen thousand
men, mostly Peninsular veterans, arrived. Altogether,
including every man present in any part of Canada during
the whole war, there were over twenty-five thousand
British regulars. In addition to these there were the
troops invading the United States at Washington and
Baltimore, with the reinforcements that joined them for
the attack on New Orleans--in all, nearly nine thousand
men. The grand total within the theatre of war was
therefore about thirty-four thousand.

_The Canadian Regulars_. The Canadian regulars were about
four thousand strong. Another two thousand took the place
of men who were lost to the service, making the total
six thousand, from first to last. There were six corps
raised for permanent service: the Royal Newfoundland
Regiment, the New Brunswick Regiment, the Canadian
Fencibles, the Royal Veterans, the Canadian Voltigeurs,
and the Glengarry Light Infantry. The Glengarries were
mostly Highland Roman Catholics who had settled Glengarry
county on the Ottawa, where Ontario marches with Quebec.
The Voltigeurs were French Canadians under a French-Canadian
officer in the Imperial Army. In the other corps there
were many United Empire Loyalists from the different
provinces, including a good stiffening of old soldiers
and their sons.

_The Canadian Embodied Militia_. The Canadian militia by
law comprised every able-bodied man except the few
specially exempt, like the clergy and the judges. A
hundred thousand adult males were liable for service.
Various causes, however, combined to prevent half of
these from getting under arms. Those who actually did
duty were divided into 'Embodied' and 'Sedentary' corps.
The embodied militia consisted of picked men, drafted
for special service; and they often approximated so
closely to the regulars in discipline and training that
they may be classed, at the very least, as semi-regulars.
Counting all those who passed into the special reserve
during the war, as well as those who went to fill up the
ranks after losses, there were nearly ten thousand of
these highly trained, semi-regular militiamen engaged in
the war.

_The Canadian Sedentary Militia_. The 'Sedentaries'
comprised the rest of the militia. The number under arms
fluctuated greatly; so did the length of time on duty.
There were never ten thousand employed at any one time
all over the country. As a rule, the 'Sedentaries' did
duty at the base, thus releasing the better trained men
for service at the front. Many had the blood of soldiers
in their veins; and nearly all had the priceless advantage
of being kept in constant touch with regulars. A passionate
devotion to the cause also helped them to acquire, sooner
than most other men, both military knowledge and that
true spirit of discipline which, after all, is nothing
but self-sacrifice in its finest patriotic form.

_The Indians_. Nearly all the Indians sided with the
British or else remained neutral. They were, however, a
very uncertain force; and the total number that actually
served at the front throughout the war certainly fell
short of five thousand.

This completes the estimate of the opposing forces-of
the more than half a million Americans against the hundred
and twenty-five thousand British; with these great odds
entirely reversed whenever the comparison is made not
between mere quantities of men but between their respective
degrees of discipline and training.

But it does not complete the comparison between the
available resources of the two opponents in one most
important particular--finance. The Army Bill Act, passed
at Quebec on August 1, 1812, was the greatest single
financial event in the history of Canada. It was also
full of political significance; for the parliament of
Lower Canada was overwhelmingly French-Canadian. The
million dollars authorized for issue, together with
interest at six per cent, pledged that province to the
equivalent of four years' revenue. The risk was no light
one. But it was nobly run and well rewarded. These Army
Bills were the first paper money in the whole New World
that never lost face value for a day, that paid all their
statutory interest, and that were finally redeemed at
par. The denominations ran from one dollar up to four
hundred dollars. Bills of one, two, three, and four
dollars could always be cashed at the Army Bill Office
in Quebec. After due notice the whole issue was redeemed
in November 1816. A special feature well worth noting is
the fact that Army Bills sometimes commanded a premium
of five per cent over gold itself, because, being
convertible into government bills of exchange on London,
they were secure against any fluctuations in the price
of bullion. A special comparison well worth making is
that between their own remarkable stability and the
equally remarkable instability of similar instruments of
finance in the United States, where, after vainly trying
to help the government through its difficulties, every
bank outside of New England was forced to suspend specie
payments in 1814, the year of the Great Blockade.




CHAPTER III

1812: OFF TO THE FRONT

President Madison sent his message to Congress on the
1st of June and signed the resultant 'war bill' on the
18th following. Congress was as much divided as the nation
on the question of peace or war. The vote in the House
of Representatives was seventy-nine to forty-nine, while
in the Senate it was nineteen to thirteen. The government
itself was 'solid.' But it did little enough to make up
for the lack of national whole-heartedness by any efficiency
of its own. Madison was less zealous about the war than
most of his party. He was no Pitt or Lincoln to ride the
storm, but a respectable lawyer-politician, whose forte
was writing arguments, not wielding his country's sword.
Nor had he in his Cabinet a single statesman with a genius
for making war. His war secretary, William Eustis, never
grasped the military situation at all, and had to be
replaced by John Armstrong after the egregious failures
of the first campaign. During the war debate in June,
Eustis was asked to report to Congress how many of the
'additional' twenty-five thousand men authorized in
January had already been enlisted. The best answer he
could make was a purely 'unofficial opinion' that the
number was believed to exceed five thousand.

The first move to the front was made by the Navy. Under
very strong pressure the Cabinet had given up the original
idea of putting the ships under a glass case; and four
days after the declaration of war orders were sent to
the senior naval officer, Commodore Rodgers, to 'protect
our returning commerce' by scattering his ships about
the American coast just where the British squadron at
Halifax would be most likely to defeat them one by one.
Happily for the United States, these orders were too
late. Rodgers had already sailed. He was a man of action.
His little squadron of three frigates, one sloop, and
one brig lay in the port of New York, all ready waiting
for the word. And when news of the declaration arrived,
he sailed within the hour, and set out in pursuit of a
British squadron that was convoying a fleet of merchantmen
from the West Indies to England. He missed the convoy,
which worked into Liverpool, Bristol, and London by
getting to the north of him. But, for all that, his sudden
dash into British waters with an active, concentrated
squadron produced an excellent effect. The third day out
the British frigate _Belvidera_ met him and had to run
for her life into Halifax. The news of this American
squadron's being at large spread alarm all over the routes
between Canada and the outside world. Rodgers turned
south within a few hours' sail of the English Channel,
turned west off Madeira, gave Halifax a wide berth, and
reached Boston ten weeks out from Sandy Hook. 'We have
been so completely occupied in looking out for Commodore
Rodgers,' wrote a British naval officer, 'that we have
taken very few prizes.' Even Madison was constrained to
admit that this offensive move had had the defensive
results he had hoped to reach in his own 'defensive' way.
'Our Trade has reached our ports, having been much favoured
by a squadron under Commodore Rodgers.'

The policy of squadron cruising was continued throughout
the autumn and winter of 1812. There were no squadron
battles. But there was unity of purpose; and British
convoys were harassed all over the Atlantic till well on
into the next year. During this period there were five
famous duels, which have made the _Constitution_ and the
_United States_, the _Hornet_ and the _Wasp_, four names
to conjure with wherever the Stars and Stripes are flown.
The _Constitution_ fought the first, when she took the
_Guerriere_ in August, due east of Boston and south of
Newfoundland. The _Wasp_ won the second in September, by
taking the _Frolic_ half-way between Halifax and Bermuda.
The _United States_ won the third in October, by defeating
the _Macedonian_ south-west of Madeira. The _Constitution_
won the fourth in December, off Bahia in Brazil, by
defeating the _Java_. And the _Hornet_ won the fifth in
February, by taking the _Peacock_, off Demerara, on the
coast of British Guiana.

This closed the first period of the war at sea. The
British government had been so anxious to avoid war, and
to patch up peace again after war had broken out, that
they purposely refrained from putting forth their full
available naval strength till 1813. At the same time,
they would naturally have preferred victory to defeat;
and the fact that most of the British Navy was engaged
elsewhere, and that what was available was partly held
in leash, by no means dims the glory of those four
men-of-war which the Americans fought with so much bravery
and skill, and with such well-deserved success. No wonder
Wellington said peace with the United States would be
worth having at any honourable price, 'if we could only
take some of their damned frigates!' Peace was not to
come for another eighteen months. But though the Americans
won a few more duels out at sea, besides two annihilating
flotilla victories on the Lakes, their coast was blockaded
as completely as Napoleon's, once the British Navy had
begun its concerted movements on a comprehensive scale.
From that time forward the British began to win the naval
war, although they won no battles and only one duel that
has lived in history. This dramatic duel, fought between
the _Shannon_ and the _Chesapeake_ on June 1, 1813, was
not itself a more decisive victory for the British than
previous frigate duels had been for the Americans. But
it serves better than any other special event to mark
the change from the first period, when the Americans
roved the sea as conquerors, to the second, when they
were gradually blockaded into utter impotence.

Having now followed the thread of naval events to a point
beyond the other limits of this chapter, we must return to
the American movements against the Canadian frontier and
the British counter-movements intended to checkmate them.

Quebec and Halifax, the two great Canadian seaports, were
safe from immediate American attack; though Quebec was
the ultimate objective of the Americans all through the
war. But the frontier west of Quebec offered several
tempting chances for a vigorous invasion, if the American
naval and military forces could only be made to work
together. The whole life of Canada there depended absolutely
on her inland waterways. If the Americans could cut the
line of the St Lawrence and Great Lakes at any critical
point, the British would lose everything to the west of
it; and there were several critical points of connection
along this line. St Joseph's Island, commanding the
straits between Lake Superior and Lake Huron, was a vital
point of contact with all the Indians to the west. It
was the British counterpoise to the American post at
Michilimackinac, which commanded the straits between Lake
Huron and Lake Michigan. Detroit commanded the waterway
between Lake Huron and Lake Erie; while the command of
the Niagara peninsula ensured the connection between Lake
Erie and Lake Ontario. At the head of the St Lawrence,
guarding the entrance to Lake Ontario, stood Kingston.
Montreal was an important station midway between Kingston
and Quebec, besides being an excellent base for an army
thrown forward against the American frontier. Quebec was
the general base from which all the British forces were
directed and supplied.

Quick work, by water and land together, was essential
for American success before the winter, even if the
Canadians were really so anxious to change their own flag
for the Stars and Stripes. But the American government
put the cart before the horse--the Army before the
Navy--and weakened the military forces of invasion by
dividing them into two independent commands. General
Henry Dearborn was appointed commander-in-chief, but only
with control over the north-eastern country, that is,
New England and New York. Thirty years earlier Dearborn
had served in the War of Independence as a junior officer;
and he had been Jefferson's Secretary of War. Yet he was
not much better trained as a leader than his raw men were
as followers, and he was now sixty-one. He established
his headquarters at Greenbush, nearly opposite Albany,
so that he could advance on Montreal by the line of the
Hudson, Lake Champlain, and the Richelieu. The intended
advance, however, did not take place this year. Greenbush
was rather a recruiting depot and camp of instruction
than the base of an army in the field; and the actual
campaign had hardly begun before the troops went into
winter quarters. The commander of the north-western army
was General William Hull. And his headquarters were to
be Detroit, from which Upper Canada was to be quickly
overrun without troubling about the co-operation of the
Navy. Like Dearborn, Hull had served in the War of
Independence. But he had been a civilian ever since; he
was now fifty-nine; and his only apparent qualification
was his having been governor of Michigan for seven years.
Not until September, after two defeats on land, was
Commodore Chauncey ordered 'to assume command of the
naval force on Lakes Erie and Ontario, and use every
exertion to obtain control of them this fall.' Even then
Lake Champlain, an essential link both in the frontier
system and on Dearborn's proposed line of march, was
totally forgotten.

To complete the dispersion of force, Eustis forgot all
about the military detachments at the western forts. Fort
Dearborn (now Chicago) and Michilimackinac, important as
points of connection with the western tribes, were left
to the devices of their own inadequate garrisons. In 1801
Dearborn himself, Eustis's predecessor as Secretary of
War, had recommended a peace strength of two hundred men
at Michilimackinac, usually known as 'Mackinaw.' In 1812
there were not so many at Mackinaw and Chicago put
together.

It was not a promising outlook to an American military
eye--the cart before the horse, the thick end of the
wedge turned towards the enemy, three incompetent men
giving disconnected orders on the northern frontier, and
the western posts neglected. But Eustis was full of
self-confidence. Hull was 'enthusing' his militiamen.
And Dearborn was for the moment surpassing both, by
proposing to 'operate, with effect, at the same moment,
against Niagara, Kingston, and Montreal.'

From the Canadian side the outlook was also dark enough
to the trained eye; though not for the same reasons. The
menace here was from an enemy whose general resources
exceeded those in Canada by almost twenty to one. The
silver lining to the cloud was the ubiquitous British
Navy and the superior training and discipline of the
various little military forces immediately available for
defence.

The Maritime Provinces formed a subordinate command,
based on the strong naval station of Halifax, where a
regular garrison was always maintained by the Imperial
government. They were never invaded, or even seriously
threatened. It was only in 1814 that they came directly
into the scene of action, and then only as the base from
which the invasion of Maine was carried out.

We must therefore turn to Quebec as the real centre of
Canadian defence, which, indeed, it was best fitted to
be, not only from its strategical situation, but from
the fact that it was the seat of the governor-general
and commander-in-chief, Sir George Prevost. Like Sir John
Sherbrooke, the governor of Nova Scotia, Prevost was a
professional soldier with an unblemished record in the
Army. But, though naturally anxious to do well, and though
very suavely diplomatic, he was not the man, as we shall
often see, either to face a military crisis or to stop
the Americans from stealing marches on him by negotiation.
On the outbreak of war he was at headquarters in Quebec,
dividing his time between his civil and military duties,
greatly concerned with international diplomacy, and always
full of caution.

At York (now Toronto) in Upper Canada a very different
man was meanwhile preparing to checkmate Hull's
'north-western army' of Americans, which was threatening
to invade the province. Isaac Brock was not only a soldier
born and bred, but, alone among the leaders on either
side, he had the priceless gift of genius. He was now
forty-two, having been born in Guernsey on October 6,
1769, in the same year as Napoleon and Wellington. Like
the Wolfes and the Montcalms, the Brocks had followed
the noble profession of arms for many generations. Nor
were the De Lisles, his mother's family, less distinguished
for the number of soldiers and sailors they had been
giving to England ever since the Norman Conquest. Brock
himself, when only twenty-nine, had commanded the 49th
Foot in Holland under Sir John Moore, the future hero of
Corunna, and Sir Ralph Abercromby, who was so soon to
fall victorious in Egypt. Two years after this he had
stood beside another and still greater man at Copenhagen,
'mighty Nelson,' who there gave a striking instance of
how a subordinate inspired by genius can win the day by
disregarding the over-caution of a commonplace superior.
We may be sure that when Nelson turned his blind eye on
Parker's signal of recall the lesson was not thrown away
on Brock.

For ten long years of inglorious peace Brock had now been
serving on in Canada, while his comrades in arms were
winning distinction on the battlefields of Europe. This
was partly due to his own excellence: he was too good a
man to be spared after his first five years were up in
1807; for the era of American hostility had then begun.
He had always been observant. But after 1807 he had
redoubled his efforts to 'learn Canada,' and learn her
thoroughly. People and natural resources, products and
means of transport, armed strength on both sides of the
line and the best plan of defence, all were studied with
unremitting zeal. In 1811 he became the acting
lieutenant-governor and commander of the forces in Upper
Canada, where he soon found out that the members of
parliament returned by the 'American vote' were bent on
thwarting every effort he could make to prepare the
province against the impending storm. In 1812, on the
very day he heard that war had been declared, he wished
to strike the unready Americans hard and instantly at
one of their three accessible points of assembly-Fort
Niagara, at the upper end of Lake Ontario, opposite Fort
George, which stood on the other side of the Niagara
river; Sackett's Harbour, at the lower end of Lake Ontario,
thirty-six miles from Kingston; and Ogdensburg, on the
upper St Lawrence, opposite Fort Prescott. But Sir George
Prevost, the governor-general, was averse from an open
act of war against the Northern States, because they were
hostile to Napoleon and in favour of maintaining peace
with the British; while Brock himself was soon turned
from this purpose by news of Hull's American invasion
farther west, as well as by the necessity of assembling
his own thwarting little parliament at York.

The nine days' session, from July 27 to August 5, yielded
the indispensable supplies. But the suspension of the
Habeas Corpus Act, as a necessary war measure, was
prevented by the disloyal minority, some of whom wished
to see the British defeated and all of whom were ready
to break their oath of allegiance whenever it suited them
to do so. The patriotic majority, returned by the votes
of United Empire Loyalists and all others who were British
born and bred, issued an address that echoed the appeal
made by Brock himself in the following words: 'We are
engaged in an awful and eventful contest. By unanimity
and despatch in our councils and by vigour in our operations
we may teach the enemy this lesson: That a country defended
by free men, enthusiastically devoted to the cause of
their King and Constitution, can never be conquered.'

On August 5, being at last clear of his immediate duties
as a civil governor, Brock threw himself ardently into
the work of defeating Hull, who had crossed over into
Canada from Detroit on July 11 and issued a proclamation
at Sandwich the following day. This proclamation shows
admirably the sort of impression which the invaders wished
to produce on Canadians.

   The United States are sufficiently powerful to afford
   you every security consistent with their rights and
   your expectations. I tender you the invaluable blessings
   of Civil, Political, and Religious Liberty... The
   arrival of an army of Friends must be hailed by you
   with a cordial welcome. You will be emancipated from
   Tyranny and Oppression and restored to the dignified
   station of Freemen... If, contrary to your own interest
   and the just expectation of my country, you should
   take part in the approaching contest, you will be
   considered and treated as enemies and the horrors and
   calamities of war will Stalk before you. If the
   barbarous and Savage policy of Great Britain be pursued,
   and the savages let loose to murder our Citizens and
   butcher our women and children, this war will be a
   war of extermination. The first stroke with the
   Tomahawk, the first attempt with the Scalping Knife,
   will be the Signal for one indiscriminate scene of
   desolation. No white man found fighting by the Side
   of an Indian will be taken prisoner. Instant destruction
   will be his Lot...

This was war with a vengeance. But Hull felt less confidence
than his proclamation was intended to display. He knew
that, while the American government had been warned in
January about the necessity of securing the naval command
of Lake Erie, no steps had yet been taken to secure it.
Ever since the beginning of March, when he had written
a report based on his seven years' experience as governor
of Michigan, he had been gradually learning that Eustis
was bent on acting in defiance of all sound military
advice. In April he had accepted his new position very
much against his will and better judgment. In May he had
taken command of the assembling militiamen at Dayton in
Ohio. In June he had been joined by a battalion of
inexperienced regulars. And now, in July, he was already
feeling the ill effects of having to carry on what should
have been an amphibious campaign without the assistance
of any proper force afloat; for on the 2nd ten days before
he issued his proclamation at Sandwich, Lieutenant Rolette,
an enterprising French-Canadian officer in the Provincial
Marine, had cut his line of communication along the
Detroit and had taken an American schooner which contained
his official plan of campaign, besides a good deal of
baggage and stores.

There were barely six hundred British on the line of the
Detroit when Hull first crossed over to Sandwich with
twenty-five hundred men. These six hundred comprised less
than 150 regulars, about 300 militia, and some 150 Indians.
Yet Hull made no decisive effort against the feeble little
fort of Malden, which was the only defence of Amherstburg
by land. The distance was nothing, only twelve miles
south from Sandwich. He sent a sort of flying column
against it. But this force went no farther than half-way,
where the Americans were checked at the bridge over the
swampy little Riviere aux Canards by the Indians under
Tecumseh, the great War Chief of whom we shall soon hear
more.

Hull's failure to take Fort Malden was one fatal mistake.
His failure to secure his communications southward from
Detroit was another. Apparently yielding to the prevalent
American idea that a safe base could be created among
friendly Canadians without the trouble of a regular
campaign, he sent off raiding parties up the Thames.
According to his own account, these parties 'penetrated
sixty miles into the settled part of the province.'
According to Brock, they 'ravaged the country as far as
the Moravian Town.' But they gained no permanent foothold.
By the beginning of August Hull's position had already
become precarious. The Canadians had not proved friendly.
The raid up the Thames and the advance towards Amherstburg
had both failed. And the first British reinforcements
had already begun to arrive. These were very small. But
even a few good regulars helped to discourage Hull; and
the new British commander, Colonel Procter of the 41st,
was not yet to be faced by a task beyond his strength.
Worse yet for the Americans, Brock might soon be expected
from the east; the Provincial Marine still held the water
line of communication from the south; and dire news had
just come in from the west.

The moment Brock had heard of the declaration of war he
had sent orders post-haste to Captain Roberts at St
Joseph's Island, either to attack the Americans at
Michilimackinac or stand on his own defence. Roberts
received Brock's orders on the 15th of July. The very
next day he started for Michilimackinac with 45 men of
the Royal Veterans, 180 French-Canadian voyageurs, 400
Indians, and two 'unwieldy' iron six-pounders. Surprise
was essential, to prevent the Americans from destroying
their stores; and the distance was a good fifty miles.
But 'by the almost unparalleled exertions of the Canadians
who manned the boats, we arrived at the place of Rendezvous
at 3 o'clock the following morning.' One of the iron
six-pounders was then hauled up the heights, which rise
to eight hundred feet, and trained on the dumbfounded
Americans, while the whole British force took post for
storming. The American commandant, Lieutenant Hanks, who
had only fifty-seven effective men, thereupon surrendered
without firing a shot.

The news of this bold stroke ran like wildfire through
the whole North-West. The effect on the Indians was
tremendous, immediate, and wholly in favour of the British.
In the previous November Tecumseh's brother, known far
and wide as the 'Prophet,' had been defeated on the banks
of the Tippecanoe, a river of Indiana, by General Harrison,
of whom we shall hear in the next campaign. This battle,
though small in itself, was looked upon as the typical
victory of the dispossessing Americans; so the British
seizure of Michilimackinac was hailed with great joy as
being a most effective counter-stroke. Nor was this the
only reason for rejoicing. Michilimackinac and St Joseph's
commanded the two lines of communication between the
western wilds and the Great Lakes; so the possession of
both by the British was more than a single victory, it
was a promise of victories to come. No wonder Hull lamented
this 'opening of the hive,' which 'let the swarms' loose
all over the wilds on his inland flank and rear.

He would have felt more uneasy still if he had known what
was to happen when Captain Heald received his orders at
Fort Dearborn (Chicago) on August 9. Hull had ordered
Heald to evacuate the fort as soon as possible and rejoin
headquarters. Heald had only sixty-six men, not nearly
enough to overawe the surrounding Indians. News of the
approaching evacuation spread quickly during the six days
of preparation. The Americans failed to destroy the strong
drink in the fort. The Indians got hold of it, became
ungovernably drunk, and killed half of Heald's men before
they had gone a mile. The rest surrendered and were
spared. Heald and his wife were then sent to Mackinaw,
where Roberts treated them very kindly and sent them on
to Pittsburg. The whole affair was one between Indians
and Americans alone. But it was naturally used by the
war party to inflame American feeling against all things
British.

While Hull was writing to Fort Dearborn and hearing bad
news from Michilimackinac, he was also getting more and
more anxious about his own communications to the south.
With no safe base in Canada, and no safe line of transport
by water from Lake Erie to the village of Detroit, he
decided to clear the road which ran north and south beside
the Detroit river. But this was now no easy task for his
undisciplined forces, as Colonel Procter was bent on
blocking the same road by sending troops and Indians
across the river. On August 5, the day Brock prorogued
his parliament at York, Tecumseh ambushed Hull's first
detachment of two hundred men at Brownstown, eighteen
miles south of Detroit. On the 7th Hull began to withdraw
his forces from the Canadian side. On the 8th he ordered
six hundred men to make a second attempt to clear the
southern road. But on the 9th these men were met at
Maguaga, only fourteen miles south of Detroit, by a mixed
force of British-regulars, militia, and Indians. The
superior numbers of the Americans enabled them to press
the British back at first. But, on the 10th, when the
British showed a firm front in a new position, the
Americans retired discouraged. Next day Hull withdrew
the last of his men from Canadian soil, exactly one month
after they had first set foot upon it. The following day
was spent in consulting his staff and trying to reorganize
his now unruly militia. On the evening of the 13th he
made his final effort to clear the one line left, by
sending out four hundred picked men under his two best
colonels, McArthur and Cass, who were ordered to make an
inland detour through the woods.

That same night Brock stepped ashore at Amherstburg.




CHAPTER IV

1812: BROCK AT DETROIT AND QUEENSTON HEIGHTS

The prorogation which released Brock from his parliamentary
duties on August 5 had been followed by eight days of
the most strenuous military work, especially on the part
of the little reinforcement which he was taking west to
Amherstburg. The Upper Canada militiamen, drawn from the
United Empire Loyalists and from the British-born, had
responded with hearty goodwill, all the way from Glengarry
to Niagara. But the population was so scattered and
equipment so scarce that no attempt had been made to have
whole battalions of 'Select Embodied Militia' ready for
the beginning of the war, as in the more thickly peopled
province of Lower Canada. The best that could be done
was to embody the two flank companies--the Light and
Grenadier companies--of the most urgently needed battalions.
But as these companies contained all the picked men who
were readiest for immediate service, and as the Americans
were very slow in mobilizing their own still more unready
army, Brock found that, for the time being, York could
be left and Detroit attacked with nothing more than his
handful of regulars, backed by the flank-company militiamen
and the Provincial Marine.

Leaving York the very day he closed the House there,
Brock sailed over to Burlington Bay, marched across the
neck of the Niagara peninsula, and embarked at Long Point
with every man the boats could carry--three hundred, all
told, forty regulars of the 41st and two hundred and
sixty flank-company militiamen. Then, for the next five
days, he fought his way, inch by inch, along the north
shore of Lake Erie against a persistent westerly storm.
The news by the way was discouraging. Hull's invasion
had unsettled the Indians as far east as the Niagara
peninsula, which the local militia were consequently
afraid to leave defenceless. But once Brock reached the
scene of action, his insight showed him what bold skill
could do to turn the tide of feeling all along the western
frontier.

It was getting on for one o'clock in the morning of August
14 when Lieutenant Rolette challenged Brock's leading
boat from aboard the Provincial Marine schooner _General
Hunter_. As Brock stepped ashore he ordered all commanding
officers to meet him within an hour. He then read Hull's
dispatches, which had been taken by Rolette with the
captured schooner and by Tecumseh at Brownstown. By two
o'clock all the principal officers and Indian chiefs had
assembled, not as a council of war, but simply to tell
Brock everything they knew. Only Tecumseh and Colonel
Nichol, the quartermaster of the little army, thought
that Detroit itself could be attacked with any prospect
of success. Brock listened attentively; made up his mind;
told his officers to get ready for immediate attack;
asked Tecumseh to assemble all the Indians at noon; and
dismissed the meeting at four. Brock and Tecumseh read
each other at a glance; and Tecumseh, turning to the
tribal chiefs, said simply, 'This is a man,' a commendation
approved by them all with laconic, deep 'Ho-ho's!'

Tecumseh was the last great leader of the Indian race
and perhaps the finest embodiment of all its better
qualities. Like Pontiac, fifty years before, but in a
nobler way, he tried to unite the Indians against the
exterminating American advance. He was apparently on the
eve of forming his Indian alliance when he returned home
to find that his brother the Prophet had just been defeated
at Tippecanoe. The defeat itself was no great thing. But
it came precisely at a time when it could exert most
influence on the unstable Indian character and be most
effective in breaking up the alliance of the tribes.
Tecumseh, divining this at once, lost no time in vain
regrets, but joined the British next year at Amherstburg.
He came with only thirty followers. But stray warriors
kept on arriving; and many of the bolder spirits joined
him when war became imminent. At the time of Brock's
arrival there were a thousand effective Indians under
arms. Their arming was only authorized at the last minute;
for Brock's dispatch to Prevost shows how strictly neutral
the Canadian government had been throughout the recent
troubles between the Indians and Americans. He mentions
that the chiefs at Amherstburg had long been trying to
obtain the muskets and ammunition 'which for years had
been withheld, agreeably to the instructions received
from Sir James Craig, and since repeated by Your
Excellency.'

Precisely at noon Brock took his stand beneath a giant
oak at Amherstburg surrounded by his officers. Before
him sat Tecumseh. Behind Tecumseh sat the chiefs; and
behind the chiefs a thousand Indians in their war-paint.
Brock then stepped forward to address them. Erect, alert,
broad-shouldered, and magnificently tall; blue-eyed,
fair-haired, with frank and handsome countenance; he
looked every inch the champion of a great and righteous
cause. He said the Long Knives had come to take away the
land from both the Indians and the British whites, and
that now he would not be content merely to repulse them,
but would follow and beat them on their own side of the
Detroit. After the pause that was usual on grave occasions,
Tecumseh rose and answered for all his followers. He
stood there the ideal of an Indian chief: tall, stately,
and commanding; yet tense, lithe, observant, and always
ready for his spring. He the tiger, Brock the lion; and
both unflinchingly at bay.

Next morning, August 15, an early start was made for
Sandwich, some twelve miles north, where a five-gun
battery was waiting to be unmasked against Detroit across
the river. Arrived at Sandwich, Brock immediately sent
across his aide-de-camp, Colonel Macdonell, with a letter
summoning Hull to surrender. Hull wrote back to say he
was prepared to stand his ground. Brock at once unmasked
his battery and made ready to attack next day. With the
men on detachment Hull still had a total of twenty-five
hundred. Brock had only fifteen hundred, including the
Provincial Marine. But Hull's men were losing what
discipline they had and were becoming distrustful both
of their leaders and of themselves; while Brock's men
were gaining discipline, zeal, and inspiring confidence
with every hour. Besides, the British were all effectives;
while Hull had over five hundred absent from Detroit and
as many more ineffective on the spot; which left him only
fifteen hundred actual combatants. He also had a thousand
non-combatants--men, women, and children--all cowering
for shelter from the dangers of battle, and half dead
with the far more terrifying apprehension of an Indian
massacre.

Brock's five-gun battery made excellent practice during
the afternoon without suffering any material damage in
return. One chance shell produced a most dismaying effect
in Detroit by killing Hanks, the late commandant of
Mackinaw, and three other officers with him. At twilight
the firing ceased on both sides.

Immediately after dark Tecumseh led six hundred eager
followers down to their canoes a little way below Sandwich.
These Indians were told off by tribes, as battalions are
by companies. There, in silent, dusky groups, moving
soft-foot on their moccasins through the gloom, were
Shawnees and Miamis from Tecumseh's own lost home beside
the Wabash, Foxes and Sacs from the Iowan valley, Ottawas
and Wyandots, Chippewas and Potawatomis, some braves from
the middle prairies between the Illinois and the
Mississippi, and even Winnebagoes and Dakotahs from the
far North-West. The flotilla of crowded canoes moved
stealthily across the river, with no louder noise than
the rippling current made. As secretly, the Indians crept
ashore, stole inland through the quiet night, and, circling
north, cut off Hull's army from the woods. Little did
Hull's anxious sentries think that some of the familiar
cries of night-birds round the fort were signals being
passed along from scout to scout.

As the beautiful summer dawn began to break at four
o'clock that fateful Sunday morning, the British force
fell in, only seven hundred strong, and more than half
militia. The thirty gunners who had served the Sandwich
battery so well the day before also fell in, with five
little field-pieces, in case Brock could force a battle
in the open. Their places in the battery were ably filled
by every man of the Provincial Marine whom Captain Hall
could spare from the _Queen Charlotte_, the flagship of
the tiny Canadian flotilla. Brock's men and his light
artillery were soon afloat and making for Spring Wells,
more than three miles below Detroit. Then, as the _Queen
Charlotte_ ran up her sunrise flag, she and the Sandwich
battery roared out a challenge to which the Americans
replied with random aim. Brock leaped ashore, formed
front towards Hull, got into touch with Tecumseh's Indians
on his left, and saw that the British land and water
batteries were protecting his right, as prearranged with
Captain Hall.

He had intended to wait in this position, hoping that
Hull would march out to the attack. But, even before his
men had finished taking post, the whole problem was
suddenly changed by the arrival of an Indian to say that
McArthur's four hundred picked men, whom Hull had sent
south to bring in the convoy, were returning to Detroit
at once. There was now only a moment to decide whether
to retreat across the river, form front against McArthur,
or rush Detroit immediately. But, within that fleeting
moment, Brock divined the true solution and decided to
march straight on. With Tecumseh riding a grey mustang
by his side, he led the way in person. He wore his
full-dress gold-and-scarlet uniform and rode his charger
Alfred, the splendid grey which Governor Craig had given
him the year before, with the recommendation that 'the
whole continent of America could not furnish you with so
safe and excellent a horse,' and for the good reason that
'I wish to secure for my old favourite a kind and careful
master.'

The seven hundred redcoats made a gallant show, all the
more imposing because the militia were wearing some spare
uniforms borrowed from the regulars and because the
confident appearance of the whole body led the discouraged
Americans to think that these few could only be the
vanguard of much greater numbers. So strong was this
belief that Hull, in sudden panic, sent over to Sandwich
to treat for terms, and was astounded to learn that Brock
and Tecumseh were the two men on the big grey horses
straight in front of him. While Hull's envoys were crossing
the river and returning, the Indians were beginning to
raise their war-whoops in the woods and Brock was
reconnoitring within a mile of the fort. This looked
formidable enough, if properly defended, as the ditch
was six feet deep and twelve feet wide, the parapet rose
twenty feet, the palisades were of twenty-inch cedar,
and thirty-three guns were pointed through the embrasures.
But Brock correctly estimated the human element inside,
and was just on the point of advancing to the assault
when Hull's white flag went up.

The terms were soon agreed upon. Hull's whole army,
including all detachments, surrendered as prisoners of
war, while the territory of Michigan passed into the
military possession of King George. Abundance of food
and military stores fell into British hands, together
with the _Adams_, a fine new brig that had just been
completed. She was soon rechristened the _Detroit_. The
Americans sullenly trooped out. The British elatedly
marched in. The Stars and Stripes came down defeated.
The Union Jack went up victorious and was received with
a royal salute from all the British ordnance, afloat and
ashore. The Indians came out of the woods, yelling with
delight and firing their muskets in the air. But, grouped
by tribes, they remained outside the fort and settlement,
and not a single outrage was committed. Tecumseh himself
rode in with Brock; and the two great leaders stood out
in front of the British line while the colours were being
changed. Then Brock, in view of all his soldiers, presented
his sash and pistols to Tecumseh. Tecumseh, in turn, gave
his many-coloured Indian sash to Brock, who wore it till
the day he died.

The effect of the British success at Detroit far exceeded
that which had followed the capture of Mackinaw and the
evacuation of Fort Dearborn. Those, however important to
the West, were regarded as mainly Indian affairs. This
was a white man's victory and a white man's defeat. Hull's
proclamation thenceforth became a laughing-stock. The
American invasion had proved a fiasco. The first American
army to take the field had failed at every point. More
significant still, the Americans were shown to be feeble
in organization and egregiously mistaken in their
expectations. Canada, on the other hand, had already
found her champion and men quite fit to follow him.

Brock left Procter in charge of the West and hurried back
to the Niagara frontier. Arrived at Fort Erie on August
23 he was dismayed to hear of a dangerously one-sided
armistice that had been arranged with the enemy. This
had been first proposed, on even terms, by Prevost, and
then eagerly accepted by Dearborn, after being modified
in favour of the Americans. In proposing an armistice
Prevost had rightly interpreted the wishes of the Imperial
government. It was wise to see whether further hostilities
could not be averted altogether; for the obnoxious
Orders-in-Council had been repealed. But Prevost was
criminally weak in assenting to the condition that all
movements of men and material should continue on the
American side, when he knew that corresponding movements
were impossible on the British side for lack of transport.
Dearborn, the American commander-in-chief, was only a
second-rate general. But he was more than a match for
Prevost at making bargains.

Prevost was one of those men who succeed half-way up and
fail at the top. Pure Swiss by blood, he had, like his
father, spent his life in the British Army, and had risen
to the rank of lieutenant-general. He had served with
some distinction in the West Indies, and had been made
a baronet for defending Dominica in 1805. In 1808 he
became governor of Nova Scotia, and in 1811, at the age
of forty-four, governor-general and commander-in-chief
of Canada. He and his wife were popular both in the West
Indies and in Canada; and he undoubtedly deserved well
of the Empire for having conciliated the French Canadians,
who had been irritated by his predecessor, the abrupt
and masterful Craig. The very important Army Bill Act
was greatly due to his diplomatic handling of the French
Canadians, who found him so congenial that they stood by
him to the end. His native tongue was French. He understood
French ways and manners to perfection; and he consequently
had far more than the usual sympathy with a people whose
nature and circumstances made them particularly sensitive
to real or fancied slights. All this is more to his credit
than his enemies were willing to admit, either then or
afterwards. But, in spite of all these good qualities,
Prevost was not the man to safeguard British honour during
the supreme ordeal of a war; and if he had lived in
earlier times, when nicknames were more apt to become
historic, he might well have gone down to posterity as
Prevost the Pusillanimous.

Day after day Prevost's armistice kept the British
helpless, while supplies and reinforcements for the
Americans poured in at every advantageous point. Brock
was held back from taking either Sackett's Harbour, which
was meanwhile being strongly reinforced from Ogdensburg,
or Fort Niagara, which was being reinforced from Oswego,
Procter was held back from taking Fort Wayne, at the
point of the salient angle south of Lake Michigan and
west of Lake Erie--a quite irretrievable loss. For the
moment the British had the command of all the Lakes. But
their golden opportunity passed, never to return. By
land their chances were also quickly disappearing. On
September 1, a week before the armistice ended, there
were less than seven hundred Americans directly opposed
to Brock, who commanded in person at Queenston and Fort
George. On the day of the battle in October there were
nearly ten times as many along the Niagara frontier.

The very day Brock heard that the disastrous armistice
was over he proposed an immediate attack on Sackett's
Harbour. But Prevost refused to sanction it. Brock then
turned his whole attention to the Niagara frontier, where
the Americans were assembling in such numbers that to
attack them was out of the question. The British began
to receive a few supplies and reinforcements. But the
Americans had now got such a long start that, on the
fateful 13th of October, they outnumbered Brock's men
four to one--4,000 to 1,000 along the critical fifteen
miles between the Falls and Lake Ontario; and 6,800 to
1,700 along the whole Niagara river, from lake to lake,
a distance of thirty-three miles. The factors which helped
to redress the adverse balance of these odds were Brock
himself, his disciplined regulars, the intense loyalty
of the militia, and the 'telegraph.' This 'telegraph'
was a system of visual signalling by semaphore, much the
same as that which Wellington had used along the lines
of Torres Vedras.

The immediate moral effects, however, were even more
favourable to the Americans than the mere physical odds;
for Prevost's armistice both galled and chilled the
British, who were eager to strike a blow. American
confidence had been much shaken in September by the sight
of the prisoners from Detroit, who had been marched along
the river road in full view of the other side. But it
increased rapidly in October as reinforcements poured
in. On the 8th a council of war decided to attack Fort
George and Queenston Heights simultaneously with every
available man. But Smyth, the American general commanding
above the Falls, refused to co-operate. This compelled
the adoption of a new plan in which only a feint was to
be made against Fort George, while Queenston Heights were
to be carried by storm. The change entailed a good deal
of extra preparation. But when Lieutenant Elliott, of
the American Navy, cut out two British vessels at Fort
Erie on the 9th, the news made the American troops so
clamorous for an immediate invasion that their general,
Van Rensselaer, was afraid either to resist them or to
let their ardour cool.

In the American camp opposite Queenston all was bustle
on the 10th of October; and at three the next morning
the whole army was again astir, waiting till the vanguard
had seized the landing on the British side. But a wrong
leader had been chosen; mistakes were plentiful; and
confusion followed. Nearly all the oars had been put into
the first boat, which, having overshot the mark, was made
fast on the British side; whereupon its commander
disappeared. The troops on the American shore shivered
in the drenching autumn rain till after daylight. Then
they went back to their sodden camp, wet, angry, and
disgusted.

While the rain came down in torrents the principal officers
were busy revising their plans. Smyth was evidently not
to be depended on; but it was thought that, with all the
advantages of the initiative, the four thousand other
Americans could overpower the one thousand British and
secure a permanent hold on the Queenston Heights just
above the village. These heights ran back from the Niagara
river along Lake Ontario for sixty miles west, curving
north-eastwards round Burlington Bay to Dundas Street,
which was the one regular land line of communication
running west from York. Therefore, if the Americans could
hold both the Niagara and the Heights, they would cut
Upper Canada in two. This was, of course, quite evident
to both sides. The only doubtful questions were, How
should the first American attack be made and how should
it be met?

The American general, Stephen Van Rensselaer, was a
civilian who had been placed at the head of the New York
State militia by Governor Tompkins, both to emphasize
the fact that expert regulars were only wanted as
subordinates and to win a cunning move in the game of
party politics. Van Rensselaer was not only one of the
greatest of the old 'patroons' who formed the landed
aristocracy of Dutch New York, but he was also a Federalist.
Tompkins, who was a Democrat, therefore hoped to gain
his party ends whatever the result might be. Victory
would mean that Van Rensselaer had been compelled to
advance the cause of a war to which he objected; while
defeat would discredit both him and his party, besides
providing Tompkins with the excuse that it would all have
happened very differently if a Democrat had been in charge.

Van Rensselaer, a man of sense and honour, took the expert
advice of his cousin, Colonel Solomon Van Rensselaer,
who was a regular and the chief of the staff. It was
Solomon Van Rensselaer who had made both plans, the one
of the 8th, for attacking Fort George and the Heights
together, and the one of the 10th, for feinting against
Fort George while attacking the Heights. Brock was puzzled
about what was going to happen next. He knew that the
enemy were four to one and that they could certainly
attack both places if Smyth would co-operate. He also
knew that they had boats and men ready to circle round
Fort George from the American 'Four Mile Creek' on the
lake shore behind Fort Niagara. Moreover, he was naturally
inclined to think that when the boats prepared for the
11th were left opposite Queenston all day long, and all
the next day too, they were probably intended to distract
his attention from Fort George, where he had fixed his
own headquarters.

On the 12th the American plan was matured and concentration
begun at Lewiston, opposite Queenston. Large detachments
came in, under perfect cover, from Four Mile Creek behind
Fort Niagara. A smaller number marched down from the
Falls and from Smyth's command still higher up. The camps
at Lewiston and the neighbouring Tuscarora Village were
partly concealed from every point on the opposite bank,
so that the British could form no safe idea of what the
Americans were about. Solomon Van Rensselaer was determined
that the advance-guard should do its duty this time; so
he took charge of it himself and picked out 40 gunners,
300 regular infantry, and 300 of the best militia to make
the first attack. These were to be supported by seven
hundred regulars. The rest of the four thousand men
available were to cross over afterwards. The current was
strong; but the river was little more than two hundred
yards wide at Queenston and it could be crossed in less
than ten minutes. The Queenston Heights themselves were
a more formidable obstacle, even if defended by only a
few men, as they rose 345 feet above the landing-place.

There were only three hundred British in Queenston to
meet the first attack of over thirteen hundred Americans;
but they consisted of the two flank companies of Brock's
old regiment, the 49th, supported by some excellent
militia. A single gun stood on the Heights. Another was
at Vrooman's Point a mile below. Two miles farther, at
Brown's Point, stood another gun with another detachment
of militia. Four miles farther still was Fort George,
with Brock and his second-in-command, Colonel Sheaffe of
the 49th. About nine miles above the Heights was the
little camp at Chippawa, which, as we shall see, managed
to spare 150 men for the second phase of the battle. The
few hundred British above this had to stand by their own
posts, in case Smyth should try an attack on his own
account, somewhere between the Falls and Lake Erie.

At half-past three in the dark morning of the 13th of
October, Solomon Van Rensselaer with 225 regulars sprang
ashore at the Queenston ferry landing and began to climb
the bank. But hardly had they shown their heads above
the edge before the grenadier company of the 49th, under
Captain Dennis, poured in a stinging volley which sent
them back to cover. Van Rensselaer was badly wounded and
was immediately ferried back. The American supports,
under Colonel Christie, had trouble in getting across;
and the immediate command of the invaders devolved upon
another regular, Captain Wool.

As soon as the rest of the first detachment had landed,
Wool took some three hundred infantry and a few gunners,
half of all who were then present, and led them up-stream,
in single file, by a fisherman's path which curved round
and came out on top of the Heights behind the single
British gun there. Progress was very slow in this direction,
though the distance was less than a mile, as it was still
pitch-dark and the path was narrow and dangerous. The
three hundred left at the landing were soon reinforced,
and the crossing went on successfully, though some of
the American boats were carried down-stream to the British
post at Vrooman's, where all the men in them were made
prisoners and marched off to Fort George.

Meanwhile, down at Fort George, Brock had been roused by
the cannonade only three hours after he had finished his
dispatches. Twenty-four American guns were firing hard
at Queenston from the opposite shore and two British guns
were replying. Fort Niagara, across the river from Fort
George, then began to speak; whereupon Fort George answered
back. Thus the sound of musketry, five to seven miles
away, was drowned; and Brock waited anxiously to learn
whether the real attack was being driven home at Queenston,
or whether the Americans were circling round from their
Four Mile Creek against his own position at Fort George.
Four o'clock passed. The roar of battle still came down
from Queenston. But this might be a feint. Not even Dennis
at Queenston could tell as yet whether the main American
army was coming against him or not. But he knew they must
be crossing in considerable force, so he sent a dragoon
galloping down to Brock, who was already in the saddle
giving orders to Sheaffe and to the next senior officer,
Evans, when this messenger arrived. Sheaffe was to follow
towards Queenston the very instant the Americans had
shown their hand decisively in that direction; while
Evans was to stay at Fort George and keep down the fire
from Fort Niagara.

Then Brock set spurs to Alfred and raced for Queenston
Heights. It was a race for more than his life, for more,
even, than his own and his army's honour: it was a race
for the honour, integrity, and very life of Canada. Miles
ahead he could see the spurting flashes of the guns, the
British two against the American twenty-four. Presently
his quick eye caught the fitful running flicker of the
opposing lines of musketry above the landing-place at
Queenston. As he dashed on he met a second messenger,
Lieutenant Jarvis, who was riding down full-speed to
confirm the news first brought by the dragoon. Brock did
not dare draw rein; so he beckoned Jarvis to gallop back
beside him. A couple of minutes sufficed for Brock to
understand the whole situation and make his plan
accordingly. Then Jarvis wheeled back with orders for
Sheaffe to bring up every available man, circle round
inland, and get into touch with the Indians. A few strides
more, and Brock was ordering the men on from Brown's
Point. He paused another moment at Vrooman's, to note
the practice made by the single gun there. Then, urging
his gallant grey to one last turn of speed, he burst into
Queenston through the misty dawn just where the grenadiers
of his own old regiment stood at bay.

In his full-dress red and gold, with the arrow-patterned
sash Tecumseh had given him as a badge of honour at
Detroit, he looked, from plume to spur, a hero who could
turn the tide of battle against any odds. A ringing cheer
broke out in greeting. But he paused no longer than just
enough to wave a greeting back and take a quick look
round before scaling the Heights to where eight gunners
with their single eighteen-pounder were making a desperate
effort to check the Americans at the landing-place. Here
he dismounted to survey the whole scene of action. The
Americans attacking Queenston seemed to be at least twice
as strong as the British. The artillery odds were twelve
to one. And over two thousand Americans were drawn up on
the farther side of the narrow Niagara waiting their turn
for the boats. Nevertheless, the British seemed to be
holding their own. The crucial question was: could they
hold it till Sheaffe came up from Fort George, till
Bullock came down from Chippawa, till both had formed
front on the Heights, with Indians on their flanks and
artillery support from below?

Suddenly a loud, exultant cheer sounded straight behind
him, a crackling fire broke out, and he saw Wool's
Americans coming over the crest and making straight for
the gun. He was astounded; and well he might be, since
the fisherman's path had been reported impassable by
troops. But he instantly changed the order he happened
to be giving from 'Try a longer fuse!' to 'Spike the gun
and follow me!' With a sharp clang the spike went home,
and the gunners followed Brock downhill towards Queenston.
There was no time to mount, and Alfred trotted down beside
his swiftly running master. The elated Americans fired
hard; but their bullets all flew high. Wool's three
hundred then got into position on the Heights; while
Brock in the village below was collecting the nearest
hundred men that could be spared for an assault on the
invaders.

Brock rapidly formed his men and led them out of the
village at a fast run to a low stone wall, where he halted
and said, 'Take breath, boys; you'll need it presently!'
on which they cheered. He then dismounted and patted
Alfred, whose flanks still heaved from his exertions.
The men felt the sockets of their bayonets; took breath;
and then followed Brock, who presently climbed the wall
and drew his sword. He first led them a short distance
inland, with the intention of gaining the Heights at the
enemy's own level before turning riverwards for the final
charge. Wool immediately formed front with his back to
the river; and Brock led the one hundred British straight
at the American centre, which gave way before him. Still
he pressed on, waving his sword as an encouragement for
the rush that was to drive the enemy down the cliff. The
spiked eighteen-pounder was recaptured and success seemed
certain. But, just as his men were closing in, an American
stepped out of the trees, only thirty yards away, took
deliberate aim, and shot him dead. The nearest men at
once clustered round to help him, and one of the 49th
fell dead across his body. The Americans made the most
of this target and hit several more. Then the remaining
British broke their ranks and retired, carrying Brock's
body into a house at Queenston, where it remained throughout
the day, while the battle raged all round.

Wool now re-formed his three hundred and ordered his
gunners to drill out the eighteen-pounder and turn it
against Queenston, where the British were themselves
re-forming for a second attack. This was made by two
hundred men of the 49th and York militia, led by Colonel
John Macdonell, the attorney-general of Upper Canada,
who was acting as aide-de-camp to Brock. Again the
Americans were driven back. Again the gun was recaptured.
Again the British leader was shot at the critical moment.
Again the attack failed. And again the British retreated
into Queenston.

Wool then hoisted the Stars and Stripes over the fiercely
disputed gun; and several more boatloads of soldiers at
once crossed over to the Canadian side, raising the
American total there to sixteen hundred men. With this
force on the Heights, with a still larger force waiting
impatiently to cross, with twenty-four guns in action,
and with the heart of the whole defence known to be lying
dead in Queenston, an American victory seemed to be so
well assured that a courier was sent post-haste to announce
the good news both at Albany and at Dearborn's headquarters
just across the Hudson. This done, Stephen Van Rensselaer
decided to confirm his success by going over to the
Canadian side of the river himself. Arrived there, he
consulted the senior regulars and ordered the troops to
entrench the Heights, fronting Queenston, while the rest
of his army was crossing.

But, just when the action had reached such an apparently
victorious stage, there was, first, a pause, and then a
slightly adverse change, which soon became decidedly
ominous. It was as if the flood tide of invasion had
already passed the full and the ebb was setting in. Far
off, down-stream, at Fort Niagara, the American fire
began to falter and gradually grow dumb. But at the
British Fort George opposite the guns were served as well
as ever, till they had silenced the enemy completely.
While this was happening, the main garrison, now free to
act elsewhere, were marching out with swinging step and
taking the road for Queenston Heights. Near by, at
Lewiston, the American twenty-four-gun battery was
slackening its noisy cannonade, which had been comparatively
ineffective from the first; while the single British gun
at Vrooman's, vigorous and effective as before, was
reinforced by two most accurate field-pieces under Holcroft
in Queenston village, where the wounded but undaunted
Dennis was rallying his disciplined regulars and Loyalist
militiamen for another fight. On the Heights themselves
the American musketry had slackened while most of the
men were entrenching; but the Indian fire kept growing
closer and more dangerous. Up-stream, on the American
side of the Falls, a half-hearted American detachment
had been reluctantly sent down by the egregious Smyth;
while, on the other side, a hundred and fifty eager
British were pressing forward to join Sheaffe's men from
Fort George.

As the converging British drew near them, the Americans
on the Heights began to feel the ebbing of their victory.
The least disciplined soon lost confidence and began to
slink down to the boats; and very few boats returned when
once they had reached their own side safely. These slinkers
naturally made the most of the dangers they had been
expecting--a ruthless Indian massacre included. The
boatmen, nearly all civilians, began to desert. Alarming
doubts and rumours quickly spread confusion through the
massed militia, who now perceived that instead of crossing
to celebrate a triumph they would have to fight a battle.
John Lovett, who served with credit in the big American
battery, gave a graphic description of the scene: 'The
name of Indian, or the sight of the wounded, or the Devil,
or something else, petrified them. Not a regiment, not
a company, scarcely a man, would go.' Van Rensselaer went
through the disintegrating ranks and did his utmost to
revive the ardour which had been so impetuous only an
hour before. But he ordered, swore, and begged in vain.

Meanwhile the tide of resolution, hope, and coming triumph
was rising fast among the British. They were the attackers
now; they had one distinct objective; and their leaders
were men whose lives had been devoted to the art of war.
Sheaffe took his time. Arrived near Queenston, he saw
that his three guns and two hundred muskets there could
easily prevent the two thousand disorganized American
militia from crossing the river; so he wheeled to his
right, marched to St David's, and then, wheeling to his
left, gained the Heights two miles beyond the enemy. The
men from Chippawa marched in and joined him. The line of
attack was formed, with the Indians spread out on the
flanks and curving forward. The British in Queenston,
seeing the utter impotence of the Americans who refused
to cross over, turned their fire against the Heights;
and the invaders at once realized that their position
had now become desperate.

When Sheaffe struck inland an immediate change of the
American front was required to meet him. Hitherto the
Americans on the Heights had faced down-stream, towards
Queenston, at right angles to the river. Now they were
obliged to face inland, with their backs to the river.
Wadsworth, the American militia brigadier, a very gallant
member of a very gallant family, immediately waived his
rank in favour of Colonel Winfield Scott, a well-trained
regular. Scott and Wadsworth then did all that men could
do in such a dire predicament. But most of the militia
became unmanageable, some of the regulars were comparatively
raw; there was confusion in front, desertion in the rear,
and no coherent whole to meet the rapidly approaching shock.

On came the steady British line, with the exultant Indians
thrown well forward on the flanks; while the indomitable
single gun at Vrooman's Point backed up Holcroft's two
guns in Queenston, and the two hundred muskets under
Dennis joined in this distracting fire against the American
right till the very last moment. The American left was
in almost as bad a case, because it had got entangled in
the woods beyond the summit and become enveloped by the
Indians there. The rear was even worse, as men slank off
from it at every opportunity. The front stood fast under
Winfield Scott and Wadsworth. But not for long. The
British brought their bayonets down and charged. The
Indians raised the war-whoop and bounded forward. The
Americans fired a hurried, nervous, straggling fusillade;
then broke and fled in wild confusion. A very few climbed
down the cliff and swam across. Not a single boat came
over from the 'petrified' militia. Some more Americans,
attempting flight, were killed by falling headlong or by
drowning. Most of them clustered among the trees near
the edge and surrendered at discretion when Winfield
Scott, seeing all was lost, waved his handkerchief on
the point of his sword.

The American loss was about a hundred killed, two hundred
wounded, and nearly a thousand prisoners. The British
loss was trifling by comparison, only a hundred and fifty
altogether. But it included Brock; and his irreparable
death alone was thought, by friend and foe alike, to have
more than redressed the balance. This, indeed, was true
in a much more pregnant sense than those who measure by
mere numbers could ever have supposed. For genius is a
thing apart from mere addition and subtraction. It is
the incarnate spirit of great leaders, whose influence
raises to its utmost height the worth of every follower.
So when Brock's few stood fast against the invader's
many, they had his soaring spirit to uphold them as well
as the soul and body of their own disciplined strength.

Brock's proper fame may seem to be no more than that
which can be won by any conspicuously gallant death at
some far outpost of a mighty empire. He ruled no rich
and populous dominions. He commanded no well-marshalled
host. He fell, apparently defeated, just as his first
real battle had begun. And yet, despite of this, he was
the undoubted saviour of a British Canada. Living, he
was the heart of her preparation during ten long years
of peace. Dead, he became the inspiration of her defence
for two momentous years of war.




CHAPTER V

1813: THE BEAVER DAMS, LAKE ERIE, AND CHATEAUGUAY

The remaining operations of 1812 are of quite minor
importance. No more than two are worthy of being mentioned
between the greater events before and after them. Both
were abortive attempts at invasion--one across the upper
Niagara, the other across the frontier south of Montreal.

After the battle of Queenston Heights Sheaffe succeeded
Brock in command of the British, and Smyth succeeded Van
Rensselaer in command of the Americans. Sheaffe was a
harsh martinet and a third-rate commander. Smyth, a
notorious braggart, was no commander at all. He did,
however, succeed in getting Sheaffe to conclude an
armistice that fully equalled Prevost's in its disregard
of British interests. After making the most of it for a
month he ended it on November 19, and began manoeuvring
round his headquarters at Black Rock near Buffalo. After
another eight days he decided to attack the British posts
at Red House and Frenchman's Creek, which were respectively
two and a half and five miles from Fort Erie. The whole
British line of the upper Niagara, from Fort Erie to
Chippawa, a distance of seventeen miles by the road along
the river, was under the command of an excellent young
officer, Colonel Bisshopp, who had between five and six
hundred men to hold his seven posts. Fort Erie had the
largest garrison--only a hundred and thirty men. Some
forty men of the 49th and two small guns were stationed
at Red House; while the light company of the 41st guarded
the bridge over Frenchman's Creek. About two o'clock in
the morning of the 28th one party of Americans pulled
across to the ferry a mile below Fort Erie, and then,
sheering off after being fired at by the Canadian militia
on guard, made for Red House a mile and a half lower
down. There they landed at three and fought a most confused
and confusing action in the dark. Friend and foe became
mixed up together; but the result was a success for the
Americans. Meanwhile, the other party landed near
Frenchman's Creek, reached the bridge, damaged it a
little, and had a fight with the 41st, who could not
drive the invaders back till reinforcements arrived. At
daylight the men from Chippawa marched into action,
Indians began to appear, and the whole situation was
re-established. The victorious British lost nearly a
hundred, which was more than a quarter of those engaged.
The beaten Americans lost more; but, being in superior
numbers, they could the better afford it.

Smyth was greatly disconcerted. But he held a boat review
on his own side of the river, and sent over a summons to
Bisshopp demanding the immediate surrender of Fort Erie
'to spare the effusion of blood.' Bisshopp rejected the
summons. But there was no effusion of blood in consequence.
Smyth planned, talked, and manoeuvred for two days more,
and then tried to make his real effort on the 1st of
December. By the time it was light enough for the British
to observe him he had fifteen hundred men in boats, who
all wanted to go back, and three thousand on shore, who
all refused to go forward. He then held a council of war,
which advised him to wait for a better chance. This closed
the campaign with what, according to Porter, one of his
own generals, was 'a scene of confusion difficult to
describe: about four thousand men without order or
restraint discharging their muskets in every direction.'
Next day 'The Committee of Patriotic Citizens' undertook
to rebuke Smyth. But he retorted, not without reason,
that the affair at Queenston is a caution against relying
on crowds who go to the banks of the Niagara to look at
a battle as on a theatrical exhibition.'

The other abortive attempt at invasion was made by the
advance-guard of the commander-in-chief's own army.
Dearborn had soon found out that his disorderly masses
at Greenbush were quite unfit to take the field. But,
four months after the declaration of war, a small
detachment, thrown forward from his new headquarters at
Plattsburg on Lake Champlain, did manage to reach St
Regis, where the frontier first meets the St Lawrence,
near the upper end of Lake St Francis, sixty miles
south-west of Montreal. Here the Americans killed Lieutenant
Rototte and a sergeant, and took the little post, which
was held by a few voyageurs. Exactly a month later, on
November 23, these Americans were themselves defeated
and driven back again. Three days earlier than this a
much stronger force of Americans had crossed the frontier
at Odelltown, just north of which there was a British
blockhouse beside the river La Colle, a muddy little
western tributary of the Richelieu, forty-seven miles
due south of Montreal. The Americans fired into each
other in the dark, and afterwards retired before the
British reinforcements. Dearborn then put his army into
winter quarters at Plattsburg, thus ending his much-heralded
campaign against Montreal before it had well begun.

The American government was much disappointed at the
failure of its efforts to make war without armies. But
it found a convenient scapegoat in Hull, who was far less
to blame than his superiors in the Cabinet. These
politicians had been wrong in every important particular
--wrong about the attitude of the Canadians, wrong about
the whole plan of campaign, wrong in separating Hull from
Dearborn, wrong in not getting men-of-war afloat on the
Lakes, wrong, above all, in trusting to untrained and
undisciplined levies. To complete their mortification,
the ridiculous gunboats, in which they had so firmly
believed, had done nothing but divert useful resources
into useless channels; while, on the other hand, the
frigates, which they had proposed to lay up altogether,
so as to save themselves from 'the ruinous folly of a
Navy,' had already won a brilliant series of duels out
at sea.

There were some searchings of heart at Washington when
all these military and naval misjudgments stood revealed.
Eustis soon followed Hull into enforced retirement; and
great plans were made for the campaign of 1813, which
was designed to wipe out the disgrace of its predecessor
and to effect the conquest of Canada for good and all.

John Armstrong, the new war secretary, and William Henry
Harrison, the new general in the West, were great
improvements on Eustis and Hull. But, even now, the
American commanders could not decide on a single decisive
attack supported by subsidiary operations elsewhere.
Montreal remained their prime objective. But they only
struck at it last of all. Michilimackinac kept their
enemy in touch with the West. But they left it completely
alone. Their general advance ought to have been secured
by winning the command of the Lakes and by the seizure
of suitable positions across the line. But they let the
first blows come from the Canadian side; and they still
left Lake Champlain to shift for itself. Their plan was
undoubtedly better than that of 1812. But it was still
all parts and no whole.

The various events were so complicated by the overlapping
of time and place all along the line that we must begin
by taking a bird's-eye view of them in territorial
sequence, starting from the farthest inland flank and
working eastward to the sea. Everything west of Detroit
may be left out altogether, because operations did not
recommence in that quarter until the campaign of the
following year.

In January the British struck successfully at Frenchtown,
more than thirty miles south of Detroit. They struck
unsuccessfully, still farther south, at Fort Meigs in
May and at Fort Stephenson in August; after which they
had to remain on the defensive, all over the Lake Erie
region, till their flotilla was annihilated at Put-in
Bay in September and their army was annihilated at Moravian
Town on the Thames in October. In the Lake Ontario region
the situation was reversed. Here the British began badly
and ended well. They surrendered York in April and Fort
George, at the mouth of the Niagara, in May. They were
also repulsed in a grossly mismanaged attack on Sackett's
Harbour two days after their defeat at Fort George. The
opposing flotillas meanwhile fought several manoeuvring
actions of an indecisive kind, neither daring to risk
battle and possible annihilation. But, as the season
advanced, the British regained their hold on the Niagara
peninsula by defeating the Americans at Stoney Creek and
the Beaver Dams in June, and by clearing both sides of
the Niagara river in December. On the upper St Lawrence
they took Ogdensburg in February. They were also completely
successful in their defence of Montreal. In June they
took the American gunboats at Isle-aux-Noix on the
Richelieu; in July they raided Lake Champlain; while in
October and November they defeated the two divisions of
the invading army at Chateauguay and Chrystler's Farm.
The British news from sea also improved as the year wore
on. The American frigate victories began to stop. The
_Shannon_ beat the _Chesapeake_. And the shadow of the Great
Blockade began to fall on the coast of the Democratic South.

The operations of 1813 are more easily understood if
taken in this purely territorial way. But in following
the progress of the war we must take them chronologically.
No attempt can be made here to describe the movements on
either side in any detail. An outline must suffice. Two
points, however, need special emphasis, as they are both
markedly characteristic of the war in general and of this
campaign in particular. First, the combined effect of
the American victories of Lake Erie and the Thames affords
a perfect example of the inseparable connection between
the water and the land. Secondly, the British victories
at the Beaver Dams and Chateauguay are striking examples
of the inter-racial connection among the forces that
defended Canada so well. The Indians did all the real
fighting at the Beaver Dams. The French Canadians fought
practically alone at Chateauguay.

The first move of the invaders in the West was designed
to recover Detroit and cut off Mackinaw. Harrison,
victorious over the Indians at Tippecanoe in 1811, was
now expected to strike terror into them once more, both
by his reputation and by the size of his forces. In
midwinter he had one wing of his army on the Sandusky,
under his own command, and the other on the Maumee, under
Winchester, a rather commonplace general. At Frenchtown
stood a little British post defended by fifty Canadians
and a hundred Indians. Winchester moved north to drive
these men away from American soil. But Procter crossed
the Detroit from Amherstburg on the ice, and defeated
Winchester's thousand whites with his own five hundred
whites and five hundred Indians at dawn on January 22,
making Winchester a prisoner. Procter was unable to
control the Indians, who ran wild. They hated the Westerners
who made up Winchester's force, as the men who had deprived
them of their lands, and they now wreaked their vengeance
on them for some time before they could be again brought
within the bounds of civilized warfare. After the battle
Procter retired to Amherstburg; Harrison began to build
Fort Meigs on the Maumee; and a pause of three months
followed all over the western scene.

But winter warfare was also going on elsewhere. A month
after Procter's success, Prevost, when passing through
Prescott, on the upper St Lawrence, reluctantly gave
Colonel Macdonell of Glengarry provisional leave to attack
Ogdensburg, from which the Americans were forwarding
supplies to Sackett's Harbour, sending out raiding parties,
and threatening the British line of communication to the
west. No sooner was Prevost clear of Prescott than
Macdonell led his four hundred regulars and one hundred
militia over the ice against the American fort. His direct
assault failed. But when he had carried the village at
the point of the bayonet the garrison ran. Macdonell then
destroyed the fort, the barracks, and four vessels. He
also took seventy prisoners, eleven guns, and a large
supply of stores.

With the spring came new movements in the West. On May
9 Procter broke camp and retired from an unsuccessful
siege of Fort Meigs (now Toledo) at the south-western
corner of Lake Erie. He had started this siege a fortnight
earlier with a thousand whites and a thousand Indians
under Tecumseh; and at first had seemed likely to succeed.
But after the first encounter the Indians began to leave;
while most of the militia had soon to be sent home to
their farms to prevent the risk of starvation. Thus
Procter presently found himself with only five hundred
effectives in face of a much superior and constantly
increasing enemy. In the summer he returned to the attack,
this time against the American position on the lower
Sandusky, nearly thirty miles east of Fort Meigs. There,
on August 2, he tried to take Fort Stephenson. But his
light guns could make no breach; and he lost a hundred
men in the assault.

Meanwhile Dearborn, having first moved up from Plattsburg
to Sackett's Harbour, had attacked York on April 27 with
the help of the new American flotilla on Lake Ontario.
This flotilla was under the personal orders of Commodore
Chauncey, an excellent officer, who, in the previous
September, had been promoted from superintendent of the
New York Navy Yard to commander-in-chief on the Lakes.
As Chauncey's forte was building and organization, he
found full scope for his peculiar talents at Sackett's
Harbour. He was also a good leader at sea and thus a
formidable enemy for the British forces at York, where
the third-rate Sheaffe was now in charge, and where
Prevost had paved the way for a British defeat by allowing
the establishment of an exposed navy yard instead of
keeping all construction safe in Kingston. Sheaffe began
his mistakes by neglecting to mount some of his guns
before Dearborn and Chauncey arrived, though he knew
these American commanders might come at any moment, and
though he also knew how important it was to save a new
British vessel that was building at York, because the
command of the lake might well depend upon her. He then
made another mistake by standing to fight in an untenable
position against overwhelming odds. He finally retreated
with all the effective regulars left, less than two
hundred, burning the ship and yard as he passed, and
leaving behind three hundred militia to make their own
terms with the enemy. He met the light company of the
8th on its way up from Kingston and turned it back. With
this retreat he left the front for good and became a
commandant of bases, a position often occupied by men
whose failures are not bad enough for courts-martial and
whose saving qualities are not good enough for any more
appointments in the field.

The Americans lost over two hundred men by an explosion
in a British battery at York just as Sheaffe was marching
off. Forty British had also been blown up in one of the
forts a little while before. Sheaffe appears to have been
a slack inspector of powder-magazines. But the Americans,
who naturally suspected other things than slack inspection,
thought a mine had been sprung on them after the fight
was over. They consequently swore revenge, burnt the
parliament buildings, looted several private houses, and
carried off books from the public library as well as
plate from the church. Chauncey, much to his credit,
afterwards sent back all the books and plate he could
recover.

Exactly a month later, on May 27, Chauncey and Dearborn
appeared off Fort George, after a run back to Sackett's
Harbour in the meantime. Vincent, Sheaffe's successor in
charge of Upper Canada, had only a thousand regulars and
four hundred militia there. Dearborn had more than four
times as many men; and Perry, soon to become famous on
Lake Erie, managed the naval part of landing them. The
American men-of-war brought the long, low, flat ground
of Mississauga Point under an irresistible cross-fire
while three thousand troops were landing on the beach
below the covering bluffs. No support could be given to
the opposing British force by the fire of Fort George,
as the village of Newark intervened. So Vincent had to
fight it out in the open. On being threatened with
annihilation he retired towards Burlington, withdrawing
the garrison of Fort George, and sending orders for all
the other troops on the Niagara to follow by the shortest
line. He had lost a third of the whole force defending
the Niagara frontier, both sides of which were now
possessed by the Americans. But by nightfall on May 29
he was standing at bay, with his remaining sixteen hundred
men, in an excellent strategical position on the Heights,
half-way between York and Fort George, in touch with
Dundas Street, the main road running east and west, and
beside Burlington Bay, where he hoped to meet the British
flotilla commanded by Yeo.

Captain Sir James Lucas Yeo was an energetic and capable
young naval officer of thirty, whom the Admiralty had
sent out with a few seamen to take command on the Lakes
under Prevost's orders. He had been only seventeen days
at Kingston when he sailed out with Prevost, on May 27,
to take advantage of Chauncey's absence at the western
end of the lake. Arrived before Sackett's Harbour, the
attack was planned for the 29th. The landing force of
seven hundred and fifty men was put in charge of Baynes,
the adjutant-general, a man only too well fitted to do
the 'dirty work' of the general staff under a weak
commander-in-chief like Prevost. All went wrong at
Sackett's Harbour. Prevost was 'present but not in
command'; Baynes landed at the wrong place. Nevertheless,
the British regulars scattered the American militiamen,
pressed back the American regulars, set fire to the
barracks, and halted in front of the fort. The Americans,
thinking the day was lost, set fire to their stores and
to Chauncey's new ships. Then Baynes and Prevost suddenly
decided to retreat. Baynes explained to Prevost, and
Prevost explained in a covering dispatch to the British
government, that the fleet could not co-operate, that
the fort could not be taken, and that the landing party
was not strong enough. But, if this was true, why did
they make an attack at all; and, if it was not true, why
did they draw back when success seemed to be assured?

Meanwhile Chauncey, after helping to take Fort George,
had started back for Sackett's Harbour; and Dearborn,
left without the fleet, had moved on slowly and
disjointedly, in rear of Vincent, with whom he did not
regain touch for a week. On June 5 the Americans camped
at Stoney Creek, five miles from the site of Hamilton.
The steep zigzagging bank of the creek, which formed
their front, was about twenty feet high. Their right
rested on a mile-wide swamp, which ran down to Lake
Ontario. Their left touched the Heights, which ran from
Burlington to Queenston. They were also in superior
numbers, and ought to have been quite secure. But they
thought so much more of pursuit than of defence that they
were completely taken by surprise when '704 firelocks'
under Colonel Harvey suddenly attacked them just after
midnight. Harvey, chief staff officer to Vincent, was a
first-rate leader for such daring work as this, and his
men were all well disciplined. But the whole enterprise
might have failed, for all that. Some of the men opened
fire too soon, and the nearest Americans began to stand
to their arms. But, while Harvey ran along re-forming
the line, Major Plenderleath, with some of Brock's old
regiment, the 49th, charged straight into the American
centre, took the guns there, and caused so much confusion
that Harvey's following charge carried all before it.
Next morning, June 6, the Americans began a retreat which
was hastened by Yeo's arrival on their lakeward flank,
by the Indians on the Heights, and by Vincent's
reinforcements in their rear. Not till they reached the
shelter of Fort George did they attempt to make a stand.

The two armies now faced each other astride of the
lake-shore road and the Heights. The British left advanced
post, between Ten and Twelve Mile Creeks, was under Major
de Haren of the 104th, a regiment which, in the preceding
winter, had marched on snow-shoes through the woods all
the way from the middle of New Brunswick to Quebec. The
corresponding British post inland, near the Beaver Dams,
was under Lieutenant FitzGibbon of the 49th, a cool,
quick-witted, and adventurous Irishman, who had risen
from the ranks by his own good qualities and Brock's
recommendation. Between him and the Americans at Queenston
and St David's was a picked force of Indian scouts with
a son of the great chief Joseph Brant. These Indians
never gave the Americans a minute's rest. They were up
at all hours, pressing round the flanks, sniping the
sentries, worrying the outposts, and keeping four times
their own numbers on the perpetual alert. What exasperated
the Americans even more was the wonderfully elusive way
in which the Indians would strike their blow and then be
lost to sight and sound the very next moment, if, indeed,
they ever were seen at all. Finally, this endless skirmish
with an invisible foe became so harassing that the
Americans sent out a flying column of six hundred picked
men under Colonel Boerstler on June 24 to break up
FitzGibbon's post at the Beaver Dams and drive the Indians
out of the intervening bush altogether.

But the American commanders had not succeeded in hiding
their preparations from the vigilant eyes of the Indian
scouts or from the equally attentive ears of Laura Secord,
the wife of an ardent U. E. Loyalist, James Secord, who
was still disabled by the wounds he had received when
fighting under Brock's command at Queenston Heights.
Early in the morning of the 23rd, while Laura Secord was
going out to milk the cows, she overheard some Americans
talking about the surprise in store for FitzGibbon next
day. Without giving the slightest sign she quietly drove
the cattle in behind the nearest fence, hid her milk-pail,
and started to thread her perilous way through twenty
miles of bewildering bypaths to the Beaver Dams. Keeping
off the beaten tracks and always in the shadow of the
full-leaved trees, she stole along through the American
lines, crossed the no-man's-land between the two desperate
enemies, and managed to get inside the ever-shifting
fringe of Indian scouts without being seen by friend or
foe. The heat was intense; and the whole forest steamed
with it after the tropical rain. But she held her course
without a pause, over the swollen streams on fallen
tree-trunks, through the dense underbrush, and in and
out of the mazes of the forest, where a bullet might come
from either side without a moment's warning. As she neared
the end of her journey a savage yell told her she was at
last discovered by the Indians. She and they were on the
same side; but she had hard work to persuade them that
she only wished to warn FitzGibbon. Then came what, to
a lesser patriot, would have been a crowning disappointment.
For when, half dead with fatigue, she told him her story,
she found he had already heard it from the scouts. But
just because this forestalment was no real disappointment
to her, it makes her the Anglo-Canadian heroine whose
fame for bravery in war is worthiest of being remembered
with that of her French-Canadian sister, Madeleine de
Vercheres. [Footnote: For Madeleine de Vercheres see
_The fighting Governor_ in this Series.]

Boerstler's six hundred had only ten miles to go in a
straight line. But all the thickets, woods, creeks,
streams, and swamps were closely beset by a body of
expert, persistent Indians, who gradually increased from
two hundred and fifty to four hundred men. The Americans
became discouraged and bewildered; and when FitzGibbon
rode up at the head of his redcoats they were ready to
give in. The British posts were all in excellent touch
with each other; and de Haren arrived in time to receive
the actual surrender. He was closely followed by the 2nd
Lincoln Militia under Colonel Clark, and these again by
Colonel Bisshopp with the whole of the advanced guard.
But it was the Indians alone who won the fight, as
FitzGibbon generously acknowledged: 'Not a shot was fired
on our side by any but the Indians. They beat the American
detachment into a state of terror, and the only share I
claim is taking advantage of a favourable moment to offer
protection from the tomahawk and scalping knife.'

June was a lucky month for the British at sea as well as
on the land; and its 'Glorious First,' so called after
Howe's victory nineteen years before, now became doubly
glorious in a way which has a special interest for Canada.
The American frigate _Chesapeake_ was under orders to
attack British supply-ships entering Canadian waters;
and the victorious British frigate _Shannon_ was taken
out of action and into a Canadian port by a young Canadian
in the Royal Navy.

The _Chesapeake_ had a new captain, Lawrence, with new
young officers. She carried fifty more men than the
British frigate _Shannon_. But many of her ship's company
were new to her, on recommissioning in May; and some were
comparatively untrained for service on board a man-of-war.
The frigates themselves were practically equal in size
and armament. But Captain Broke had been in continuous
command of the _Shannon_ for seven years and had trained
his crew into the utmost perfection of naval gunnery.
The vessels met off Boston in full view of many thousands
of spectators. Not one British shot flew high. Every day
in the Shannon's seven years of preparation told in that
fight of only fifteen minutes; and when Broke led his
boarders over the Chesapeake's side her fate had been
sealed already. The Stars and Stripes were soon replaced
by the Union Jack. Then, with Broke severely wounded and
his first lieutenant killed, the command fell on Lieutenant
Wallis, who sailed both vessels into Halifax. This young
Canadian, afterwards known as Admiral-of-the-Fleet Sir
Provo Wallis, lived to become the longest of all human
links between the past and present of the Navy. He was
by far the last survivor of those officers who were
specially exempted from technical retirement on account
of having held any ship or fleet command during the Great
War that ended on the field of Waterloo. He was born
before Napoleon had been heard of. He went through a
battle before the death of Nelson. He outlived Wellington
by forty years. His name stood on the Active List for
all but the final decade of the nineteenth century. And,
as an honoured centenarian, he is vividly remembered by
many who were still called young a century after the
battle that brought him into fame.

The summer campaign on the Niagara frontier ended with
three minor British successes. Fort Schlosser was surprised
on July 5. On the 11th Bisshopp lost his life in destroying
Black Rock. And on August 24 the Americans were driven
in under the guns of Fort George. After this there was
a lull which lasted throughout the autumn.

Down by the Montreal frontier there were three corresponding
British successes. On June 3 Major Taylor of the 100th
captured two American gunboats, the _Growler_ and the
_Eagle_, which had come to attack Isle-aux-Noix in the
Richelieu river, and renamed them the _Broke_ and the
_Shannon_. Early in August Captains Pring and Everard,
of the Navy, and Colonel Murray with nine hundred soldiers,
raided Lake Champlain. They destroyed the barracks, yard,
and stores at Plattsburg and sent the American militia
flying home. But a still more effective blow was struck
on the opposite side of Lake Champlain, at Burlington,
where General Hampton was preparing the right wing of
his new army of invasion. Stores, equipment, barracks,
and armaments were destroyed to such an extent that
Hampton's preparations were set back till late in the
autumn. The left wing of the same army was at Sackett's
Harbour, under Dearborn's successor, General Wilkinson,
whose plan was to take Kingston, go down the St Lawrence,
meet Hampton, who was to come up from the south, and then
make a joint attack with him on Montreal.

In September the scene of action shifted to the West,
where the British were trying to keep the command of Lake
Erie, while the Americans were trying to wrest it from
them. Captain Oliver Perry, a first-rate American naval
officer of only twenty-eight, was at Presqu'isle (now
Erie) completing his flotilla. He had his troubles, of
course, especially with the militia garrison, who would
not do their proper tour of duty. 'I tell the boys to
go, but the boys won't go,' was the only report forthcoming
from one of several worthless colonels. A still greater
trouble for Perry was getting his vessels over the bar.
This had to be done without any guns on board, and with
the cumbrous aid of 'camels,' which are any kind of
air-tanks made fast to the sides low down, in order to
raise the hull as much as possible. But, luckily for
Perry, his opponent, Captain Barclay of the Royal Navy,
an energetic and capable young officer of thirty-two,
was called upon to face worse troubles still. Barclay
was, indeed, the first to get afloat. But he had to give
up the blockade of Presqu'isle, and so let Perry out,
because he had the rawest of crews, the scantiest of
equipment, and nothing left to eat. Then, when he ran
back to Amherstburg, he found Procter also facing a state
of semi-starvation, while thousands of Indian families
were clamouring for food. Thus there was no other choice
but either to fight or starve; for there was not the
slightest chance of replenishing stores unless the line
of the lake was clear.

So Barclay sailed out with his six little British vessels,
armed by the odds and ends of whatever ordnance could be
spared from Amherstburg and manned by almost any crews
but sailors. Even the flagship _Detroit_ had only ten
real seamen, all told. Ammunition was likewise very
scarce, and so defective that the guns had to be fired
by the flash of a pistol. Perry also had a makeshift
flotilla, partly manned by drafts from Harrison's army.
But, on the whole, the odds in his favour were fairly
shown by the number of vessels in the respective flotillas,
nine American against the British six.

Barclay had only thirty miles to make in a direct
south-easterly line from Amherstburg to reach Perry at
Put-in Bay in the Bass Islands, where, on the morning of
September 10, the opposing forces met. The battle raged
for two hours at the very closest quarters till Perry's
flagship _Lawrence_ struck to Barclay's own _Detroit_.
But Perry had previously left the _Lawrence_ for the
fresh _Niagara_; and he now bore down on the battered
_Detroit_, which had meanwhile fallen foul of the only
other sizable British vessel, the _Queen Charlotte_. This
was fatal for Barclay. The whole British flotilla
surrendered after a desperate resistance and an utterly
disabling loss. From that time on to the end of the war
Lake Erie remained completely under American control.

Procter could hardly help seeing that he was doomed to
give up the whole Lake Erie region. But he lingered and
was lost. While Harrison was advancing with overwhelming
numbers Procter was still trying to decide when and how
to abandon Amherstburg. Then, when he did go, he carried
with him an inordinate amount of baggage; and he retired
so slowly that Harrison caught and crushed him near
Moravian Town, beside the Thames, on the 5th of October.
Harrison had three thousand exultant Americans in action;
Procter had barely a thousand worn-out, dispirited men,
more than half of them Indians under Tecumseh. The
redcoats, spread out in single rank at open order, were
ridden down by Harrison's cavalry, backed by the mass of
his infantry. The Indians on the inland flank stood longer
and fought with great determination against five times
their numbers till Tecumseh fell. Then they broke and
fled. This was their last great fight and Tecumseh was
their last great leader.

The scene now shifts once more to the Montreal frontier,
which was being threatened by the converging forces of
Hampton from the south and Wilkinson from the west. Each
had about seven thousand men; and their common objective
was the island of Montreal. Hampton crossed the line at
Odelltown on September 20. But he presently moved back
again; and it was not till October 21 that he began his
definite attack by advancing down the left bank of the
Chateauguay, after opening communications with Wilkinson,
who was still near Sackett's Harbour. Hampton naturally
expected to brush aside all the opposition that could be
made by the few hundred British between him and the St
Lawrence. But de Salaberry, the commander of the British
advanced posts, determined to check him near La Fourche,
where several little tributaries of the Chateauguay made
a succession of good positions, if strengthened by abattis
and held by trained defenders.

The British force was very small when Hampton began his
slow advance; but 'Red George' Macdonell marched to help
it just in time. Macdonell was commanding a crack corps
of French Canadians, all picked from the best 'Select
Embodied Militia,' and now, at the end of six months of
extra service, as good as a battalion of regulars. He
had hurried to Kingston when Wilkinson had threatened it
from Sackett's Harbour. Now he was urgently needed at
Chateauguay. 'When can you start?' asked Prevost, who
was himself on the point of leaving Kingston for
Chateauguay. 'Directly the men have finished their dinners,
sir!' 'Then follow me as quickly as you can!' said Prevost
as he stepped on board his vessel. There were 210 miles
to go. A day was lost in collecting boats enough for this
sudden emergency. Another day was lost _en route_ by a
gale so terrific that even the French-Canadian voyageurs
were unable to face it. The rapids, where so many of
Amherst's men had been drowned in 1760, were at their
very worst; and the final forty miles had to be made
overland by marching all night through dense forest and
along a particularly difficult trail. Yet Macdonell got
into touch with de Salaberry long before Prevost, to whom
he had the satisfaction of reporting later in the day:
'All correct and present, sir; not one man missing!'

The advanced British forces under de Salaberry were now,
on October 25, the eve of battle, occupying the left, or
north, bank of the Chateauguay, fifteen miles south of
the Cascade Rapids of the St Lawrence, twenty-five miles
south-west of Caughnawaga, and thirty-five miles south-west
of Montreal. Immediately in rear of these men under de
Salaberry stood Macdonell's command; while, in more
distant support, nearer to Montreal, stood various posts
under General de Watteville, with whom Prevost spent that
night and most of the 26th, the day on which the battle
was fought.

As Hampton came on with his cumbrous American thousands
de Salaberry felt justifiable confidence in his own
well-disciplined French-Canadian hundreds. He and his
brothers were officers in the Imperial Army. His Voltigeurs
were regulars. The supporting Fencibles were also regulars,
and of ten years' standing. Macdonell's men were practically
regulars. The so-called 'Select Militia' present had been
permanently embodied for eighteen months; and the only
real militiamen on the scene of action, most of whom
never came under fire at all, had already been twice
embodied for service in the field. The British total
present was 1590, of whom less than a quarter were
militiamen and Indians. But the whole firing line comprised
no more than 460, of whom only 66 were militiamen and
only 22 were Indians. The Indian total was about one-tenth
of the whole. The English-speaking total was about
one-twentieth. It is therefore perfectly right to say
that the battle of Chateauguay was practically fought
and won by French-Canadian regulars against American odds
of four to one.

De Salaberry's position was peculiar. The head of his
little column faced the head of Hampton's big column on
a narrow front, bounded on his own left by the river
Chateauguay and on his own right by woods, into which
Hampton was afraid to send his untrained men. But, crossing
a right-angled bend of the river, beyond de Salaberry's
left front, was a ford, while in rear of de Salaberry's
own column was another ford which Hampton thought he
could easily take with fifteen hundred men under Purdy,
as he had no idea of Macdonell's march and no doubt of
being able to crush de Salaberry's other troops between
his own five thousand attacking from the front and Purdy's
fifteen hundred attacking from the rear. Purdy advanced
overnight, crossed to the right bank of the Chateauguay,
by the ford clear of de Salaberry's front, and made
towards the ford in de Salaberry's rear. But his men lost
their way in the dark and found themselves, not in rear
of, but opposite to, and on the left flank of, de
Salaberry's column in the morning. They drove in two of
de Salaberry's companies, which were protecting his left
flank on the right, or what was now Purdy's, side of the
river; but they were checked by a third, which Macdonell
sent forward, across the rear ford, at the same time that
he occupied this rear ford himself. Purdy and Hampton
had now completely lost touch with one another. Purdy
was astounded to see Macdonell's main body of redcoats
behind the rear ford. He paused, waiting for support from
Hampton, who was still behind the front ford. Hampton
paused, waiting for him to take the rear ford, now occupied
by Macdonell. De Salaberry mounted a huge tree-stump and
at once saw his opportunity. Holding back Hampton's
crowded column with his own front, which fought under
cover of his first abattis, he wheeled the rest of his
men into line to the left and thus took Purdy in flank.
Macdonell was out of range behind the rear ford; but he
played his part by making his buglers sound the advance
from several different quarters, while his men, joined
by de Salaberry's militiamen and by the Indians in the
bush, cheered vociferously and raised the war-whoop. This
was too much for Purdy's fifteen hundred. They broke in
confusion, ran away from the river into the woods under
a storm of bullets, fired into each other, and finally
disappeared. Hampton's attack on de Salaberry's first
abattis then came to a full stop; after which the whole
American army retired beaten from the field.

Ten days after Chateauguay dilatory Wilkinson, tired of
waiting for defeated Hampton, left the original rendezvous
at French Creek, fifty miles below Sackett's Harbour.
Like Dearborn in 1812, he began his campaign just as the
season was closing. But, again like Dearborn, he had the
excuse of being obliged to organize his army in the middle
of the war. Four days later again, on November 9, Brown,
the successful defender of Sackett's Harbour against
Prevost's attack in May, was landed at Williamsburg, on
the Canadian side, with two thousand men, to clear the
twenty miles down to Cornwall, opposite the rendezvous
at St Regis, where Wilkinson expected to find Hampton
ready to join him for the combined attack on Montreal.
But Brown had to reckon with Dennis, the first defender
of Queenston, who now commanded the little garrison of
Cornwall, and who disputed every inch of the way by
breaking the bridges and resisting each successive advance
till Brown was compelled to deploy for attack. Two days
were taken up with these harassing manoeuvres, during
which another two thousand Americans were landed at
Williamsburg under Boyd, who immediately found himself
still more harassed in rear than Brown had been in front.

This new British force in Boyd's rear was only a thousand
strong; but, as it included every human element engaged
in the defence of Canada, it has a quite peculiar interest
of its own. Afloat, it included bluejackets of the Royal
Navy, men of the Provincial Marine, French-Canadian
voyageurs, and Anglo-Canadian boatmen from the
trading-posts, all under a first-rate fighting seaman,
Captain Mulcaster, R.N. Ashore, under a good regimental
leader, Colonel Morrison--whose chief staff officer was
Harvey, of Stoney Creek renown--it included Imperial
regulars, Canadian regulars of both races, French-Canadian
and Anglo-Canadian militiamen, and a party of Indians.

Early on the 11th Brown had arrived at Cornwall with his
two thousand Americans; Wilkinson was starting down from
Williamsburg in boats with three thousand more, and Boyd
was starting down ashore with eighteen hundred. But
Mulcaster's vessels pressed in on Wilkinson's rear, while
Morrison pressed in on Boyd's. Wilkinson then ordered
Boyd to turn about and drive off Morrison, while he
hurried his own men out of reach of Mulcaster, whose
armed vessels could not follow down the rapids. Boyd
thereupon attacked Morrison, and a stubborn fight ensued
at Chrystler's Farm. The field was of the usual type:
woods on one flank, water on the other, and a more or
less flat clearing in the centre. Boyd tried hard to
drive his wedge in between the British and the river.
But Morrison foiled him in manoeuvre; and the eight
hundred British stood fast against their eighteen hundred
enemies all along the line. Boyd then withdrew, having
lost four hundred men; and Morrison's remaining six
hundred effectives slept on their hard-won ground.

Next morning the energetic Morrison resumed his pursuit.
But the campaign against Montreal was already over.
Wilkinson had found that Hampton had started back for
Lake Champlain while the battle was in progress; so he
landed at St Regis, just inside his own country, and went
into winter quarters at French Mills on the Salmon river.

In December the scene of strife changed back again to
the Niagara, where the American commander, McClure,
decided to evacuate Fort George. At dusk on the 10th he
ordered four hundred women and children to be turned out
of their homes at Newark into the biting midwinter cold,
and then burnt the whole settlement down to the ground.
If he had intended to hold the position he might have
been justified in burning Newark, under more humane
conditions, because this village undoubtedly interfered
with the defensive fire of Fort George. But, as he was
giving up Fort George, his act was an entirely wanton
deed of shame.

Meanwhile the new British general, Gordon Drummond, second
in ability to Brock alone, was hurrying to the Niagara
frontier. He was preceded by Colonel Murray, who took
possession of Fort George on the 12th, the day McClure
crossed the Niagara river. Murray at once made a plan to
take the American Fort Niagara opposite; and Drummond at
once approved it for immediate execution. On the night
of the 18th six hundred men were landed on the American
side three miles up the river. At four the next morning
Murray led them down to the fort, rushing the sentries
and pickets by the way with the bayonet in dead silence.
He then told off two hundred men to take a bastion at
the same time that he was to lead the other four hundred
straight through the main gate, which he knew would soon
be opened to let the reliefs pass out. Everything worked
to perfection. When the reliefs came out they were
immediately charged and bayoneted, as were the first
astonished men off duty who ran out of their quarters to
see what the matter was. A stiff hand-to-hand fight
followed. But every American attempt to form was instantly
broken up; and presently the whole place surrendered.
Drummond, who was delighted with such an excellent
beginning, took care to underline the four significant
words referring to the enemy's killed and wounded--_all
with the bayonet_. This was done in no mere vulgar spirit
of bravado, still less in abominable bloody-mindedness.
It was the soldierly recognition of a particularly gallant
feat of arms, carried out with such conspicuously good
discipline that its memory is cherished, even to the
present day, by the 100th, afterwards raised again as
the Royal Canadians, and now known as the Prince of
Wales's Leinster regiment. A facsimile of Drummond's
underlined order is one of the most highly honoured
souvenirs in the officers' mess.

Not a moment was lost in following up this splendid feat
of arms. The Indians drove the American militia out of
Lewiston, which the advancing redcoats burnt to the
ground. Fort Schlosser fell next, then Black Rock, and
finally Buffalo. Each was laid in ashes. Thus, before
1813 ended, the whole American side of the Niagara was
nothing but one long, bare line of blackened desolation,
with the sole exception of Fort Niagara, which remained
secure in British hands until the war was over.




CHAPTER VI

1814: LUNDY'S LANE, PLATTSBURG, AND THE GREAT BLOCKADE

In the closing phase of the struggle by land and sea the
fortunes of war may, with the single exception of
Plattsburg, be most conveniently followed territorially,
from one point to the next, along the enormous irregular
curve of five thousand miles which was the scene of
operations. This curve begins at Prairie du Chien, where
the Wisconsin joins the Mississippi, and ends at New
Orleans, where the Mississippi is about to join the sea.
It runs easterly along the Wisconsin, across to the Fox,
into Lake Michigan, across to Mackinaw, eastwards through
Lakes Huron, Erie, and Ontario, down the St Lawrence,
round to Halifax, round from there to Maine, and thence
along the whole Atlantic coast, south and west--about
into the Gulf of Mexico.

The blockade of the Gulf of Mexico was an integral part
of the British plan. But the battle of New Orleans, which
was a complete disaster for the British arms, stands
quite outside the actual war, since it was fought on
January 8, 1815, more than two weeks after the terms of
peace had been settled by the Treaty of Ghent. This
peculiarity about its date, taken in conjunction with
its extreme remoteness from the Canadian frontier, puts
it beyond the purview of the present chronicle.

All the decisive actions of the campaign proper were
fought within two months. They began at Prairie du Chien
in July and ended at Plattsburg in September. Plattsburg
is the one exception to the order of place. The tide of
war and British fortune flowed east and south to reach
its height at Washington in August. It turned at Plattsburg
in September.

Neither friend nor foe went west in 1813. But in April
1814 Colonel McDouall set out with ninety men, mostly of
the Newfoundland regiment, to reinforce Mackinaw. He
started from the little depot which had been established
on the Nottawasaga, a river flowing into the Georgian
Bay and accessible by the overland trail from York.

After surmounting the many difficulties of the inland
route which he had to take in order to avoid the Americans
in the Lake Erie region, and after much hard work against
the Lake Huron ice, he at last reached Mackinaw on the
18th of May. Some good fighting Indians joined him there;
and towards the end of June he felt strong enough to send
Colonel McKay against the American post at Prairie du
Chien. McKay arrived at this post in the middle of July
and captured the whole position--fort, guns, garrison,
and a vessel on the Mississippi.

Meanwhile seven hundred Americans under Croghan, the
American officer who had repulsed Procter at Fort Stephenson
the year before, were making for Mackinaw itself. They
did some private looting at the Sault, burnt the houses
at St Joseph's Island, and landed in full force at Mackinaw
on the 4th of August. McDouall had less than two hundred
men, Indians included. But he at once marched out to the
attack and beat the Americans back to their ships, which
immediately sailed away. The British thenceforth commanded
the whole three western lakes until the war was over.

The Lake Erie region remained quite as decisively commanded
by the Americans. They actually occupied only the line
of the Detroit. But they had the power to cut any
communications which the British might try to establish
along the north side of the lake. They had suffered a
minor reverse at Chatham in the previous December. But
in March they more than turned the tables by defeating
Basden's attack in the Longwoods at Delaware, near London;
and in October seven hundred of their mounted men raided
the line of the Thames and only just stopped short of
the Grand River, the western boundary of the Niagara
peninsula.

The Niagara frontier, as before, was the scene of desperate
strife. The Americans were determined to wrest it from
the British, and they carefully trained their best troops
for the effort. Their prospects seemed bright, as the
whole of Upper Canada was suffering from want of men and
means, both civil and military. Drummond, the British
commander-in-chief there, felt very anxious not only
about the line of the Niagara but even about the neck of
the whole peninsula, from Burlington westward to Lake
Erie. He had no more than 4,400 troops, all told; and he
was obliged to place them so as to be ready for an attack
either from the Niagara or from Lake Erie, or from both
together. Keeping his base at York with a thousand men,
he formed his line with its right on Burlington and its
left on Fort Niagara. He had 500 men at Burlington, 1,000
at Fort George, and 700 at Fort Niagara. The rest were
thrown well forward, so as to get into immediate touch
with any Americans advancing from the south. There were
300 men at Queenston, 500 at Chippawa, 150 at Fort Erie,
and 250 at Long Point on Lake Erie.

Brown, the American general who had beaten Prevost at
Sackett's Harbour and who had now superseded Wilkinson,
had made his advanced field base at Buffalo. His total
force was not much more than Drummond's. But it was all
concentrated into a single striking body which possessed
the full initiative of manoeuvre and attack. On July 3
Brown crossed the Niagara to the Canadian side. The same
day he took Fort Erie from its little garrison; and at
once began to make it a really formidable work, as the
British found out to their cost later on. Next day he
advanced down the river road to Street's Creek. On hearing
this, General Riall, Drummond's second-in-command, gathered
two thousand men and advanced against Brown, who had
recommenced his own advance with four thousand. They met
on the 5th, between Street's Creek and the Chippawa river.
Riall at once sent six hundred men, including all his
Indians and militia, against more than twice their number
of American militia, who were in a strong position on
the inland flank. The Canadians went forward in excellent
style and the Americans broke and fled in wild confusion.
Seizing such an apparently good chance, Riall then attacked
the American regulars with his own, though the odds he
had to face here were more than three against two. The
opposing lines met face to face unflinchingly. The
Americans, who had now been trained and disciplined by
proper leaders, refused to yield an inch. Their two
regular brigadiers, Winfield Scott and Ripley, kept them
well in hand, manoeuvred their surplus battalions to the
best advantage, overlapped the weaker British flank, and
won the day. The British loss was five hundred, or one
in four: the American four hundred, or only one in ten.

Brown then turned Riall's flank, by crossing the Chippawa
higher up, and prepared for the crowning triumph of
crushing Drummond. He proposed a joint attack with Chauncey
on Forts Niagara and George. But Chauncey happened to be
ill at the time; he had not yet defeated Yeo; and he
strongly resented being made apparently subordinate to
Brown. So the proposed combination failed at the critical
moment. But, for the eighteen days between the battle of
Chippawa on the 5th of July and Brown's receipt of
Chauncey's refusal on the 23rd, the Americans carried
all before them, right up to the British line that ran
along the western end of Lake Ontario, from Fort Niagara
to Burlington. During this period no great operations
took place. But two minor incidents served to exasperate
feelings on both sides. Eight Canadian traitors were
tried and hanged at Ancaster near Burlington; and Loyalists
openly expressed their regret that Willcocks and others
had escaped the same fate. Willcocks had been the
ring-leader of the parliamentary opposition to Brock in
1812; and had afterwards been exceedingly active on the
American side, harrying every Loyalist he and his raiders
could lay their hands on. He ended by cheating the gallows,
after all, as he fell in a skirmish towards the end of
the present campaign on the Niagara frontier. The other
exasperating incident was the burning of St David's on
July 19 by a Colonel Stone; partly because it was a 'Tory
village' and partly because the American militia mistakenly
thought that one of their officers, Brigadier-General
Swift, had been killed by a prisoner to whom he had given
quarter.

When, on the 23rd of July, Brown at last received Chauncey's
disappointing answer, he immediately stopped manoeuvring
along the lower Niagara and prepared to execute an
alternative plan of marching diagonally across the Niagara
peninsula straight for the British position at Burlington.
To do this he concentrated at the Chippawa on the 24th.
But by the time he was ready to put his plan into execution,
on the morning of the 25th, he found himself in close
touch with the British in his immediate front. Their
advanced guard of a thousand men, under Colonel Pearson,
had just taken post at Lundy's Lane, near the Falls.
Their main body, under Riall, was clearing both banks of
the lower Niagara. And Drummond himself had just arrived
at Fort Niagara. Neither side knew the intentions of the
other. But as the British were clearing the whole country
up to the Falls, and as the Americans were bent on striking
diagonally inland from a point beside the Falls, it
inevitably happened that each met the other at Lundy's
Lane, which runs inland from the Canadian side of the
Falls, at right angles to the river, and therefore between
the two opposing armies.

When Drummond, hurrying across from York, landed at Fort
Niagara in the early morning of the fateful 25th, he
found that the orders he had sent over on the 23rd were
already being carried out, though in a slightly modified
form. Colonel Tucker was marching off from Fort Niagara
to Lewiston, which he took without opposition. Then,
first making sure that the heights beyond were also clear,
he crossed over the Niagara to Queenston, where his men
had dinner with those who had marched up on the Canadian
side from Fort George. Immediately after dinner half the
total sixteen hundred present marched back to garrison
Forts George and Niagara, while the other half marched
forward, up-stream, on the Canadian side, with Drummond,
towards Lundy's Lane, whither Riall had preceded them
with reinforcements for the advanced guard under Colonel
Pearson. In the meantime Brown had heard about the taking
of Lewiston, and, fearing that the British might take
Fort Schlosser too, had at once given up all idea of his
diagonal march on Burlington and had decided to advance
straight against Queenston instead. Thus both the American
and the British main bodies were marching on Lundy's Lane
from opposite sides and in successive detachments throughout
that long, intensely hot, midsummer afternoon.

Presently Riall got a report saying that the Americans
were advancing in one massed force instead of in successive
detachments. He thereupon ordered Pearson to retire from
Lundy's Lane to Queenston, sent back orders that Colonel
Hercules Scott, who was marching up twelve hundred men
from near St Catharine's on Twelve Mile Creek, was also
to go to Queenston, and reported both these changes to
Drummond, who was hurrying along the Queenston road
towards Lundy's Lane as fast as he could. While the
orderly officers were galloping back to Drummond and
Hercules Scott, and while Pearson was getting his men
into their order of march, Winfield Scott's brigade of
American regulars suddenly appeared on the Chippawa road,
deployed for attack, and halted. There was a pause on
both sides. Winfield Scott thought he might have Drummond's
whole force in front of him. Riall thought he was faced
by the whole of Brown's. But Winfield Scott, presently
realizing that Pearson was unsupported, resumed his
advance; while Pearson and Riall, not realizing that
Winfield Scott was himself unsupported for the time being,
immediately began to retire.

At this precise moment Drummond dashed up and drew rein.
There was not a minute to lose. The leading Americans
were coming on in excellent order, only a musket-shot
away; Pearson's thousand were just in the act of giving
up the key to the whole position; and Drummond's eight
hundred were plodding along a mile or so in rear. But
within that fleeting minute Drummond made the plan that
brought on the most desperately contested battle of the
war. He ordered Pearson's thousand back again. He brought
his own eight hundred forward at full speed. He sent
post-haste to Colonel Scott to change once more and march
on Lundy's Lane. And so, by the time the astonished
Americans were about to seize the key themselves, they
found him ready to defend it.

Too long for a hillock, too low for a hill, this key to
the whole position in that stern fight has never had a
special name. But it may well be known as Battle Rise.
It stood a mile from the Niagara river, and just a step
inland beyond the crossing of two roads. One of these,
Lundy's Lane, ran lengthwise over it, at right angles to
the Niagara. The other, which did not quite touch it,
ran in the same direction as the river, all the way from
Fort Erie to Fort George, and, of course, through both
Chippawa and Queenston. The crest of Battle Rise was a
few yards on the Chippawa side of Lundy's Lane; and there
Drummond placed his seven field-guns. Round these guns
the thickest of the battle raged, from first to last.
The odds were four thousand Americans against three
thousand British, altogether. But the British were in
superior force at first; and neither side had its full
total in action at any one time, as casualties and
reinforcements kept the numbers fluctuating.

It was past six in the evening of that stifling 25th of
July when Winfield Scott attacked with the utmost steadiness
and gallantry. Though the British outnumbered his splendid
brigade, and though they had the choice of ground as
well, he still succeeded in driving a wedge through their
left flank, a move which threatened to break them away
from the road along the river. But they retired in good
order, re-formed, and then drove out his wedge.

By half-past seven the American army had all come into
action, and Drummond was having hard work to hold his
own. Brown, like Winfield Scott, at once saw the supreme
importance of taking Battle Rise; so he sent two complete
battalions against it, one of regulars leading, the other,
of militia, in support. At the first salvo from Drummond's
seven guns the American militia broke and ran away. But
Colonel Miller worked some of the American regulars very
cleverly along the far side of a creeper-covered fence,
while the rest engaged the battery from a distance. In
the heat of action the British artillerymen never saw
their real danger till, on a given signal, Miller's
advanced party all sprang up and fired a point-blank
volley which killed or wounded every man beside the guns.
Then Miller charged and took the battery. But he only
held it for a moment. The British centre charged up their
own side of Battle Rise and drove the intruders back,
after a terrific struggle with the bayonet. But again
success was only for the moment. The Americans rallied
and pressed the British back. The British then rallied
and returned. And so the desperate fight swayed back and
forth across the coveted position; till finally both
sides retired exhausted, and the guns stood dumb between
them.

It was now pitch-dark, and the lull that followed seemed
almost like the end of the fight. But, after a considerable
pause, the Americans--all regulars this time--came on
once more. This put the British in the greatest danger.
Drummond had lost nearly a third of his men. The effective
American regulars were little less than double his present
twelve hundred effectives of all kinds and were the
fresher army of the two. Miller had taken one of the guns
from Battle Rise. The other six could not be served
against close-quarter musketry; and the nearest Americans
were actually resting between the cross-roads and the
deserted Rise. Defeat looked certain for the British.
But, just as the attackers and defenders began to stir
again, Colonel Hercules Scott's twelve hundred weary
reinforcements came plodding along the Queenston road,
wheeled round the corner into Lundy's Lane, and stumbled
in among these nearest Americans, who, being the more
expectant of the two, drove them back in confusion. The
officers, however, rallied the men at once. Drummond told
off eight hundred of them, including three hundred militia,
to the reserve; prolonged his line to the right with the
rest; and thus re-established the defence.

Hardly had the new arrivals taken breath before the final
assault began. Again the Americans took the silent battery.
Again the British drove them back. Again the opposing
lines swayed to and fro across the deadly crest of Battle
Rise, with nothing else to guide them through the hot,
black night but their own flaming musketry. The Americans
could not have been more gallant and persistent in attack:
the British could not have been more steadfast in defence.
Midnight came; but neither side could keep its hold on
Battle Rise. By this time Drummond was wounded; and Riall
was both wounded and a prisoner. Among the Americans
Brown and Winfield Scott were also wounded, while their
men were worn out after being under arms for nearly
eighteen hours. A pause of sheer exhaustion followed.
Then, slowly and sullenly, as if they knew the one more
charge they could not make must carry home, the foiled
Americans turned back and felt their way to Chippawa.

The British ranks lay down in the same order as that in
which they fought; and a deep hush fell over the whole,
black-shrouded battlefield. The immemorial voice of those
dread Falls to which no combatant gave heed for six long
hours of mortal strife was heard once more. But near at
hand there was no other sound than that which came from
the whispered queries of a few tired officers on duty;
from the busy orderlies and surgeons at their work of
mercy; and from the wounded moaning in their pain. So
passed the quiet half of that short, momentous, summer
night. Within four hours the sun shone down on the living
and the dead--on that silent battery whose gunners had
fallen to a man--on the unconquered Rise.

The tide of war along the Niagara frontier favoured
neither side for some time after Lundy's Lane, though
the Americans twice appeared to be regaining the initiative.
On August 15 there was a well-earned American victory at
Fort Erie, where Drummond's assault was beaten off with
great loss to the British. A month later an American
sortie was repulsed. On September 21 Drummond retired
beaten; and on October 13 he found himself again on the
defensive at Chippawa, with little more than three thousand
men, while Izard, who had come with American reinforcements
from Lake Champlain and Sackett's Harbour, was facing
him with twice as many. But Yeo's fleet had now come up
to the mouth of the Niagara, while Chauncey's had remained
at Sackett's Harbour. Thus the British had the priceless
advantage of a movable naval base at hand, while the
Americans had none at all within supporting distance.
Every step towards Lake Ontario hampered Izard more and
more, while it added corresponding strength to Drummond.
An American attempt to work round Drummond's flank, twelve
miles inland, was also foiled by a heavy skirmish on
October 19 at Cook's Mills; and Izard's definite abandonment
of the invasion was announced on November 5 by his blowing
up Fort Erie and retiring into winter quarters. This
ended the war along the whole Niagara.

The campaign on Lake Ontario was very different. It opened
two months earlier. The naval competition consisted rather
in building than in fighting. The British built ships in
Kingston, the Americans in Sackett's Harbour; and reports
of progress soon travelled across the intervening space
of less than forty miles. The initiative of combined
operations by land and water was undertaken by the British
instead of by the Americans. Yeo and Drummond wished to
attack Sackett's Harbour with four thousand men. But
Prevost said he could spare them only three thousand;
whereupon they changed their objective to Oswego, which
they took in excellent style, on May 6. The British
suffered a serious reverse, though on a very much smaller
scale, on May 30, at Sandy Creek, between Oswego and
Sackett's Harbour, when a party of marines and bluejackets,
sent to cut out some vessels with naval stores for
Chauncey, was completely lost, every man being either
killed, wounded, or taken prisoner.

From Lake Ontario down to the sea the Canadian frontier
was never seriously threatened; and the only action of
any consequence was fought to the south of Montreal in
the early spring. On March 30 the Americans made a last
inglorious attempt in this direction. Wilkinson started
with four thousand men to follow the line of Lake Champlain
and the Richelieu river, the same that was tried by
Dearborn in 1812 and by Hampton in 1813. At La Colle,
only four miles across the frontier, he attacked Major
Handcock's post of two hundred men. The result was like
a second Chateauguay. Handcock drew in three hundred
reinforcements and two gunboats from Isle-aux-Noix.
Wilkinson's advanced guard lost its way overnight. In
the morning he lacked the resolution to press on, even
with his overwhelming numbers; and so, after a part of
his army had executed some disjointed manoeuvres, he
withdrew the whole and gave up in despair.

From this point of the Canadian frontier to the very end
of the five-thousand-mile loop, that is, from Montreal
to Mexico, the theatre of operations was directly based
upon the sea, where the British Navy was by this time
undisputedly supreme. A very few small American men-of-war
were still at large, together with a much greater number
of privateers. But they had no power whatever even to
mitigate the irresistible blockade of the whole coast-line
of the United States. American sea-borne commerce simply
died away; for no mercantile marine could have any
independent life when its trade had to be carried on by
a constantly decreasing tonnage; when, too, it could go
to sea at all only by furtive evasion, and when it had
to take cargo at risks so great that they could not be
covered either by insurance or by any attainable profits.
The Atlantic being barred by this Great Blockade, and
the Pacific being inaccessible, the only practical way
left open to American trade was through the British lines
by land or sea. Some American seamen shipped in British
vessels. Some American ships sailed under British colours.
But the chief external American trade was done illicitly,
by 'underground,' with the British West Indies and with
Canada itself. This was, of course, in direct defiance
of the American government, and to the direct detriment
of the United States as a nation. It was equally to the
direct benefit of the British colonies in general and of
Nova Scotia in particular. American harbours had never
been so dull. Quebec and Halifax had never been so
prosperous. American money was drained away from the
warlike South and West and either concentrated in the
Northern States--which were opposed to the war--or paid
over into British hands.

Nor was this all. The British Navy harried the coast in
every convenient quarter and made effective the work of
two most important joint attacks, one on Maine, the other
on Washington itself. The attack on Maine covered two
months, altogether, from July 11 to September 11. It
began with the taking of Moose Island by Sir Thomas Hardy,
Nelson's old flag-captain at Trafalgar, and ended with
the surrender, at Machias, of 'about 100 miles of
sea-coast,' together with 'that intermediate tract of
country which separates the province of New Brunswick
from Lower Canada.' On September 21 Sir John Sherbrooke
proclaimed at Halifax the formal annexation of 'all the
eastern side of the Penobscot river and all the country
lying between the same river and the boundary of New
Brunswick.'

The attack on Maine was meant, in one sense at least, to
create a partial counterpoise to the American preponderance
on Lake Erie. The attack on Washington was made in
retaliation for the burning of the old and new capitals
of Upper Canada, Newark and York.

The naval defence of Washington had been committed to
Commodore Barney, a most expert and gallant veteran of
the Revolution, who handled his wholly inadequate little
force with consummate skill and daring, both afloat and
ashore. He was not, strictly speaking, a naval officer,
but a privateersman who had made the unique record of
taking eleven prizes in ten consecutive days with his
famous Baltimore schooner _Rossie_. The military defence
was committed to General Winder, one of the two generals
captured by Harvey's '704 firelocks' at Stoney Creek the
year before. Winder was a good soldier and did his best
in the seven weeks at his disposal. But the American
government, which had now enjoyed continuous party power
for no less than thirteen years, gave him no more than
four hundred regulars, backed by Barney's four hundred
excellent seamen and the usual array of militia, with
whom to defend the capital in the third campaign of a
war they had themselves declared. There were 93,500
militiamen within the threatened area. But only fifteen
thousand were got under arms; and only five thousand were
brought into action.

In the middle of August the British fleet under Admirals
Cochrane and Cockburn sailed into Chesapeake Bay with a
detachment of four thousand troops commanded by General
Ross. Barney had no choice but to retire before this
overwhelming force. As the British advanced up the
narrowing waters all chance of escape disappeared; so
Barney burnt his boats and little vessels and marched
his seamen in to join Winder's army. On August 24 Winder's
whole six thousand drew up in an exceedingly strong
position at Bladensburg, just north of Washington; and
the President rode out with his Cabinet to see a battle
which is best described by its derisive title of the
Bladensburg Races. Ross's four thousand came on and were
received by an accurate checking fire from the regular
artillery and from Barney's seamen gunners. But a total
loss of 8 killed and 11 wounded was more than the 5,000
American militia could stand. All the rest ran for dear
life. The deserted handful of regular soldiers and sailors
was then overpowered; while Barney was severely wounded
and taken prisoner. He and they, however, had saved their
honour and won the respect and admiration of both friend
and foe. Ross and Cockburn at once congratulated him on
the stand he had made against them; and he, with equal
magnanimity, reported officially that the British had
treated him 'just like a brother.'

That night the little British army of four thousand men
burnt governmental Washington, the capital of a country
with eight millions of people. Not a man, not a woman,
not a child, was in any way molested; nor was one finger
laid on any private property. The four thousand then
marched back to the fleet, through an area inhabited by
93,500 militiamen on paper, without having so much as a
single musket fired at them.

Now, if ever, was Prevost's golden opportunity to end
the war with a victory that would turn the scale decisively
in favour of the British cause. With the one exception
of Lake Erie, the British had the upper hand over the
whole five thousand miles of front. A successful British
counter-invasion, across the Montreal frontier, would
offset the American hold on Lake Erie, ensure the control
of Lake Champlain, and thus bring all the scattered parts
of the campaign into their proper relation to a central,
crowning triumph.

On the other hand, defeat would mean disaster. But the
bare possibility of defeat seemed quite absurd when
Prevost set out from his field headquarters opposite
Montreal, between La Prairie and Chambly, with eleven
thousand seasoned veterans, mostly 'Peninsulars,' to
attack Plattsburg, which was no more than twenty-five
miles across the frontier, very weakly fortified, and
garrisoned only by the fifteen hundred regulars whom
Izard had 'culled out' when he started for Niagara.

The naval odds were not so favourable. But, as they could
be decisively affected by military action, they naturally
depended on Prevost, who, with his overwhelming army,
could turn them whichever way he chose. It was true that
Commodore Macdonough's American flotilla had more trained
seamen than Captain Downie's corresponding British force,
and that his crews and vessels possessed the further
advantage of having worked together for some time. Downie,
a brave and skilful young officer, had arrived to take
command of his flotilla at the upper end of Lake Champlain
only on September 2, that is, exactly a week before
Prevost urged him to attack, and nine days before the
battle actually did take place. He had a fair proportion
of trained seamen; but they consisted of scratch drafts
from different men-of-war, chosen in haste and hurried
to the front. Most of the men and officers were complete
strangers to one another; and they made such short-handed
crews that some soldiers had to be wheeled out of the
line of march and put on board at the very last minute.
There would have been grave difficulties with such a
flotilla under any circumstances. But Prevost had increased
them tenfold by giving no orders and making no preparations
while trying his hand at another abortive armistice--one,
moreover, which he had no authority even to propose.

Yet, in spite of all this, Prevost still had the means
of making Downie superior to Macdonough. Macdonough's
vessels were mostly armed with carronades, Downie's with
long guns. Carronades fired masses of small projectiles
with great effect at very short ranges. Long guns, on
the other hand, fired each a single large projectile up
to the farthest ranges known. In fact, it was almost as
if the Americans had been armed with shot-guns and the
British armed with rifles. Therefore the Americans had
an overwhelming advantage at close quarters, while the
British had a corresponding advantage at long range. Now,
Macdonough had anchored in an ideal position for close
action inside Plattsburg Bay. He required only a few men
to look after his ground tackle; [Footnote: Anchors and
cables.] and his springs [Footnote: Ropes to hold a vessel
in position when hauling or swinging in a harbour. Here,
ropes from the stern to the anchors on the landward side.]
were out on the landward side for 'winding ship,' that
is, for turning his vessels completely round, so as to
bring their fresh broadsides into action. There was no
sea-room for manoeuvring round him with any chance of
success; so the British would be at a great disadvantage
while standing in to the attack, first because they could
be raked end-on, next because they could only reply with
bow fire--the weakest of all--and, lastly, because their
best men would be engaged with the sails and anchors
while their ships were taking station.

But Prevost had it fully in his power to prevent Macdonough
from fighting in such an ideal position at all. Macdonough's
American flotilla was well within range of Macomb's
long-range American land batteries; while Prevost's
overwhelming British army was easily able to take these
land batteries, turn their guns on Macdonough's helpless
vessels--whose short-range carronades could not possibly
reply--and so either destroy the American flotilla at
anchor in the bay or force it out into the open lake,
where it would meet Downie's long-range guns at the
greatest disadvantage. Prevost, after allowing for all
other duties, had at least seven thousand veterans for
an assault on Macomb's second-rate regulars and ordinary
militia, both of whom together amounted at most to
thirty-five hundred, including local militiamen who had
come in to reinforce the 'culls' whom Izard had left
behind. The Americans, though working with very creditable
zeal, determined to do their best, quite expected to be
beaten out of their little forts and entrenchments, which
were just across the fordable Saranac in front of Prevost's
army. They had tried to delay the British advance. But,
in the words of Macomb's own official report, 'so undaunted
was the enemy that he never deployed in his whole march,
always pressing on in column'; that is, the British
veterans simply brushed the Americans aside without
deigning to change from their column of march into a line
of battle. Prevost's duty was therefore perfectly plain.
With all the odds in his favour ashore, and with the
power of changing the odds in his favour afloat, he ought
to have captured Macomb's position in the early morning
and turned both his own and Macomb's artillery on
Macdonough, who would then have been forced to leave his
moorings for the open lake, where Downie would have had
eight hours of daylight to fight him at long range.

What Prevost actually did was something disgracefully
different. Having first wasted time by his attempted
armistice, and so hindered preparations at the base,
between La Prairie and Chambly, he next proceeded to
cross the frontier too soon. He reported home that Downie
could not be ready before September 15. But on August 31
he crossed the line himself, only twenty-five miles from
his objective, thus prematurely showing the enemy his
hand. Then he began to goad the unhappy Downie to his
doom. Downie's flagship, the _Confiance_, named after a
French prize which Yeo had taken, was launched only on
August 25, and hauled out into the stream only on September
7. Her scratch crew could not go to battle quarters till
the 8th; and the shipwrights were working madly at her
up to the very moment that the first shot was fired in
her fatal action on the 11th. Yet Prevost tried to force
her into action on the 9th, adding, 'I need not dwell
with you on the evils resulting to both services from
delay,' and warning Downie that he was being watched:
'Captain Watson is directed to remain at Little Chazy
until you are preparing to get under way.'

Thus watched and goaded by the governor-general and
commander-in-chief, whose own service was the Army,
Downie, a comparative junior in the Navy, put forth his
utmost efforts, against his better judgment, to sail that
very midnight. A baffling head-wind, however, kept him
from working out. He immediately reported to Prevost,
giving quite satisfactory reasons. But Prevost wrote back
impatiently: 'The troops have been held in readiness,
since six o'clock this morning [the 10th], to storm the
enemy's works at nearly the same time as the naval action
begins in the bay. I ascribe the disappointment I have
experienced to the unfortunate change of wind, and shall
rejoice to learn that my reasonable expectations have
been frustrated by no other cause.' '_No other cause_.'
The innuendo, even if unintentional, was there. Downie,
a junior sailor, was perhaps suspected of 'shyness' by
a very senior soldier. Prevost's poison worked quickly.
'I will convince him that the Navy won't be backward,'
said Downie to his second, Pring, who gave this evidence,
under oath, at the subsequent court-martial. Pring, whose
evidence was corroborated by that of both the first
lieutenant and the master of the _Confiance_, then urged
the extreme risk of engaging Macdonough inside the bay.
But Downie allayed their anxiety by telling them that
Prevost had promised to storm Macomb's indefensible works
simultaneously. This was not nearly so good as if Prevost
had promised to defeat Macomb first and then drive
Macdonough out to sea. But it was better, far better,
than what actually was done.

With Prevost's written promise in his pocket Downie sailed
for Plattsburg in the early morning of that fatal 11th
of September. Punctually to the minute he fired his
preconcerted signal outside Cumberland Head, which
separated the bay from the lake. He next waited exactly
the prescribed time, during which he reconnoitred
Macdonough's position from a boat. Then the hour of battle
came. The hammering of the shipwrights stopped at last;
and the ill-starred _Confiance_, that ship which never
had a chance to 'find herself,' led the little squadron
into Prevost's death-trap in the bay. Every soldier and
sailor now realized that the storming of the works on
land ought to have been the first move, and that Prevost's
idea of simultaneous action was faulty, because it meant
two independent fights, with the chance of a naval disaster
preceding the military success. However, Prevost was the
commander-in-chief; he had promised co-operation in his
own way; and Downie was determined to show him that the
Navy had stopped for '_no other cause_' than the head-wind
of the day before.

Did _no other cause_ than mistaken judgment affect Prevost
that fatal morning? Did he intend to show Downie that a
commander-in-chief could not suffer the 'disappointment'
of 'holding troops in readiness' without marking his
displeasure by some visible return in kind? Or was he no
worse than criminally weak? His motives will never be
known. But his actions throw a sinister light upon them.
For when Downie sailed in to the attack Prevost did
nothing whatever to help him. Betrayed, traduced, and
goaded to his ruin, Downie fought a losing battle with
the utmost gallantry and skill. The wind flawed and failed
inside the bay, so that the _Confiance_ could not reach
her proper station. Yet her first broadside struck down
forty men aboard the _Saratoga_. Then the _Saratoga_
fired her carronades, at point-blank range, cut up the
cables aboard the _Confiance_, and did great execution
among the crew. In fifteen minutes Downie fell.

The battle raged two full hours longer; while the odds
against the British continued to increase. Four of their
little gunboats fought as well as gunboats could. But
the other seven simply ran away, like their commander
afterwards when summoned for a court-martial that would
assuredly have sentenced him to death. Two of the larger
vessels failed to come into action properly; one went
ashore, the other drifted through the American line and
then hauled down her colours. Thus the battle was fought
to its dire conclusion by the British _Confiance_ and
_Linnet_ against the American _Saratoga_, _Eagle_, and
_Ticonderoga_. The gunboats had little to do with the
result; though the odds of all those actually engaged
were greatly in favour of Macdonough. The fourth American
vessel of larger size drifted out of action.

Macdonough, an officer of whom any navy in the world
might well be proud, then concentrated on the stricken
_Confiance_ with his own _Saratoga_, greatly aided by
the _Eagle_, which swung round so as to rake the _Confiance_
with her fresh broadside. The _Linnet_ now drifted off
a little and so could not help the _Confiance_, both
because the American galleys at once engaged her and
because her position was bad in any case. Presently both
flagships slackened fire; whereupon Macdonough took the
opportunity of winding ship. His ground tackle was in
perfect order on the far, or landward, side; so the
_Saratoga_ swung round quite easily. The _Confiance_ now
had both the _Eagle's_ and the _Saratoga's_ fresh carronade
broadsides deluging her battered, cannon-armed broadside
with showers of deadly grape. Her one last chance of
keeping up a little longer was to wind ship herself. Her
tackle had all been cut; but her master got out his last
spare cables and tried to bring her round, while some of
his toiling men fell dead at every haul. She began to
wind round very slowly; and, when exactly at right angles
to Macdonough, was raked completely, fore and aft. At
the same time an ominous list to port, where her side
was torn in over a hundred places, showed that she would
sink quickly if her guns could not be run across to
starboard. But more than half her mixed scratch crew had
been already killed or wounded. The most desperate efforts
of her few surviving officers could not prevent the
confusion that followed the fearful raking she now received
from both her superior opponents; and before her fresh
broadside could be brought to bear she was forced to
strike her flag. Then every American carronade and gun
was turned upon Pring's undaunted little _Linnet_, which
kept up the hopeless fight for fifteen minutes longer;
so that Prevost might yet have a chance to carry out his
own operations without fear of molestation from a hostile
bay.

But Prevost was in no danger of molestation. He was in
perfect safety. He watched the destruction of his fleet
from his secure headquarters, well inland, marched and
countermarched his men about, to make a show of action;
and then, as the _Linnet_ fired her last, despairing gun,
he told all ranks to go to dinner.

That night he broke camp hurriedly, left all his badly
wounded men behind him, and went back a great deal faster
than he came. His shamed, disgusted veterans deserted in
unprecedented numbers. And Macomb's astounded army found
themselves the victors of an unfought field.

The American victory at Plattsburg gave the United States
the absolute control of Lake Champlain; and this,
reinforcing their similar control of Lake Erie,
counterbalanced the British military advantages all along
the Canadian frontier. The British command of the sea,
the destruction of Washington, and the occupation of
Maine told heavily on the other side. These three British
advantages had been won while the mother country was
fighting with her right hand tied behind her back; and
in all the elements of warlike strength the British Empire
was vastly superior to the United States. Thus there
cannot be the slightest doubt that if the British had
been free to continue the war they must have triumphed.
But they were not free. Europe was seething with the
profound unrest that made her statesmen feel the volcano
heaving under their every step during the portentous year
between Napoleon's abdication and return. The mighty
British Navy, the veteran British Army, could not now be
sent across the sea in overwhelming force. So American
diplomacy eagerly seized this chance of profiting by
British needs, and took such good advantage of them that
the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the war on Christmas
Eve, left the two opponents in much the same position
towards each other as before. Neither of the main reasons
for which the Americans had fought their three campaigns
was even mentioned in the articles.

The war had been an unmitigated curse to the motherland
herself; and it brought the usual curses in its train
all over the scene of action. But some positive good came
out of it as well, both in Canada and in the United
States.

The benefits conferred on the United States could not be
given in apter words than those used by Gallatin, who,
as the finance minister during four presidential terms,
saw quite enough of the seamy side to sober his opinions,
and who, as a prominent member of the war party, shared
the disappointed hopes of his colleagues about the conquest
of Canada. His opinion is, of course, that of a partisan.
But it contains much truth, for all that:

   The war has been productive of evil and of good; but
   I think the good preponderates. It has laid the
   foundations of permanent taxes and military
   establishments, which the Republicans [as the
   anti-Federalist Democrats were then called] had deemed
   unfavorable to the happiness and free institutions of
   the country. Under our former system we were becoming
   too selfish, too much attached exclusively to the
   acquisition of wealth, above all, too much confined
   in our political feelings to local and state objects.
   The war has renewed the national feelings and character
   which the Revolution had given, and which were daily
   lessening. The people are now more American. They feel
   and act more as a nation. And I hope that the permanency
   of the Union is thereby better secured.

Gallatin did not, of course, foresee that it would take
a third conflict to finish what the Revolution had begun.
But this sequel only strengthens his argument. For that
Union which was born in the throes of the Revolution had
to pass through its tumultuous youth in '1812' before
reaching full manhood by means of the Civil War.

The benefits conferred on Canada were equally permanent
and even greater. How Gallatin would have rejoiced to
see in the United States any approach to such a financial
triumph as that which was won by the Army Bills in Canada!
No public measure was ever more successful at the time
or more full of promise for the future. But mightier
problems than even those of national finance were brought
nearer to their desirable solution by this propitious
war. It made Ontario what Quebec had long since
been--historic ground; thus bringing the older and newer
provinces together with one exalting touch. It was also
the last, as well as the most convincing, defeat of the
three American invasions of Canada. The first had been
led by Sir William Phips in 1690. This was long before
the Revolution. The American Colonies were then still
British and Canada still French. But the invasion itself
was distinctively American, in men, ships, money, and
design. It was undertaken without the consent or knowledge
of the home authorities; and its success would probably
have destroyed all chance of there being any British
Canada to-day. The second American invasion had been that
of Montgomery and Arnold in 1775, during the Revolution,
when the very diverse elements of a new Canadian life
first began to defend their common heritage against a
common foe. The third invasion--the War of 1812--united
all these elements once more, just when Canada stood most
in need of mutual confidence between them. So there could
not have been a better bond of union than the blood then
shed so willingly by her different races in a single
righteous cause.




BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

Enough books to fill a small library have been written
about the 'sprawling and sporadic' War of 1812. Most of
them deal with particular phases, localities, or events;
and most of them are distinctly partisan. This is
unfortunate, but not surprising. The war was waged over
an immense area, by various forces, and with remarkably
various results. The Americans were victorious on the
Lakes and in all but one of the naval duels fought at
sea. Yet their coast was completely sealed up by the
Great Blockade in the last campaign. The balance of
victory inclined towards the British side on land. Yet
the annihilating American victories on the Lakes nullified
most of the general military advantages gained by the
British along the Canadian frontier. The fortunes of each
campaign were followed with great interest on both sides
of the line. But on the other side of the Atlantic the
British home public had Napoleon to think of at their
very doors; and so, for the most part, they regarded the
war with the States as an untoward and regrettable
annoyance, which diverted too much force and attention
from the life-and-death affairs of Europe.

All these peculiar influences are reflected in the
different patriotic annals. Americans are voluble about
the Lakes and the naval duels out at sea. But the completely
effective British blockade of their coast-line is a too
depressingly scientific factor in the problem to be
welcomed by a general public which would not understand
how Yankee ships could win so many duels while the British
Navy won the war. Canadians are equally voluble about
the battles on Canadian soil, where Americans had decidedly
the worst of it. As a rule, Canadian writers have been
quite as controversial as Americans, and not any readier
to study their special subjects as parts of a greater
whole. The British Isles have never had an interested
public anxious to read about this remote, distasteful,
and subsidiary war; and books about it there have
consequently been very few.

The two chief authors who have appealed directly to the
readers of the mother country are William James and Sir
Charles Lucas. James was an industrious naval historian;
but he was quite as anti-American as the earlier American
writers were anti-British. Owing to this perverting bias
his two books, the _Naval_ and the _Military Occurrences
of the late War between Great Britain and the United
States_, are not to be relied upon. Their appendices,
however, give a great many documents which are of much
assistance in studying the real history of the war. James
wrote only a few years after the peace. Nearly a century
later Sir Charles Lucas wrote _The Canadian War of 1812_,
which is the work of a man whose life-long service in
the Colonial Office and intimate acquaintance with Canadian
history have both been turned to the best account. The
two chief Canadian authors are Colonel Cruikshank and
James Hannay. Colonel Cruikshank deserves the greatest
credit for being a real pioneer with his _Documentary
History of the Campaigns upon the Niagara Frontier_.
Hannay's _History of the War of 1812_ shows careful study
of the Canadian aspects of the operations; but its
generally sound arguments are weakened by its controversial
tone.

The four chief American authors to reckon with are,
Lossing, Upton, Roosevelt, and Mahan. They complement
rather than correspond with the four British authors.
The best known American work dealing with the military
campaigns is Lossing's _Field-Book of the War of 1812_.
It is an industrious compilation; but quite uncritical
and most misleading. General Upton's _Military Policy of
the United States_ incidentally pricks all the absurd
American militia bubbles with an incontrovertible array
of hard and pointed facts. _The Naval War of 1812_, by
Theodore Roosevelt, is an excellent sketch which shows
a genuine wish to be fair to both sides. But the best
naval work, and the most thorough work of any kind on
either side, is Admiral Mahan's _Sea Power in its Relations
to the War of 1812_.

A good deal of original evidence on the American side is
given in Brannan's _Official Letters of the Military and
Naval Officers of the United States during the War with
Great Britain in the Years 1812 to 1815_. The original
British evidence about the campaigns in Canada is given
in William Wood's _Select British Documents of the Canadian
War of 1812_. Students who wish to see the actual documents
must go to Washington, London, and Ottawa. The Dominion
Archives are of exceptional interest to all concerned.

The present work is based entirely on original evidence,
both American and British.



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