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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14582 ***
+
+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.
+
+
+
+END
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The War With the United States
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14582 ***