MOVED TO UPPER CANADA
IN 1809 Brock learned that Brigadier-General Baron de Rottenberg was
coming to Canada. He knew that as the Baron was his senior in the
service he would probably be the appointee of Sir James Craig to the
commanding position. About this time he wrote to his sister-in-law, Mrs.
W. Brock: “The spirit of insubordination lately manifested by the French
Canadian population of this colony naturally called for precautionary
measures, and our worthy chief (Sir James) is induced, in consequence,
to retain in this country those on whom he can best confide. I am highly
flattered in being reckoned among the number, whatever inward
disappointment I may feel. Some unpleasant events have likewise happened
in the upper country which have occasioned my receiving intimation to
proceed thither, whether as a permanent station, or merely as a
temporary visit, Sir James Craig has not determined.” Evidently Brock
still had at the back of his mind an idea that the French in Lower
Canada would welcome again the suzerainty of France.
In July Sir James, when Rottenberg came, sent Brock to Upper Canada and,
in September, with his goods and chattels, chiefly consisting of books
which, we have seen, he learned to love as a boy, he moved to Fort
George, Niagara. He had not been there a month before he again felt
restless and anxious to get back to some post where he might see
service, for he expressed a desire to serve with the British forces who
were then in Spain and Portugal. The adjutant-general, Colonel Baynes,
however, replied that Sir James Craig informed him that he did not think
the state of the public service would warrant his relieving Brock from
duty in Upper Canada.
Brock busied himself with the duties attendant on his position and seems
to have spent a good deal of time, as he had done in Quebec, in trying
to gain the confidence of the people. He early saw that the upper
province was by no means restful and his suspicions of a few years ago
that the American immigrants were unsettling the province were thus
confirmed.
In June, 1811, he was promoted to the rank of major-general. Sir James
Craig, with the excuse of ill-health, resigned the position of
governor-general and left for England. Sir James was ill, but he had
incensed Lower Canada so much that his departure at this time was the
best service he could render the country. Before he went he begged Brock
to remain in Canada. “Your presence is needed here,” he said. And a
little later, as an earnest of what the governor-general thought of him,
Brock received a letter from Colonel Baynes in which he said: “He (Sir
James) requests that you will do him the favor to accept as a legacy and
mark of his very sincere regard his favorite horse Alfred, and he is
induced to send him to you, not only from wishing to secure for his old
favorite a kind and careful master, but from the conviction that the
whole continent of America could not furnish you with so safe and
excellent an horse?”
Three months later Sir George Prevost, who was the new governor-general
of and commander of the forces in Canada, appointed Brock president and
administrator of the government of Upper Canada, in place of the
lieutenant-governor who had obtained leave to visit England. Upper
Canada needed him, and Sir George Prevost made a wise move in this
appointment. Bad feeling between Britain generally and the United States
had developed in connection with the Canadas.
Before Craig left for England, amongst the matters he had discussed with
Brock was that of possible trouble between the Indians in Canada and
United States border citizens. Sir James Craig’s policy is outlined in a
letter to Brock: “Upon every principle of policy our interests should
lead us to use all our endeavors to prevent a rupture between the
Indians and the subjects of the United States.” Brock appreciated the
wisdom of this and followed it out. He instructed those under him, who
had charge of territory inhabited by these Indians, to keep a tight rein
on their maraudings and pillagings and did all he could to discourage
border crime. But, doubtless to his amazement, in the summer of 1811,
the government of the United States accused British officers in Canada
of actually aiding and abetting the Indians in their lawlessness. Brock,
naturally, had a hard enough row to hoe, for though he must deprecate
the cruelty of the Indians, he was anxious to preserve friendliness with
them, since, should war come, he desired them as allies, or at any rate,
did not want them as enemies. His position was difficult.
This was but one of the perplexities which the new administrator of
Upper Canada had to face. Just about this time, domestic trouble caused
him great anxiety. He had two brothers in London, William and Irving.
They were partners in a private bank. Serious financial troubles had
been caused by the wars in Europe, and in New York failures had been
many. Brock, in a letter to his brother Irving, reporting these,
prophesied a financial crash in London. He hoped they had “withheld
their confidence in public stock.” Unfortunately, they had not, and
owing to the depredations of Napoleon’s privateers upon the boats
belonging to his banker-brothers, the latter had had to close their
house. When the books were examined there was an item of £3,000, which
appeared as a debt owed to the bank by Isaac Brock. This was really a
personal loan by William Brock to Isaac, but as the transaction appeared
in the books, Brock deemed himself liable. That was a small matter,
however, compared to the trouble which the bank’s affairs had made
between William and Irving. Irving blamed his brother William for the
smash.
Brock wrote from Canada to Irving imploring his kindliness to William.
“Hang the world! It is not worth a thought,” he wrote. “Be generous, and
find silent comfort in being so.” Brock knew how his brother William,
who had been so kind to him, was suffering. “Why refuse him
consolation”? his letter to Irving read. “Could tears restore him he
would soon be happy.... My thoughts are fixed on you all and the last
thing that gives me any concern is the call which Savery prepared me to
expect from the creditors.”
Great hearted Brock! It meant much to him just now to find £3,000, but
the suffering of William and the breach between the brothers meant far
more.
He felt that, with an effort he could wipe out his own debt. To Irving
he offered his salary as acting lieutenant-governor, which was about
$5,000 a year. He might, had he been any but the just and honorable man
he was, have paid his debt by money made unfairly out of his office;
but, unlike many public men in Canada before and since, he refused to be
a profiteer. Speaking of his opportunities for finding the money, he
wrote to Irving Brock: “Be satisfied that even your stern honesty shall
have no just cause to censure one of my actions.”
Brock was a great soldier, but he was also a great public servant, and
greater in nothing than his rugged and immaculate honesty. Canada to-day
would be better for more Isaac Brocks!
We are coming to an important time alike for Brock and Canada and some
description of his appearance will be interesting. A lionlike head
crowned a splendidly tall body. It was said that he did not find it easy
to get a hat in Canada to fit him. He was fair-headed and of a ruddy
complexion. The gray-blue eyes, added to his fairness, made him more
Anglo-Saxon than Norman in type. He was bluffly handsome, and his genial
smile was the index to a pervading and unceasing kindliness. He was
indeed a gentle man, and so a gentleman. Somebody might aptly have said
of him, in Martin Tupper’s words: “Yet is that giant very gentleness.”
We have touched, before this, on the abundant largeness of his heart. He
had nothing petty about him. He was glad to praise others when they
deserved it, and he was too big a man to steal the credit that belonged
to subordinates. He was a man of example as well as of precept, and he
knew the greater worth of the example. He was essentially humane and
therefore human. And he had the saving grace of a sense of humor.
He was a man of real lovingkindness—with all that that grand old word
means—towards his fellows. Once a certain Hogan deserted from the 49th.
Describing this he said: “A fair damsel persuaded him to this act of
madness, for the poor fellow cannot possibly gain his bread by labor, as
he has half killed himself by excessive drinking, and we know he cannot
live upon love alone.” Brock was not angry; he was compassionate. He was
always sensible of difficulties and never underestimated them. But he
never appraised them too highly. FitzGibbon, afterwards the hero of
Beaver Dam, tells an experience which shows this. At the time FitzGibbon
was a sergeant-major. Brock ordered him to do something which was
admittedly difficult. FitzGibbon said he was sorry, but it was
impossible. “By the Lord Harry,” cried Brock, “don’t tell me it is
impossible. Nothing should be impossible to a soldier. The word
'impossible’ should not be in a soldier’s dictionary.” FitzGibbon never
forgot that and often quoted it to the men under him, when they were
downhearted and inclined to deem things impossible of attainment.
Brock’s outstanding characteristic was his white humanity. His men loved
him because, though far removed from them in position and station, he
was one with them and one for them.
His headquarters were now at York. He was sure and surer of war with the
United States, and even in December of 1811, he told Sir George Prevost
that, in case of war, he thought Canada should seize Mackinaw and
Detroit immediately. This, he submitted, would impress the Indians, and
also hold up an invading army. Acting on his advice, Sir George Prevost
ordered two armed schooners, the _Prince Regent_ and the _Lady Prevost_
to be equipped, one for each of the two lakes, Ontario and Erie.
Early next year, Brock declined a command in Spain which the home
government offered him, requesting to stay in Canada. He had a great
deal on hand. He had a frontier of 1,300 miles to defend, and that
needed many men and much material. He was greatly concerned about
securing these.
In his first address to the House of Assembly at York in February, 1812,
Brock gave striking evidence that he was thoroughly master of the
political situation in Upper Canada. He had in his ears the shrill
bombast of the political leaders in the United States and knew just how
to estimate it. A president had recently declared that the capture of
Canada was a “mere matter of marching.” A Massachusetts officer offered
to “capture Canada by contract, raise a company, and take it in six
weeks.” Henry Clay “verily believed that the militia of Kentucky alone
were competent to place Canada at the feet of Americans.” Said Brock:
“We wish and hope for peace, but it is nevertheless our duty to be
prepared for war.”
He received the support of the Assembly, and, that spring, was more
soldier than governor. He got to know the Six Nations Indians on the
Grand River. He raised companies of militia. He set about the additional
defence of the Niagara frontier and saw that through. He had only 1,450
British regulars,—and just how far it was safe to arm Canada’s dozen
thousand men who were said to be ready to bear arms, he did not know.
Meanwhile war was almost upon him. May saw large detachments of United
States soldiers sent to Detroit and Niagara. At the latter border they
were drilling busily, and this and kindred signs of war seems to have
got on Brock’s nerves. Since war was to come, he was impatient at delay.
He wanted to take the two posts he had mentioned in the first sharp
attack, and thus hearten his people. He knew the value to be placed upon
_morale_. On June 18th, 1812, war against Great Britain was declared by
President Madison, with the consent of the Congress of the United States
of America. The president placed an embargo on shipping. He raised a
public subscription fund and issued a call for a hundred thousand
volunteers.