After the capture of York, General Dearborn resolved to attempt the
capture of Fort George. On the morning of the 27th of May, the light
troops under Colonel Scott and Major Forsyth, supported by Colonel
Porter’s light artillery and General Lewis’s division, crossed the
Niagara river, and attacked the fort. Other brigades of troops
followed. Commodore Chauncey had made judicious arrangements with
his small ships, to silence the enemy’s batteries at the point of
landing. The descent was warmly contested at the water’s edge, by the
British; but they were soon compelled to give way, and the landing
was completed. The American batteries soon succeeded in rendering the
fort untenable. The British, retiring from the banks of the river,
re-entered the fort, fired a few shot, set fire to the magazine, and
then moved off in different directions. Of the British regular troops,
ninety were killed, one hundred and sixty wounded, and one hundred
captured. The Americans lost seventeen killed, and sixty wounded.
[Illustration: FORT GEORGE.]
[Illustration: DEFENCE OF SACKETT’S HARBOR.]