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