purpose, and word was passed from tavern to tavern on the American
side to rendezvous at the wharf--with arms and ammunition, “but to
take no heed to provisions.” They expected to find food in plenty.
The captain and crew of the _Champlain_ did not care to violate the
neutrality laws, and kept out of the way; so a crew selected from the
patriots took the vessel across the river, through many patches of
drift ice, to a point about four miles above Windsor. The command on
landing was that no noise should be made, the farmers were not to be
wakened, and to make for the barracks, which were guarded by only a
small force. Patriotic Mr. Dougall, bank manager as well as trader,
writes that he was roused from his not too sound sleep by the sound
of shots, saw the flames of already burning barracks, hurried his
wife and family to a place of safety, and made his way to the safe,
where $20,000 was locked up. The old-fashioned receptacle bristled
with knobs, three of which had to be shoved aside before the keyhole
could be uncovered. He shoved every knob on its entire surface and the
keyhole was lost; but eventually he got the money, secured it about
him, seized his gun, and went off towards Sandwich. Those who were
the dupes among the invaders believed that once the protection of
their presence was announced the people would rise up to meet their
deliverers half-way in the effort to overthrow an obnoxious form of
government. The first man they saw in the early morning light was
hastening towards the barracks, evidently someone from Detroit who
had rowed over to give the alarm. They fired and he fell, but the
shot alarmed the sleeping town, and there was an end to the intended
surprise. After that the old nine-pounder in the barrack square,
opposite St. John’s Church, gave a resounding alarm, and as usual
shattered the glass in the church and Court House windows. In a short
time a gallant resistance had been made, and ammunition had given
out; burning brands were thrust inside the torn siding of the wooden
barracks by the brigands, who served themselves materially by getting
under the eaves of the building and so out of range from the guns at
the loopholes. Many within made escape by a door at the back unknown
to the invaders, and those whom the heat forced to the other entrance
sold their lives dearly; some, shot or wounded, were thrust back into
the fire--in all a work of carnage and atrocity. Four brigands were
told off to take burning brands from the barracks to set fire to the
steamboat _Thames_, which lay at the wharf. They did so, to the slogan
of “Remember the _Caroline_.” Never was there so much trouble in
lighting a fire. She was more obstinate than the _Caroline_ herself,
but from bow to stern the flames shot up, and the four incendiaries ran
back to the barracks to take their stand in the line, which prepared
to place itself in an orchard hard by, under Captains Putnam and
Harvell. Putnam, six feet four and hailing from Middlesex, was said to
be a grandson of the old general, Israel Putnam; Harvell was known as
the Big Kentuckian, a man six feet two in height, weighing over two
hundred pounds, and with hair long on his collar; he was a remarkable
figure as he bore an enormous flag adorned with “a large white star in
a blue field--the lone star of Canada.” The “lone star” is evidently
poetic license; the flag bore the ordinary two stars and crescent, as
described by those of each side. Those who had chief honour in routing
this band were Captain Sparkes and his company, who, uniformed in
scarlet, were little inferior to regulars. The patriots aimed at the
bits of bright colour, but in their trepidation fired too high, and
the balls went whistling overhead; in a moment their own ranks were
broken, and the hundred under the pear trees dispersed in disorder, as
Captain Sparkes and his men came over an intervening fence to let them
taste the bayonet. The huge figure of the lone star standard-bearer
made surprising time considering his own weight and the cumbersome
colours, which trailed behind him on the ground. “A hundred dollars to
whoever shoots the standard-bearer,” shouted Mr. Jimmy Dougall in great
excitement, and more than one bullet tried for the reward.
Nothing but the gift of second sight can let one account for the
difference between the patriots’ tale of the Windsor affair and the
somewhat less hysterical loyalist one. The latter chronicle says
Harvell died at once, as indeed he had every right to do; the former,
which credits him with being a veritable Davy Crockett, brave,
honest, impulsive and kind-hearted--very probably all true--says
that he dropped on one knee and fired at his pursuers; that the fire
was not returned, as no doubt they were anxious to secure alive so
handsome and formidable a foe. When his ammunition was exhausted he
drew a bowie knife, “or more properly speaking, tremendous butcher
cleaver,” from his collar, which he brandished menacingly. This act
brought the order to fire; he was far too formidable in appearance to
be allowed to live, and he fell retaining his hold on his staff. The
enemy approached, says the patriot historian, and demanded surrender.
“Never!” said this modern Fitz-James; “I have sworn never to fly mine
enemy, and never to surrender my neck to be broke upon the scaffold.
Come on--come one, come all!” At any rate, to Ensign Rankin belonged
the honour of capturing the flag; that seems the one point upon which
there is unanimity of opinion. Many of the actors in this tragicomedy
of invasion and war shed their stage properties as they fled, parting
company with arms, accoutrements, ammunition, even clothing.
Colonel Prince, who had been on the watch at the Park Farm, passing an
anxious night with a terrified and ailing wife, had by now got word of
what was happening. He made his appearance in fustian shooting-jacket
and wolf-skin cap, no bad dress for the work before him, as he had not
time to assume his ordinary uniform. He at once ordered the pursuit
discontinued, upon which one shamming dead man got up and ran into the
woods. Some stragglers in the militia fired at and killed him, and one
of them, a negro of a thrifty turn like the Scotchman in Galt, pulled
off the brigand’s boots and slung them over his gun; the negro, in
his turn, was to be taken by straggling pirates, and again rescued.
The retreat did not stop until the place where the _Champlain_ had
been left was reached; she had disappeared, and the heroes of the
orchard were constrained to drift about in canoes without paddles like
so many Mrs. Aleshines. They used the stocks of their guns to sweep
themselves ashore on Hog Island. But the river was full of drifting
ice, and Lieutenant Airey and Captain Broderick, who had arrived from
Amherstburg with some of the 34th, a field-piece and twenty mounted
Indians from the Reserve, soon had the gun trained on the canoes. Airey
himself took aim; the first ball plunged at the stern of a canoe,
the second took off a man’s arm, and the arm could be seen spinning
over the water. One patriot was killed outright; his comrades threw
themselves flat, with the exception of the steersman, who, bending as
low as he could, poled the unlucky canoe to shore. They imagined that
the third shot shattered the last canoe, but its load was destined to
illustrate the value of a neutrality law. The men in it were captured
by the Brady Guards; were hailed, fired at and surrounded, in due
order; dropped their guns overboard and were found unarmed; were taken
on board the Guards’ vessel, dried themselves, and were questioned
by the officer as to what they did in Canada, who set fire to the
_Thames_--questions easily evaded; went through the farce of a second
interrogation, were threatened with confinement, were called some hard
names, answered boldly, were cheered by the onlookers; in a stern tone
were ordered ashore, where they were met by “amazingly cordial” shouts;
were escorted to public places of refreshment by an ex-Senator, and,
in a word, received the freedom of the city of Detroit. Happy men to
be there; for there was a terrible retribution going on while their
exciting canoe race and triumphant entry were transpiring.
On the evening before this 3rd of December, a Dr. Hume, assistant
staff-surgeon--only child of Dr. John Hume, of Almada Hill, Lanark,
Scotland, in whose family the medical profession was hereditary, the
father being in Egypt under Abercrombie, and a cousin-german surgeon
to the Duke of Wellington--dined at the house of a friend in Sandwich.
He wore his undress uniform, and during the evening went to the Park
Farm, partly to see the Colonel, as times were exciting; partly to give
professional advice for Mrs. Prince, who was ill to distraction from
nervous fever; partly to prescribe for the Colonel himself, who “was
extremely ill and worn out by fatigue both night and day;” and chiefly
to see the third ill person in this afflicted family, Miss Rudyard.
Hume was a fair-complexioned fellow, of easy and gentlemanly manner,
with a look and countenance peculiarly mild; altogether a pleasing
personality, handsome and distinguished-looking. On the morning of
the attack, he and Commissary Morse directed their steps from the Park
Tavern to where the sounds of firing came, the former to tender his
professional services. They rode, the staff-surgeon still in uniform,
and the horse in its usual military trappings. Someone suggested that
to be in plain clothes might be safer, but he laughingly replied that
no one would touch a doctor. As the incendiaries returned from burning
the _Thames_ they met the two. Hume mistook them for Loyalists. A woman
came out from her house and warned him that they were a detachment
of patriots, but she was too late. The patriot account is that their
captain demanded Hume’s surrender. To his question, “To whom shall
I surrender?” came the answer, “To the Patriots.” He then quickly
dismounted, with the uncomplimentary rejoinder, “Never, to a ---- set
of rebels!” Then a dozen bullets pierced him. “Only part of our force
fired--the rest, among whom I was one, thinking it quite unnecessary
to go to extremes with so brave a man.” The surgeon’s body told a
different story. Colonel Prince’s official despatch says that, not
content with firing several balls into him, the savages stabbed him in
many places with their bowie knives and mangled his body with an axe.
Another Loyalist appears to have been near enough to call out, “Don’t
shoot that man--he is the doctor!” This interruption and their absurd
query, “Then why does he not surrender?” enabled him to slip past the
corner of a house under cover of which he tried to reach a friend’s.
The first man who fired must have been satisfied with his aim, for he
turned to a companion and said, “You may go and take the sword, he
won’t run farther.” At any rate, he retreated, pistol in hand, facing
his enemies. The legends of the time say he was barbarously mutilated,
dismembered, and his heart cut out, and preparations made to skin
him, with a view to drumheads. It was said that these barbarities
were committed under the impression that he was the dreaded Prince
himself; this is now contradicted by many, as are also some of the
details of the atrocities. There are those still alive who say they
saw his quarters hung on the fence pickets by these human shrikes, and
yet others who saw his body intact, as it lay in Mrs. Hawkins’ store.
Hume’s companion fared better; he was shot at, but the balls passed
through his hair.
Again to quote from the despatch: “Of the brigands and pirates, 21 were
killed, besides 4 who were brought in just at the close and immediately
after the engagement, all of whom I ordered to be shot upon the spot,
and which was done accordingly.” Over the last thirteen words were
innumerable articles written, controversies begun which nearly ended
in bloodshed; they led to twelve challenges to the duello from Colonel
Prince to his detractors; to debates in the Houses of Commons and
Lords, where Pakington, Labouchere, Brougham, the Duke of Wellington,
Melbourne and Normanby were to fight over again the famous battle of
Windsor; a reward was offered on the other side of the river, for
Prince’s body $800, for him alive $1,000; the much beset Colonel had
notices displayed on his farm that none should venture there after
dark, as he had spring-guns and man-traps set to protect himself; and
lastly there was the court-martial.
Naturally such a story, horrible at first, grew as it travelled and
as time progressed. “John Bishop of St. Albans, in a fit of jealousy,
shot his wife and then himself,” once wrote a French newspaper. “Jean,
évêque de St. Albans, dans un accès de jalousie a tué sa femme,” said
the first exchange; the next editor supposed that a married bishop must
be an Episcopalian--and next “The Protestant bishop of St. Albans has
killed his wife and then himself.” In like manner ran the prisoner
stories. One unfortunate was commanded by an onlooker to run for his
life, the order to shoot having been already given. He did so, with
results that are sickening in detail. Before long the four prisoners
had developed into nine, who were represented as running the gauntlet,
Indian fashion, with additions of further horror.
A prisoner of war is one captured in the course of acknowledged and
honourable warfare, and the legality or illegality of the contest makes
him a hero or a ruffian. Previous to the fourth of December, ’38, in
connection with recent affairs a subject of frequent debate in the
Sandwich-Windsor neighbourhood was the hanging on the spot, without
the slightest form of trial, of a gang of pirates, by Sir Thomas
Maitland, in the island of Malta. However, this summary proceeding on
the marooners took place a couple of days after the battle with them,
and what was sought for by the Canadians was a precedent for shooting
on the field without allowing time for justice to mellow.
As the “Curiæ Canadenses” tells us, formerly
“These legal seats of divers ranks
Have limit to St. Laurent’s banks;”
by ’37,
“... all beyond, down to Detroit,
Becomes new ground for fresh exploit.”
The exploit of which these debaters, and Colonel Prince in particular,
complained was the decision made under the “discouraging shade cast by
Whig conciliation;” for at the last court held in Sandwich, when he was
prepared to prosecute nine prisoners for murder, he found they, through
some point of law which he never could be brought to understand, had
become dignified as prisoners of war. As to American citizenship and
neutrality laws, it was asked “What avail the speeches, messages,
proclamations and paper measures of the President, when unprovoked
aggressions of his people remain unpunished.” It was small satisfaction
to hear their friends in the neighbouring Republic term the invaders
but the roughscuffs of their people; people--they had no people, they
were the repudiated of either shore. To term them prisoners of war
legalized the cause of the marauders and added hundreds to their ranks.
The Tories upheld Prince in his action anent the Pelee Island prisoners
“who escaped their just deserts under the nickname of prisoners of
war.” Never had he appeared to better advantage than in his address to
the court as he declaimed, “I deny also the right of any person of the
Executive Council, the right of the Lieutenant-Governor, the right of
even Majesty itself, to step between the accuser and those accused of
murder, and to prevent the incipient proceeding of an inquiry into the
matter by the grand inquest of the country.” But a few hours before his
eyes had been filled with the horror of Hume’s body the young surgeon
had been in his house, in full possession of youth, health, strength
and intelligence; he turned over in the barracks the smoking remains
of what he believed to be his fellow-townsmen; he saw the murdered
negro; he was distracted with thoughts of one very dear to him whose
reason he feared would be unhinged; arson and murder, rifle and torch,
the bowie-knife and axe of those whom he considered barbarians, “a
cowardly and scampering set of pirates,” merited but one reward. He
was in command, and he set about putting his ideas into effect. The
details of the “shooting” are so shocking that it is better to omit
them here; and shocking or entirely justifiable, the tale as told by
historian or eye-witness differs throughout. If more brutality than
the case demanded was exercised, it was rebuked by the mounted Indians
who soon afterwards brought in seven prisoners from the woods where an
escape had been attempted. The first cry was, “Bayonet them!” “No,”
said Martin, the Indian leader, “we are Christians, we will not murder
them--we will deliver them to our officers to be treated as they think
proper.” When Prince saw them he ordered the waggon in which they sat
to be wheeled off the road, and as soon as it reached an open spot in
rear of the barracks, which still smoked, he ordered that the prisoners
should be shot. “For God’s sake, don’t let a white man murder what an
Indian has spared!” was the entreaty, and Colonel Prince yielded to it.
Head, once controverting the British idea that Indian warfare was
inadmissible in Canada, gave a supposititious reply: “Our Indians
never scalp us, never scalp each other; and they have only scalped
you because, in defiance of the laws of nations, you invaded their
territory to rob them of their lands. If you think their habits of
war barbarous, learn in future to leave them in the placid enjoyment
of peace.” But the Indians were wiser than Sir Francis in his rounded
periods. The Hurons of Detroit had seen the ships of Jacques Cartier,
and reported great dark animals with broad white wings spitting out
fire and uttering thunder--their first experience of cannon. The cross
planted at Gaspé had sent its lesson far inland by 1837, and the
warrior in feathers and wampum could teach the controllers of gunpowder
by example.
Harvell, the tall Kentuckian, and twelve others were buried in one
grave in the lower corner of Colonel Baby’s orchard; the body of
General Putnam found a grave until his wife and daughter came, had it
exhumed, and took it away.
Of the survivors who scattered themselves in the woods some were
discovered frozen, sitting at the roots of trees and evidently famished
ere they froze; some were found round the miserable remains of a
camp-fire, remnants of potatoes, their only food, scattered about. Many
had been wounded, suffering tortures beyond hunger and cold. Of those
taken alive most were sent to Van Diemen’s Land, among them a farmer
who had joined the expedition haphazard at the last moment when he
was both drunk and reckless. His wife and family could not trace what
became of him; but after the lapse of twenty years he made his escape
to the South Sea Islands, whence he returned to his former home, to
find his wife again married, his children grown up, and his estate in
due course of law divided among them. Hardship and old age had so told
on him there was small fear of recognition; he obtained some small
appointment, never troubled his family, and worked an Enoch Arden end
to an existence spoiled by the sad freak of having been a pirate for a
day.
Some found shelter with the Irish and French peasants, for although
on the whole Loyalist both these nationalities had quickly-moved
sympathies. One of the escaping “officers” threw himself on the
protection of a big Irish woman. “Are yez a Patriarch?” He told her
he was a Patriot. “Thin it’s yourself is safe enough; just hide in
the cellar and kape aisy.” It is said her husband was in Prince’s
employ to deliver all such up; “but bad luck to me if ivvir he sets
his eye on wan o’ thim.” This peasant is said to have kept four such
refugees for six weeks, so well cared for that when they arrived in
Detroit they were “hale, fat and hearty as porkers.” “Now, my lads,”
he remarked to his guests, “you have a taste of how the English use
us poor Irish.” “Bad luck to thim,” chimed in his wife; “my own dear
fader was twelve years hid in a rock for the fear av thim after the
battle of Vinegar Hill, and it’s meself carried his vittles till he
died.” As for Baptiste, his fine address was equal to the occasion. One
hunted creature, some troopers in hot pursuit, burst into a neat little
cabin where the Frenchman had risen but madame had not. Taking in the
situation at a glance, he clapped a night-cap on the patriot’s head,
popped him into bed beside the astonished wife, and when the soldiers
entered, with elbows well in and palms extended he shrugged his
ignorance of any rebels--no one but his two women-kind, _les voilà!_ He
gave the searchers directions towards the bush, and in a short time had
his patriot in a canoe, well out in the river, bound for Detroit.
Next morning a large concourse of people, the officers of the militia,
Captain Sparkes’ company and a division of Captain Bell’s under Ensign
Powell, all in full uniform and with arms reversed, preceded the corpse
of the murdered Hume to the churchyard. The Grenadier company of the
34th, drawn up before the Court House, presented arms, so remaining
until the procession had passed. The moaning of the wind, the naked
branches of the trees above the open grave, the falling snow, were
in unison with the sadness of the onlookers; “Suffer us not for any
pain of death to fall away from Thee” came with a new meaning to
the hearers’ hearts; the words of the ever beautiful ritual for the
burial of the dead rose and fell from the rector’s lips on the wintry
atmosphere; “dust to dust, ashes to ashes,” a volley of musketry, and
the family name of Hume was extinct. His fortune of some £20,000,
derived from his mother, passed to distant relatives.
The uproar which ensued after this series of tragedies was not by any
means all Loyalist-Rebel, nor yet pure righteous indignation; party
feeling, private spleen, and the complexity of motives good and bad
which enter into any similar demonstration where the actors are human,
all had place. A man of extraordinary popularity is generally a mark
for jealousy. Across the river hatred of him culminated in the action
of “the waddling, twaddling Theller,” who announced that he was coming
over at the head of two thousand men and would wash his hands in the
blood of John Prince. The patriots who had been saved in the canoes
told crowds of “Detroit’s most intelligent citizens” the details of
their truly thrilling escape, not only by canoe, but from “the Indian
and negro volunteers in the Royal service, or from the more brutal
Orangemen.” After he was taken prisoner on the _Anne_, this Theller
had experienced the weight of Colonel Prince’s foot and knew the
measure of his speech. In the middle of what he terms a refreshing
and invigorating sleep he was waked by a kick from “an individual of
the name of John Prince, who had run away from London, England, with
plenty of golden means to secure himself a retreat in the western wilds
of Canada,” where he strove to “imitate the manners of the artificial
nobility of his native land.” This individual Prince “was thirsting
for knighthood,” was dark, mysterious, cruel, vindictive, plausible
but to deceive, and--herein lay his greatest crime and was the only
item of truth in Theller’s impeachment--spared no time, money, act, to
crush the hopes of the friends of Canadian rebellion. “His friendly
salute aroused me,” writes Theller; “he was armed to the teeth. A brace
of pistols and a tomahawk graced his girdle; on his back was slung
a double-barrelled gun; a long cavalry sword dangled at his side,
a wide-mouthed blunderbuss in his right hand. His whole appearance
betokened malignity and determined vengeance.”
Under these circumstances Colonel Prince must be excused for using his
foot; clearly it was the only free part of his anatomy. Some months
before this trying pedal performance, Theller on the dock at Windsor
had taken upon himself to lecture the Colonel, his “blessed privilege
as an American citizen” so to do, after Prince had been similarly
engaged with a French-Canadian whom he suspected of disaffection.
Theller knew, “by the restless brilliancy of his eye, dastardly
flashing like the electricity of an approaching thunderstorm,” what he
had to expect. He quietly enough stepped on the ferry ready to leave
for Detroit, concluding, “Thus was I rescued for the first time from
the cherished revenge of this man!”
Between their last meeting and the battle of Windsor Theller had made
his wonderful leap for life from the citadel at Quebec and was back in
Detroit, ready to inaugurate more mischief just when the attack was the
theme of every tongue there.
Perhaps the unkindest mention of the battle was the report given,
as the events progressed, by the Detroit _Morning Post_, fresh from
the wonderful spy-glass of the reporter: “The infantry are evidently
citizens and, as near as we can judge by means of a spy-glass, are like
men employed in an unwilling service. They move at the rate of two
miles an hour, and have several times stopped, as though irresolute
about proceeding.”
In his own country Colonel Prince was more of a hero than ever. His
journeys were ovations. Hamilton, Oakville, Chatham, and London
testified to a general appreciation. In Chatham “the incorporated
companies saluted him not only with arms, but with hearty cheers;” at
London the Union Jack was run up on his hotel, and fire balls were
thrown about to make the night brilliant; the volunteers, under Colonel
Burwell, came out to do him honour, drawing from him a short, pithy
address in which he announced that should a similar opportunity occur
a similar result would follow, and his only regret was he had given
the much-talked-of prisoners a soldier’s death; addresses, signed by
hundreds of the District’s best residents, testified to approval and
continued respect; and by the time he reached the House of Assembly he
was greeted with a burst of enthusiasm which was supposed to and did
represent the feelings of the majority of constituents as well as of
members.