1812

THE LIVERPOOL MINISTRY’S plan of attack against the United States had been developing for weeks before Napoleon’s abdication, but it could not be implemented until Bonaparte was packed off to Elba in April 1814. Once that event actually occurred, the prime minister and his colleagues intended to divert forces from Europe to smash the incipient power of the United States. They wanted to regain Britain’s position as the dominant power on the North American continent and crush a bothersome maritime rival.

Their grandiose strategy included two major invasions of the United States—one from Canada and the other from New Orleans. Simultaneously, large-scale raids would be conducted along the Atlantic seaboard to act as diversions, and the blockade would be tightened from the Canadian border to Louisiana. The goal was to wrest the Louisiana Territory, including West Florida, from the United States and unite it with both Canada and the newly acquired base at Astoria on the Pacific coast. At the same time, Liverpool intended to further dismember the United States by encouraging New England to break away from the Union and either join Canada or become independent and by creating a huge Indian buffer state north and west of the Ohio River.

Liverpool’s basic policy in America differed markedly from the one he and Castlereagh pursued in Europe, where they sought to restore a balance of power that would prevent a single country from gaining dominance, as Napoleon had, and directly threatening British security. In America their policy was to reassert dominance on the continent through the acquisition of territory. The central question, as Castlereagh put it later to Liverpool, was “Is it desirable to take the chance of the campaign, and then to be governed by circumstances? If the latter is advisable, we have the means of doing so.” Being governed by circumstances meant taking advantage of opportunities presented by the military campaigns to be waged in North America during the spring, summer, and fall of 1814.

Although Liverpool’s goals were extensive, they were also flexible. He could extend or contract them as the success of British arms warranted. Realities on the ground would ultimately determine the extent of his demands at the negotiating table. In the spring of 1814, with British hubris soaring after the great victory over Napoleon, the prime minister’s expectations were high indeed.

On April 22, 1814, Albert Gallatin was in London witnessing the effect of Napoleon’s abdication on Britain, and he was understandably concerned. He sent a letter to Henry Clay in Gothenburg, Sweden, analyzing why the British cabinet was adding substantially to its land and sea forces in North America instead of settling the war with the United States. “A well organized and large army is at once liberated from any European employment, and ready, together with a super abundant naval force to act immediately against us,” he wrote. Gallatin was careful to point out that the Liverpool ministry “profess to be disposed to make an equitable peace.” But the sheer weight of opinion in Britain, he thought, might move them in the opposite direction. “The hope not of ultimate conquest but of a dissolution of the union, the convenient pretense which the American war will afford to preserve large military establishments, and above all the force of popular feeling may all unite in inducing the Cabinet in throwing impediments in the way of peace.... That the war is popular, and that national pride inflated by the last unexpected success cannot be satisfied without what they call the chastisement of America, cannot be doubted.”

Gallatin underestimated the extent of the cabinet’s plans for North America. His portrayal of the ministers as reasonable men carried away by public opinion was inaccurate. Liverpool and his colleagues were as much caught up in the spirit of the moment as the rest of the country.

The euphoria of the spring and early summer led Liverpool to expect operations in America to be completed in a relatively short time. After fighting the French for twenty-two years, a long-term commitment of massive forces in North America would be too onerous for already overburdened British taxpayers. Liverpool expected that Madison would cave in quickly. British newspapers like the Times were constantly pointing out how weak American finances were, how difficult it was for Madison to increase the army and navy, and how divided the country was. Liverpool and Castlereagh also assumed that sufficient harmony existed among the European powers to make a peace settlement on the continent relatively easy to arrange, freeing their hand in North America.

Dispatching the land and sea forces necessary to carry out the ministry’s ambitious strategy required time, however. Although plans for operations in America had been developing since November, nothing could be done until Napoleon actually abdicated, which did not occur until the second week of April. Assembling the troops necessary for the invasion of America and then transporting them would take weeks. The earliest the expeditionary forces would reach Bermuda and Canada was the summer.

Also, the number of troops that would be available was limited by conditions in Europe. Although Liverpool and Castlereagh were optimistic in the spring of 1814 about prospects of an early and satisfactory settlement in Europe, they still had to wait for it to happen before they diverted too many troops to North America. They were confident enough, however, to begin dispatching veterans from Wellington’s army in France before a settlement in Europe was finalized. They were taking a big chance, but their confidence in the spring was so strong they were willing to assume the risk.

It is not surprising that the forces they actually dispatched were small, given their expectations. The hubris of the cabinet was so high the ministers vastly underestimated how many troops it would take to cow a nation of nearly eight million, divided though she might be. Only 13,000 were dispatched to Canada, bringing the total of British regulars there to 29,000. Of these, 3,000 were sent from Portsmouth and Cork in May, but the bulk of them, some 10,000, would come from Wellington’s veterans in France. They would be sent later in June from Bordeaux and ports on the Mediterranean to Canada, traveling first to Bermuda and then to Quebec under their own generals. These troops and their officers were Wellington’s best, but they had been fighting in the Iberian Peninsula and France for seven years without relief. By the time they reached Quebec they were not the crack troops they had once been.

To conduct raids along the American seacoast the ministry thought in terms of 4,000 to 5,000 men, and to invade New Orleans they planned to use the men conducting the seacoast raids and add enough troops to bring the total to 10,000. Thus, for the invasion of a country as large as the United States, they planned to use a tired army of fewer than 35,000. Of course, these forces could be augmented as the need arose, but London did not think that would be necessary.

The army Liverpool was sending was considerably smaller than George III had dispatched in 1775 and 1776 to subdue the colonies when their population was no more than two and a half million. In 1776 the number of British troops sent to occupy New York City alone had been over 30,000. An additional 8,000 had been in Canada, poised to invade, and 4,000 more had been on troop transports off the Carolinas preparing to subdue the South, bringing the total of the king’s forces in America in 1776 to over 42,000.

Changing from defense to offense against America in 1814 required new leadership. On November 4, 1813, when the results of the Battle of Leipzig were first becoming known in London, and the British believed their long battle with Napoleon was finally coming to an end, the Admiralty decided to recall Admiral Sir John Borlase Warren and replace him with fifty-six-year-old Vice Admiral Alexander F. I. Cochrane. The son of a Scottish peer and a longtime navy veteran, Cochrane had plenty of experience during the American Revolutionary War and in the West Indies, where he was commander in chief on the Leeward Islands Station and governor of Guadeloupe. The Admiralty expected him to act far more aggressively along the Atlantic coast than Warren had and to invade New Orleans. Cochrane’s fleet captain would be Trafalgar hero Edward Codrington.

Cochrane received his orders on January 25, 1814. After long discussions with Lord Melville (First Lord of the Admiralty) in London, Cochrane sailed for Bermuda, arriving on March 6 raring to go. His assumption of command was delayed for a month, however, until Admiral Warren finally departed on April 1. To make effective use of Cochrane, the Admiralty relieved him of some administrative responsibilities that had burdened Warren. Cochrane’s new command was limited to the North American coast. The Jamaica and Leeward Islands Stations were once again separated, and Admiral Yeo was given an independent command on the lakes. To further support Cochrane, Rear Admiral Edward Griffith would direct the fleet from Nantucket to the St. Lawrence River. At the time the British were making these changes they were feeling an extravagant sense of their power, and they expected spectacular results. Cochrane understood the optimism in London. He wrote to Bathurst, “I have it much at heart to give them a complete drubbing before peace is made, when I trust their northern limits will be circumscribed and the command of the Mississippi wrested from them.”

Cochrane was expected to work closely with Major General Robert Ross—one of Wellington’s best generals—who would command the troops raiding the eastern seaboard as well as direct land operations against New Orleans. Ross departed Bordeaux with his soldiers on June 2, 1814, and reached Bermuda on July 25.

Governor General Prevost and Admiral Yeo were not replaced, however. They were expected to direct the land and naval offensives from Canada, even though they had shown no capacity for offensive operations in the preceding months nor even an ability to work together. Nonetheless, Prevost was expected to attack Sackets Harbor, the Champlain Valley, and possibly the Hudson Valley. Success, it was thought, would protect Canada from another American invasion, while encouraging New England to break away from the Union, and justify a radical adjustment of Canada’s boundary southward.

WHILE LIVERPOOL AND his colleagues had a clear idea of the North American strategy they intended to pursue in the spring of 1814, President Madison, uncertain about British plans, was in a quandary. He hoped that faced with the monumental task of redrawing the map of Europe, Liverpool would end the war with America on reasonable terms. But that did not appear to be happening. Even though Castlereagh had proposed direct negotiations and Madison had accepted, the president was fearful that Liverpool was bent on achieving stunning military victories before undertaking any serious talks. Madison responded to the potential threat by continuing to attack Canada and hoping that meaningful negotiations would begin soon.

Thus, in the winter and spring of 1814, while London waited for Napoleon’s final capitulation, Madison continued with his quixotic campaign against Canada. As had been the case during the previous two years, however, neither the army nor the navy was strong enough to accomplish the president’s goals. In January, what remained of the army of the north was at Detroit and Amherstburg, under Lieutenant Colonel George Groghan, and at French Mills, New York, under General James Wilkinson. Bitter cold, poor food, inadequate clothing, filthy camps, and uncontrolled disease, especially dysentery, plagued Wilkinson soldiers. At the end of January, Secretary Armstrong ordered him to send Jacob Brown with 2,000 men to Sackets Harbor and march the rest of his army to Plattsburgh, where the troops could find some relief.

Wilkinson knew he was going to be cashiered for the disasters of the previous year. He spent the next few weeks recuperating and planning an action that might retrieve some of his lost reputation, perhaps even allow him to keep his job. On March 27, in what can only be described as a bizarre stunt, he marched 4,000 men and eleven pieces of artillery five miles across the Canadian border to attack a tiny British outpost at Lacolle Mill. It took three difficult days of plodding through deep snow and getting lost before he found his way to a giant, fortresslike millhouse made of thick stone and defended by 180 men. Wilkinson tried blasting them out with heavy guns, but the building remained intact. The British garrison at Isle aux Noix was ten miles away, and it attempted a rescue, but Brigadier General Alexander Macomb’s brigade turned it back in some sharp fighting. Instead of then besieging the millhouse with his overwhelming numbers, Wilkinson called off the attack and marched back to Plattsburgh.

Eleven days later, he learned that Major General Ralph Izard would relieve him. Wilkinson claimed he was being persecuted. Actually, replacing him was part of a long overdue change in the army’s leadership. The president and the secretary of war wanted generals who could perform better than relics like Wilkinson, Hampton, Hull, Dearborn, Boyd, and Morgan Lewis. Armstrong advised that the new leaders be appointed regardless of seniority. The president agreed, and he promoted two brigadier generals, Izard and Jacob Brown, to major general and six colonels to brigadier general: Winfield Scott, Alexander Macomb, Thomas Smith, Daniel Bissell, Edmund Gaines, and Eleazer E. Ripley. William Henry Harrison, pressured by Armstrong, resigned in May, opening up a slot for Brigadier General Andrew Jackson to become a major general. Peter B. Porter replaced Amos Hall as head of the New York militia. The average age for generals in the U. S. Army was now thirty-six instead of sixty. For the first time in the war, the army had leadership that was as good as the navy’s. Madison and Armstrong also created a general staff for the army that markedly improved the efficiency of the War Department.

To further strengthen the army, Congress approved Madison’s request to raise enlistment bounties to a whopping $124, plus 320 acres of land. As a result, the recruitment of regulars for five years or until the end of the war increased significantly. By the spring of 1814, the army had risen to 40,000 men, and by the end of the year to nearly 45,000. The president retained Armstrong, however, even though the secretary bore a major part of the responsibility for the failures of the previous year. Madison wasn’t happy with him, but he evidently thought replacing him was more bother than it was worth.

GAINING NAVAL SUPREMACY on lakes Ontario and Champlain was as essential, in Madison’s view, as reinvigorating the army. Secretary Jones spared no effort to carry out the president’s policy, but he thought the forces building on the lakes should be part of a defensive, rather than an offensive, strategy. He did not think it wise, given the government’s limited resources, to continue attacking Canada. He urged that emphasis be placed on the oceans, “where twenty of his ships cannot check the depredations of one of our ships or prevent the capture of his single ships.” Secretary Armstrong disagreed; he wanted to move aggressively against Canada. He continued to support attacking Kingston as a prelude to moving on Montreal, but if that failed, he was open to making an effort in the Niagara area and farther west with a view to acquiring all of Upper Canada. The administration gave little thought to defending the eastern seaboard against attacks.

Secretary Jones wrote to Commodore Chauncey on January 15, 1814, emphasizing again the president’s urgent desire to obtain supremacy on Lake Ontario. “Every possible resource and effort must be directed to the creation of such a force at Sackets Harbor as will enable you to meet the enemy on the Lake the moment he may appear, and with means competent to ensure success.”

Jones also urged Master Commandant Macdonough to do whatever was necessary to regain supremacy on Lake Champlain so that he “could meet the enemy on the first opening of navigation.” Macdonough had a monumental task ahead of him. At the end of December 1813 he had only the 6-gun sloop President, the 7-gun sloop Preble, and the 7-gun sloop Montgomery, along with four gunboats carrying one long eighteen-pounder each. The British had four men-of-war at Isle aux Noix, including two captured the year before. The ships were small, the largest carried only 13 guns, but Commander Daniel Pring was building the 16-gun Niagara (renamed Linnet). Pring, who had been Yeo’s flag captain in the Wolfe, was appointed commander of the Lake Champlain fleet in July 1813. He was one of the better officers in the Royal Navy.

To help Yeo win the arms races on both lakes, and to restore British supremacy on Lake Erie, the Admiralty sent him sailors, ships in frame, shipwrights, dockhands, guns, ammunition, and naval stores. The added resources were having an effect. During the winter of 1813–14, Chauncey fell seriously behind in the “war of the dockyards,” as the great Canadian scholar Robert Malcomson called it. The energy and optimism that had marked Chauncey’s work when he first arrived at Sackets Harbor in the fall of 1812 had considerably diminished. He estimated that it would not be until July that he had supremacy again on Lake Ontario.

During the winter, Yeo raced ahead at Kingston, building the 58-gun Prince Regent, the 40-gun Princess Charlotte, and three gunboats, Crysler, Queenston, and Niagara. Three more would come later. To help man them, the Admiralty sent seven hundred ten seamen and a battalion of marines—a considerable reinforcement. The ice broke on Lake Ontario the first of April, and two weeks later Yeo’s ships and crews were ready to fight.

At Sackets Harbor, on the other hand, Henry Eckford and his men did not begin construction on new ships until January. He was building two brigs, the 20-gun Jefferson, under Master Commandant Melancthon Woolsey, and the 20-gun Jones, under Master Commandant Charles Ridgely. Both were launched the second week of April. Eckford was also building the 58-gun Superior and the 42-gun Mohawk. When completed, Chauncey would have unquestioned supremacy on Lake Ontario, but the Superior was not even launched until the first of May and the Mohawk not until the eleventh of June.

Obtaining enough men remained a problem for Chauncey. Madison tried to help by signing a law increasing wages for service on the lakes by 25 percent and increasing the bounty by a third. On March 7 the commodore wrote to Jones, “The increase pay and bounty I think will insure men for this service, and in fact they deserve it for they suffer much beyond what anyone can form an idea of unless they witness it—we seldom have less than 20 percent of our whole number sick and sometimes 30 percent—within three days we have buried seven marines out of a corps of 180 and have this day on the sick report of the same corps 40—and our seamen in nearly the same proportion.” The commodore’s own health was being compromised by long service on the lake, just as Oliver Hazard Perry’s had been on Lake Erie.

IN PURSUANCE OF Secretary Armstrong’s orders, General Brown split off from Wilkinson’s army and marched west to Sackets Harbor with 2,000 men, arriving on February 16, 1814. In early March Brown received orders from Armstrong indicating he wanted to attack Kingston as soon as practicable. A direct attack on Montreal was ruled out because it was thought to be too strong. Moving on Kingston proved impossible, however. The mildness of the winter made traveling across the ice too hazardous, and Chauncey would not be ready with his fleet until July at the earliest.

Unable to attack Kingston, Brown marched west to Buffalo. He was under the impression that Armstrong wanted him to move to the Niagara area, but the secretary had intended only to make a feint in that direction. Nonetheless, when Armstrong discovered Brown had traveled west, he approved the move. General Brown waited at Buffalo for further orders, and his subordinate Winfield Scott trained the troops, something they badly needed.

At this point, the president still did not have a clear idea of how he was going to proceed. British forces in Canada were still relatively weak, and Madison continued to support an invasion, but without a definite plan. In the absence of a clear overall strategy, Armstrong, without the administration giving any thought to it, shifted the focus of the invasion west to the Niagara River, a peripheral area, when Kingston and Montreal were the original and more logical targets.

WHEN THE Prince Regent and Princess Charlotte were finished in Kingston the third week of April, Admiral Yeo and Lieutenant General Gordon Drummond prepared to attack Sackets Harbor, but Prevost, judging the defenses to be too strong, restrained them. Yeo and Drummond then looked for an easier target and decided to attack Oswego, through which Chauncey routed nearly all his supplies.

On May 5, the British fleet suddenly hove into view off the beach at Oswego, where U.S. Army Colonel George Mitchell prepared hurriedly to fight with only 290 men. Yeo opened fire on the American defenses a mile from shore. At the same time, he deployed fifteen boats loaded with troops. As they approached the beach, Mitchell’s accurate artillery fire created so much havoc the boats turned around and went back to the ships. Undeterred, Yeo attacked again the next morning. His flagship Wolfe pounded Mitchell’s batteries and the fort, while his huge landing force of as many as 1,000 rowed once more toward the beach.

After putting up what fight he could against overwhelming odds, Mitchell retreated in good order to Oswego Falls, twelve miles up the Oswego River, and prepared to defend the important supply depot there. For some unknown reason Yeo did not follow. Instead, he settled for capturing the schooner Penelope, a supply vessel that was sitting in the harbor with a cargo of three long thirty-two-pounders and two long twenty-four-pounders; two bateaux with a cargo of one thirty-two-pounder and one twenty-four-pounder; some ordinance; naval stores; a large quantity of rope; and 2,600 barrels of flour, pork, salt, and bread. Yeo overlooked the far more important heavy guns, cables, and other supplies at Oswego Falls. Had he captured those, Chauncey’s shipbuilding would have been set back weeks. Secretary Jones wrote to the president that had the enemy destroyed what was at Oswego Falls, “the consequences would be disastrous indeed.”

The following week Yeo began blockading Sackets Harbor. Chauncey was convinced that if the British had launched an attack right then, they would have taken the shipyard. “If Sir James had landed 3000 men when he first appeared off this harbor and made a simultaneous attack with the fleet,” Chauncey wrote to Jones, “he must have carried the place, for our new vessels (with the exception of the Jefferson) at that time were without their armament and the military force had been considerably weakened by five hundred of the best troops being ordered from this place to Buffalo and a few days ago about seven hundred more marched in the same direction.” General Brown, who was in charge of the army defending Sackets Harbor, strongly disagreed; he thought the defenses were more than adequate. He had placed General Gaines in command with 1,500 troops, and he thought Gaines had the matter well in hand. Yeo must have concluded the same thing, for he did not attack. Chauncey had a bad habit of overestimating the enemy’s strength and underestimating his own.

Avoiding Yeo’s blockade was a constant problem for Master Commandant Melancthon Woolsey, who was in charge of moving heavy guns and other essential equipment and provisions from Oswego to Sackets Harbor. Woolsey ran bateaux at night along the coast, hugging the shore. On May 28, nineteen bateaux, carrying twenty-one thirty-two-pounders, thirteen smaller guns, and ten heavy cables, silently moved out of the Oswego River for the trip. One of the bateaux lost its way, however, and fell into British hands. A captured sailor was forced to reveal details of the shipment. Yeo immediately dispatched Commander Stephen Popham with two hundred men to seize it. On May 30 Popham attacked Woolsey’s remaining eighteen boats at Sandy Creek, twenty miles north of the Oswego and thirty miles south of Sackets Harbor.

Commander Popham was in for a surprise, however. Woolsey had laid a clever trap. Major Daniel Appling of the U.S. Army, with 120 men and an equal number of Oneida Indians, supported by cavalry and light artillery that Chauncey provided when he learned what was afoot, waited for Popham and attacked when he least expected it. In the ensuing melee, Popham lost 14 men and had 28 wounded before he surrendered. Appling captured 6 Royal Navy officers, 55 sailors and marines, and 106 soldiers. He also took two gunboats and five barges. The defeat induced more caution in Yeo; he could ill afford to lose either the men or the boats.

On June 6 Yeo returned to Kingston with his fleet. He was building the gargantuan 102-gun St. Lawrence, and he decided to wait for her to be completed and for more reinforcements from England before he attacked Chauncey. Drummond agreed that a delay was in order. Until Chauncey launched the Mohawk and the Superior, however, Yeo still had command of the lake. Drummond could move men and equipment wherever he pleased, and the Americans could not.

WHILE YEO WAS concentrating on Lake Ontario, he neglected Lake Champlain. He used the new powers the Admiralty had given him to command all the operations on the lakes to put the lion’s share of his resources into building the St. Lawrence. His fixation with the giant ship drained men and materiel away from Commander Pring’s operation on Lake Champlain. Yeo had done the same thing to Barclay on Lake Erie the previous year, depriving him of the resources needed to compete with Perry. Pring continued to build at Isle aux Noix but not with the speed that would have allowed him to keep ahead of Macdonough. Yeo’s obsession also allowed Chauncey to regain superiority on Lake Ontario the first week of August, when the Mohawk and Superior were finally finished. Even by that time, the St. Lawrence was not yet launched. It would not be until September 10, and it would not be ready to sail until October 16, just as the season was ending.

Meanwhile, Master Commandant Macdonough was working hard preparing his fleet at Vergennes, Vermont, twenty-two miles south of Burlington and approximately fifty miles from Plattsburg. He had moved his squadron to Vergennes in December 1813 and had established a secure dockyard on Otter Creek, one of the state’s largest rivers. The facility was situated at the head of navigation, seven miles from the mouth of the creek. Timber resources were plentiful, and Vergennes had a blast furnace, an air furnace, eight forges, a rolling mill, a wire factory, a grist mill, and a mill for fulling cloth.

Macdonough’s biggest problem continued to be a lack of seamen. Even with added bonuses and more pay, finding sailors was difficult. Recruiting offices were opened in Boston and New York, but the bounties now being offered for service in the army, the attraction of privateers, the high price of clothing (which seamen had to pay for themselves), and little prospect of prize money on Lake Champlain continued to make recruiting slow. While Macdonough waited for sailors, he asked the army to fill the gap. General Izard loaned him 250 soldiers until more seamen arrived.

Macdonough was competing for resources with Chauncey, just as Pring was with Yeo. Fortunately, Secretary Jones had a higher appreciation of the critical needs on Lake Champlain than the Admiralty did. Jones induced Noah Brown and his brother Adam, the shipbuilders who had worked miracles for Perry on Lake Erie, to do the same at Vergennes. They arrived in February 1814 and went right to work. By March 2, two new gunboats were in the water, and a 26-gun ship, the Saratoga, was begun. By March 7 her keel had been laid, and on April 11 she was launched—a remarkable feat. The ship’s timber had been standing in the forest less than six weeks before.

By April 2 Lake Champlain was free of ice, and Macdonough had to worry about Pring destroying his operation before the American force got too powerful. Macdonough erected strong defenses along Otter Creek and at its mouth. He received support from Brigadier General Macomb at Burlington and General Izard at Plattsburgh. Federalist governor Chittenden of Vermont also helped. Chittenden did not approve of the war, but he was willing to call out the Vermont militia to defend Vergennes. He sent 1,000 men to guard Otter Creek and another 500 to strengthen Macomb at Burlington.

On May 9 Commander Pring went after Macdonough, standing out from the Isle aux Noir with the new 16-gun Linnet, five sloops, thirteen galleys, and a bomb vessel. Five days later, he appeared off Otter Creek, where he planned to create an impassable obstruction by sinking two sloops in its mouth. Macdonough had been aware of Pring’s movements for days, and he was waiting for him with seven long twelve-pounders and one fieldpiece posted on the high ground overlooking the entrance to the creek. He also had ten galleys strung across its mouth.

Pring’s bomb vessel and eight galleys tested the creek’s defenses, exchanging fire with the shore batteries for an hour and a half before it became obvious that Macdonough was too strong; Pring had no hope of putting obstructions at the mouth of the creek, so he withdrew. A short time later, observers at Burlington saw the British squadron sailing northward.

Thanks to the Browns, by May 30 Macdonough’s fleet was superior to the British squadron. He assembled his ships at the mouth of Otter Creek—the 26-gun Saratoga, the 16-gun schooner Ticonderoga, the 10-gun sloop President, the 9-gun sloop Preble, the 6-gun sloop Montgomery, and six galleys with two guns each. The Ticonderoga was a former steamboat that the Browns had converted into a schooner, launching her on May 12, two days before Pring’s attack. Two weeks later, Macdonough sailed north toward the Canadian border and the Richelieu River with his entire squadron, forcing Pring to move his vessels back to the safety of the Isle aux Noix.

Macdonough then moved his fleet to Plattsburg, anchoring in the bay on the twenty-ninth. Oliver Hazard Perry and Isaac Hull sent letters wishing him good luck with his mission. Macdonough was confident in his squadron. He wrote to Secretary Jones, “I find the Saratoga to be a fine ship.” And he told Izard that his men-of-war were “remarkably fine vessels.” He also informed the general that “the squadron is ready for service.”

Pring was not sitting idle, however. Macdonough soon discovered the enterprising British commander had started a crash program to build the giant 37-gun frigate Confiance. In addition, eleven galleys had arrived at the Isle aux Noix from Quebec. With the new ship and boats the British would dominate the lake again. On June 11 Macdonough warned Jones of the imminent danger and requested funds to build another warship. Knowing how strapped the navy was for money, Jones hesitated. The president intervened, however, and ordered the ship built. Macdonough directed the Browns to start the 20-gun Eagle immediately, hoping it would be finished in time to help deal with the Confiance. Work went ahead at a furious pace, but the delay was potentially fatal.

Macdonough now returned to Pointe aux Fer just above Chazy, where he could watch the Richelieu River, remaining there until the end of August. His blockade materially slowed progress on the Confiance, when he captured three parties of Vermont traitors attempting to run a mainmast, three topmasts, and other spars to the Isle aux Noix, along with twenty-seven barrels of tar.

Two days before the Eagle joined Macdonough, on August 25, Pring launched the Confiance. When she was in the water, Admiral Yeo decided that in spite of Commander Pring’s excellent record, a higher ranking officer should be in charge at the Isle aux Noix, and he sent Captain Peter Fisher from Kingston. Pring remained as his second. The sudden, ill-thought-out change in command would have important consequences.

MEANWHILE, ON MAY 14–15 at Presque Isle on Lake Erie, Captain Arthur Sinclair—the new naval commander on the lake—and Colonel John B. Campbell, on their own initiative, led a raiding party of seven hundred across the lake to Port Dover on the Long Point peninsula to destroy the town and a large quantity of flour. Campbell landed his men on the fourteenth at the village of Dover, and in retaliation for General Riall’s destruction of Buffalo, he burned all the private and public buildings in the defenseless town and three mills near Turkey Point. Campbell wrote to Armstrong, “I determined to make them feel the effects of that conduct they had pursued toward others.” Madison, however, was chagrined. Colonel Campbell was court-martialed and censured. Unaware of the president’s strong disapproval of Campbell’s actions, five days after his raid, American troops from Amherstburg burned Port Talbot on the northern shore of Lake Erie, midway between Amherstburg and Buffalo. Pro-American Canadian volunteers participated in the raid.

When Lieutenant General Drummond informed Governor-General Prevost of Campbell’s attack and the wanton destruction, Prevost was bitter. Ignoring the depraved acts of his own troops, as he always did, he sought retribution. On June 2 he wrote to Admiral Cochrane, the new commander of the North American station, demanding attacks on American coastal towns.

PRESIDENT MADISON SPENT the month of May 1814 at Montpelier. After he returned to Washington, he gathered the cabinet on June 7 to discuss strategy for the war. For weeks it had been obvious that the country faced a serious threat from Britain. Rear Admiral Cockburn was already sounding a loud alarm bell by ratcheting up his spring campaign in Chesapeake Bay. Madison recognized the danger. He warned Monroe that they had to be prepared for “the worst measures of the enemy and in their worst forms.”

The major threat came from Canada, where troops from Wellington’s army were gathering in large numbers. A force of that size could only have Montreal as its base, with Plattsburgh and Sackets Harbor the most obvious targets. Additional British forces at Bermuda threatened Washington and Baltimore, as well as Philadelphia, New York, Newport, Boston, and Portsmouth, New Hampshire—indeed, the entire eastern seaboard. The situation required the United States to adopt a defensive posture and immediately strengthen Plattsburgh and Washington, the two weakest areas.

Instead, Madison unaccountably decided to deploy a significant portion of his army west, away from the probable theaters of action. He ordered Captain Sinclair on Lake Erie to use four or five vessels from his small fleet to transport 800 to 1,000 men under Lieutenant Colonel Croghan and occupy the enemy’s new base at Matchedash on Severn Sound in Georgian Bay, take Fort St. Joseph, and recapture Fort Michilimackinac.

The president also decided that when Chauncey acquired command of Lake Ontario, which the commodore predicted would be in mid-July, General Brown’s army at Buffalo would cross the Niagara River and invade Canada with a view to “reducing the peninsula, and proceeding towards York.” In addition, Madison approved building fourteen or fifteen armed boats at Sackets Harbor for use on the St. Lawrence after Chauncey had dominance on the lake. The boats were to interrupt water communication between Kingston and Montreal. The only role envisioned for Ralph Izard’s force of 5,000 at Plattsburg was to create a diversion by making a demonstration against Montreal. Amazingly, the president continued in an offensive mode, placing large numbers of scarce troops in places least likely to be attacked.

THE EXPEDITION TO Lake Huron got under way from Erie, Pennsylvania, on June 19, at a time when the British were increasing their forces and activity in Chesapeake Bay. Arthur Sinclair sailed five vessels, Lawrence, Niagara, Caledonia, Scorpion, and Tigress, to Detroit, where for two weeks he loaded seven hundred of Colonel Croghan’s troops. Sinclair departed Detroit on July 3, but delayed by contrary winds, he did not enter Lake Huron until July 12.

Sinclair’s first priority was to take St. Joseph’s and Michilimackinac. If possible, he was also to destroy the new enemy naval force building at Matchedash. Secretary Jones cautioned Sinclair to avoid burning private dwellings, as he and Campbell had done at Long Point in May. Jones emphasized that wanton destruction “excited much regret” on the president’s part.

Sinclair first attempted to sail to Matchedash, but he found the fog, sunken rocks, and islands too difficult to navigate and turned away. He then sailed for St. Joseph’s, which was abandoned. He destroyed the fort but not the town and then steered for Mackinac Island, arriving on July 26 to attack the fort.

Croghan debarked his men on August 4. He had scant intelligence about what awaited him, but looking at the terrain for the first time, he feared the worst. Captain Sinclair described Croghan’s predicament: “Mackinac is by nature a perfect Gibraltar, being a high inaccessible rock on every side except the west, from which to the heights, you have near two miles to pass through a [thick] wood.”

Lieutenant Colonel Robert McDouall directed the island’s defense. Prevost had sent him out in the spring to take command. McDouall skillfully deployed two hundred British regulars and three hundred fifty Indians to stop Croghan, using the terrain to full advantage. “Our men were shot in every direction,” Sinclair wrote, “. . . without being able to see the Indian who did it, and a height was scarcely gained, before there was another in 50 or 100 yards commanding it, where breastworks were erected, and cannon opened on them.”

Seeing no way to attain his objective against a clever, hidden foe, Croghan soon ordered a retreat back to the boats. His losses were sixteen killed and sixty wounded. They might have been much worse had he not acted promptly. One of the dead was his second in command, Major A. H. Holmes. Croghan sent a flag of truce to the fort and asked McDouall for the body. The request was politely granted. McDouall also offered the fleet provisions and fruit, which were gratefully accepted. The body of Major Holmes was returned unharmed, but McDouall’s Indian allies scalped and buried the other bodies.

When Sinclair departed, he sailed to the Nottawasaga River and destroyed the schooner Nancy. Her skipper, Lieutenant Miller Worsley, and his sparse crew escaped, however, and made their way to Michilimackinac in canoes. While they did, Captain Sinclair sailed for Detroit, leaving the small schooners Tigress (one gun, Sailing Master Stephen Champlin) and Scorpion (two guns, Lieutenant Daniel Turner) to maintain American naval supremacy on Lake Huron and make life difficult, if not impossible, for McDouall.

Lieutenant Worsley decided to turn the tables on the Americans, however, and McDouall supported him. On September 3, Worsley led a surprise night attack on the Tigress, using four small boats filled with armed men, including some Indians. They had rowed silently for six miles from a hiding place to within one hundred yards of the Tigress when her night watch spotted them and opened fire with muskets and a single twenty-four-pounder. Worsley was not deterred; he soon pulled up to the schooner’s side and boarded. After a fierce hand-to-hand fight, his superior numbers told, and Sailing Master Champlin surrendered with thirty sailors.

The Scorpion had been fifteen miles away when the Tigress was captured, and Lieutenant Turner had no idea what had happened. Two days later, the Scorpion returned and anchored for the night two miles from the Tigress, where Worsley and his men were hiding. Worsley had the American flag flying conspicuously on the Tigress. Turner did not suspect a thing. At dawn, the Tigress crept toward the Scorpion. Worsley got to within ten yards before being discovered. As the Scorpion’s night watch fired at him, he ran up alongside, jumped aboard with his crew, and overpowered Turner and his thirty-two men.

Not long afterward, McDouall went on the offensive, sending a substantial force of over six hundred men to seize Prairie du Chien on the Upper Mississippi, in what is today southwestern Wisconsin but was then Illinois Territory. An American force of two hundred men had captured the area in May 1814 and built a fort. Prairie du Chien was strategically located at the terminus of the Fox-Wisconsin waterway that connected the Great Lakes with the Mississippi. It was an important fur trading center, where Jacob Astor had a large warehouse. McDouall’s men easily captured the American fort, which surrendered on July 19. Major Zachary Taylor tried to regain control of the area later, marching three hundred thirty men in August to the mouth of the Rock River in Illinois, but he was checked on September 5 by Indians, supported by British regulars from Prairie du Chien, and he retreated to St. Louis. The British and their Indian allies held the area until the war was over.

The administration, meanwhile, went ahead with General Brown’s invasion of Canada in the Niagara region, despite the threat to the eastern states from British forces gathering at Montreal, in Bermuda, and in Chesapeake Bay. It was decided that Brown would cross the Niagara and take Fort Erie, then proceed north and attack Fort George. After that, he would move on to Burlington. If all went well, he would combine with Chauncey and occupy York again and then Kingston. If that were accomplished, he was to push into the St. Lawrence with the armed galleys being made at Sackets Harbor and move on Montreal. It was a strategic vision divorced from reality, particularly with the thousands of reinforcements Prevost was receiving at the port of Quebec from Wellington.

Brown’s offensive depended on Chauncey regaining control of Lake Ontario. Without Chauncey’s big guns, Brown could not hope to take even Fort George. He could subdue lightly defended Fort Erie, but that was about all. Since Chauncey would not be ready until mid-July at the earliest, Armstrong advised Brown: “To give . . . immediate occupation to your troops and to prevent their blood from stagnating—why not take Fort Erie and its garrison, stated at three or four hundred men. Land between point Albino and Erie in the night—assail the fort by land and water—push forward a corps to seize the bridge of Chippawa, and be governed by circumstances in either stopping there, or going further.” Armstrong sent the necessary orders to Brown on June 10.

Brown decided to follow Armstrong’s suggestion. He wrote to Chauncey asking when he’d be ready to stand out into Lake Ontario. Chauncey replied on June 25 that his movements would depend on Yeo. He would not move up the lake to Niagara unless Yeo led him. This amounted to no commitment at all. Brown conferred with his commanders, Generals Eleazer Ripley and Winfield Scott, who gave him conflicting advice. Ripley advised waiting for Chauncey, but Scott wanted to act now. He had been training his men for months, and he was anxious to lead them into battle. Brown decided that the United States needed a victory at this depressing time and planned to attack Fort Erie.

On July 2, in the dead of night, concealed by a heavy fog, Scott and Ripley led 3,500 men—Brown’s entire army—across the Niagara River. Scott commanded the left division and Ripley the right. Scott was in the lead boat and nearly drowned when he stepped out too soon into deep water. Only 137 men were defending the fort, and their commander, Thomas Buck, immediately sent word of the invasion to the British commander at Chippawa. At eight o’clock Buck fired three small cannon, and four hours later he sent out a flag of truce and surrendered. When the residents of Chippawa heard what had happened, they evacuated the town.

The following day, July 4, Brown sent Scott and his brigade north to Chippawa on what amounted to a recognizance in force. British lieutenant colonel Thomas Pearson, one of Wellington’s veterans experienced in rearguard actions, harassed Scott the entire sixteen miles with a small detachment of light infantry and dragoons, making Scott’s march to Chippawa far more difficult than he had anticipated. Scott had to cross five creeks, and Pearson annoyed him at each one of them.

Major General Phineas Riall was in command on the Niagara peninsula, and he was at Fort George when he learned of the invasion. He immediately sent to General Drummond at York for reinforcements and then marched what troops he had to reinforce Chippawa. When Scott reached the south side of the Chippawa River, he found that Riall had taken up a strong defensive position on the north side. Deciding to wait for reinforcements, Scott withdrew south a short distance to Street’s Creek, which he crossed, and settled down for the night. Brown and Ripley joined him later with additional troops. The former congressman, now militia general, Peter B. Porter arrived with New York volunteers and Indians early the next morning.

By July 5, Riall had 1,350 regulars, 200 militia, and 350 Indians led by John Norton. In spite of knowing he was greatly outnumbered, he crossed the Chippawa with 1,200 regulars and attacked, thinking the American militiamen would run. Scott reacted quickly, marching his brigade, 1,300 strong, over the single bridge at Street’s Creek under heavy fire and deployed on the plain between the creek and the Chippawa River. Scott’s soldiers were attired in grey uniforms, which Riall thought marked them as militiamen. He soon realized, however, that he was facing regular troops—militiamen would have run long before now. A vicious fight ensued for an hour, when Riall, much to his surprise, was forced to withdraw. He successfully retreated across the Chippawa, destroying the bridge as he went. Scott and Porter were close behind, but with little daylight left, Brown ordered them back to camp. Casualties on both sides were severe—485 British and 319 Americans.

“For completeness, Scott’s victory at Chippawa could be compared with that of Isaac Hull over the Guerriere,” Henry Adams wrote, “but in one respect Scott surpassed Hull. The Constitution was a much heavier ship than its enemy; but Scott’s brigade was weaker, both in men and guns than Riall’s force.” Actually, Scott’s force slightly outnumbered Riall’s. Nonetheless, Chippawa was a source of immense pride to the fledgling U. S. Army. For the first time, American regulars defeated British regulars of nearly equal force in an engagement on an open plain. Instilling self-respect in the beleaguered American army was no mean achievement, but Scott paid a high price in lives for a victory that had only symbolic value.

Two days later, Brown crossed the Chippawa in force, and Riall retreated, falling back toward Burlington Bay to await reinforcements, leaving detachments at Fort George and Fort Niagara. Brown then moved his army up to Queenston, five miles from Fort George. He needed siege guns to attack the fort, however, and he did not have any. He also needed reinforcements and provisions, all of which he expected Chauncey to supply. But Chauncey, who was seriously ill at the time, still did not have command of the lake, despite his earlier promises. He could neither stop Drummond from moving troops and provisions across the lake to Riall nor help Brown. And even if he could, he had made it clear in his June 25 letter that his movements would be dictated by Yeo, not by Brown. In other words, Brown was not to count on him for either bombarding Fort George or for transporting men and supplies.

Anxious to counter Brown’s movements, General Drummond took advantage of Yeo’s dominance on the lake to ferry reinforcements from Kingston and York to the Niagara area. At the same time, sickness and desertion had reduced General Brown’s army to 2,500 effectives. Chauncey’s weakness put Brown in danger of being stranded on the west side of the Niagara, cut off from his bases at Buffalo, Black Rock, and Fort Schlosser on the east side of the river. All three places were weakly defended. If Drummond and Riall pushed down on both sides of the river, Brown would be trapped on the Canadian side.

Recognizing his exposed position, Brown withdrew south of Chippawa on July 24. Riall followed with 1,000 men, marching at night, stopping at Lundy’s Lane, just north of town. On July 25 Brown dispatched Scott’s brigade north toward Riall in the hope that Drummond, who was now at Fort Niagara, would notice and concentrate on coming to Riall’s rescue, rather than marching down the east side of the river, taking the forts, and trapping the American army.

Drummond did exactly what Brown wanted. By late afternoon on the twenty-fifth, Drummond had crossed the river and was approaching Riall with a 2,000-man reinforcement. Before he arrived, Winfield Scott’s brigade appeared and began attacking Riall, who ordered a retreat. But when Drummond arrived suddenly, Riall countermanded his order and turned on Scott. Riall’s force was now three times larger than Scott’s. It was 6 P.M.

Scott soon discovered he was badly outnumbered and sent for reinforcements while continuing to skirmish so fiercely that Drummond thought he was facing a much larger army than he was. In the initial fighting, Riall himself was captured. In the next couple of hours, Brown, Porter, and Ripley arrived with reinforcements and artillery. The American force now totaled 2,800 men.

A general battle developed that lasted from around 8:45 until midnight and was as fiercely fought as any in the war. The key was Drummond’s artillery, which was posted on a small hill north of Lundy’s Lane. Brown and his generals recognized that they had to seize the seven heavy guns there or lose the battle, and after heroic efforts they succeeded. They then beat off three of Drummond’s counterattacks. The fighting went on hour after bloody hour, the armies often within half pistol shot of each other. “The slaughter had been prodigious,” Brown reported, and as midnight approached, he decided to withdraw to Chippawa to regroup before returning to the fight. By that time, the battle had lasted for six ugly hours. It had been a ghastly bloodletting. Brown had 171 killed, 572 wounded, and 110 missing. Drummond had 84 killed, 559 wounded, 193 missing, and 42 prisoners. Brown was badly hurt, and so was General Scott. His wound was so severe he could no longer participate in the war.

Both sides claimed victory. Since the British remained on the battlefield, they maintained they had won. But Militia General Peter Porter wrote in his report to Governor Tompkins that “victory was complete, ... but converted into a defeat by a precipitate retreat.” In fact, Lundy’s Lane was a bloody draw. If anything, it was an American victory. Brown held Drummond off with a decidedly weaker army. When Brown withdrew from the battlefield, Drummond, who had been shot in the neck himself, could not follow; his army was as totally exhausted as Brown’s was.

The following morning, Ripley, under Brown’s order, reluctantly led 1,200 exhausted men back to the battlefield. He soon found Drummond, who obviously had a larger force. Ripley did not attack as Brown had directed. Neither did Drummond. They simply watched each other warily from a distance. Believing the Americans outnumbered him, and knowing that the previous day’s fighting had worn out his troops, Drummond let Ripley retire unmolested, which the American general chose to do.

Ripley’s return to camp angered Brown, who was convinced that Ripley was robbing him of a chance for a clear-cut victory. Nonetheless, given the condition of his army, there was nothing Brown could do for the moment. He ordered Ripley to move the men sixteen miles back to Fort Erie; Ripley proceeded to do so that same day. Brown was taken to Buffalo to recuperate, and from there he sent to Sackets Harbor for General Gaines to assume command at Fort Erie. Brown did not trust Ripley to do the job.

COMMODORE CHAUNCEY, WHO had just regained command of Lake Ontario, finally appeared off Fort George on August 5 with a squadron, but it was much too late to coordinate an attack with Brown. Chauncey then returned to blockading Kingston, which prevented General Drummond from receiving supplies by water. Men marching overland reinforced Drummond, however, increasing his army to over 3,000.

With his new troops in camp, Drummond carefully planned an assault on Fort Erie. While waiting, he sent a detachment of six hundred exhausted regulars across the Niagara to attack Black Rock, but two hundred forty American riflemen beat them off, and the British returned to camp.

Before Drummond attacked Fort Erie, the Royal Navy pulled off a smart action on the Niagara River just outside the fort. On August 12 British commander Alexander Dobbs and seventy-five men surprised and captured the 3-gun schooner Ohio, under Lieutenant Augustus H. M. Conckling, and the 3-gun schooner Somers, under Sailing Master Gamliel Darling. The schooners were part of the American fleet on Lake Erie and had thirty-five men each. They had been anchored close to Fort Erie to assist the army. Dobbs narrowly missed capturing a third schooner, the Porcupine, under Acting Sailing Master Thomas Brownell, who heard the commotion, cut his cable, and, using the current in the Niagara, slipped away into the night.

The next day, August 13, Drummond began bombarding Fort Erie. His long delay had given generals Gaines and Ripley critical time to strengthen the dilapidated fort. On August 15, Drummond attacked in earnest, with 2,100 men in three columns rushing the fort. But they were beaten back with huge losses—57 killed, 309 wounded, and 539 missing. The Americans had 84 casualties. Drummond’s repulse underscored the bloody stalemate that had developed on the Niagara frontier.

Despite Drummond’s defeat, he remained outside the fort, rebuilding his force and planning another attack. Inside the fort, General Brown, although still recovering from the wounds he received at Lundy’s Lane, had assumed command again. General Gaines had been wounded in the fighting. Brown was not content to remain on the defensive. On September 17 he launched a surprise attack on the enemy’s three main batteries. The fighting was ferocious, and Drummond eventually drove Brown’s men back with heavy losses on both sides. The Americans suffered 79 killed and 432 wounded, while Drummond had 115 killed, 176 wounded, and 315 missing. The butcher’s bill was so excruciating it influenced Drummond to finally call off the siege on September 21 and retreat back to Chippawa. Brown could not follow; the casualties he had sustained made it impossible.

The standoff in the Niagara region continued. It demonstrated that Madison’s dream of conquering Canada was dead, but also that the U. S. Army, with its new leadership, could stand up to British regulars, making the Liverpool ministry’s plans for invading America look ill-advised. The strength shown by both sides in these bloody battles would have important consequences when the peace treaty was negotiated later in the year.