When the military and naval authorities at Kingston were informed of the weakening of the important post at Sackett’s Harbor by the withdrawal of troops and vessels for the expedition against York, they resolved to attempt the capture of the place, or to destroy the new ship-of-war then on the stocks, 1 and other public property there. The capture of York made them circumspect, for the flushed victors might turn their faces toward Kingston; but when it was known that Dearborn and Chauncey were about to attack Fort George and its dependencies, it was resolved to assail Sackett’s Harbor immediately. The prize was more attractive now than ever before. Besides being the principal place of deposit on the lake for military and naval stores, and a fine vessel was there nearly completed, all the property captured at York 2 was deposited there. The possession or destruction of these by the British would have given them the command of Lake Ontario, and a decided advantage during the whole campaign. With singular remissness of duty on the part of the commanding general, these had been left exposed. The guard detailed for their protection, under Colonel Barker, was utterly inadequate for the task. It consisted of parts of the First and Second Regiments of Dragoons, numbering about two hundred and fifty men, fifty or sixty artillerists, and from eighty to one hundred infantry, composed chiefly of invalids, recruits, and fragments of companies left behind when the expedition sailed for York. The dragoons, dismounted, manned Fort Tompkins, a considerable work on the bluff; on the west side of the Harbor, 3 and covering the site of the present residence and garden of the naval commandant of the station. The artillerists, under Lieutenant Ketchum, were also there. A little north of the village, on the east side of the Harbor, opposite Fort Tompkins, was a small work, erected principally by the labor of a company of exempts, called Fort Volunteer.

General Jacob Brown, 4 of the New York Militia, who, having finished the six months’ service for which he was called to the field at the beginning of the war, as we have seen, was residing at his home in Brownsville, on the Black River, a few miles from Sackett’s Harbor, had been requested by General Dearborn, and urged by Colonel Macomb, to assume chief command in that region. He was unwilling to interfere with his esteemed friend, Colonel Backus, and agreed to take command only in the event of actual invasion. He went to head-quarters frequently to advise with Backus concerning preparations for defense, and it was understood between them that if the enemy should threaten the post, Brown was to call the neighboring militia to the Harbor and take chief command.

As fast as they appeared they were armed and sent to Horse Island, a mile distant, where Colonel Mills and about two hundred and fifty Albany Volunteers had been stationed for a week. The island (on which the light-house stands) 5 commands the entrance to the Harbor, and there it was believed the enemy would attempt to land. Then, as now, it was separated from the main by only a shallow strait, always fordable, and sometimes almost dry. Between it and the village was a thin wood that had been partly cut over, and was encumbered with logs, stumps, and brush. The main shore is a ridge of gravel, about five feet in height, and at that time formed a natural breast-work.

The British formed in good order on the island, and with the grenadiers of the One Hundredth at their head, commanded by Colonel Baynes, they pressed rapidly across the shallow strait. The rank and file of the American militia had suffered no material injury, but the sound of bullets among the bushes, and the din of the oncoming foe, struck the whole line with an extraordinary panic, and before they had time to give a second fire they rose from their cover behind the gravel bank and fled with precipitation, leaving their 6-pounder behind. The efforts of the gallant Major Herkimer to arrest their flight were vain. 6

This disgraceful retreat astonished and perplexed General Brown, who was on the left of his little army. He expected the militia would have remained firm until the enemy were finally on the main. But their movement was so sudden, general, and rapid, that he found himself completely alone, not a man standing within several rods of him. Stung by this shameful conduct, he ran after the fugitives and endeavored to arrest their flight. His efforts were unavailing. Forgetful of their promises of courage, and unmindful of the orders they had received to rally in the woods in the event of their being driven back, they continued their flight until they were sure of being out of harm’s way. Some of them were not heard of again during the day. Those under Colonel Tuttle were equally recreant to duty, and joined in the disgraceful flight, although they had not in any way been exposed to the enemy’s fire. But there was an honorable exception. Captain Samuel M‘Nitt, with unflinching courage, had maintained his position on the extreme left, and stood blazing away at the enemy after his companions had fled. Seeing the panic, he started in pursuit of the fugitives, and, with the aid of Lieutenant Mayo, succeeded in rallying almost one hundred of them behind some fallen timber. From that cover they annoyed the enemy exceedingly, who were then marching through the woods toward the town. 7 Meanwhile Colonel Backus and his regulars had advanced, and, with the Albany Volunteers, who had stood firm when the militia fled, and had retired slowly along a wagon-road by the margin of the lake before superior numbers, was disputing the march of the invaders inch by inch.

These demonstrations of courage revived the sinking hopes of the commanding general. In hastening from M‘Nitt’s gallant band to Backus’s line, his affrighted horse had broken from him in the woods. Fortunately, he soon met a man on horseback, whose animal he seized and mounted, and then pushed forward to the extreme right. There he found Colonel Backus with his dismounted dragoons on the right, assisted by Major Lavall, the gallant Albany Volunteers on the left, and infantry and artillery in the centre, while the gun at Fort Tompkins was playing upon the advancing column of the foe. For an hour the conflict continued, and so great was the weight of the enemy that the American line was constantly pressed back. Lieutenant Fanning, in command at Fort Volunteer, perceiving no danger of an attack there, had led his little force forward and engaged gallantly in the fight. Still the foe bore heavily upon them, and when the Americans were most in want of encouragement a disheartening event occurred. Dense smoke arose in their rear, and it was soon ascertained that the store-houses on the margin of the Harbor, filled with the spoils of York and a vast amount of other valuable property, also the new ship General Pike, were in flames. Had a portion of the enemy landed in the rear and applied the torch? No. In the almost universal panic that prevailed when the militia fled, Lieutenant Wolcott Chauncey, of the Navy, who had the stores in charge, was informed that all was lost, and that the victorious enemy was rapidly marching upon the post. A train prepared for the emergency was lighted, and in a few minutes stores and ship were in flames. The friendly incendiary was soon named to General Brown, much to his relief and he hastened to inform and reassure Colonel Backus. He arrived just in time to see that gallant officer fall, mortally wounded, and to wipe his pallid brow with his own hand. 8

Pressed back, back, back, the wearied and worried Americans took refuge in some new log barracks in an open space near the town. The enemy made desperate efforts to dislodge them. Brown saw that all would be lost should they be driven from that shelter, and he determined to rally the fugitive militia, if possible, who, he was informed, were on the outskirts of the village and on the roads leading from it, and with them feign a descent upon the enemy’s boats. He sent out mounted dragoons instructed to proclaim a victory gained, knowing that in the supposed absence of danger most of them would return. The stratagem was successful. About three hundred of them were collected, though in great disorder, on the eastern side of the village, about three fourths of a mile from the place where the battle was still raging. There they were addressed by the commanding general, who loaded them with reproaches, and informed them that measures had been taken to shoot every man of them who should be found attempting to run again. Many of them, stung by the words of the general, begged to be led into the thickest of the fight, and almost two hundred of them formed under the direction of Westcott, a Sackett’s Harbor butcher, and Caleb, a volunteer, and, while others went toward the British landing-place, they attacked a flanking party of the enemy under Captain Grey, the adjutant general, just as they were about to assail the log barracks. Grey was a gallant soldier. He was walking backward, waving his sword, and had just shouted "Come on, boys; remember York! The day is ours!" when a drummer-boy among the rallied militia cried out, "Perhaps not yet!" and shot him. Grey fell, and instantly expired. 9

This rallying of the fugitive militia and menacing of the enemy’s boats decided the fortunes of the day in favor of the Americans. Sir George Prevost, sweeping the horizon with his glass from a high stump, perceived the militia on his flank and rear, and supposing them to be re-enforcements of regulars in large numbers, immediately sounded a retreat while the way to their boats was open. 10 It was commenced in good order, but soon became a disorderly flight. It was so precipitate that the fatigued Americans could not overtake them. They reached the squadron in safety, leaving a large portion of their dead and wounded behind. 11 At about ten o’clock in the morning, Sir George, with cool impudence, sent a flag to demand the surrender of the post which he had failed to capture. The summons was treated with deserved contempt. He then asked permission to send surgeons to take care of his wounded. This was denied; but an assurance was given by General Brown that Americans were "distinguished for humanity as well as bravery."

It was believed that the enemy intended to renew the attack. His squadron continued at anchor, and his boats remained filled with soldiers for some time not far from Horse Island. At noon they returned to the squadron, and the whole flotilla sailed for Kingston. It entered that port on the morning of the 30th, to the great mortification of the inhabitants, who had expected to see the expedition return with all the garrison at Sackett’s Harbor and the public property there. 12 The whole affair, on the part of the British, was pronounced at the time, and has been by their own writers since, "in a high degree disgraceful." 13 The skill, courage, and energy of General Brown, under the most appalling difficulties, seconded by the like qualities in a part of the troops, made it a brilliant achievement for the Americans, and a subject for just praise of the commanding general. 14

As soon as the battle was ended the efforts of the men were turned to the salvation of the public property from the flames. Because of the greenness of the timber of the General Pike she had burned but little, and was saved. The Duke of Gloucester, captured at York, also escaped destruction. She was saved by the gallantry of Lieutenant Talman, of the army, who, notwithstanding he knew there was a large quantity of gunpowder on board of her, hastened to her deck, extinguished the kindling flames, and brought her from under the fire that was consuming the store-houses. The Fair American and Pert had cut their cables and retreated up the Black River. Several of the guns on Navy Point were spiked. The value of the property destroyed by the fire was about half a million of dollars. The loss was severely felt, because the distance from Albany, from which most of these stores were drawn, was such that they could not be seasonably replaced. 15

SACKETT’S HARBOR IN 1814. 16

No further attempts were made by the enemy to capture Sackett’s Harbor, and it remained, as it had been from the beginning, the most important place of deposit for the army and navy stores of the Americans on the Northern frontier. During the summer and autumn of 1813 several expeditions were fitted out there, which we shall hereafter consider, and labor was vigorously applied by the troops stationed there in the autumn, and by the sailors in the winter, in strongly fortifying the post. Fort Tompkins was strengthened, and several other works were constructed, and before the midsummer of 1814 the post seemed to be secured against any force the enemy might bring to bear upon it. 17

I visited Sackett’s Harbor in the summer of 1860. I rode up from Sandy Creek during a sultry morning, through the wealthy agricultural towns of Ellisburg and Henderson, after a heavy rain. Before noon the sky was almost cloudless, and I spent the afternoon in visiting places of interest around Sackett’s Harbor. Commodore Josiah Tattnall, one of the most accomplished men in the navy, and then in command of the naval station at the Harbor, accompanied me. I found him an exceedingly courteous man, of medium size in stature, and in the sixty-fourth year of his age. He had been commander of the East India squadron for some time, having the Powhatan for his flag-ship, in which he brought over the seas the Japanese embassadors in the spring of 1860. Having been for several years in arduous service, the government had kindly ordered him to the Sackett’s Harbor station to enjoy a season of rest. There he deserted the flag of his country, under which he had been cherished for almost half a century. He resigned his commission, joined the traitors in the slave-labor states who were then in open rebellion against his government, and became commander-in-chief of the "Confederate Navy." 18

Yet I can not forget the commodore’s kindness. He accompanied me to the ship-house on Navy Point, in which is the New Orleans, just as she was left in her unfinished state at the end of the war in 1815. He also went with me to the site of Fort Pike, to Madison Barracks and the burial-ground, and to visit the widow of Captain William Vaughan, whose exploits have already been mentioned in these pages. 19 Mrs. Vaughan (a small, delicate woman) occupied the Sackett mansion, which was her residence in 1812. At the time now under consideration, Colonels Backus and Mills boarded with her there. The house was near the site of Fort Tompkins. It was a substantial frame building, with a fine portico, and was embowered in shrubbery and trees.

The New Orleans was to have been a huge vessel, made to cope with the St. Lawrence, a three-deck man-of-war of 120 guns, which the British launched at Kingston in the autumn of 1813. Henry Eckford 20 was the constructor, and Henry Eagle, late of Oswego, was foreman of the navy yard. Time was precious, and Eckford applied to the work all the force that he could command. So vigorous were his efforts, that within twenty-seven days [January and February, 1815.] from the time when the axe was first laid to the timber in the surrounding forest for the great ship she was almost ready to be launched. She was to have been a three-decker, pierced for 110 guns, but capable of carrying 120 eighteens and forty-fours. Her frame was all completed, and planks nearly all on, when tidings of peace caused work upon her to cease. In the condition in which she was then left she has ever since remained. She was never launched. A spacious house was built over her, and so well has she been taken care of that her timbers remain perfectly sound. Her keel, according to a statement of Mr. Henry Metcalf; the ship-keeper, is 183 feet 7 ˝ inches; breadth of beam, 56 feet; depth, 47 feet; length over all, 214 feet; tonnage, 3000. She was to draw 27 feet. Within the time above mentioned all the timbers for other purposes connected with the vessel were got out. The annexed sketch shows the appearance of her bow as seen at the entrance to the ship-house. Near this building, on the south side, may be seen the sunken hulk of the Jefferson.

We strolled into the burial-ground attached to the barracks, and visited the wooden monument erected to the memory of General Pike and others who gave their lives to their country during the war. That monument, utterly neglected, was rapidly crumbling into dust. I was there five years before [July, 1855.], when it was more leaning than the Pisa tower, and fortunately made a sketch of it and copied the fading inscriptions upon it. Sergeant Gaines, who was then taking charge of the barracks, accompanied me, and assisted in deciphering the inscriptions. He had placed a copy of them, written on parchment, in a bottle, which was tightly sealed, and was then hanging under the urn, as the best way to preserve the precious records on the spot. When I was there in 1860 the urn and the bottle had disappeared, the panels were much decayed, and the inscriptions were illegible. The remains of the gallant dead were collected there during the administration "original text has "adminstration".} of Colonel Hugh Brady, who commanded the post for ten years after the war; and the monument, which was about seven feet in height to the top of the urn, was erected by the officers of the garrison. 21 How long will our national government suffer just reproach for neglect in not erecting enduring monuments over the graves of these heroes?

We returned to the commodore’s residence at five o’clock, and after tea I started in a light wagon for Watertown, on the Black River, about twelve miles distant, where I spent the Sabbath [August 22, 1860.] with the family of an old friend. On Monday morning he accompanied me to Brownsville, four miles distant, where I had the pleasure of spending a part of the forenoon at the elegant mansion of the widow of General Brown. There many mementos of that gallant officer were preserved. Among them was the portrait painted by John Wesley Jarvis, from which the engraving on page 608 was copied; also a monochrome drawn by Sully, of Philadelphia (now [1867] the oldest painter in the United States), for the medal voted to General Brown by the American Congress for his meritorious conduct on the Niagara frontier. That medal was also there. There too was his sword; also the elegantly written and well ornamented diploma which by vote of the Common Council of New York conferred upon him the "freedom of the city," and the gold box in which it was presented to him. Of the latter mementos of the gallant soldier I shall have occasion to write hereafter.

The mansion of General Brown, which he built in 1814-’15, is spacious and elegant. It is of blue limestone, and stands on the borders of the village of six or seven hundred inhabitants, in the midst of a lawn of about eight acres, ornamented with shrubbery and stately trees. The view of it here given is from the banks of a little stream that runs through a gentle swale along the skirt of the lawn.

On our return to Watertown we rode along the margin of the Black River, where it sweeps in swift current through the village after leaping the precipice at the falls, and halted at the entrance to a cavern which extends to an unknown distance under the town. In front of it, projecting into the stream like a huge buttress, is a mass of limestone known as the Whittlesey Rock, it being the place where the guilty wife of a man of that name jumped into the stream and perished over fifty years ago. Her husband was a lawyer from Connecticut, and settled in Watertown in 1809. Toward the close of the war he was appointed brigade paymaster, and in the performance of his duties went to the city of New York for funds, accompanied by his wife. He received thirty thousand dollars. On the way back she robbed him of several thousand dollars; and he was induced by the machinations of his wife – a woman of education, but thoroughly depraved, who worked upon his fears – to report himself robbed of all, in order to secure the money for themselves. This was done on an occasion when he went out on a tour to pay off the drafted militia. He offered two thousand dollars reward for the robber, and made other demonstrations of honesty. But he was not believed by many; and his securities, Fairbanks and Keyes, of Watertown, were so well convinced of foul play, that they decoyed him into a lonely place [July 17, 1815.] not far from the village, and extorted from him a confession, and the assertion that a larger portion of the money might be found with his wife. One of the sureties and two or three others proceeded to the residence of Whittlesey, which stood near the bank of the river, forcibly entered the house, and there, between beds and quilted in a garment, most of the money was found. Whittlesey was taken to his home, and husband and wife, bitterly criminating each other, were placed under a guard. Unperceived by these, in a moment of confusion Mrs. Whittlesey glided from the house, crossed the present cemetery of Trinity Church to the river, and plunged in. Her body was found floating near the lower bridge. Public opinion fastened all the guilt upon the wretched wife. Whittlesey went into a Western state, where he led a correct life, and held the offices of justice of the peace and county judge. Mr. Fairbanks, one of the actors in the affair, is yet (1867) living at Watertown, and from his lips, on our return to the village, I received an account of the tragedy. 22

At the Woodruff House, in Watertown, I met Captain Hollins, of the navy, a stout, thick-set man, sixty-one years of age. He was a midshipman in our navy toward the close of the War of 1812, and in the course of long years rose to the rank of captain. He, too, deserted his flag in the hour of his country’s peril, went South, and, during the Great Rebellion, played traitor with all the vigor his abilities would allow. 23 His accomplished wife, who was with him in Watertown, was a daughter of the patriotic Colonel Sterett, of Baltimore, and, true to her family instincts, tried, it is said, to persuade her husband to stand by his flag. She was in Poughkeepsie, New York, when he arrived at Boston from a cruise in the Massachusetts in May or June, 1861, and hastened to him to prevent his apprehended purpose. She failed, and he fell.

We left the Americans, under General Dearborn, at Fort George, and the enemy’s advance, at the same time, occupied a strong position at the Beaver Dams, among the hills, and at Ten-mile Creek (now Homer village, three miles eastward of St. Catharine’s), nearer the lake shore. At the former place, De Cou’s house, a strong stone building, was made a sort of citadel by the enemy, where supplies were collected from the surrounding country, especially from those of the inhabitants who favored the American cause. The character and position of the place had been ascertained by a scout of mounted riflemen under Major Cyrenius Chapin, of the New York Volunteers, who was under Towson in the capture of the Caledonia at Fort Erie the preceding autumn. 24 It was an important post, and General Dearborn determined to attempt its capture.

For that purpose he detached five hundred and seventy men, including Chapin’s corps, some artillerymen, and two field-pieces, under Lieutenant Colonel Charles G. Bśrstler, of the Fourteenth Infantry. 25

The Americans moved steadily forward until they reached the "Ten Road," a little eastward of the present village of Thorold, and at an old German church 26 commenced the ascent of the "Mountain" (as the Canadians call the gentle eminences that extend from the Niagara to Hamilton and beyond), through a forest of pine and beech trees, to the more level country on the summit, where they halted for some time. On resuming their march and proceeding about a mile, they saw Indians in a cleared field (Hoover’s) and open woods running toward a more dense forest of beech-trees that skirted each side of the road, near the present toll-gate, close by the residence of the Rev. Dr. R. H. Fuller, rural dean. Chapin was immediately ordered forward with his mounted men, who were kept considerably in advance of the main body. These had passed the beech woods, and a greater portion of the others had also gone by, when a body of Mohawk and Caughnawaga Indians, four hundred and fifty in number, under Captain John Brant and Captain William John Kerr 27 (who afterward became his brother-in-law), who had been lying in ambush, fell upon Bśrstler’s rear, where about twenty light dragoons were posted. Bśrstler immediately recalled Chapin, formed his troops, charged upon the half-concealed foe, and drove them almost a mile. The Indians might have been entirely routed had Bśrstler followed up the advantage gained. He hesitated. The Indians rallied, and hung upon his flank and rear, keeping up a most galling fire at every exposed situation. The Americans pressed onward, over the Beaver Dam Creek, fighting the wily foe to immense disadvantage, and made conscious that they were almost, if not altogether surrounded by them. For about three hours this annoying contest was kept up. Bśrstler’s cannon had been posted on a rise of ground at the turn in the road near the residence of Mr. Schriner at the time of my visit, and the Indians fell slowly back before the American bayonets.

At length Bśrstler determined to retire and abandon the object of the expedition. While moving off he encountered a small body of militia, under Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Clark, in the Beech Woods. They had hastened to the field from all quarters. Bśrstler halted, and sent a courier to Dearborn for re-enforcements. Very soon afterward Lieutenant James Fitzgibbon, who was in command at De Cou’s, appeared with forty or fifty men of the British Forty-ninth. 28

He had been warned of the expedition of Bśrstler, and the danger to his post and command, by Mrs. Laura Secord, then a resident of Queenston, and now (1867) dwelling at Chippewa, who had been privately informed of the plans of General Dearborn. Resolving to reveal them to her endangered friends, she made a circuit of nineteen miles on foot, and gave the information which led to the Indian ambush and the check of Bśrstler’s march. 29 Fitzgibbon displayed his men, and, perceiving much confusion in the American ranks, conceived the plan of boldly demanding their surrender in the name of Major De Haven, the commandant of the district. Fitzgibbon himself approached with a flag. He falsely assured Bśrstler that his party was the advance of fifteen hundred British troops and seven hundred Indians, then approaching under Lieutenant Colonel Bisshopp, and that the savages were becoming so exasperated that it would be difficult to keep them from massacring the Americans. Bśrstler believed, and was alarmed. He agreed to surrender on the conditions that the officers should retain their arms, horses, and baggage, and that the militia and volunteers, with Colonel Bśrstler (who was slightly wounded), should be permitted to return to the United States on parole. 30 By the time the capitulation was agreed to in final form, De Haven, who had been sent for by Fitzgibbon, came up with two hundred men and received the submission of the captives. The number of prisoners surrendered was five hundred and forty-two, and the spoils of victory were one 12-pounder, one 6-pounder, and a stand of colors.

The surrender was scarcely completed when the articles of the capitulation were violated. The Indians immediately commenced plundering the prisoners of their arms and clothing, and the militia and volunteers, instead of being released on parole, were taken to Burlington Heights and kept there as prisoners of war. Some of them escaped through the adroit management of Major Chapin, who was soon sent, with a number of his volunteers, in two bateaux, in charge of Captain Showers and a guard, to Kingston, there to be held as prisoners. When within twelve miles of York they arose and overpowered the guard, crossed the lake in the night, and arrived safely at Fort Niagara with their jailers as prisoners. 31

When Bśrstler’s courier reached Dearborn, that commander sent Colonel Christie with three hundred men to re-enforce him. They pushed forward rapidly to Queenston, where they heard of the surrender of the Americans. Christie hastened back to camp with the sad intelligence. It caused alarm there that was speedily justified by events. The British advanced upon Queenston, and, occupying that place and vicinity, soon invested the Americans at Fort George with a formidable force. General Vincent, with a small force, held Burlington Heights, and General De Rottenburg was encamped with a strong body at Ten-mile Creek. Dearborn, whose career as chief had been singularly unsuccessful, was soon superseded by a more incompetent and less trustworthy man, General Wilkinson, 32 whose movements on the Northern frontier present a series of blunders and disasters. 33

It was in sultry August, 1860, that I visited the scenes of Bśrstler’s march and disaster, and places in the vicinity. I have already mentioned my trip from Queenston to St. Catharine’s, and so on to Hamilton, Paris, Brantford, and the Indian settlements on the Grand River in Canada. 34 It was at that time that I stopped at St. Catharine’s for the purpose of seeing the Honorable William Hamilton Merritt, the brave British cavalry officer already mentioned, and of visiting places of interest near. I arrived there on Saturday evening, and at a boarding-house where I procured lodgings I had the pleasure of meeting the family of a once valued acquaintance in Virginia, who were seeking health from the use of the powerful mineral waters that flow up copiously there from the deep recesses of the earth. 35 Little did I think that within a few months the accomplished head of that family, whom I had learned to esteem most highly, would be seduced from his allegiance to the flag of his country, under which he had served with fidelity and distinction for five-and-thirty years, and become the general-in-chief of armies in rebellion against the government of the Republic! He held the narrow view of American citizenship, engendered by the doctrine of supreme state sovereignty, expressed in the words "I go with my state," and followed the terrible fortunes of his native Virginia when her political charlatans – her selfish trading politicians – declared her secession from the Union, and brought ruin on her people.

Early on Monday morning [August 20, 1860.], after a night made memorable by a fearful thunder-storm, I started for the Beaver Dams, accompanied by Mr. Merritt.. On the way I sketched the ancient German church delineated on page 620; and early in the forenoon we reached the house of the Reverend Dr. Fuller by the famous Beech Woods where Bśrstler was first attacked. From the roof of his dwelling we obtained a fine view of the Beaver Dams’ battle-ground and the theatre of Bśrstler’s misfortunes, and from that elevation made the sketch seen at the top of the picture on the following page.

From Dr. Fuller’s we rode on through Beaver Dam village to De Cou’s, passing on the way the smoking ruins of a barn which had been fired by lightning during the night. The famous house was of stone, two stories in height, spacious, with ornamental shrubbery around it. It was in an elevated, fertile, and beautiful region. After sketching the building we passed on to the lake slopes of the hills, and, following a farm-road a little distance, came to De Cou’s Falls, where the Twelve-mile Creek pours over a ledge of rocks, semicircular in form, into a wild ravine, in a perpendicular cascade of sixty feet. The sides of the ravine are very precipitous, and covered chiefly with evergreens. With much difficulty and some danger, I made my way to its wild depths, and obtained a favorable position for a sketch of the Falls, on the crown of which, shaded by cedars and hemlocks, were the remains of an old mill. A fourth of a mile below was another fall of thirty feet, where the ravine deepens and darkens, for the whole declivity down which the stream pours toward the plain is covered with a dense forest.

He was commander of the Fourth Lincoln company, and was in the battles at Queenston, Fort George, and Niagara, or Lundy’s Lane, and was active on the frontier and over the peninsula during the whole of the war. He arrived at the Beaver Dams a few minutes after the surrender of Bśrstler, and participated in the joy of the occasion. Captain Dittrick was a bald-headed, heavy man, very pleasant and communicative – ready to "fight his battles o’er again" by his hearthstone. Our visit was made too short for our pleasure and profit by the rumbling of thunder. We rode on to St. Catharine’s, where we arrived in time to escape a drenching shower. I dined with Mr. Merritt and his father’s family, and had the pleasure of meeting at the table the widow of the eminent Jesse Hawley, who was a distinguished citizen of Western New York, to whom Governor De Witt Clinton (autograph letter now before me) gave the credit of being the chief projector of that great work of internal improvement, the Erie Canal. He published a series of able letters over the signature of "Hercules," whose wise suggestions led to the construction of that mighty work which immortalized the name of Clinton, and added millions to the wealth of New York. 36

I left St. Catharine’s toward evening for the beautiful city of Hamilton, at the head of the lake. The railway passes through a most charming country lying between the "Mountain" or ancient shore of Ontario and the lake. This mountain approaches the lake within three fourths of a mile at Hamilton, and then, turning more southward, assists in forming the deep valley in which Dundas lies nestled. I passed the night at the Royal Hotel in Hamilton, and at six o’clock the next morning started in a light wagon for Stony Creek, seven miles eastward, over a fine stone road, I was directed to Colonel Daniel Lewis for information concerning the battle and its localities. His residence was a little northward of the village, but he was absent. From Mr. Heales, residing there, I obtained all needful knowledge respecting the place of the encampment and the combat. After making the sketch on page 603, I returned to the village, made my way half a mile southward of it, and took a hasty glance at the pouring down of Stony Creek from the "Mountain" in a perpendicular fall of one hundred and thirty feet into a deep, narrow gorge. Wishing to depart from Hamilton for Paris at twelve o’clock, I did not linger long at the falls. On my way back I stopped at the house of Mr. Michael Aikman to obtain some information concerning the place of the British encampment on Burlington Heights. He too was absent, but I spent a most interesting half hour with his mother, Mrs. Hannah Aikman, a small, delicate woman, then ninety-one years of age. She was the daughter of Michael Showers, a Tory refugee from the Wyoming Valley. She and her family were in Wintermoot’s Fort, and her father was one of Butler’s Rangers. After the battle there they were compelled to fly. They went up the Susquehanna, and across the country by way of the Genesee, intending to go to Niagara by the lake in a small boat which they took with them. It was so injured that it could not be used. The father walked to Fort Niagara for relief, and for a week his family subsisted on roots which they dug from the soil. They were timely relieved by some Mississagua Indians. Her father was one of the settlers with Butler’s Rangers on the Canadian peninsula, and for almost seventy years she had lived at her then place of abode. 37 When I told her of my visit to Wintermoot’s house, and described it as she remembered it, and spoke of the Wintermoots, the Burnets, the Hallenbecks, the Dorrances, and others whom she knew, her eyes brightened, and she said it seemed as if one of her old neighbors had come to see her.

I reached Hamilton 38 just in time to take the cars for the West, and, as I have already mentioned, arrived at Brantford, on the Grand River, that evening. Of my visit to the Indian settlements in that vicinity I have elsewhere written. 39

Four days later a sad tragedy was performed near the residences of John and Peter Ball, 40 about a mile and a half from Fort George. The gallant young leader, Merritt, then just twenty years of age, was sent with a small party to recover some medicines near Ball’s which the British had concealed when they fled from Fort George in May. A body of one hundred and fifty savages, just arrived from the Western wilderness, under Captain M. Elliott, and led by the bloody Blackbird, of Chicago fame, 41 were employed as a covering party. Merritt was encamped, and while breakfasting at Ball’s a skirmish with an American picket-guard took place not far off. Lieutenant Eldridge (then adjutant), with thirty-nine volunteers, went out to the relief of the guard, and a larger force, under Major Malcolm, prepared to follow. The impetuous Eldridge dashed forward into the thick wood, and fell into an ambush prepared for him by Blackbird and his followers. The foe was repulsed at first, but overwhelming numbers crushed Eldridge and his little party. 42 Only five escaped. The prisoners and wounded were butchered and scalped by the Western savages, whose conduct on the occasion was marked by the most atrocious barbarity. 43 This was so shocking and exasperating that General Boyd resolved to adopt Washington’s plan of having "Indians fight Indians," and to accept the services of the Senecas and Tuscaroras, who had proffered them, under certain conditions which humanity would impose.

Clark’s success at Schlosser suggested another and more important expedition. It was the surprise of the American naval station and deposit for stores and munitions of war at Black Rock, near Buffalo. It was organized by the gallant Lieutenant Colonel Cecil Bisshopp, of the British Forty-first. He left his head-quarters at Lundy’s Lane on the afternoon of the 10th [July, 1813.], with detachments from the Royal Artillery, and the Eighth, Forty-first, and Forty-ninth Regiments, and at Chippewa was joined by Lieutenant Colonel Clark, with a body of Lincoln militia and volunteers, making his whole force between three and four hundred in number. They embarked at Chippewa early in the evening, and at half an hour before dawn [July 11.] landed unperceived on the American shore, a short distance below Black Rock. The block-house there, called Fort Tompkins, was in charge of less than a dozen artillerists; and the only other available military force at the station was about two hundred militia, under Major Adams, with two or three pieces of artillery. At Buffalo, two miles distant, were less than a hundred infantry and dragoon recruits from the South, on their way to Fort George, and a small body of Indians under Henry O’Bail, the young Corn-planter, who had been partially educated at Philadelphia, but who, Indian-like, could not brook the restraints of civilization, and had gone back to his blanket and feather head-dress. These forces were under the command of General Peter B. Porter, who was then residing at his house near Black Rock. 44

On meeting Captain Cummings, Porter ordered him to halt. Then, mounting the horse of one of the dragoons, he hastened to Buffalo, rallied about one half of Major Adam’s militia, and, with these and about fifty volunteer citizens, he soon rejoined Cummings. With the united force and about forty Indians, he attacked the invaders, at eight o’clock, from three different points. The Indians, who were concealed in a ravine, arose from cover, and gave the appalling war-whoop at the moment of the attack, and added much to the surprise and confusion of the British, who did not expect the return of the Americans. After a short, spirited contest, the foe were beaten, and driven in confusion toward their boats, now moored near the present ferry, where they rallied. Porter now concentrated his own forces, and fell upon Bisshopp with so much power that, after a contest of not more than twenty minutes, he fled with precipitation to his boats, leaving nine killed and sixteen or eighteen prisoners, among whom was Captain Saunders, of Bisshopp’s regiment, who was badly wounded. 45 He was carried gently by the Indians in blankets to General Porter’s house. 46 The British suffered a greater loss after they had reached their boats. 47 Among those mortally wounded was the commander of the expedition, a gallant young man, thirty years of age. He was conveyed in sadness to his head-quarters at Lundy’s Lane, where, after lingering five days, he died.

He was buried in the bosom of a green slope, in a small cemetery on the south side of Lundy’s Lane, a short distance from the great cataract of the Niagara, by his brother officers, who erected over his grave a neat monument. In the course of time it fell into decay, and thirty-three years afterward the sisters of the young soldier replaced it by another and more elegant one. Upon the recumbent slab that surmounts it is an appropriate inscription. 48

The expedition to Burlington Heights was under the chief command of Chauncey. He appeared at the mouth of the Niagara River with his fleet on the 27th of July, and on the following day he sailed for the head of Ontario, with three hundred land troops under Colonel Scott. Meanwhile Colonel Harvey had taken measures for the security of the British stores at Burlington. Lieutenant Colonel Battersby was ordered from York with a part of the Glengary corps to re-enforce the guard under Major Maule. By forced marches Battersby joined Maule before Chauncey’s arrival. That officer and Scott soon perceived that their force was insufficient for the prescribed work. Convinced of this, and informed of the defenseless state of York on account of the withdrawal of Battersby’s detachment, Chauncey spread his sails, went across the lake, and entered that harbor on the 31st. Colonel Scott landed his troops without opposition, took possession of the place, burnt the barracks, public storehouses and stores, and eleven transports, destroyed five pieces of cannon, and bore away as spoils one heavy gun and a considerable quantity of provisions, chiefly of flour. The expedition returned to the Niagara on the 3d of August, carrying with them the sick and wounded of Bśrstler’s command found in York. No military movements of much importance occurred on that frontier after this until late in the year. 49

We have noticed the retirement of General Dearborn from the command of the Northern Army. That measure had been decided upon by General Armstrong, the Secretary of War, full six months before it occurred. He considered the command of that army "a burden too heavy for General Dearborn to carry with advantage to the nation or credit to himself" and two remedies were suggested to the Secretary’s mind – "the one a prompt and peremptory recall, the other such an augmentation of his staff as would secure to the army better instruction, and to himself the chance of wiser councils." 50 The former remedy was chosen, and General James Wilkinson, then in command in the Gulf region, and General Wade Hampton, stationed at Norfolk, in Virginia, were ordered to the Northern frontier. These men had been active officers in the old War for Independence, the first on the staff of General Gates, and the second as a partisan ranger in South Carolina in connection with Marion. Unfortunately for the good of the public service, they were now bitter enemies, and so jealous of each other that they would not co-operate, as we shall observe, at a critical moment.

It was early in March when the Secretary’s orders were sent to Wilkinson, and with them was a private letter from the same hand, breathing the most friendly spirit, and saying, "Why should you remain in your land of cypress when patriotism and ambition equally invite you to one where grows the laurel? . . . . If our cards be well played we may renew the scenes of Saratoga." 51 Wilkinson was flattered, and as soon as he could make his arrangements he left the "land of the cypress," journeyed through the Creek country by way of Fort Mims to the capital of Georgia, and thence northward to Washington City, where he arrived, weary and worn with several hundreds of miles of travel, and weak with sickness, on the 31st of July. He was cordially received by Armstrong and the President, and, after being allowed to rest a few days, and becoming formally invested with the power of commander-in-chief of the Army of the North in place of Dearborn, a plan of the proposed operations of that army during the remainder of the campaign, which the Secretary had laid before the Cabinet on the 23d of July [1813.], was presented to him for consideration [August 5.], with an expressed desire that if he should perceive any thing objectionable in the plan he would freely suggest modifications.

At the beginning of the campaign Armstrong was anxious to secure the control of the St. Lawrence by the capture of Kingston, but circumstances, as we have seen, 52 prevented an attempt to do so. That project was now revived, and had received the approval of the Cabinet. It did not strike Wilkinson favorably, and on the 6th of August, in a written communication to the Secretary, the general freely suggested modifications, saying, "Will it not be better to strengthen our force already at Fort George, cut up the British in that quarter, destroy Indian establishments, and (should General Harrison fail in his object) march a detachment and capture Malden? After which, closing our operations on the peninsula, razing all works there, and leaving our settlements on the strait in tranquillity, descend like lightning with our whole force on Kingston, and, having reduced that place, and captured both garrison and shipping, go down the St. Lawrence and form a junction with Hampton’s column, 53 if the lateness of the season should permit." 54 The object of that junction was to make a combined attack on Montreal. The Secretary of War, always impatient when his opinions were disputed, at once conceived a dislike of his old companion in arms, whom he had invited so kindly to come North and win laurels, and from that time a widening estrangement existed. Long years afterward the Secretary wrote, "This strategic labor of the general had no tendency to increase the executive confidence in either his professional knowledge or judgment. Still the President hoped that if the opinions it contained were mildly rebuked, the general would abandon them, and, after joining the army, would hasten to execute the plan already communicated to him." 55

Armstrong replied courteously to Wilkinson. He adhered to his own plan, but allowed that the fall of Kingston and the attainment of the control of the St. Lawrence might be as effectually accomplished indirectly by a quick movement down the river against Montreal, masked by a feigned attack on the former place. But he decidedly objected to any farther movements against the enemy on the Canadian peninsula, as they would but "wound the tail of the lion;" 56 and Wilkinson departed for Sackett’s Harbor [August 11, 1813.] without any definite plan of operations determined upon, while Armstrong sent instructions to General Boyd to keep within his lines at Fort George, and simply hold the enemy at bay, notwithstanding the American force was much larger than that of the British.

On his way to Sackett’s Harbor Wilkinson sent from Albany his first orders to Hampton, as commander-in-chief of the Northern Army. This aroused the ire of the old aristocrat, whose landed possessions in South Carolina and Louisiana were almost princely, and whose slaves were numbered by thousands. His anger was intensified by his hatred of Wilkinson, and he immediately wrote to the Secretary of War [August 23.], insisting that his was a separate command, and tendering his resignation in the event of his being compelled to act under Wilkinson. Wilkinson at the same time was distrustful of Armstrong, and evidently quite as jealous of his own rights, for on the 24th of August he wrote to the Secretary of War, saying, "I trust you will not interfere with my arrangements, or give orders within the district of my command, but to myself because it would impair my authority and distract the public service, Two heads on the same shoulders make a monster." "Unhappily for the country," says Ingersoll, "that deplorable campaign was a monster with three heads, biting and barking at each other with a madness which destroyed them all and disgusted the country." 57 This calamity we shall have occasion to consider hereafter.

Wilkinson arrived at Sackett’s Harbor late in August [August 20.], and found himself nominally in command of between twelve and fourteen thousand troops, four thousand of them, under Hampton, at Burlington, composing the right wing, and the remainder equally divided between Sackett’s Harbor, the centre, and Fort George, the left wing. 58 But his real effective force did not exceed nine thousand men. It had been a sickly summer on the frontier, especially on the Canadian peninsula, and the hospitals were full. The British force opposed to him amounted to about eight thousand. Their right was on Burlington Heights, their centre at Kingston, and their left at Montreal.

Wilkinson called a council of officers on the 28th [August, 1813.]. It was attended by Generals Lewis, Brown, and Swartwout, and Commodore Chauncey. It was determined to concentrate at Sackett’s harbor all the troops of that department except those on Lake Champlain, preparatory to striking "a deadly blow somewhere." 59 Wilkinson accordingly hastened to Fort George, leaving Lewis in command at the Harbor, and arrived there on the 4th of September, extremely ill, after a fatiguing voyage the whole distance in an open boat. As soon as his strength would allow he assumed active command there, and on the 20th held a council of officers, at which Generals Boyd, Miller, and Williams, eleven colonels and lieutenant colonels, and ten majors, attended. It was resolved to abandon and destroy Fort George, and transfer the troops to the east end of Lake Ontario. But orders came from Washington to "put Fort George in a condition to resist assault; to leave there an efficient garrison of at least six hundred regular troops; to remove Captain Nathaniel Leonard, of the First Regiment of Artillery, from the command of Fort Niagara, and give it to Captain George Armistead, of the same regiment; to accept the services of a volunteer corps offered by General P. B. Porter and others, and to commit the command of Fort George and the Niagara frontier to Brigadier General Moses Porter." 60 These instructions were but partially obeyed. Leonard was left in command of Fort Niagara; no arrangements were made for the acceptance of the volunteers; and Colonel Scott, instead of General Moses Porter, was placed in command of Fort George, with a garrison of about eight hundred regular troops, and a part of Colonel Philetus Swift’s regiment of militia, instructed, in the anticipated event of the British abandoning that frontier, to leave the fort in command of Brigadier General M‘Clure, of the New York Militia, and with his regulars join the expedition on the St. Lawrence. Having completed his arrangements, Wilkinson embarked with the Niagara army on Chauncey’s fleet, and sailed eastward on the 2d of October.

Colonel Scott immediately set Captain Totten, of the Engineers, at work to strengthen the post over which, a few months before, he had unfurled the American flag for the first time. Much had been accomplished at the end of a week, when, suddenly, to the surprise of all, the British broke camp and hastened toward Burlington Heights. General Vincent had received intelligence of the defeat of Proctor on the Thames, 61 and he instantly directed the concentration of all his forces at the head of the lake, to either meet Harrison, should he push in from the field of victory, or to renew the attempt to repossess themselves of the Niagara frontier. Proctor, with the small remnant of his vanquished army, joined Vincent on the 10th. This retrograde movement of the British was the contingency which Scott longed for, because he preferred active service down the St. Lawrence to garrison duty. He accordingly placed Fort George in command of General M‘Clure, and crossed the river to the American shore with all the regulars on the 13th of October [1813.]. He marched to the mouth of the Genesee River, where he expected to find lake transportation for his troops. He was disappointed; and in drenching rain, and through deep mud, he pressed on with his little army by way of the sites of Rochester 62 and Syracuse 63 to Utica, 64 where he struck the road that from there penetrated the Black River country. 65 There he met General Armstrong, who had left his post at Washington for the double purpose of reconciling the differences between Wilkinson and Hampton, and to superintend in person the movements of the St. Lawrence expedition. The Secretary permitted Scott to leave his troops in command of Major Hindman, and to push forward to Ogdensburg, where he joined Wilkinson, and took part in subsequent events of the expedition.

While affairs were in this condition at Fort George General Harrison arrived there, as we have seen, 66 with the expectation of leading an expedition against Burlington Heights. But he was speedily ordered to embark, with all his troops, on Chauncey’s squadron for Sackett’s Harbor. M‘Clure was again alone [November 10.] with his volunteers and militia. The time of service of the latter was about to expire, and none could be induced to remain. 67 Gloomy intelligence came from the St. Lawrence – Wilkinson’s expedition had failed. Startling intelligence came from the westward – Lieutenant General Drummond, accompanied by Major General Riall, had lately arrived on the Peninsula, with re-enforcements from Kingston, and assumed chief command; and Murray, with his regulars and Indians, was moving toward Fort George. Its garrison was reduced to sixty effective regulars of the Twenty-fourth United States Infantry. These were in great peril, and M‘Clure determined to abandon the post, and place his little garrison in Fort Niagara. The weather was extremely cold. Temperature had been faithful to the calendar, and winter had commenced in earnest on the 1st of December. Deep snow was upon the ground, and biting north winds came over the lake. "Shall I leave the foe comfortable quarters, and thus increase the danger to Fort Niagara?" he asked of the Spirit and Usage of War. They answered No, and with this decision, and under the sanction of an order from the itinerant War Department, 68 he attempted to blow up the fort while his men were crossing [December 10.] the icy flood. 69 Then he applied the brand to the beautiful village of Newark. One hundred and fifty houses were speedily laid in ashes. 70 The inhabitants had been given only a few hours’ warning; and, with little food and clothing, a large number of helpless women and children were driven from their homes into the wintry air houseless wanderers. 71 Oh! it was a cruel act. War is always cruel, but this was more cruel than necessity demanded. It excited hot indignation and the spirit of vengeance, which soon caused the hand of retaliation to work fearfully. It provoked the commission of great injury to American property, and left a stain upon the American character.

"Let us retaliate by fire and sword," said Murray to Drummond, as they gazed, with eyes flashing with indignation, upon the ruins of Newark. "Do so," said the commander, "swiftly and thoroughly;" and on the night of the 18th of December – a cold, black night – Murray crossed the river at Five-mile Meadows, three miles above Fort Niagara, with about a thousand men, British and Indians. With five hundred and fifty regulars he pressed on toward the fort, carrying axes, scaling-ladders, and other implements for assault, and shielded from observation by the thick cover of darkness. They captured the advanced pickets, secured silence, and, while the garrison were soundly sleeping, hovered around the fort in proper order for a systematic and simultaneous attack at different points. Five companies of the One Hundredth Regiment, under Lieutenant Colonel Hamilton, were to assail the main gate and escalade the adjacent works; three companies of the same regiment, under Captain Martin, were to storm the eastern demi-bastion; the Royal Scots Grenadiers, Captain Bailey, were to assault the salient angle of the fortification; and the flank companies of the Forty-first Regiment were ordered to support the principal attack. 72

These preparations were unnecessary. Gross negligence or positive treachery had exposed the fort to easy capture. M‘Clure had established his head-quarters at Buffalo, and when he left Niagara on the 12th [December, 1813.], he charged Captain Leonard, commander of the garrison, to be vigilant and active, for invasion might be expected. This vigilance and activity the invaders had prepared for; but when, at about three o’clock in the morning, Hamilton went forward to assail the main gate, he found it standing wide open and unguarded! Leonard had left the fort the evening before at eleven o’clock, and spent the night with his family at his house three miles in the rear. He gave no hint to the garrison of expected assault, and his departure was without their knowledge. 73 They were between three and four hundred strong in fairly effective men, and, with a competent and faithful commander, might have kept the invaders at bay. They had neither, and when the foe came there was no one to lead. The sentinels were seized, and in fear gave up the countersign to the foe, and the fort was entered without much resistance. The occupants of the southeastern block-house, and the invalids of the Red Barracks, made such determined opposition for a few minutes that Lieutenant Nowlan and five men were killed, and Colonel Murray, three men, and a surgeon were wounded. This conflict was over before the remainder of the garrison were fairly awake to the cause of the tumult, and the fort was in possession of the foe. It might have been an almost bloodless victory had not the unhallowed spirit of revenge for the outrage at Newark demanded victims. Murray did not restrain that spirit, and a large number of the garrison, many of them invalids, were bayoneted after all resistance had ceased! 74 This horrid work was performed on Sunday morning, the 19th of December, 1813.

Full license was given by Riall to his Indian allies, and Lewiston was sacked, plundered, and destroyed – made a perfect desolation. 75 This accomplished, the invaders pushed on toward the little hamlet of Manchester (now Niagara Falls Village); but, when ascending Lewiston Heights, they were met and temporarily checked and driven back by the gallant Major Mallory, who, with forty Canadian volunteers, came down from Schlosser and fought the foe for two days as they pushed him steadily back toward Buffalo. 76 He could do but little to stay the march of the desolator. The whole Niagara frontier on the American side, from Fort Niagara to Tonewanta Creek, a distance of thirty-six miles, and far into the interior, was swept with the besom of destruction placed by British authority in the hands of savage pagans. 77 Manchester, Schlosser, and Tuscarora Village shared the fate of Youngstown and Lewiston. 78 Free course was given to the blood-thirsty Indians, and many innocent persons were butchered, and survivors were made to fly in terror through the deep snow to some forest shelter or remote cabin of a settler far beyond the invaders’ track. Buffalo, too, would have been plundered and destroyed had not the progress of the foe been checked by the timely destruction of the bridge over the Tonewanta Creek.

But the respite for doomed Buffalo was short. Riall and his followers returned to Lewiston, crossed over to Queenston, and on the morning of the 28th appeared at Chippewa, under the command of Lieutenant General Drummond. In the mean time the alarm had spread over Western New York, and the inhabitants were thoroughly aroused. General M‘Clure had sent out a stirring address [December 18, 1813.] to the "inhabitants of Niagara, Genesee, and Chautauqua," urging them to repair immediately to Lewiston, Schlosser, and Buffalo. 79

General Amos Hall, with his usual alacrity, called out the militia and invited volunteers. His head-quarters were at Batavia, where the government had an arsenal, thirty or forty miles eastward from Buffalo, and there General M‘Clure resigned his command, and took orders from Hall. As fast as men were collected they were sent to Black Rock and Buffalo, and thitherward Hall hastened on the morning of the 25th. He reached Buffalo twenty-four hours after his departure from Batavia, and there found "a considerable body of irregular troops of various descriptions, disorganized and confused. Every thing wore the appearance of consternation and dismay." 80 He ordered their immediate organization; and when, on the 27th, he reviewed the troops, he found their number to be a little more than two thousand at Buffalo and Black Rock. 81

General Drummond advanced to a point nearly opposite Black Rock on the 29th, and reconnoitred the American camp. At midnight General Riall crossed with regulars, Canadians, and Indians, about a thousand strong, and landed where Bisshopp did, about two miles below Black Rock. Moving immediately forward, they encountered mounted pickets under Lieutenant Boughton, who, after a brief skirmish with the British vanguard, fled across Shogeoquady Creek. 82 The enemy took possession of the "Sailors’ Battery" there and the bridge, and then paused, while Boughton hastened with news of the fact to General Hall’s quarters, between Buffalo and Black Rock. The night was very dark. The troops at head-quarters were paraded, and Lieutenant Colonels Warren and Churchill (General Hopkins was absent from camp) were ordered to go forward with their corps and feel the position and strength of the enemy. They met the foe, and at the first fire they broke and fled, and were no more seen during the following day. Hall then ordered Adams and Chapin, with their commands, to the same duty, and the same result ensued; and at the dawn of the 30th he found himself in command of eight hundred troops less than at the evening twilight of the 29th. They had actually deserted.

Hall now advanced with his whole force, and ordered Lieutenant Colonel Blakeslee to move forward and commence the attack on the enemy’s left. They marched toward Black Rock on the Hill Road, and in the dim light of early dawn saw a flotilla of British boats making for the shore near General Porter’s mansion. These bore the Royal Scots, eight hundred in number, who landed under cover of a five-gun battery on the American shore, in the face of severe opposition. Their plan of attack was soon revealed to the American general, and he made his dispositions accordingly. Colonel Gordon, of the centre, with about four hundred Scots, commenced the attack, while the British left wing attempted to flank the American right. Hall quickly foiled this design by throwing Granger and his Indians, and Mallory and his Canadian Refugees, in the way of the enemy’s advancing left wing. At the same time Blakeslee and his Ontario militia confronted the centre, and M‘Mahon and his Chautauqua troops were posted as a reserve at the battery of Fort Tompkins, 83 which was commanded by the gallant Lieutenant John Seely.

The batteries on the Canada shore and the cannon of the Americans opened fire simultaneously and vigorously, while Blakeslee’s men, cool as veterans, disputed the ground with the foe inch by inch. But the Indians and Canadians, lacking moral strength, gave way almost before a struggle was begun, and M‘Mahon and his reserves were ordered to the breach. They, too, gave way and fled, and could not be rallied by their officers. Hall’s power was thus completely broken, and he was placed in great peril. Deserted by a large portion of his troops, opposed by veterans, vastly outnumbered, and almost surrounded, he was compelled, for the safety of the remnant of his little army, to sound a retreat, after he had maintained the unequal conflict for half an hour. He tried to rally his troops, but in vain. The gallant Chapin, with a few of the bolder men, retired slowly along the present Niagara Street toward Buffalo, keeping the enemy partially in check, 84 while Hall, with the remainder, who were alarmed and scattered, retired to Eleven-mile Creek, where he rallied about three hundred men, who remained true to the old flag. With these he was enabled to cover the flight of the inhabitants, and to check the advance of the invaders into the interior.

The British and their Indian allies took possession of Buffalo, 85 and proceeded to plunder, destroy, and slaughter. Only four buildings were left standing in the town. These were the jail (built of stone), the frame of a barn, Reese’s blacksmith-shop, and the dwelling of Mrs. St. John, a resolute woman, who, more fortunate than her neighbor, Mrs. Lovejoy (who was murdered and burnt in her own house), saved her own life and her property. 86 At Black Rock only a single building escaped conflagration. It was a log house, in which women and children had taken refuge. The Ariel, Little Belt, Chippewa, and Trippe, vessels that performed service in the battle on Lake Erie a little more than a hundred days before, were committed to the flames. Fearful was the retaliation for the destruction of half-inhabited Newark, where not a life was sacrificed! Six villages, many isolated country houses, and four vessels were consumed; and the butchery of innocent persons at Fort Niagara, Lewiston, Schlosser, Tuscarora Village, Black Rock, and Buffalo, and in farm-houses, attested the fierceness of the enemy’s revenge. 87

2 See page 591.

3 This consisted of a strong block-house and surrounding intrenchments, and occupied the place of the battery on which the iron thirty-two-pounder that drove off the British in 1812 was mounted. See page 368. The single cannon with which it was armed at the time we are now considering was the same iron thirty-two-pounder. The fort was named Tompkins in honor of Daniel D. Tompkins, then governor of the State of New York. The bluff on which it stood overlooks Navy Point, within which is the Harbor, where the ship-yard was. The place was named in honor of Augustus Sackett, the first settler. Its Indian name was a long one, and signified "fort at the mouth of Great River."

4 Jacob Brown was born of Quaker parents, in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, on the 9th of May, 1775. He was well educated early. When he was sixteen years of age his father lost his property, and the right-minded youth resolved to earn his own livelihood. He taught school in the Quaker settlement of Crosswicks, in New Jersey, from his eighteenth to his twenty-first birthday. For a while he was a surveyor in the vicinity of Cincinnati, and in 1798 was a schoolteacher in the city of New York. He commenced the study of law, but it was distasteful to him, and he abandoned it. He then purchased some land on the Black River, in Jefferson County, and adopted the pursuit of a farmer. In 1809 he was appointed colonel of a regiment of militia in that section, and on his estate a settlement was formed and named Brownsville. In 1811 the Governor of New York commissioned him a brigadier general of militia, and, as we have seen (see page 366), he was intrusted with important command. From that time until the close of the war General Brown’s public career formed an important part of the history of the times, and the record may be found in these pages. He was retained in the army at the close of the war, and was appointed to the command of the Northern Division. He became a general-in-chief of the armies of the United States in 1821, and held that office until his death, at his head-quarters in the City of Washington, on the 24th of February, 1828, at the age of fifty-three years. His widow, yet (1867) living, resided, until recently, in the fine mansion erected at Brownsville by the general in 1814.