CHAPTER IV.

Weak as was the army at Niagara, it was relatively stronger than the defence at any other threatened point. Sackett’s Harbor contained only seven hundred effectives.[137] On Lake Champlain, Major-General Izard tried to cover Plattsburg and Burlington with about five thousand regular troops.[138] Already Armstrong knew that large British reinforcements from Wellington’s army were on their way to Canada;[139] and within a few weeks after the battle of Lundy’s Lane eleven thousand of the best troops England ever put in the field were camped on or near the Sorel River, about to march against Izard’s five thousand raw recruits.

They could march nowhere else. Not only was the line of Lake Champlain the natural and necessary path of an invading army, but the impossibility of supplying any large number of troops in Upper Canada made Lake Champlain the only region in which a large British force could exist. Sir George Prevost had reached the limit of his powers in defending Upper Canada. His commissary-general, W. H. Robinson, wrote to him, August 27, expressing “the greatest alarm” on account of deficient supplies at Burlington Heights and Niagara, where instead of nine thousand rations daily as he expected, he was required to furnish fourteen thousand, half of them to Indians.[140] Much as Prevost wanted to attack Sackett’s Harbor, and weak as he knew that post to be, he could not attempt it, although he had thirteen or fourteen thousand rank-and-file idle at Montreal. In October he went to Kingston expressly to arrange such an attack, and found it impossible.

“An investigation of the state of the stores at this post,” he wrote to Lord Bathurst October 18,[141] “proved that the articles for the armament and equipment for a ship of the class of the ‘St. Lawrence,’ carrying upward of one hundred guns, had absorbed almost the whole of the summer transport-service from Montreal, leaving the materials for an undertaking of the magnitude of the destruction of Sackett’s Harbor still at the extremity of the line of communication; and now, by giving precedence to that supply of provisions and stores without which an army is no longer to be maintained in Upper Canada, its removal is inevitably postponed until the winter roads are established.”

Not only were military operations on a large scale impossible in Upper Canada, but for the opposite reason occupation of Lake Champlain by a British force was necessary. Northern New York and Vermont furnished two thirds of the fresh beef consumed by the British armies. General Izard reported to Armstrong, July 31,[142]—

“From the St. Lawrence to the ocean, an open disregard prevails for the laws prohibiting intercourse with the enemy. The road to St. Regis is covered with droves of cattle, and the river with rafts, destined for the enemy. The revenue officers see these things, but acknowledge their inability to put a stop to such outrageous proceedings. On the eastern side of Lake Champlain the high roads are found insufficient for the supplies of cattle which are pouring into Canada. Like herds of buffaloes they press through the forest, making paths for themselves.... Nothing but a cordon of troops from the French Mills to Lake Memphramagog could effectually check the evil. Were it not for these supplies, the British forces in Canada would soon be suffering from famine, or their government be subjected to enormous expense for their maintenance.”

After Chauncey, August 1, regained possession of Lake Ontario, any British campaign against Sackett’s Harbor or Detroit became doubly impossible, and the occupation of Lake Champlain became doubly necessary. Prevost wrote to Bathurst, August 27,[143]—

“In fact, my Lord, two thirds of the army in Canada are at this moment eating beef provided by American contractors, drawn principally from the States of Vermont and New York. This circumstance, as well as that of the introduction of large sums in specie into this province, being notorious in the United States, it is to be expected that Congress will take steps to deprive us of those resources; and under that apprehension large droves are daily crossing the lines coming into Lower Canada.”

The fear that Izard might at any moment take efficient measures to cut off the British supplies gave double force to the reasons for occupying Lake Champlain, and forcing the military frontier back beyond Plattsburg and Burlington.

The political reasons were not less strong or less notorious than the military. England made no secret of her intention to rectify the Canadian frontier by lopping away such territory as she could conquer. July 5, the day of the battle of Chippawa, Lieutenant-Colonel Pilkington sailed from Halifax, and under the naval protection of Sir Thomas Hardy in the “Ramillies,” landed at Eastport, July 11, with the One-Hundred-and-second regiment, some engineers and artillery,—a detachment of six hundred men,—and took possession of Moose Island.[144] Fort Sullivan, with six officers and eighty men, capitulated, and Great Britain took permanent possession of the place.

Moose Island was disputed territory, and its occupation was not necessarily conquest; but the next step showed wider views. August 26, Lieutenant-General Sir J. C. Sherbrooke, the British governor of Nova Scotia, set sail from Halifax with a powerful fleet, carrying near two thousand troops, and arrived September 1 at the Penobscot.[145] At his approach, the American garrison of the small battery at Castine blew up their fort and dispersed. In all Massachusetts, only about six hundred regular troops were to be found, and beyond the Penobscot, in September, 1814, hardly a full company could have been collected. The able-bodied, voting, male population of the counties of Kennebeck and Hancock, on either side of the Penobscot River, capable of bearing arms, was at that time about twelve thousand, on an estimate of one in five of the total population; but they offered no resistance to the British troops.

One misfortune led to another. A few days before Sherbrooke’s arrival at Castine the United States ship “Adams,” a heavy corvette carrying twenty-eight guns, having escaped from Chesapeake Bay and cruised some months at sea struck on a reef on the Isle of Haut, and was brought into the Penobscot in a sinking condition. Captain Morris, who commanded her, took the ship up the river about twenty-five miles, as far as Hampden near Bangor, and removed her guns in order to repair her. Sherbrooke, on occupying Castine, sent a detachment of some six hundred men in boats up the river to destroy the ship, while he occupied Belfast with another regiment.[146] Captain Morris hastily put his guns in battery, and prepared to defend the ship with his crew, numbering probably more than two hundred men, relying on the militia to cover his flanks. On the morning of September 3, in a thick fog, the enemy’s boats approached and landed their infantry, which attacked and routed the militia, and obliged Captain Morris to set fire to the “Adams,” abandon his guns, and disperse his men.[147] The British force then marched to Bangor, which they occupied without opposition. Their entire loss was one man killed and eight wounded.[148] At Bangor they remained nearly a week, destroying vessels and cargoes; but Sir John Sherbrooke had no orders to occupy the country west of the Penobscot, and his troops returned September 9 to Castine.

At Castine the British remained, while another detachment occupied Machias. All the province of Maine east of the Penobscot was then in Sherbrooke’s hands. The people formally submitted. One hundred miles of Massachusetts sea-coast passed quietly under the dominion of the King of England. The male citizens were required to take, and took, the oath of allegiance to King George,[149] and showed no unwillingness to remain permanently British subjects. After September 1 the United States government had every reason to expect that Great Britain would require, as one condition of peace, a cession of the eastern and northern portions of Maine.

For this purpose the British needed also to occupy Lake Champlain, in order to make their conquests respectable. The British general might move on Plattsburg or on Burlington; but in order to maintain his position he must gain naval possession of the Lake. In such a case the difficulties of the American government would be vastly increased, and the British position would be impregnable. Armstrong knew these circumstances almost as well as they were known to Sir George Prevost.

In May the British flotilla entered Lake Champlain from the Sorel River, and cruised, May 9, as far southward as Otter Creek, terrifying Vermont for the safety of the American flotilla under Lieutenant Thomas Macdonough at Vergennes. Irritated and alarmed by this demonstration, Armstrong ordered Izard to seize and fortify Rouse’s Point, or the mouth of Lacolle River, or Ash Island, and so close the entrance to the Lake.[150] Apparently Armstrong gave the order in ignorance that Lacolle River and Ash Island were strongly fortified British positions,[151] and that a battery established at Rouse’s Point, in the relative situation of forces, must have fallen into British hands. On this point the opinion of Izard was more valuable than that of Armstrong; and Izard, after much study and inquiry, decided to erect his fortifications at Plattsburg. He preferred the task of taking a position which he could certainly hold, although it would not prevent the enemy from passing if they chose to leave it behind them. At Plattsburg, therefore, he collected his troops, amounting to five or six thousand men, and constructed strong forts, while Macdonough’s fleet took position in the bay.

While thus occupied, Izard cast anxious glances westward, doubting whether, in case of a reverse at Niagara or Sackett’s Harbor, he ought not to move on the St. Lawrence and threaten the British communications between Montreal and Kingston.[152] The same idea occurred to Armstrong, who in a letter dated July 27 recommended Izard to carry it out.[153] The letter reached Izard August 10, when he had advanced with his army to Chazy, and had learned enough of the concentration of British troops in his front to be assured that they meant to direct their serious attack against Lake Champlain. He wrote Armstrong a letter, August 11, which failed only in saying too little, rather than too much, of the dangers risked in obeying Armstrong’s order:[154]—

“I will make the movement you direct, if possible; but I shall do it with the apprehension of risking the force under my command, and with the certainty that everything in this vicinity but the lately erected works at Plattsburg and Cumberland Head will in less than three days after my departure be in the possession of the enemy. He is in force superior to mine in my front; he daily threatens an attack on my position at Champlain; we are in hourly expectation of a serious conflict. That he has not attacked us before this time is attributable to caution on his part, from exaggerated reports of our numbers, and from his expectation of reinforcements.... It has always been my conviction that the numerical force of the enemy has been under-rated. I believe this to be the strong point of our frontier for either attack or defence, and I know that a British force has been kept in check in Lower Canada for many weeks past, greatly superior to that which I could oppose to it.”

Izard was right. Every week new British forces poured into Quebec and were forwarded to Montreal. The arrival of the first division at Quebec was announced in the American newspapers early in August. Within a few weeks three brigades arrived and were sent to the front. When Izard wrote, he was probably faced by ten thousand veteran British troops within twenty or thirty miles of his position, and more were known to be on their way. At such a moment the danger of attempting a diversion was great; but Armstrong refused to believe it. Irritated by Izard’s remonstrance, the secretary not only persisted in his own opinion, but, abandoning the idea of a movement against the British communications along the St. Lawrence, ordered Izard to march his army to Sackett’s Harbor, and from there to operate either directly in force against Kingston,[155] or to go on to Niagara and assist Brown, then hard pressed at Fort Erie. “It is very distinctly my opinion,” wrote the secretary August 12,[156] “that it has become good policy on our part to carry the war as far to the westward as possible, particularly while we have an ascendency on the Lakes.”

Izard obeyed. His troops, numbering four thousand men, began their march August 29 for Sackett’s Harbor, and for several weeks at the crisis of the campaign ceased to exist for military purposes. Within the fortifications at Plattsburg Izard left a miscellaneous body of three thousand, three hundred men,[157] without an organized battalion except four companies of the Sixth regiment. Brigadier-General Alexander Macomb, who as senior officer was left in command, reported his force as not exceeding fifteen hundred effectives.[158]

Armstrong’s policy of meeting the enemy’s main attack by annihilating the main defence never received explanation or excuse. At times Armstrong seemed to suggest that he meant to rely on the navy,[159]—and indeed nothing else, except Izard’s forts, was left to rely upon; but in truth he rather invited the invasion of a British army into New York to “renew the scene of Saratoga.”[160] As Izard predicted, the enemy crossed the frontier at once after his departure, occupying Chazy September 3, and approaching, September 5, within eight miles of Plattsburg.

Great Britain had never sent to America so formidable an armament. Neither Wolfe nor Amherst, neither Burgoyne nor Cornwallis, had led so large or so fine an army as was under the command of Sir George Prevost. According to his proposed arrangement, the light brigade, under Major-General Robinson, contained four battalions of the Twenty-seventh, Thirty-ninth, Seventy-sixth, and Eighty-eighth foot, with artillery, and numbered two thousand eight hundred and eighty-four rank-and-file. The second brigade, under Major-General Brisbane, contained battalions of the Eighth, Thirteenth, and Forty-ninth, De Meuron’s regiment and Canadian voltigeurs and chasseurs, numbering four thousand and forty-eight rank-and-file. The third brigade, under Major-General Power, contained battalions of the Third, Fifth, Twenty-seventh, and Fifty-eighth, and numbered three thousand eight hundred and one rank-and-file. The reserve, under Major-General Kempt, contained battalions of the Ninth, Thirty-seventh, Fifty-seventh, and Eighty-first, numbering three thousand five hundred and forty-nine rank-and-file. Finally, fourteen hundred and eighty-eight men of the Sixteenth and Seventieth regiments, under the command of Major-General DeWatteville, were stationed between Coteau du Lac and Gananoque on the St. Lawrence.[161]

Thus the left division of the British army in Canada numbered fifteen thousand seven hundred and seventy effectives, or, including officers, probably eighteen thousand men, without reckoning the Canadian militia, either incorporated or sedentary. Two lieutenant-generals and five major-generals were in command. Amply provided with artillery and horses, every brigade well equipped, they came fresh from a long service in which the troops had learned to regard themselves as invincible. As they were at last organized, four brigades crossed the border, numbering not less than “eleven thousand men with a proportionate and most excellent train of artillery, commanded in chief by Sir George Prevost, and under him by officers of the first distinction in the service.”[162] A reserve of about five thousand men remained behind.

The fleet was almost as formidable as the army. As the force of the flotilla was reported to Prevost, it consisted of a thirty-six-gun ship, the “Confiance;” an eighteen-gun brig, the “Linnet;” two ten-gun sloops and twelve gunboats, carrying sixteen guns,[163]—all commanded by Captain Downie, of the Royal Navy, detached by Sir James Yeo for the purpose.

Such an expedition was regarded with unhesitating confidence, as able to go where it pleased within the region of Lake Champlain. About every other undertaking in America the British entertained doubts, but in regard to this affair they entertained none.[164] Every movement of the British generals showed conviction of their irresistible strength. Had Prevost doubted the result of attacking Plattsburg, he could have advanced by St. Albans on Burlington,[165] which would have obliged Macomb and Macdonough to leave their positions. So little did his army apprehend difficulty, that in advancing to Plattsburg in face of Macomb’s skirmishers they did not once form in line, or pay attention to the troops and militia who obstructed the road. “The British troops did not deign to fire on them except by their flankers and advanced patrols,” reported Macomb.[166] “So undaunted was the enemy that he never deployed in his whole march, always pressing on in column.”

The fleet felt the same certainty. According to the best Canadian authority,[167] “the strongest confidence prevailed in the superiority of the British vessels, their weight of metal, and in the capacity and experience of their officers and crews.” Captain Downie informed Sir George Prevost’s staff-officer that he considered himself with the “Confiance” alone a match for the whole American squadron.[168] Taking the British account of the “Confiance” as correct, she was one hundred and forty-six feet long on the gun-deck, and thirty-six feet broad; she carried a crew of three hundred officers and men;[169] her armament was thirty-seven guns,—twenty-seven long twenty-four-pounders, six thirty-two-pound carronades, and four twenty-four-pound carronades,—throwing in all nine hundred and thirty-six pounds.[170] The American account, which was more trustworthy because the “Confiance” became better known in the American than in the British service, gave her thirty-one long twenty-four-pounders and six carronades.[171]

Macdonough’s best ship was the “Saratoga.” Her dimensions were not recorded. Her regular complement of men was two hundred and ten, but she fought with two hundred and forty; she carried eight twenty-four-pounders, twelve thirty-two and six forty-two-pound carronades,—or twenty-six guns, throwing eight hundred and twenty-eight pounds. Her inferiority to the “Confiance” at long range was immense, and within carronade range it was at least sufficient to satisfy Captain Downie. He believed that a few broadsides would dispose of the “Saratoga,” and that the other American vessels must then surrender.

Assuming Sir George Prevost’s report to have been correct, the two fleets compared as follows:[172]—

Force of British Fleet.

Vessels.Guns.Long.Short.Long
metal.		Short
metal.		Weight of
metal.
Confiance37316744192936
Linnet1616192192
Chubb111106180186
Finch104624108132
Twelve Gunboats1688162256418
Total90603011287361864

Force of American Fleet.

Vessels.Guns.Long.Short.Long
metal.		Short
metal.		Weight of
metal.
Saratoga26818192636828
Eagle20812144384528
Ticonderoga17125168146314
Preble776363
Ten Gunboats16106192108300
Total86454175912742033

In this calculation the possible error consists only in one disputed eighteen-pound columbiad on the “Finch,” and three disputed guns—one long and two short—on the British gunboats. In one case the British would have thrown about nineteen hundred pounds of metal,—in the other, about eighteen hundred. A glance at the two tables shows that in one respect Downie held a decisive superiority in his guns. He had no less than sixty long-range pieces, while Macdonough had but forty-five. Downie’s long-range guns threw at least eleven hundred pounds of metal; Macdonough’s threw but seven hundred and sixty. If Downie chose his own distance beyond range of the thirty-two-pound carronades, and fought only his long guns, nothing could save Macdonough except extreme good fortune, for he had but fourteen twenty-four-pound guns against Downie’s thirty-four. Firing by broadsides, Downie could throw from his single ship, the “Confiance,” sixteen twenty-four-pound shot, to which Macdonough could reply only with eight, even if he used all his long guns on the same side.

The Americans had a decided advantage only in their commander. Thomas Macdonough, born in Delaware in 1783, was thirty years old when this responsibility fell upon him. He had been educated, like most of the naval heroes, in the hard service of the Tripolitan war, and had been sent to construct and command the naval force on Lake Champlain in the spring of 1813. Macdonough’s superiority over ordinary commanders consisted in the intelligent forethought with which he provided for the chances of battle. His arrangement showed that he foresaw, and as far as possible overcame in advance, every conceivable attack. He compelled the enemy to fight only as pleased himself.

PLAN
OF THE
BATTLE
OF
PLATTSBURG

Position of vessels 20 M. after anchoring

Macdonough anchored his four large vessels across Plattsburg Bay, where it was a mile and a half wide, and placed his gunboats in their rear to fill the gaps. Cumberland Head on his left and front, and Crab Island on his right obliged the enemy to enter in a line so narrow that Downie would find no room to anchor on his broadside out of carronade range, but must sail into the harbor under the raking fire of the American long guns, and take a position within range of the American carronades.[173] As the battle was to be fought at anchor, both squadrons would as a matter of course be anchored with springs on their cables; but Macdonough took the additional precaution of laying a kedge off each bow of the “Saratoga,” bringing their hawsers in on the two quarters, and letting them hang in bights under water.[174] This arrangement enabled him to wind his ship at any time without fear of having his cables cut by the enemy’s shot, and to use his larboard broadside if his starboard guns should be disabled. In effect, it doubled his fighting capacity.

Sir George Prevost and the army were ready to move before Downie’s fleet could be prepared. Marching directly forward with the utmost confidence, Sir George turned the advanced American position at Dead Creek Bridge and drove away the gunboats that covered it. He reached the Saranac River September 6, and saw beyond it a ridge “crowned with three strong redoubts and other field-works, and blockhouses armed with heavy ordnance, with their flotilla at anchor out of gunshot from the shore.”[175] The description was not exaggerated. Izard was himself a trained engineer, and the works built by him, under the direction of Major Totten of the Engineer Corps, were believed capable of resisting for three weeks a combined attack by land and water, even if the British fleet were victorious.[176] Three good companies of artillery manned the guns. Excellent officers of every arm were in command.

Prevost properly halted, and declined to assault without the co-operation of the fleet. He waited five days impatiently for Downie to appear. Not till seven o’clock on the morning of September 11 did the British flotilla sail round Cumberland Head. At the same time Prevost ordered his troops to cross the Saranac and storm the American works.

Downie intended, without regarding his superiority in long-range guns, to sail in and to lay the “Confiance” alongside of the “Saratoga;” but the wind was light and baffling, and his approach was so slow that he could not long bear the raking fire of the American guns. As he came within carronade range the wind baffling, he was obliged to anchor at two cables’ lengths,[177] or three hundred yards,[178] and begin action. With the same discipline that marked the movements of the troops on shore, Downie came to, anchored, made everything secure, and then poured a full broadside into Macdonough’s ship. The “Saratoga” shivered under the shock of sixteen twenty-four-pound shot and canister charges striking her hull; almost one-fifth of her crew were disabled; but she stood stoutly to her work, and the whole line was soon hotly engaged.

Americans usually had a decided advantage in their better gunnery, but three hundred yards was a long range for thirty-two-pound carronades, which at point-blank carried less than two hundred and fifty yards, and lost accuracy in proportion to elevation.[179] Macdonough was slow to prove superiority. Early in the battle the British suffered a severe, and perhaps in the experience of this war a decisive, loss in their commander, Captain Downie, instantly killed by one of his own guns thrown off its carriage against him by a solid shot. Yet at the end of two hours’ combat the British squadron was on the whole victorious, and the American on the point of capture. Of the three smaller American vessels, the “Preble” on the extreme right was driven out of the engagement, and the British gunboats, turning the American flank, attacked the “Ticonderoga,” which maintained a doubtful battle. The American left was also turned, the “Eagle” having been driven to take refuge between the “Saratoga” and “Ticonderoga,” in the centre. Macdonough’s ship was then exposed to the concentrated fire of the “Confiance” and “Linnet,” and his battery was soon silenced. The “Saratoga” could no longer use a gun on the engaged side, and the battle was nearly lost.

Then Macdonough’s forethought changed the impending defeat into victory. His fire had nearly silenced the “Confiance,” and disregarding the “Linnet,” he ceased attention to the battle in order to direct the operation of winding ship. Little by little hauling the ship about, he opened on the “Confiance” with one gun after another of the fresh broadside, as they bore; and the “Confiance,” after trying in vain to effect the same operation, struck her colors. Then the British fleet was in the situation which Downie had anticipated for the Americans in the event of silencing the “Saratoga.” The three smaller vessels were obliged to surrender, and the gunboats alone escaped. The battle had lasted from quarter past eight till quarter before eleven.

POSITIONS
OF THE
BRITISH AND AMERICAN FORCES
AT
PLATTSBURG

AFTER A SKETCH BY BRIG. GEN. MACOMB

By land, the British attack was much less effective than by water. The troops were slow in reaching their positions, and had time to make no decisive movement. A column under Major-General Robinson was ordered to move round by the right flank to a ford previously reconnoitred, some distance up the Saranac, in order to gain a position whence they could reverse the American works and carry them by assault; but Robinson’s column missed its way, and before reaching the ford heard the cheers of the American troops, and halted to ascertain its cause.[180] The remainder of the army waited for Robinson’s column to assault. The casualties showed that nothing like a serious engagement took place. The entire loss of the British army from September 6 to September 14 was officially reported as only thirty-seven killed and one hundred and fifty wounded, and of this loss a large part occurred previous to the battle of September 11. The entire American loss was thirty-seven killed and sixty-two wounded.

In the naval battle, Macdonough reported fifty-two killed and fifty-eight wounded, among about eight hundred and eighty men. The British reported fifty-seven killed and seventy-two wounded, in crews whose number was never precisely known, but was probably fully eight hundred. In neither case was the loss, though severe, as great relatively to the numbers as the severity of the action seemed to imply. The “Saratoga” lost twenty-eight killed in a crew of two hundred and forty. In Perry’s battle on Lake Erie, the “Lawrence” lost twenty-two men killed in a crew of one hundred and thirty-one. About one man in eight was killed on Macdonough’s ship; about one man in six on Perry’s.

With needless precipitation, Prevost instantly retreated the next day to Champlain, sacrificing stores to a very great amount, and losing many men by desertion. The army was cruelly mortified, and Prevost lost whatever military reputation he still preserved in Canada. In England the impression of disgrace was equally strong. “It is scarcely possible to conceive the degree of mortification and disappointment,” said the “Annual Register,”[181] “which the intelligence of this defeat created in Great Britain.” Yeo brought official charges of misconduct against Prevost, and Prevost defended himself by unusual arguments.

“With whatever sorrow I may think of the unfortunate occurrences to which I allude,” he wrote to Bathurst, three weeks later,[182] “I consider them as light and trivial when compared to the disastrous results which, I am solemnly persuaded, would have ensued had any considerations of personal glory, or any unreflecting disregard of the safety of the province, or of the honor of the army committed to my charge, induced me to pursue those offensive operations by land, independent of the fleet, which it would appear by your Lordship’s despatch were expected of me. Such operations, my Lord, have been attempted before, and on the same ground. The history of our country records their failure; and had they been undertaken again with double the force placed under my command, they would have issued in the discomfiture of his Majesty’s arms, and in a defeat not more disastrous than inevitable.”

The Duke of Wellington was not so severe as other critics, and hesitated to say that Prevost was wrong; “though of this I am certain, he must equally have returned ... after the fleet was beaten; and I am inclined to think he was right. I have told the ministers repeatedly that a naval superiority on the Lakes is a sine qua non of success in war on the frontier of Canada, even if our object should be wholly defensive.”[183] Yet the Duke in conversation seemed to think that his army in Canada was also at fault. “He had sent them some of his best troops from Bordeaux,” he said five-and-twenty years afterward,[184] “but they did not turn out quite right; they wanted this iron fist to command them.”

Meanwhile Major-General Izard, by Armstrong’s order, marched his four thousand men as far as possible from the points of attack. Starting from Champlain, August 29, the army reached Sackett’s Harbor September 17, having marched about two hundred and eighty miles in twenty days. At Sackett’s Harbor Izard found no orders from the government, for the government at that time had ceased to perform its functions; but he received an earnest appeal from General Brown to succor Fort Erie. “I will not conceal from you,” wrote Brown, September 10,[185] “that I consider the fate of this army very doubtful unless speedy relief is afforded.” Izard, who had no means of testing the correctness of this opinion, decided to follow Brown’s wishes, and made, September 17, the necessary preparations. Violent storms prevented Chauncey from embarking the troops until September 21; but September 27 the troops reached Batavia, and Izard met Brown by appointment. The army had then been a month in movement. The distance was more than four hundred miles, and no energy could have shortened the time so much as to have affected the result of the campaign. At one end of the line Sir George Prevost retreated from Plattsburg September 12; at the other end, Lieutenant-General Drummond retreated from Fort Erie September 21; and Izard’s force, constituting the largest body of regular troops in the field, had been placed where it could possibly affect neither result.

Izard was a friend of Monroe, and was therefore an object of Armstrong’s merciless criticism.[186] Brown was a favorite of Armstrong, and shared his prejudices. The position of Izard at Buffalo was calculated to excite jealousy. He had implicitly obeyed the wishes of Armstrong and Brown; in doing so, he had sacrificed himself,—yielding to Macomb the credit of repulsing Prevost, and to Brown, who did not wait for his arrival, the credit of repulsing Drummond. As far as could be seen, Izard had acted with loyalty toward both Armstrong and Brown; yet both distrusted him. Brown commonly inclined toward severity, and was the more sensitive because Izard, as the senior officer, necessarily took command.

Until that moment Izard had enjoyed no chance of showing his abilities in the field, but at Niagara he saw before him a great opportunity. Drummond lay at Chippawa, with an army reduced by battle and sickness to about twenty-five hundred men. Izard commanded fifty-five hundred regular troops and eight hundred militia.[187] He had time to capture or destroy Drummond’s entire force before the winter should set in, and to gather the results of Brown’s desperate fighting. Brown was eager for the attack, and Izard assented. October 13 the army moved on Chippawa, and stopped. October 16, Izard wrote to the War Department,[188]—

“I have just learned by express from Sackett’s Harbor that Commodore Chauncey with the whole of his fleet has retired into port, and is throwing up batteries for its protection. This defeats all the objects of the operations by land in this quarter. I may turn Chippawa, and should General Drummond not retire, may succeed in giving him a good deal of trouble; but if he falls back on Fort George or Burlington Heights, every step I take in pursuit exposes me to be cut off by the large reinforcements it is in the power of the enemy to throw in twenty-four hours upon my flank or rear.”

In this state of mind, notwithstanding a successful skirmish, October 19, between Bissell’s brigade and a strong detachment of the enemy, Izard made a decision which ruined his military reputation and destroyed his usefulness to the service. He reported to the Department, October 23,[189]—

“On the 21st, finding that he [Drummond] still continued within his works, which he had been assiduously engaged in strengthening from the moment of our first appearance, the weather beginning to be severe, and a great quantity of our officers and men suffering from their continued fatigues and exposure, at twelve at noon I broke up my encampment, and marched to this ground [opposite Black Rock] in order to prepare winter quarters for the troops.”

Nothing remained but to break up the army. Brown was sent at his own request to Sackett’s Harbor, where the next fighting was expected. A division of the army went with him. The remainder were placed in winter quarters near Buffalo. Fort Erie was abandoned and blown up, November 5, and the frontier at Niagara relapsed into repose.

Izard felt the mortification of his failure. His feelings were those of a generous character, and his tone toward Brown contrasted to his advantage both in candor and in temper with Brown’s language toward him; but great energy generally implied great faults, and Brown’s faults were better suited than Izard’s virtues for the work of an American general at Niagara. Greatly to Izard’s credit, he not only saw his own inferiority, but advised the government of it. He wrote to the Secretary of War, November 20,[190]—

“The success of the next campaign on this frontier will in a great measure depend on concert and good understanding among the superior officers.... General Brown is certainly a brave, intelligent, and active officer. Where a portion of the forces is composed of irregular troops, I have no hesitation in acknowledging my conviction of his being better qualified than I to make them useful in the public service.”

So sensitive was Izard to the public feeling and his loss of standing that he sent his resignation to the secretary, December 18,[191] in terms which betrayed and even asserted his consciousness of shrinking under the weight of responsibility:—

“I am fully aware that attempts have been made to lessen the confidence of government as well as of the public in my ability to execute the important duties intrusted to me,—duties which were imposed unexpectedly and much against my inclination. It is therefore not improbable that my voluntary retirement will relieve the Department of War from some embarrassment, and that my individual satisfaction will accord with the public advantage,—especially as my view of the connection between military command and responsibility differs materially from that entertained by persons in high authority.”

A man who showed so little confidence in himself could not claim the confidence of others, and in contact with stronger characters like Armstrong, Brown, Scott, or Andrew Jackson could play no part but that of a victim. His resignation was not accepted, but his career was at an end. When he relieved the pressure kept by Brown constantly applied to the extremity of the British line, the movement of war necessarily turned back to its true object, which was Sackett’s Harbor. Drummond no sooner saw Fort Erie evacuated and his lines re-established, November 5, than he hurried on board ship with a part of his troops, and reached Kingston, November 10,[192] where Sir George Prevost had already prepared for an attack on Sackett’s Harbor as soon as supplies could be brought from Quebec to Kingston over the winter roads. Soon afterward Sir George Prevost was recalled to England, and a new commander-in-chief, Sir George Murray, supposed to be a man of higher capacity, was sent to take direction of the next campaign. Reinforcements continued to arrive.[193] About twenty-seven thousand regular troops, including officers, were in Canada;[194] a seventy-four-gun ship and a new frigate were launched at Kingston; and no one doubted that, with the spring, Sackett’s Harbor would be formally besieged. Izard remained at Buffalo, doing nothing, and his only influence on the coming as on the past campaign was to leave the initiative to the enemy.