THE DEFENCE OF FORT STEPHENSON ON THE SANDUSKY.
By J. W. Faulkner, in the Cincinnati Enquirer.
“We have determined to hold this place, and, by heavens, we can.” This was the closing sentence of a military despatch written on the night of July 29, 1813. It was penned in the commandant’s room of the rude stockade known as Fort Stephenson, on the Sandusky River.
The writer was Maj. George Croghan, of the Seventeenth United States Infantry, a boy who had just attained his twenty-first year. It was addressed to Gen. William Henry Harrison, in command of the American forces in the Northwest. The reply of General Harrison to this remarkable despatch was an order removing Major Croghan from command and ordering him to report to headquarters under virtual arrest for disobedience.
Young Croghan responded promptly, traversing a dangerous country. Face to face with his general he explained that it was not braggadocio that inspired the language of his message. When it was written it was expected that it would fall into the hands of the enemy, then boastfully advancing to the attack. With the warlike eloquence that came as heritage from his Irish ancestors, Major Croghan showed his general that it was too late to retreat from the fort, and that it was a necessary military maneuver to hold it pending the execution of other movements. His tongue won for him what every great soul desires—opportunity. Restored to command, he returned to the fort and won a victory that will forever live in the annals of the early republic.
Not long ago the body of Major Croghan was interred at the base of the monument erected to the memory of the soldiers of Sandusky County. This imposing shaft marks the site of the old fort where the dead hero won his laurels and where the blow was struck that opened the way to ultimate victory over the British and Indian power in the northwestern country. Over his grave will stand as a silent witness the single cannon used in defense of the fort, an ancient six-pounder, which wears the affectionate feminine sobriquet of “Old Betsy.” It was a single belch from the iron jaws of this that decided the fate of the battle, and though inanimate, still it deserved a share of the glory that surrounded the interment of the gallant Croghan.
Since that eventful day in August many great events have occurred to fill the pages of history. General Harrison became greater and filled the president’s chair. Around the base of the old fort a city has sprung up named after Gen. John C. Fremont, the Pathfinder. In Croghan’s day the little settlement was known as Lower Sandusky, to distinguish it from the city in Wyandot County known as Upper Sandusky. So powerful a pleader as Rutherford B. Hayes, then a practising attorney at the Sandusky County bar, and afterward president of the United States, pleaded that the old name be permitted to stand.
There was pomp and ceremony to mark the final sepulture of the old commander’s dust in the ground that he hallowed with his victory, but no greater tribute could be paid to his soldier memory than to tell again the story of the battle. He came of fighting stock, this young American soldier. The blood of “Kelly, Burke and Shea” flowed in his veins and he smelled the battle from afar off. His father was William Croghan, an Irishman, born in Dublin in 1752, but who was well settled in this country when the War of the Revolution broke out. He fought at Monmouth, Brandywine and Germantown, and froze with the rest of the immortal band at Valley Forge.
Joining in the drift from the Virginias across the mountains, he reached the settlement at the falls of the Ohio, where Louisville now stands. In 1791 he married Lucy Clark, sister of George Rogers Clark, the mighty figure of the Vincennes campaign, who saved an empire to the American republic. Another brother, William, was the Clark who, with Captain Lewis, made the historic exploration tour across the then unknown continent. Of such a union was born the man whom a state and a nation afterward honored for bravery. The exact place of his birth was at Locust Grove, Ky., a few miles below Louisville. When but twenty years of age he gained distinction at the battle of Tippecanoe, and was promoted to a captaincy in March, 1812, being detailed as aide-de-camp to General Harrison, with the rank of major. This was his condition when the events that were to make him famous began to unfold themselves.
The Indians, under Tecumseh, and the British, under General Proctor, had raised the siege of Fort Meigs, in what is now Wood County, and were coming toward the post at Upper Sandusky and Seneca. The British sailed around into Sandusky Bay, while their Indian allies marched across through the swamps and marshes of the Portage River. They expected to meet and make a combined attack upon Lower Sandusky while Harrison was engaged in protecting Forts Winchester and Meigs. The work known as Fort Stephenson was in reality an old stockade used for storage purposes, and inclosed an acre of ground.
Examination by Harrison some days before the allies invested Fort Meigs showed that the stockade was commanded by a hill to the southeast. It was not strong enough to resist heavy artillery, and only 200 men could be accommodated as a garrison. Croghan was left in charge, with orders that if the British approached by water, which carried the presumption that if they had their heavy artillery, he was to retreat, if possible, destroying both the fort and the public stores. If only the Indians came he was to stand fast, as retreat through these wary hostiles was an impossibility and a defense was a certainty.
On July 29 Harrison received word that the siege of Fort Meigs had been raised and that it seemed the intention of the allies to descend upon either Sandusky or Seneca. At a council of war held that night it was decided that Fort Stephenson was untenable and orders were sent to Major Croghan to carry out his original instructions. This order did not reach Croghan until the next morning at eleven o’clock. A council of his officers reached the decision that it was too late to retreat and the famous note was sent and the meeting with Harrison arranged. On August 1 the advance guard of the enemy was seen on the hill over the river. They were the fleet-footed Indians who had been observed by a reconnoitering party from headquarters the day before. There was but one piece of artillery in the fort, “Old Betsey,” and it was promptly fired, causing the redskins to retire. Within a half hour the British gunboats, a part of Commodore Barclay’s fleet, hove into sight. A landing was effected a half mile below the fort and a howitzer disembarked and mounted.
A British officer, Major Chambers, with a flag of truce, was sent forward and was met by Ensign Shipp, of the Seventeenth Regiment. The visitor demanded in the name of General Proctor the immediate surrender of the fort. The Americans were warned that it would be almost impossible to restrain the Indians in case of success, and that the whole garrison would be slain. The gallant answer was returned that the Indians would find no one to massacre when the fort fell, for every man had sworn to die before surrender.
The battle then opened, the gunboats, the land battery, five hundred Wellington veterans and eight hundred Indians joining in the attack. Throughout the evening Croghan fired his six pounder in a desultory way, moving it from place to place to make it appear that he had more artillery. Ascertaining from the enemy’s fire that the northwestern angle of the fort was to be reached, he made preparation to checkmate his plans. During the night the gun was removed to a block house which commanded that angle and the embrasure was masked. The piece itself was loaded with grape and slugs. Croghan’s foresight was vindicated when the next day additional artillery was landed and the hammering of the doomed angle was renewed. The shaking wall was reinforced with bags of sand and even of flour, making it capable of resisting the pounding. On the evening of August 2 the grand assault was launched, Colonel Short leading the principal column.
He rallied his men with great bravery under a destructive rifle fire and gained the ditch beneath the stockade walls. There he ordered his men to cut down the pickets and give the Americans no quarter. At the proper second of time the masked embrasure was thrown open and the slug-charged cannon was permitted to belch its death-dealing contents into the close packed mass of soldiers at short range. Few escaped this destructive fire. Colonel Short was killed.
The second column, led by Major Chambers and Colonel Warburton, was also defeated by the line in charge of Captain Hunter. When night came the enemy withdrew in a disorderly fashion, leaving behind them one of their gunboats, some of the wounded, much ammunition and many guns. At nine o’clock the next morning, Major Croghan sent an express to Harrison announcing his victory and the retirement of the defeated enemy. The defenders of the fort lost only one killed and seven wounded of the 100 men who answered roll call. Ten times that number opposed them, and 2,000 more were in reserve near Fort Meigs to cut off any reinforcement from that direction.
In his official report of the battle Harrison said: “It will not be among the least of Proctor’s mortifications that he has been baffled by a youth who has just passed his twenty-first year. He is, however, a hero worthy of his gallant uncle, Gen. George Rogers Clark.” The brevet rank of lieutenant-colonel was at once conferred upon the young hero by the president of the United States, and he was presented with a sword by the ladies of Chillicothe. Of this victory, Gen. W. T. Sherman, writing from the standpoint of a military expert, said: “The defense of Fort Stephenson by Croghan and his gallant little band was the necessary precursor to Perry’s victory on the lake and of Harrison’s triumphant victory on the Thames. These assured our immediate ancestors the mastery of the great West, and from that day to this the West has been the bulwark of the nation.”
The following year saw him made a full lieutenant-colonel. He served with distinction until 1817, when he resigned and went to New Orleans to live. He was made postmaster of that city in 1824. Some years later he was appointed inspector general of the army, and in 1835 he was voted a gold medal by Congress in recognition of his fight of twenty-two years before.
He died on January 8, 1849, while the guns were thundering their salutes in honor of another great victory, that of General Jackson, another Irishman’s son, over Packenham and the British below New Orleans in 1814. His body was removed to the old family burying ground at Locust Grove and buried near that of his famous uncle, where they were found last June by Maj. Webb C. Hayes, acting for the Fremont Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, which is named after Major Croghan.
They were removed to Fremont on June 10, and were placed temporarily in the vault at Oakwood Cemetery. The pall-bearers were five venerable survivors of the Mexican War who had enlisted in Sandusky County. The youngest was seventy-seven years of age and the oldest eighty-five. As Croghan was inspector-general of the army during the Mexican War, they can be said to have served under him. The dead hero left three children. His only son, St. George Croghan, died on the field early in the Civil War, wearing the gray of the Confederate army. A grandson, also George Croghan, survives, and there are other descendants on the distaff side.
The Daughters of the American Revolution have erected on the British redoubt 250 yards northwest of Fort Stephenson a tablet commemorating the fact that it was there that the cannon from Commodore Barclay’s fleet thundered against Croghan’s walls. Exultingly the fact is proclaimed that Barclay was afterward wounded and his entire fleet, including the cannon which had been used against Fort Stephenson, was captured by Commodore Perry at the battle of Lake Erie in the following September.