The Canadians did not hesitate, though their country was to be the scene of war, and their homes to be the stake for which the nations were to strive. Aid they could not expect from their British friends across the sea, already strained to the utmost in the long conflict with the armies of Europe; their reliance must be upon their own stout hearts and strong right arms. But this was enough, for
"Odds lie not in numbers, but in spirit, too."
So they rallied with eagerness beneath their Country's and Britain's Union flag.
62. The War Medal, 1793-1814.
Only four thousand five hundred regular trained soldiers were in Canada in 1812, and in them are included men of the Newfoundland and Glengarry regiments, recruited locally in the colonies; and thus the brunt of the defence was to fall upon the stalwart but untrained militia of the countryside.
63. The Service Medal, Canada, 1866-70.
The tide of invasion advanced north against Canada from the United States. For three years, from 1812 to 1815, the contest went on. Our French Canadians again bravely took up their arms, and this time, under the new three-crossed Jack, again drove the United States invaders back, making the names of Chateauguay and Chrystler's Farm ring down through history in token of the victories which they won beneath it in defence of their Canadian liberties and homes. So, too, their English-speaking brothers of Upper Canada won equal victories for this same Union Jack. At Mackinac, Captain Roberts,[148] with his Indians and Canadian voyageurs, raised it above the captured American fort. At the capitulation of Fort Detroit to Brock and Tecumseh, the American soldiers laid down their arms before it, and all Michigan was surrendered. At Queenston Heights, under the glorious Brock, at Stoney Creek and Beaver Dams, Niagara and Lundy's Lane, the American invader was sent in quick retreat from Canadian soil, and at the conclusion of the three years' war, after all the varying fluctuations in reverse and success between the contending forces, there was, at its end, not a foot of Canada, occupied or sullied by the foot of the foreign foe.
Thus all along their frontier shores, from Mackinac to far St. John, the Canadians stood shoulder to shoulder in one bold, united line, and held the larger half of North America for the British crown.