THE ARTS OF PEACE AND THE ART OF WAR.
This ends the history of the first half-year of the war of 1812. While everything went wrong on land, the ocean showed only a succession of brilliant victories. England, chagrined and humiliated, declared that her flag had been disgraced "by a piece of striped bunting flying at the mast-heads of a few fir-built frigates, manned by a handful of outlaws."
REORGANIZATION OF THE ARMY.
Congress took measures for strengthening and reorganizing the army. The pay and bounty of the soldiers were increased; the President was empowered to raise twenty additional regiments of infantry, to borrow money, and to issue treasury notes, and provisions were made for adding four ships-of-the-line, six frigates, and as many vessels of war on the Great Lakes as might be needed. The army was organized into three divisions: the Army of the North, under General Wade Hampton, to act in the country about Lake Champlain; the Army of the Centre, under the commander-in-chief, General Henry Dearborn, to act on the Niagara frontier and Lake Ontario; and the Army of the East, under General Winchester, who soon after was superseded by General William Henry Harrison.
IN THE WEST.
The last-named officer did his utmost to drive the British out of Detroit. His troops were volunteers, brave but undisciplined, and displayed their most effective work in scattered fighting and against the Indians; but their success was not decisive. When the swamps and lakes of the Northwest were sufficiently frozen to bear their weight, Harrison repeated his attempts to expel the British from Detroit. His advance, under General Winchester, was attacked on the River Raisin by the British, led by General Proctor. Winchester was as prompt as General Hull in surrendering. Proctor allowed his Indians to massacre the wounded prisoners, most of whom were Kentuckians. Thereafter, when the Kentucky troops rushed into battle they raised the war-cry, "Remember the Raisin!"
The disaster to Winchester caused Harrison to fall back to Fort Meigs, which stood near the site of the present town of Defiance. There, in the spring of 1813, he was besieged by Proctor. A force of Kentuckians relieved him, after severe loss, and Proctor retreated. Some months later he again advanced against Fort Meigs, but was repulsed, and marched to Fort Stephenson, where Fremont now stands.
The besiegers consisted of 3,000 British and Indians, while the garrison numbered only 160, under the command of Major George Croghan, only twenty years of age. When Proctor ordered the youth to surrender he threatened that, in case of resistance, every prisoner would be tomahawked. Major Croghan replied that when the surrender took place there would not be a single man left to tomahawk. Although Croghan had but a single cannon, he made so gallant a defense that his assailants were repulsed, and Proctor, fearing the approach of Harrison, withdrew from the neighborhood.