While the mounted regiment moved by the road to Detroit, Harrison’s main force was embarked in boats September 20, and in the course of a few days some forty-five hundred infantry were safely conveyed by way of Bass Island and Put-in-Bay to Middle Sister Island, about twelve miles from the Canadian shore.[126] Harrison and Perry then selected a landing place, and the whole force was successfully set ashore, September 27, about three miles below Malden.
Although Proctor could not hope to maintain himself at Malden or Detroit without control of the Lake, he had still the means of rendering Harrison’s possession insecure. According to the British account, he commanded at Detroit and Malden a force of nine hundred and eighty-six regulars, giving about eight hundred effectives.[127] Not less than thirty-five hundred Indian warriors had flocked to Amherstburg, and although they greatly increased the British general’s difficulties by bringing their families with them, they might be formidable opponents to Harrison’s advance. Every motive dictated to Proctor the necessity of resisting Harrison’s approach. To Tecumthe and his Indians the evacuation of Malden and Detroit without a struggle meant not only the sacrifice of their cause, but also cowardice; and when Proctor announced to them, September 18, that he meant to retreat, Tecumthe rose in the council and protested against the flight, likening Proctor to a fat dog that had carried its tail erect, and now that it was frightened dropped its tail between its legs and ran.[128] He told Proctor to go if he liked, but the Indians would remain.
Proctor insisted upon retiring at least toward the Moravian town, seventy miles on the road to Lake Ontario, and the Indians yielded. The troops immediately began to burn or destroy the public property at Detroit and Malden, or to load on wagons or boats what could not be carried away. September 24, three days before Harrison’s army landed, the British evacuated Malden and withdrew to Sandwich, allowing Harrison to establish himself at Malden without a skirmish, and neglecting to destroy the bridge over the Canards River.
Harrison was surprised at Proctor’s tame retreat.
“Nothing but infatuation,” he reported,[129] “could have governed General Proctor’s conduct. The day that I landed below Malden he had at his disposal upward of three thousand Indian warriors; his regular force reinforced by the militia of the district would have made his number nearly equal to my aggregate, which on the day of landing did not exceed forty-five hundred.... His inferior officers say that his conduct has been a series of continued blunders.”
This crowning proof of Proctor’s incapacity disorganized his force. Tecumthe expressed a general sentiment of the British army in his public denunciation of Proctor’s cowardice. One of the inferior British officers afterward declared that Proctor’s “marked inefficiency” and “wanton sacrifice” of the troops raised more than a doubt not only of his capacity but even of his personal courage, and led to serious thoughts of taking away his authority.[130] The British at Sandwich went through the same experience that marked the retreat of Hull and his army from the same spot, only the year before.
Harrison on his side made no extreme haste to pursue. His army marched into Malden at four o’clock on the afternoon of September 27,[131] and he wrote to Secretary Armstrong that evening: “I will pursue the enemy to-morrow, although there is no probability of my overtaking him, as he has upwards of a thousand horses, and we have not one in the army.”[132] The pursuit was not rapid. Sandwich, opposite Detroit, was only thirteen miles above Malden, but Harrison required two days to reach it, arriving at two o’clock on the afternoon of September 29. From there, September 30, he wrote again to Secretary Armstrong that he was preparing to pursue the enemy on the following day;[133] but he waited for R. M. Johnson’s mounted regiment, which arrived at Detroit September 30, and was obliged to consume a day in crossing the river. Then the pursuit began with energy, but on the morning of October 2 Proctor had already a week’s advance and should have been safe.
Proctor seemed to imagine that the Americans would not venture to pursue him. Moving, according to his own report,[134] “by easy marches,” neither obstructing the road in his rear nor leaving detachments to delay the enemy, he reached Dolson’s October 1, and there halted his army, fifty miles from Sandwich, while he went to the Moravian town some twenty-six miles beyond. He then intended to make a stand at Chatham, three miles behind Dolson’s.
“I had assured the Indians,” said Proctor’s report of October 23, “that we would not desert them, and it was my full determination to have made a stand at the Forks (Chatham), by which our vessels and stores would be protected; but after my arrival at Dover [Dolson’s] three miles lower down the river, I was induced to take post there first, where ovens had been constructed, and where there was some shelter for the troops, and had accordingly directed that it should be put into the best possible state of defence that time and circumstances would admit of; indeed it had been my intention to have opposed the enemy nearer the mouth of the river, had not the troops contrary to my intention been moved, during my absence of a few hours for the purpose of acquiring some knowledge of the country in my rear.”
The British army, left at Dolson’s October 1, without a general or orders,[135] saw the American army arrive in its front, October 3, and retired three miles to Chatham, where the Indians insisted upon fighting; but when, the next morning, October 4, the Americans advanced in order of battle,[136] the Indians after a skirmish changed their minds and retreated. The British were compelled to sacrifice the supplies they had brought by water to Chatham for establishing their new base, and their retreat precipitated on the Moravian town the confusion of flight already resembling rout.