Scarcely had the fighting begun when news arrived that Great Britain had recalled the hated orders in council, but she would not give up the right of search and of impressment, so the war went on, as Madison believed that cause enough still remained.
[Illustration: WAR OF 1812.]
FIGHTING ON THE FRONTIER, 1812.—The hope of the leaders of the war party, "War Hawks" as the Federalists called them, was to capture the British provinces north of us and make peace at Halifax. Three armies were therefore gathered along the Canadian frontier. One under General Hull was to cross at Detroit and march eastward. A second under General Van Rensselaer was to cross the Niagara River, join the forces under Hull, capture York (now Toronto), and then go on to Montreal. The third under General Dearborn was to enter Canada from northeastern New York, arid meet the other troops near Montreal. The three armies were then to capture Montreal and Quebec and conquer Canada.
But the plan failed; Hull was driven out of Canada, and surrendered at Detroit. Van Rensselaer did not get a footing in Canada, and Dearborn went no farther than the northern boundary line of New York.
FIGHTING ON THE FRONTIER, 1813.—The surrender of Hull filled the people with indignation, and a new army under William Henry Harrison was sent across the wilds of Ohio in the dead of winter to recapture Detroit. But the British and Indians attacked and captured part of the army at Frenchtown on the Raisin River, where the Indians massacred the prisoners. They then attacked Fort Meigs and Fort Stephenson, but were driven off.
BATTLE OF LAKE ERIE.—Meantime a young naval officer, Oliver Hazard Perry, was hastily building at Erie (Presque Isle) a little fleet to attack the British, whose fleet on Lake Erie had been built just as hurriedly. The fight took place near the west end of the lake and ended in the capture of all the British ships. [14] It was then that Perry sent off to Harrison those familiar words "We have met the enemy and they are ours." [15]
BATTLE OF THE THAMES.—This signal victory gave Perry command of Lake Erie and enabled him to carry Harrison's army over to Canada, where, on the Thames River, he beat the British and Indians and put them to flight. [16] By these two victories of Perry and Harrison we regained all that we had lost by the surrender of Hull. On the New York frontier neither side accomplished anything decisive in 1813, though the public buildings at York (now Toronto) were destroyed, and some villages on both sides of the Niagara River were burned.
FIGHTING ON THE FRONTIER, 1814.—Better officers were now put in command
on the New York frontier, and during 1814 our troops under Jacob Brown and
Winfield Scott captured Fort Erie and won the battles of Chippewa and
Lundys Lane. But in the end the British drove our army out of Canada.
Further eastward the British gathered a fleet on Lake Champlain and sent an army to attack Plattsburg, but Thomas Macdonough utterly destroyed the fleet in Plattsburg Bay, and the army was repulsed.
FIGHTING ALONG THE SEABOARD.—During 1812 and 1813 the British did little more than blockade our coast from Rhode Island to New Orleans, leaving all the east coast of New England unmolested. [17] But in 1814 the entire coast was blockaded, the eastern part of Maine was seized and occupied, and Stonington in Connecticut was bombarded.