The night of the eighteenth of December was moonless and dark. A column of five hundred men of the Forty-First and Hundredth regiments, a grenadier company of the First Royals, and fifty militia, filed out of the portals of Fort George, bearing scaling ladders and other implements of assault, as silent, as ghosts. At the head marched the forlorn hope of twenty men, among whom were Captain Villiers, Zenas, and McKay. But each man, though he bore his life in his hand, walked proudly erect, as if with the assurance of victory, or of a reward more glorious than even victory. They marched several miles up the river to a spot where a crossing could safely be effected without discovery or interruption.
Now began the stealthy march on the devoted fort. Like an avenging Nemesis, shod with silence, the column approached the unconscious garrison. Every order was conveyed in a whisper. No clink of sabre, nor clatter of muskets was heard. The snow, which had begun to fall, muffled the tread and deadened each sound. The column wound on in the hush of midnight over the wintry waste, stealing like a tiger on its prey. The piquets, lulled into security by the storm, were avoided by a detour. Now amid the blackness of night, the deeper blackness of the fort loomed up. McKay and Zenas moved to the front beside Captain Villiers who whispered his commands. McKay silently led the way to the sally-port. A huge grenadier grasped the sentry by the throat to prevent his giving the alarm. The forlorn hope glided through the small opening of the sally-port, and, well instructed beforehand, rushed to the main gateway, overpowered the guard, and flung open the huge iron- studded gates. The British column now poured in, and before drum had rolled or bugle rung had reached the central quadrangle. The garrison awoke from slumber only to a futile struggle with an exasperated foe, and after a short resistance were compelled to surrender. In this assault the loss of the victors was only six men—a circumstance almost unparalleled in military annals—that of the vanquished unhappily was considerably greater.
Three hundred prisoners, three thousand stand of arms, and an immense quantity of stores were captured—the latter a great boon to the well-nigh famished people of the devastated town of Niagara. [Footnote: The writer was intimately acquainted with an old resident on the Niagara River, who in his youth had been a prisoner in the American fort, and formed part of the forlorn hope which aided in its capture. From him many interesting incidents of the war were learned.]
We would fain here close this record of retaliation. Enough had been done for British honour and for the punishment of the enemy. But when dread Bellona cries "Havoc," and slips the leashes of the hellish dogs of war, the instincts of humanity seem lost, and baptized men seem in danger of reverting to unredeemed savagery. Trueman expostulated, and pleaded, and prayed for a mitigation of the penalty inflicted on the vanquished, but in vain. In ruthless retaliation for the burning of Niagara, the British ravaged the American frontier, and gave to the flames the thriving towns of Lewiston, Manchester, Black Rock, and Buffalo. At the latter place, an American force, two thousand strong, made a stout resistance, but was defeated, with the loss of four hundred men, by the British, with only one-third the number of troops, December 30.
Thus the holy Christmas-tide, God's pledge of peace and good-will toward men, rose upon a fair and fertile frontier scathed and blackened by wasting and rapine, and the year went out in "tears and misery, in hatred and flames and blood."
The marks of recent conflict were everywhere visible, and—saddest evidence of all—was the multitude of soldiers' graves whose silent sleepers no morning drum-beat should arouse forever. The peaceful parish church of Niagara had been turned into a hospital, where, instead of praise and prayer, were heard the groans of wounded and dying men. Everything in fact gave indications of military occupation and the prevalence of the awful reign of war.
Seldom has the frightful destructiveness of war been more strikingly illustrated. The commerce of the United States was completely crippled by the blockade of her ports, her revenue falling from $24,000,000 to $8,000,000. Admiral Cockburn, of the British Navy, swept the Atlantic coast with his fleet, destroying arsenals and naval stores wherever his gun-boats could penetrate. Great Britain also recovered her old prestige in more than one stubborn sea-fight with a not unworthy foe. On a lovely morning in June, the United States frigate "Chesapeake," of forty-nine guns, stood out of Boston harbour amid the holiday cheers of a sympathizing multitude, to answer the challenge to a naval duel of H. M. S. "Shannon," of fifty-two guns. They were soon locked muzzle to muzzle in deadly embrace, belching shot and grape through each other's sides, while the streaming gore incarnadined the waves. The British boarders swarmed on the "Chesapeake's" deck, and soon, with nearly half his crew killed or wounded, she struck her colours to the red-cross flag. In five days the shattered and blood-stained vessels crept together into Halifax harbour, the American captain, the gallant Lawrence, lying in his cabin cold in death; the British commander, the chivalric Broke, raving in the delirium of a desperate wound. The slain captain was borne to his grave amid the highest honours paid to his valour by a generous foe. Amid the roar of Broadway's living tide, beneath the shadow of old Trinity Church, a costly monument commemorates his heroic and untimely death. A few days later, the British brig "Boxer," of fourteen guns, surrendered to the U. S. brig "Enterprise," of sixteen guns. In one quiet grave, overlooking Casco Bay, beside which the writer, one sunny summer day, meditated on the vanity of earthly strife, their rival captains lie buried side by side. Some kindly hand had decked their graves with tiny flags, which in sun and shower had become dimmed and faded; and planted fair and innocent flowers which breathed their beauty and fragrance amid the shadows of death. So fade and pass away the false and transient glory of arms. So bloom and flourish in immortal beauty the supernal loveliness of virtue and piety.
It is a relief to turn away from these scenes of war and bloodshed to the record of human affection and heroic self-sacrifice and devotion.
George Morton, the faithful Canadian patriot, crippled, impoverished, sick at heart, and despairing of ever claiming Mary Lawson as his bride, returned after the burning of his native town to the ashes of his ruined home to begin life over again. A partial indemnity from the Government enabled him to resume business on a modest scale, which, by thrift and industry, grew and increased with the gradual growth of the town. Ensign Roberts was among the slain at the taking of the Fort, and Mr. Lawson's property was destroyed by the conflagration that followed. The old man, broken by his losses and by exposure, gradually sunk, and died, Mary nursing him devotedly to the last. After years of delay the love of the no longer youthful pair found its consummation in a happy marriage, followed by a calmly tranquil wedded life.
"Although this cruel war," whispered George to his bride upon their wedding-day, "has robbed us of all our own worldly wealth, has cost you your father, and has left me a cripple for life, yet it could not take from us the priceless wealth of our affection."