USA > New York > New York City > History of the city of New York : its origin, rise, and progress Vol. III > Part 32
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June 6. 6th, and his body wrapped in the flag of the Chesapeake lay upon the quarter-deck, as the two ships entered the harbor of Halifax on the 7th. A whole nation mourned his loss, and the enemy contended with his countrymen as to who should most honor his remains. Funeral obsequies were performed at Halifax with every mark of respect for the hero. In August, by permission of the British authorities, the remains of both Lawrence and Ludlow were brought to New York, and received public funeral honors for the third time, and were interred in Trinity churchyard. Their resting-place is marked by a mausoleum of brown freestone, around which are placed eight trophy cannon, with chains attached, forming an appropriate enclosure.
The manner in which Lawrence carried his vessel into action was eulogized by enemies as well as friends, and all agreed that the disaster was owing to a concurrence of circumstances not likely to happen again. His dying words, " Don't give up the ship !" became the battle- cry of the American navy during the whole war. It was the motto upon the banner borne by Perry's flag-ship into battle three months later, and is still a proverbial phrase to all who are struggling in life's vari- ous battles.
The year 1813 was one not soon to be forgotten by the inhabitants of New York. The war raged along her extensive borders with varied suc- cess. The St. Lawrence was a dividing line between small bodies of hostile troops who were constantly projecting forays, plundering and cap- turing private persons, and destroying public property wherever it could be found. On the cold night of February 6, Major Forsyth, in command at Ogdensburg, crossed the river upon the ice to Brockville with a party of two hundred, riflemen and volunteers, aided by Colonel Benedict of the
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New York militia, his purpose being to rescue some American prisoners confined in the jail of that town. He surprised the post, captured the commander, five subordinate officers, forty-six men, and a large quantity of military stores, besides securing the key of the jail and releasing the prisoners. He returned to Ogdensburg before daylight, without the loss of a man. In retaliation, a large British force came over on the ice from Prescott, attacking Ogdensburg on the morning of the 22d, and after a sharp contest drove the troops off and sacked the town, entering every house but three, and destroyed a large amount of private property. They retired with their booty to Canada on the same day.
The invasion of Canada was the principal feature in the programme of the campaign of 1813. Dearborn joined Commodore Chauncey at Sack- ett's Harbor, and by the middle of April a joint land and naval expedition was matured against York, now Toronto, the capital of Upper Canada. The squadron under Chauncey conveyed the troops across Lake Ontario, and on the 27th of April, after a sharp engagement the post was captured, and the stars and stripes floated triumphantly over the fort. But the town had no natural defenses, and being of little value to the Americans, was abandoned.
Just one month later, May 27th, an expedition against Fort George, on the western shore of the Niagara River, resulted in the capture of that British stronghold. In this masterly achievement, Oliver Hazard Perry, Winfield Scott, and Alexander Macomb bore a prominent part. The specific duty of landing the troops was intrusted to Perry. Scott led the advance up a precipitous bank in the face of a formidable force of eight hundred men, well posted on its summit. The conduct of Perry was remarkable. Unmindful of personal danger he went from vessel to vessel in an open boat, giving directions concerning the landing, and, finally, leaped with Scott into the water and swam ashore through the surf. Scott, in his first attempt to ascend the bank, was hurled backward to the beach, but rallying instantly, he pushed forward with such destructive energy that in twenty minutes he had accomplished the undertaking, and the enemy were fiying in confusion towards Queenstown. At noon Fort George and its dependencies, with the village of Newark, were in the quiet possession of the Americans; the attack and conquest having occupied only three hours.
The same evening a British squadron, which had been confined all winter in the harbor of Kingston through the audacious operations of Chauncey upon Lake Ontario, spread its sails, and at midday on the 28th appeared off Sackett's Harbor. It was commanded by Sir James Lucas Yeo, in person, who was accompanied by Sir George Prevost, the governor-
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general of Canada. These two British officers thought to capture Sackett's Harbor, with all its valuable public property, during the absence of the ex- pedition to Fort George. The assault was made on the 29th, but through the skill, courage, and nerve of General Jacob Brown,1 assisted by the gallant Colonel Backus of New York, who fell in the engagement, and Lieutenant-colonel Aspinwall, Lieutenant Ketchum, Lieutenant Talman, Lieutenant Wolcott Chauncey, and others of equal spirit, the British and Indians were driven in disorder to their vessels. No event of the war was of more importance to the Republic. The loss of the post would have inflicted a terrible injury upon the American cause ; and its intrepid defense under the most appalling difficulties and against a greatly supe- rior force won universal praise and gratitude. No further attempts were made by the enemy to capture Sackett's Harbor, and it remained, as it had been from the beginning, the most important place of deposit for the army and navy stores of the Americans on the New York frontier.
Dearborn remained at Fort George; the discomfited enemy, gathering strength in the vicinity, abandoned Fort Erie, which the Americans immediately occupied; and, finally, a rumor came that Proctor was marching from the Detroit frontier to assist in recovering Fort George. Detachments were immediately sent to dislodge the British commander at Burlington Heights, but they were ensnared at Stony Creek on the 6th of June in a confused and disastrous night-battle, and Generals Chandler and Winder were both captured. In the mean time the British squadron hovered along the lake coast and interfered greatly with the supplies for the American camp; on the 12th of June it captured two American vessels laden with valuable hospital stores ; on the 15th it made a descent upon the village of Charlotte, on the Genesee River, and car- ried off a large quantity of stores ; and on the 18th, landed a party of one hundred fully armed men at Sodus Point for the purpose of destroying American stores known to be deposited there, and, when arrested and driven back, burned the public store-houses, five dwellings, and one hotel - destroying property to the amount of twenty-five thousand dollars.
1 The public career of General Jacob Brown forms an important part of the history of the times. In 1798, at the age of twenty-three, he was a school-teacher in the city of New York, and commenced the study of law, but it was distasteful to him, and he purchased a large estate on the Black River and founded the settlement of Brownsville. He was com- missioned a brigadier-general of militia by Tompkins in the beginning of the war, and having finished the term of service for which he was called, retired to his home at Brownsville, but a few miles distant from Sackett's Harbor. He had been requested by Dearborn, and urged by Macomb, to assume chief command in that region, and had signified his willingness to do so in case of an actual invasion. Colonel Electus Backus of New York, who was left in com- mand of the post, sent an express to General Brown, as soon as the enemy were discovered off the harbor, May 28, 1813.
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On the 23d Dearborn detached a party of six hundred under Colonel Bærstler to disperse a body of the enemy at Beaver Dams, seventeen miles from Fort George, and was assailed on the route in the woods by a force of British and Indians who compelled his surrender. In addition to all this, several tragedies occurred in the immediate neighborhood of the fort. The continual tidings of misfortune irritated Congress, and Dearborn was superseded by Wilkinson in the early part of July.
Meanwhile Harrison - charged with the defense of the isolated posts in Ohio, the recovery of Detroit, and the invasion of Canada from that point- had fortified Fort Meigs opposite the present city of Maumee, immediate- ly after the massacre at Frenchtown. The ice had no sooner passed from the rivers than Proctor and Tecumseh, with a large force of British and Indians, encamped on the left bank of the Maumee about two miles below, near old Fort Miami, and on the 28th of April commenced a vig- orous bombardment of Fort Meigs. The siege was maintained until the 9th of May, during which period some of the most tragic scenes in hu- man history were enacted. But brighter days were dawning. On the 4th Proctor sent an officer to demand the surrender of the post. "Tell General Proctor," responded Harrison promptly, " that if he shall take the fort it will be under circumstances that will do him more honor than a thousand surrenders." All efforts proving unsuccessful, the enemy finally retired in disgust. Tecumseh's emissaries at once hurried westward, for savage recruits, even to the Mississippi, making desolated Chicago the grand ren- dezvous, and three thousand warriors speedily tramped through the woods of Michigan and joined the British at Detroit. In the latter part of July they made a second attempt to capture "Fort Meigs," which ended as before in disappointment and exasperation. They proceeded thence to assault Fort Stephenson, at Sandusky, which was so gallantly defended by only one hundred and sixty men under George Croghan of Kentucky, a young major of twenty-one, that they were obliged to aban- don the undertaking.
All eyes were now turned towards the movements on Lake Erie. Oliver Hazard Perry, twenty-seven years of age, was about to perform the most important naval service of the campaign and of the war. When the year commenced, he was in command of a flotilla of gunboats at Newport, but desired a wider field of action. In February, Chauncey wrote to him, "You are the very person I want for a particular service." Within twenty-four hours young Perry was seated in a sleigh on his way to' New York, accompanied by Alexander, his little brother of thirteen. He proceeded at once to Erie to hasten the preparation of a squadron. Noah Brown, a shipwright from New York had already done
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much of the preliminary work. Captain Henry Brevoort of New York, who, while with Hull's army at Detroit, was appointed commander of such government vessels as might be placed upon the lakes at that period, was detailed with two hundred seamen to accompany Perry from Fort George to Erie, after the abandonment of the entire line of the Niagara River by the British, in July. This party succeeded in taking five war- vessels from that stream to the harbor of Erie after six days of almost incredible labor. Brevoort performed another service of great moment ; He communicated the exact size and character of each British vessel in the harbor at Malden. This he was enabled to do through the aid of his family, who had resided in Detroit ever since its surrender. Perry's fleet consisted of ten vessels, and each one was assigned to a special antagonist, which it was to engage in close action. A large square battle-flag of blue with words in white, "Don't give up the ship," had been privately prepared under his direction at Erie ; when hoisted to the main-royal mast-head of the flag-ship Lawrence, it was to be the signal for going into battle.
Oliver Hazard Perry. Perry sailed in quest of the ene- my on the 1st of September, but the British commander was not quite ready to respond to the challenge. On the morning of the 10th a sail was descried in the direction of Malden, and the whole British Sept. 10. squadron was presently in full view. The battle was commenced by the Americans, the gallant Stephen Champlin in command of the Scorpion firing the first shot. He was first cousin to Commodore Perry, and but twenty-four years of age. It was a terrible contest, and a complete victory. In the midst of the carnage Perry left his disabled flag-ship, and in a lit- tle open row-boat with four seamen passed to the unharmed Niagara. The perilous voyage occupied fifteen minutes, during which Perry stood erect, tall, graceful, a man of remarkable symmetry of figure, with the pennant and banner half folded about him, unmindful of danger, while the enemy seeing the bold movement hurled a steady shower of cannon-ball, grape, canister, and musket-shot towards his frail bark. It was only when the oarsmen threatened to cease labor if he remained standing, that he seated
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himself. He was no sooner upon the Niagara than, with his pennant and banner flying, he bore down and broke the enemy's line, and made such havoc with his guns, that the entire squadron surrendered - not one vessel being left to bear the tidings of defeat.
It was a proud moment for Perry and his companions ; it was a proud moment for America. Never before in history had a whole British fleet or squadron been captured ! The conqueror, even before the blue vapor of battle was borne away by the breeze, wrote in pencil on the back of an old letter the remarkable despatch to General Harrison which has been so often quoted, "We have met the enemy and they are ours : two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop."
At that very hour two armies, one on the north and one on the south side of the warring ships, were waiting for the result most anxiously. Should the day be gained by the British, Proctor and Tecumseh were ready to rush into Ohio and lay waste the whole frontier. Should the day be gained by the Americans, Harrison was prepared to press forward for the recovery of Detroit, and the invasion of Canada.
This success upon Lake Erie destroyed the Indian confederacy. The British could no longer hope to hold Detroit and Malden, and therefore evacuated both places. Perry converted some of the captured vessels into transports and conveyed Harrison's troops to the Canada shore. Malden was garrisoned, Detroit was reoccupied, and Lewis Cass appointed gov- ernor of the recovered Territory of Michigan. Harrison soon started in pursuit of Proctor and Tecumseh, and, after traversing eighty miles, found their main army upon the Thames and fought the famous battle Oct. 5. in which the great Tecumseh was killed. It was a complete and
decisive victory for the Americans ; the coast was cleared of the British, and the various tribes of Indians sued for peace. On the same day that Proctor was defeated at the Thames, Chauncey captured six British schooners on Lake Ontario. These repeated losses induced Sir George Prevost to withdraw his troops from the investment of Fort George. Harrison on the 20th embarked with his regulars for Buffalo to Oct. 20. aid in carrying the war into the neighborhood of the St. Lawrence River.
As these events were following each other in rapid succession, the glad tidings of Perry's victory were being conveyed from town to town through the country by messengers on horseback, or on foot, as the case might be. " Oh, for a canal -the vehicle for the quick and safe transmission or important intelligence!" exclaimed one of the New York enthusiasts upon that subject. From Albany to New York the news came by steamboat. A riot of exultation took possession of the land; the popular joy ex- pressed itself in shouts and bonfires, in artillery, bells, and orations.
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New York was gorgeously illuminated, every building in Broadway, and
in all the other principal streets, being lighted from foundation to Oct. 23. roof. The City Hall was like a sea of fire. A fine band discoursed music in the gallery of the portico, and transparencies were displayed showing naval battles ; also, the words of Lawrence, " Don't give up the ship," and those of Perry's despatch to Harrison, " We have met the enemy and they are ours." Similar transparencies were exhibited at the thea- ter, and were carried by processions through the streets during the evening. The whole community participated in the demonstrations of delight.
But the storm was not yet spent for New York. The war-cloud set- tled darker and more portentous than ever over her northern frontier. Lake Champlain was erelong to become the scene of another terrible struggle for supremacy between the two nations. And in the interim a series of attempts and failures, of partial triumphs and disasters, of con- solations and disappointments, were to keep New York in one continual ferment of agitation from center to circumference; while a fearful array of retaliatory barbarities were perpetrated upon defenseless and unoffending citizens dwelling near the borders of the State to the north and west.
Another portion of New York was sorely distressed by the blockade. The eastern end of Long Island, with its well-stocked, and rich, highly- cultivated farms was unprotected. The people were terror-stricken when Commodore Sir Thomas Hardy anchored his flag-ship Ramillies in Gar- diner's Bay early in April. The frigate Orpheus, Captain Sir Hugh Pigott, with several ships of the line, and a number of smaller vessels, made this little retreat headquarters. As Admiral Cockburn was just then engaged in the pastime of plundering and desolating the coasts south of the Dela- ware, it was supposed Long Island would share the same fate. But Hardy was a gentleman, not a marauder. His troops, however, must be fed, and he immediately took measures to obtain fresh provisions.
Gardiner's Island, the oldest feudal estate in New York, had outgrown all traces of Revolutionary wastes, and was once more a garden of beauty. Its fields of oats, wheat, and other grains, prospered under the well- directed care of eighty or more dependents; some two thousand loads of hay were yearly stored in its barns ; three hundred head of cattle grazed its green pastures ; its dairy produced immense quantities of butter and an average of one hundred and twenty pounds of cheese per day ; two thousand sheep yielded annually some sixteen thousand pounds of wool ; one hundred or more hogs were raised ; and the lord of the isle rarely stabled less than sixty or seventy horses, the finest in the country. Deer roamed at will, and wild turkeys coming to the yards were daily fed with the tame fowls.
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John Lyon Gardiner, the seventh manorial lord in the direct descent, reigned over the island. His wife was the granddaughter of Governor Matthew and Ursula Wolcott Griswold, and the niece of Governor Roger Griswold who had so recently died. Despite the democratic sentiment of America, the proprietor of this old manor-property retained his title of lord among his associates and neighbors. He was addressed as Lord Gardiner to the end of his life. He was educated at Princeton, New Jersey, and in 1803, a refined, scholarly bachelor of thirty-four, was residing in princely solitude on his water-bound estate. The even tenor of his life was suddenly changed by a freak of the elements. A sailing party from Old Lyme, Connecticut, was becalmed one afternoon on the Sound within sight of Gardiner's Island. As night approached, a breeze
A.WILL DEL
Lord and Lady Gardiner. [ From an old painting in the manor-house.]
sprung up and so did a storm. They steered their little bark towards the nearest landing, and hurried to the manor-house for shelter. They were received by an old housekeeper ; but presently the handsome young lord made his appearance and, learning who his visitors were, extended cordial hospitalities. An elaborate supper was served, and music and dancing followed. The next morning the delighted refugees bade their charming host adieu. But the island sovereign soon after entered his barge, and with numerous attendants and much stately ceremony proceeded to Black Hall, the seat of the Griswolds in Old Lyme, and ere many months elapsed bore the beautiful Sarah, a bride, to the manor-island whither she had been drifted in such a romantic manner by the breeze of destiny.
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Commodore Hardy prefaced his requisitions for produce from the island with courteous words and promises of payment. And he endeav- ored to restrain his seamen from showing disrespect to the proprietor and his family. But they were perpetually coming ashore and taking what- ever they pleased ; oxen were often shot at the plough and carried to the vessels. The steward, or overseer of the island, Lewis Edwards, claimed and received the market price for what was taken with his knowledge. His hatred of the British was very great and he tried to outwit them, not infrequently by sorting out the poorest cattle and sheep and placing them where detachments coming ashore would see them first. Gardiner, discovering that the little garrison at Sag Harbor was about to be attacked, sent a trusty colored servant thither with a note of informa- tion, directing him to keep a stone tied to the missive while crossing the bay, and if overhauled by the British picket-boats to drop it into the water. The negro accomplished his mission in safety, and when over a hundred assaulters, in one launch and two barges from the squadron, approached that village at midnight they were met by the militia and driven to their vessels in disorder.
Charles Paget, a senior officer of the squadron, suspecting that all was not friendly, wrote to Gardiner, warning him that " the peaceable situa- tion of the island was wholly through sufferance," and that the most trivial instance of hostility practised upon any boat or individual belong- ing to the British squadron would be visited with serious consequences upon himself, his people, and his property. This did not deter the resolute proprietor, however, from promptly refusing to accede to certain unreason- able demands made by Sir Hugh Pigott, when early one June morning that officer appeared with a number of subordinates before the manor-house. Threats of firing into the dwelling only resulted in Gardiner's sending his family and servants into the cellar, while he remained facing the intruders, firm as adamant. Pigott finally went away in a rage without doing any harm. When the party had nearly reached the shore one of the officers stepped back and intimated to Gardiner that Pigott would be reported to the Commodore. The next day Sir Thomas Hardy wrote a polite letter of apology and regret for the occurrence to the lord of the manor.1
1 The purchase and settlement of the manor of Gardiner's Island in 1639, was one of the most romantic incidents in the history of New York, or of America. Lion Gardiner landed at Boston in the autumn of 1635, accompanied by his wife and one maid-servant, having crossed the ocean in a Norsey bark of twenty-five tons burden. Mass. Hist. Coll. Vol. III. Third Series, pp. 131 - 161 ; Vol. III., Third Series, p. 271; Vol. X. Third Series, pp. 173 - 185. He was expected and hospitably welcomed by the little Boston community, composed chiefly of governors - Dudley, Sir Henry Vane, Endicott, Bellingham, Ludlow, and the two Winthrops being already there. He was destined for Saybrook, but Boston had no fort, and
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On the 1st of June Commodore Decatur, anxious to leave New York, resolved to run the blockade. The Poictiers and a number of other vessels were carefully guarding the passage beyond the Narrows, hence he passed through the Sound, accompanied by the Macedonian (which had been repaired at the New York navy-yard and placed under the com- mand of the gallant Captain Jones) and the Hornet under Captain Biddle - hoping to slip out upon the ocean between Montauk Point and Block Island. They were discovered, however, by three or four of the large British vessels, and all chased into New London harbor and blockaded there for the next twenty months.
A boat's crew of Decatur's men managed soon after to elude the vigi- lance of the enemy and landed on Gardiner's Island. They concealed themselves in the woods until a party from one of the British ships, among whom were several officers, came ashore and strolled up to the manor-house, then coming suddenly into view made them all prisoners. The astonished captives were violently enraged, but helpless, and were quickly and quietly conveyed across the water into Connecticut. Barges were at once ordered by the enemy to patrol the waters about Gardiner's Island, and troops were sent for the arrest of the proprietor, who was sup- posed instrumental in betraying the British into the trap, but who was as he was the first professional engineer who had landed in New England he remained long enough to design and build one (which continued in use until after the Revolution) before proceeding to Saybrook where he commanded in person throughout the Pequot War. His signature and seal as attached to a letter written from Saybrook to Governor Winthrop,
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