USA > New York > Erie County > Sardinia > History of the original town of Concord : being the present towns of Concord, Collins, N. Collins, and Sardinia, Erie County, New York > Part 9
USA > New York > Erie County > Collins > History of the original town of Concord : being the present towns of Concord, Collins, N. Collins, and Sardinia, Erie County, New York > Part 9
USA > New York > Erie County > Concord > History of the original town of Concord : being the present towns of Concord, Collins, N. Collins, and Sardinia, Erie County, New York > Part 9
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Colonel Miller commanding a regiment of infantry, was asked by Brown if he could capture it. "I can try, sir!" was the memorable response of the gallant officer.
Though the regiment which should have supported Miller's gave way, yet the latter moved steadily up the hill. Increas- ing its pace, it swept forward, while its ranks were depleted at every step, and, after a brief but desperate struggle, carried the heights and captured the hostile cannon at the point of the bayonet. At the same time, Major Jessup's regiment drove back a part of the enemy's infantry, capturing Major-General Riall, their commander, and when General Ripley led forward his reserve regiment the British fell back and disappeared from the field.
It was now eight o'clock and entirely dark. In a short time the enemy rallied and attempted to regain his lost artillery.
Seldom, in all the annals of war, has a conflict been fought under more strange and romantic circumstances. The dark- ness of night was over all the combatants. A little way to the northeastward rolled and roared the greatest cataract in the world- wonderful Niagara. Its thunders subdued, yet dis- tinct, could be heard whenever the cannon were silent. And there in the darkness upon that solitary hillside, within sound of that mighty avalanche of water the soldiers of the young republic, flushed with the triumph which had given them their enemy's battle-ground and cannon and commander, calmly awaited the onslaught of England's defeated but not disheart- ened veterans.
At half-past eight the Americans saw the darkness turning red, far down the slope, and soon in the gloom were dimly outlined the advancing battalions of the foe. The red line
90
AMERICANS RETURNING WITH THEIR PRISONERS.
came swiftly, silently and gallantly up the hill, beneath the banners of St. George, and all the while the subdued roar of Niagara was rolling gently over the field.
Suddenly the American cannon and small arms lighted up the scene with their angry glare, their voices drowning the noise of the cataract. The red battalions were torn asunder, and the hillside strewn with dead and dying men, but the line closed up and advanced still more rapidly, their fire rivaling that of the Americans, and both turning the night into deadly day. Presently the assailants ceased firing and then with thun- dering cheers and leveled bayonets rushed forward to the charge. But the American grape and canister made terrible havoc in their ranks, the musketry of Scott and Ripley mowed them down by the score, and the sharp-cracking rifles of Por- ter's volunteers did their work with deadly discrimination. More and more the assailants wavered, and when the Americans in turn charged bayonets, the whole British line fled at their utmost speed. The regulars followed but a short distance, being held in hand by their officers, who had no idea of plung- ing through the darkness against a possible . reserve. But the volunteers chased the enemy down the slope and captured a considerable number of prisoners. Then the Americans reformed their lines, and then again the murmur of the cataract held sway over the field. Twice during the next hour the British attempted to retake their cannon, and both times the result was the same as that of the first effort. For two hours after the Americans remained in line awaiting another onslaught of the foe, but the latter made no further attempt. Having no extra teams the victors were unable to take away the captured guns, with one exception. Accordingly, with this single tro- phy, with their own wounded and with a hundred and sixty- nine prisoners, including General Riall, the Americans at mid- night returned to their encampment on the Chippewa. Their loss was 171 killed, 449 wounded and 117 missing. Both Brown and Scott were wounded, the latter severely, and both were removed to Buffalo.
The condition of the two armies is plainly shown by the fact that the next day the enemy allowed Ripley to burn the mills, barracks and bridges at Bridgewater without molestation.
91
THE BATTLE OF CONJOCKETY CREEK.
The Americans then pursued their untroubled march to Fort Erie. On their arrival the most of the volunteers went home having served the remarkably long time of three or four months. Nevertheless they had done good service and were entitled to a rest according to the views of volunteering then in vogue. The regulars had been reduced by various casualties to some fifteen hundred men. The British, on the other hand, had received reinforcements, and felt themselves strong enough to besiege the fort, if fort it might be called, which was rather a partially intrenched encampment.
General Drummond's army for two weeks steadily worked their way toward the American defences at Fort Erie. These consisted principally of two stone mess-houses and bastion known as " Old Fort Erie," a short distance cast of the river bank, and a natural mound half a mile south and near the lake which was surmounted with breast-works and cannon, and called " Towson's battery."
Between the old fort and the battery ran a parapet, and another from the old fort eastward to the river. On both the north and west, a dense forest came within sixty rods of the American works. The British erected batteries in the woods on the north, each one farther south than its predecessor, and then in the night chopped out openings through which their cannon could play on our works. At this time the commander at Fort Erie was in the habit of sending across a battalion of regular riflemen every night to guard the bridge over Scaja- quada creek, who returned each morning to the fort.
About the 10th of August a heavy British force crossed the river at night at some point below the Scajaquada, and just before daylight they attempted to force their way across the latter stream. Their objective point was doubtless the public stores at Black Rock and Buffalo. Being opposed by the riflemen before mentioned, under Major Lodowick Morgan, there ensued a fight of some importance, of which old men sometimes speak as the " Battle of Conjockety Creek," but of which I have found no printed record. Even the Buffalo Gasette of the day was silent regarding it, though it afterwards alluded to Major Morgan as " The hero of Conjockety." The planks of the bridge had been taken up and the riflemen lay in
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DRUMMOND REPULSED THE THIRD TIME.
wait on the south side. When the enemy's column came up Morgan's men opened a destructive fire. The English pressed forward so boldly that some of them, when shot, fell into the creek and were swept down the Niagara.
They were compelled to fall back, but again and again they repeated the attempt, and every time they were repulsed with loss. A body of militia, under Colonels Swift and Warren, were placed on the right of the regulars, and prevented the enemy from crossing farther up the creek.
Several deserters came over to our forces, having thrown away their weapons and taken off their red coats, which they carried rolled up under their arms. They reported the enemy's force at seventeen hundred, but that was probably an exagger- ation.
After a conflict lasting several hours, the enemy retreated, having suffered severely in the fight. The Americans had eight men wounded.
Early in the morning of the 15th of August, 1814, the Eng- lish attempted to carry Fort Erie by storm, under cover of darkness.
At half-past two o'clock a column of a thousand to fifteen hundred men moved from the woods on the west against Tow- son's Battery. Though received with a terrific fire they pressed forward, but were at length stopped within a few yards of the American lines. They retreated in confusion and no further attempt was made at that point.
Notwithstanding the strength of this attack, it was partly in the nature of a feint, for immediately afterwards two other columns issued from the forest on the north. One sought to force its way up along the river bank, but was casily repulsed. The other, led by Lieutenant-Colonel Drummond, advanced against the main bastion. It was defended by several heavy guns and field-pieces, by the Ninth United States infantry, and by one company each of New York and Pennsylvania volun- teers. Received with a withering discharge of cannon and musketry, Drummond's right and left were driven back. His center, however, ascended the parapet, but were finally repulsed with dreadful carnage. Again Drummond led his men to the charge, and again they were repulsed. A third time the
93
BRITISH VALOR-DEATH OF DRUMMOND.
undaunted Englishmen advanced over ground strewn thick with the bodies of their brethren, in the face of flame from the walls of the bastion, and a third time they were driven back with terrible loss.
This would have satisfied most men of any nation, and one cannot refrain from a tribute to English valor of the most des- perate kind, when he learns that Drummond again rallied his men, led them a fourth time over that pathway of death, mounted the parapet in spite of the volleying flames which enveloped it, and actually captured the bastion at the point of the bayonet.
Many American officers were killed in this terrible struggle. Drummond was as fierce as he was brave, and was. frequently heard crying to his men, "Give the damned Yankees no quarter." But even in the moment of apparent victory he met his fate-a shot from one of the last of retreating Ameri- cans laying him dead upon the ground. Reinforcements were promptly sent to the endangered locality by Generals Ripley and Porter. A detachment of riflemen attacked the British in the bastion but were repulsed.
Another and larger force repeated the attack but also failed. The Americans prepared for a third charge, and two batteries were playing upon the heroic band of Britons.
Suddenly the whole scene was lighted up by a vast column of flame, the earth shook to the water's edge, the ear was deaf- ened by a fearful sound which re-echoed far over the river.
A large amount of cartridges stored in one of the mess- houses adjoining the bastion had been reached by a cannon ball and exploded. One instant the fortress, the forest, the river, the dead, the dying and the maddened living were revealed by that fearful glare ; the next all was enveloped in darkness, while the shrieks of hundreds of Britons in more terrible agony than even the soldier often suffers, pierced the murky and sul- phurous air.
The Americans saw their opportunity and redoubled the fire of their artillery. For a few moments the conquerors of the bastion maintained their positions, but half their number, including most of their officers, were killed or wounded, their commander was slain, and they were dazed and overwhelmed
94
AMERICANS AGAIN VICTORIOUS.
by the calamity that had so unexpectedly befallen them. After a few volleys they fled in utter confusion to the friendly forest.
As they went out of the bastion, the Americans dashed in, snatching a hundred and eighty-six prisoners from the rear of the flying foc. Besides these there remained on the ground they had so valiantly contested, two hundred and twenty-one English dead, and a hundred and seventy-four wounded, nearly all in and around that single bastion. Besides these, there were the wounded who were carried away by their comrades, includ- ing nearly all who fell in the other two columns. The Ameri- cans had twenty six killed and ninety-two wounded.
Seldom had there been a more gallant attack, and seldom a more disastrous repulse. During the fight the most intense anxiety prevailed on this side.
The tremendous cannonade a little after midnight told plainly enough that an attack was being made. Nearly every human being who resided among the ruins of Buffalo and Black Rock, and many in the country around, were up and watching. All expected that if the fort should be captured, the enemy would immediately cross, and the horrors of the previous Win- ter would be repeated. Many packed up and prepared for in- stant flight. Then the explosion came, the shock startled even the war-seasoned inhabitants of Buffalo. Some thought the British had captured the fort and had blown it up, others im- agined that the Americans had penetrated to the British camp and blown that up ; and all awaited the coming of morn with nerves strung to their utmost tension.
It was noon-day light when boats crossed the river from the fort, and the news of another American victory was soon scat- tered far and wide through the country.
A day or two afterwards the wounded prisoners were sent to the hospital at Williamsville, and the unwounded to the depot of prisoners near Albany. Mr. William Hodge relates that when the wagons filled with blistered, blackened men halted near his father's house, they begged for liquor to drown their pain, but some of the unhurt who marched on foot, were saucy enough. Looking at the brick house rising on the ruins of the former one, they declared they would burn it again within a year. They could not, however, have been very anxious to escape, for
95
GENERAL BROWN RESUMES COMMAND.
they were escorted by only a very small guard. Many of the prisoners were Highlanders, of the Glengarry regiment.
Having failed to carry the fort by assault, the British settled down to a regular siege.
Closer and closer their lines were drawn and their batteries erected, the dense forest affording every facility for uninter- rupted approach. Reinforcements constantly arrived at the English camp, while not a solitary regular soldier was added to the constantly diminishing force of the Americans.
By the latter part of August, their case had become so des- perate that Governor Tompkins called out all the militia west of the Genesee en masse, and ordered them to Buffalo. They are said by Turner to have responded with great alacrity.
Arriving at Buffalo, the officers were first assembled and General Porter called on them to volunteer to cross the river. There was considerable hurrying back, but the General made another speech, and under his stinging words most of the officers volunteered.
The men were then called on to follow their example, and a force of about fifteen hundred was raised.
The Forty-eighth regiment furnished one company. Colonel Warren volunteered and crossed the river, but was sent back with other supernumerary officers and placed in command of the militia remaining at Buffalo.
The volunteers were conveyed across the river at night, about the Ioth of September, and encamped along the lake shore above Towson's battery, behind a sod of breast-work hastily erected by themselves. They were commanded by General Porter, who bivouacked in their midst, under whom was Gen. Daniel Davis, of Le Roy. General Brown had resumed command of the whole American force.
At this time the enemy was divided into three brigades of fourteen or fifteen hundred men, each one of which was kept on duty in their batteries every three days, while the other two remained at the main camp on a farm a mile and a half west of the fort.
Immediately after the arrival of the volunteers, a plan was concerted to break in on the enemy's operations by a sortic.
The British had opened two batteries and were nearly ready
96
MARCHING ON BATTERY NUMBER THREE.
to unmask another still nearer and in a more dangerous posi- tion. This was called battery " No. 3." the one next " No. 2." and the furthest one "No. I."
It was determined to make an attack on the 17th of Sep- tember, before battery No. 3 could be completed.
On the 16th, Majors Fraser and Riddle, both officers of the regular army acting as aides to General Porter, each followed by a hundred men, fifty of each party being armed and fifty pro- vided with axes, proceeded from the camp of the volunteers, by a circuitous route through the woods to within a short dis- tance of battery No. 3. Thence each detachment cut out the underbrush so as to make a track back to camp over the swampy ground, curving, when necessary, to avoid the most miry places. The work was accomplished without the British having the slightest suspicion of what was going on. This was the most difficult part of the whole enterprise.
In the forenoon of the 17th the whole of the volunteers were paraded, the enterprise was revealed to them, and a handbill was read announcing the glorious victories won on Lake Cham- plain and at Plattsburg a few days before. The news was joy- fully received, and the sortie enthusiastically welcomed. The volunteers not being uniformed, every one was required to lay aside his hat or cap and wear on his head a red handkerchief or a piece of cloth which was furnished. Not an officer or man wore any other head-gear except General Porter.
At noon that commander led forth the principal attacking body from the volunteer camp. The advance consisted of two hundred volunteers under Colonel Gibson. Behind them came the column designed for storming the batteries, composed of four hundred regulars followed by five hundred volunteers, all commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Wood. These took the right-hand track, cut out the day before. Another column of nearly the same strength, mostly volunteers, under General Davis, intended to hold the enemy's reinforcements in check and co-operate in the attack, took the left-hand road. At the same time a body of regulars under General Miller was concealed in a ravine near the northwest corner of the intrenchments, pre- pared to attack in front at the proper time. The rest of the troops were held in reserve under General Ripley. Just after
97
CAPTURE OF THE THREE BATTERIES.
the main column started it began to rain and continued to do so throughout the afternoon. The march was necessarily slow along the swampy winding pathway, and had it not been for the underbrushed tracks the columns would probably have lost their way or been delayed till nightfall.
At nearly 3 o'clock Porter's command arrived at the end of the track within a few rods of battery No. 3, entirely unsus- pected by its occupants. The final arrangements being made, they moved on, and in a few moments emerged upon the astonished workers and their guard. With tremendous cheer, which was distinctly heard across the river, the men rushed forward, and the whole force in the battery thoroughly sur- prised and overwhelmed by numbers, at once surrendered without hardly firing a shot. The attack was the signal for the advance of Miller's regulars, who sprang up out of their ravine and hurried forward, directing their steps toward battery No. 2. Leaving a detachment to spike and dismount the captured can- non, both of Porter's columns dashed forward toward the same object, General Davis leading his volunters and co-operating closely with Wood. They arrived at the same time as Miller. They were received with a heavy fire, but the three commands combined and carried the battery at the point of the bayonet. Leaving another party to spike and dismount the cannon, the united force pressed forward toward battery No. I. But by this time the whole British army was alarmed and reinforce- ments were rapidly arriving. Nevertheless, the Americans attacked and captured battery No. I after a severe conflict.
How gallantly they were led is shown by the fact that all of Porter's principal commanders were shot down-Gibson at bat- tery No. 2; Wood while approaching No. 1, and Davis while gallantly mounting a parapet between the two batteries at the head of his men. In the last struggle, too, General Porter him- self was slightly wounded by a sword cut on his hand, and tem- porarily taken prisoner, but was immediately secured by his own men.
Of course in a sortie the assailants are not expected to hold the conquered ground. The work in this case had been as completely done as in any sortie ever made, and after battery No. I had been captured a retreat was ordered to the fort, 6
98
HONORS TO GENERAL PORTER.
where the victorious troops arrived just before sunset. The loss of the Americans was seventy-nine killed and 214 wounded; very few, if any, captured. Four hundred British were taken prisoners, a large number killed and wounded, and what was far more important, all the results of nearly two months' labor were entirely overthrown.
So completely were their plans destroyed by this brilliant assault that only four days afterwards General Drummond raised the siege and retired down the Niagara. After the enemy retreated the volunteers were dismissed with the thanks of their commanders, having saved the American army from losing its last hold on the western side of the Niagara.
The relief of Fort Erie was one of the most skillfully planned and gallantly executed sorties ever made. Gen. Napier, the celebrated British soldier and military historian, mentions it as one of very few cases in which a single sortie had compelled the raising of a siege.
Very high credit was given to General Porter, both for his eloquence in engaging the volunteers and his skill in leading them.
The press sounded his praises, the citizens of Batavia ten- dered him a dinner, the governor breveted him a major-general, and Congress voted him a gold medal, he being, I think, the only officer of volunteers to whom that honor was awarded during the war of 1812. The raising of the siege of Fort Erie was substantially the close of the war on the Niagara frontier. A few unimportant skirmishes took place, but nothing that need be recorded here.
All the troops except a small guard were withdrawn from Fort Erie to Buffalo. It was known during the Winter that commissioners were trying to negotiate a peace at Ghent, and there was a universal desire for their success.
In this vicinity, at least, the people had had enough of the glories of war. On the 15th of January, 1815, the news of the victory of New Orleans was announced in an extra of the Buf- falo Gasette, but although it occasioned general rejoicing, yet the delight was by no means so great as when, a week later, the people of the ravaged frontier were informed of the signing of the treaty of Ghent.
99
CLOSE OF THE WAR.
Post-riders, as they delivered letters, doctors, as they visited their patients, ministers, as they journeyed to meet their back- woods congregations, spread everywhere the welcome news of peace. General Nott, in his reminiscences, relates that the first sermon in Sardinia was preached at his house by "Father Spencer," early in 1815. There was a large gathering. The people had heard that the good missionary had a newspaper announcing the conclusion of peace, and they were, most of them, probably more anxious to have their hopes in that respect confirmed than for ought else.
Father Spencer was not disposed to tantalize them, and im- mediately on rising to begin the service, he took the paper from his pocket, saying: "I bring you news of peace." He then read the official announcement, and it may be presumed that the gratified congregation afterwards listened all the more earnestly to the news of divine peace, which it was the minis- ter's especial province to deliver.
In a very brief time the glad tidings penetrated to the most secluded cabins in the country, and all the people turned with joyful anticipations to the half-suspended pursuits of peace- ful life.
100
ENTERING UPON THE HOLLAND PURCHASE.
CHAPTER XIV.
GENERAL PIONEER HISTORY.
THE EARLY SETTLERS.
As a rule, the pioneers of the Holland Purchase were men of splendid physique, intelligent, self-reliant and possessed great strength, courage and endurance, which stood them well in hand in the herculean task they had in rescuing this fair domain from a savage state They came of a noble race and could trace their lineage back to the pilgrims who landed on Plymouth Rock, through the bloody times that tried men's souls during the dark days of the Revolution. And they had come here actuated in part by the same bold spirit that had prompted their ancestors to leave the comfortable abodes of civilization and to seek new homes in the Western world, across three thousand miles of trackless ocean. They had left the homes and scenes of their childhood and bid good-bye to early associates and friends, turned their faces toward the setting sun, and with their wives and little ones had started forth on their long and weary journey towards their future homes. For weeks and weeks they continued their course with slow and toilsome progress, sometimes compelled to camp in the wilderness, and cook and sleep beside some fallen tree. And when at last arrived at their destination, within the dense forests of the Holland Purchase, hundreds of miles away from any city or large village, and without post offices or mails to aid them in communicating with their Eastern friends, they selected lands and built their log cabins, without lumber or nails, and entered upon a new mode of life. They had health, strength, energy and perseverance, and soon the sound of their axes and the crashing of falling trees were heard in every direction. And as the great forest receded year by year before their sturdy blows, smiling fields of grass and grain appeared in
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