USA > New York > New York City > The Memorial History of the City of New York: From Its First Settlement to the Year 1892, Volume III > Part 29
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Tecumseh, who seems to have followed the example of Pontiac in an endeavor to unite all the neighboring tribes to recover their hunting-grounds on the northwestern territory, flushed with the suc- cesses before the forts at Mackinaw, the Chicago River, and Detroit, planned desultory attacks on the other frontier posts. In August a force of Kentuckians, raised to reinforce Hull, had been placed under command of General Harrison, the victor of Tippecanoe. On the fall of Detroit it was marched through the Ohio wilderness to the relief of Fort Wayne, where Captain Aaron Rhae was closely beset by a joint force of British and Indians. This was the scene of Josiah Harmar's defeat in the Miami campaign of 1790. On the approach of Harrison's relieving force the besiegers withdrew. Fort Harrison, which stood on the Wabash River on the site of the present city of Terre Haute, was held by Captain Zachary Taylor with a small force. Invested by the savages and the blockhouse set on fire, the post was stoutly held, and, after a hot struggle, the attempt to capture it was foiled. This oc- curred on September 3. Fort Madison, which stood on the bank of the Mississippi near the site of the city of St. Louis, was attacked on Sep- tember 5 by a force of two hundred Winnebago Indians. It was ably defended by Lieutenant Hamilton, and on the 8th the savages withdrew. Besides these concerted attacks there were sundry skir- mishes with the Indians, the most noted of which was that of Colonel Ball with a mounted command on the bank of the Sandusky, in which the chiefs fell. This chastisement insured the quiet of the settlements for many years.
The invasion of Canada was not abandoned because of Hull's sur- render. On the night of September 20 Captain Benjamin Forsyth took a party of Americans from Cape Vincent by water to the village of Gananoqui, where, after a skirmish in which he defeated the oppos- ing force, he burned the military storehouse and returned to the American shore. On October 2 the Canadians replied with a much more formidable expedition against Ogdensburg. They crossed the river from Prescott opposite, in forty boats, under the escort of two
NEW-YORK IN THE SECOND WAR WITH GREAT BRITAIN 259
gunboats ; the movement being covered by the fire of the British bat- teries at Prescott. General Jacob Brown, who commanded at Ogdens- burg, with the American battery and a company of riflemen received the flotilla so warmly that it returned to Prescott without having made a landing.
The force with which General Brock took Detroit included two British war vessels. To these the surrender added the American brig of war Adams, which the British named the Detroit. This leaving the United States with- out any force on the upper lakes, Lieutenant Jesse D. El- liott of the navy was sent to Buffalo to organize a flotilla, and a detachment of men was ordered up from New-York city, where seamen were abun- FORT GANSEVOORT -"THE OLD WHITE FORT." dant. In October the Detroit and a smaller vessel, the Caledonia, which had done service at the capture of Mackinaw, came down Lake Erie and anchored off Fort Erie. On the night of the 8th they were surprised by Lieutenant Elliott. The Caledonia was run ashore and secured, the Detroit captured. Elliott fought the British batteries from the captured vessel, but finding he could not tow her out of their reach, and the vessel drifting ashore on Squam Island, he aban- doned her, carrying off his prisoners. Boarded by a British party, they were driven off by the American batteries, and she was thus the point of fire for both sides. In the night she was again boarded by the Americans and burned.
After the capture of Detroit the British force employed was with- drawn to the Niagara River, which became the scene of the autumn campaign. General Stephen Van Rensselaer, in command of the American forces, planned an expedition to capture Queenstown, which commanded the end of the portage between Ontario and the upper lakes. The American force was six thousand men-regulars, militia, and volunteers. On October 13, after some previous blunders and one unsuccessful attempt, a crossing was made. Two hundred regu- lars under Lieutenant-Colonel John Chrystie, and the same number of militia under Colonel Solomon Van Rensselaer, were to cross before daybreak and storm the heights. Lieutenant-Colonel Winfield Scott placed a battery on Lewiston Heights to protect the crossing. The regulars and a few of the militia had crossed, when they were met at the landing by a force of the enemy. Pushing on, line was formed by Captain John E. Wool at the foot of the heights, when they were attacked in front and on flank. Though without artillery, Wool stood his ground. Van Rensselaer's militia on the left were less severely
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treated. Both Wool and Van Rensselaer were badly wounded. The Americans fell back to the river to reform, and were reinforced. By a skilful movement Wool turned the British battery, which he cap- tured so suddenly that General Brock, who was standing near, had not time to mount his horse, and at sunrise the American flag was flying over the works.
Brock ordered up reinforcements from Fort George, but without waiting their arrival took the lead of the defeated troops and moved up the slope to recapture the works. They were repulsed by a charge of bayonets. As Brock rallied his men for a second assault, he fell, mortally wounded. All attempts to avenge his death were in vain. Soon after Scott and General William Wadsworth arrived with re- inforcements. Wool, weak with loss of blood, turned over the com- mand to Scott. The British general Roger H. Sheaffe brought up the reinforcements from Fort George, but General Van Rensselaer could not persuade the militia to cross the river to Scott's support. Scott held his ground against a flank attack by the Indians, who were under command of John Brant, son of the famous Mohawk chief Thayendanegea (or Joseph Brant), which he re- CLARKSON ARMS. pelled by the bayonet. General Sheaffe bringing up his whole force, Scott was compelled to retreat, but finding escape cut off, all the boats having been allowed to float down the river, or to be taken by the enemy, he surrendered his force, carrying the flag of truce through the Indian line in person. Thus ended the battle of Queens- town, where, as with Francis the First at Pavia, "all was lost but honor."
The stoppage of trade was not the only grievance to the merchants of New-York. This was unavoidable in a state of war; but their property was seized also under what were in many cases wholly innocent breaches of the law. Mr. Madison, in his message of No- vember 4, 1812, called attention to this subject: "A number of Ameri- can vessels which were in England when the revocation of the orders in council took place, were laden with British manufactures, under an erroneous impression that the non-importation act would immediately cease to operate, and had arrived in the United States." The for- feitures incurred under the act were not remitted by the officers of the government, and Mr. Madison asked Congress to consider the subject in the light of equity and the public interest. Madison accom- panied his message with petitions for remission from the leading merchants of New-York, Boston, Philadelphia, New Haven, Rich- mond, and Albany. The New-York memorial was plain-spoken : " The citizens of New-York had no idea that under the hard circum- stances of their case their own government would either forfeit their
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property or mulct them when they intended no violation of the laws of the country." The memorial was accompanied by affidavits.1
The congressional committee reported that it appeared that the orders in council were revoked by Great Britain June 23, 1812, and that the declaration of war only reached England on July 30. There- upon a temporary embargo had been laid on American vessels, but the next day they were permitted to con- tinue to take cargoes of British merchan- dise consigned to the United States, being provided for that purpose with "licenses protecting them, notwithstanding the ex- isting hostilities, against capture by Brit- ish cruisers." The time of obtaining li- censes was limited to September 15, 1812. Congress declined to legislate, and turned the matter over to Albert Gallatin, the secretary of the treasury. Gallatin, in reply, recommended that the one half of the forfeitures that would fall to the share of the collectors should be re- mitted, but that the United States should benefit by the extra profit secured on their importations and retain at least so much of its half of the fines. Among W. Smith" the New-York merchants examined by the congressional committee were John G. Coster, John Mason, Wil- liam Irving, and Abram R. Lawrence. Mr. Irving testified that for some of the English goods there was "a ravenous demand," army contractors bidding one over another. Mr. Coster had imported to the amount of £20,000 sterling. But while, notwithstanding these grievances, New-York sustained the war with patriotic enthusiasm, Mr. Madison had to report "that Massachusetts and Connecticut refused to furnish their required contingents towards the defence of the maritime frontier."
It is a question whether Great Britain ever during this contest entertained any purpose of general conquest or of subjugating any of the parts of the United States. Her designs on New Orleans were
1 Affidavits in matter of forfeiture before com- mittee of Congress, November, 1812: Charles Os- borne, Cornelius Heyer, H. Van Wagenen, John Stoutenburgh, William Irving, Nathaniel Rich- ards, John Dodgson, John Mowatt, Jr., Eliphalet Williams, Robert C. Cornell, John B. Dash, Ben- jamin W. Dwight, John R. Willis, Isaac Cary, Joseph Cornell, William W. Mott, James Jenkins, Francis B. Winthrop, Jr., Moses Judah, Garret B. Abeel, Edward Lyde, George Newbold, Sea-
bury Tredwell, Leonard Kip, James J. Roosevelt, Charles Smith, Jr., Robert Lee, Ebenezer Irving, James S. Bailey, Joseph Curtis, Henry King.
2 Colonel William Stephens Smith, a native of New-York city, married the only daughter of John Adams. He was aide de camp to Washing- ton, and in 1813-15 was a member of Congress. For many years he was president of the State Society of the Cincinnati. The portrait is copied from the painting by Stuart. EDITOR.
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evident later, and there was no doubt a vague but undeclared hope that by a starvation process she might isolate New England from the Union and perhaps attach her to her Canadian dominions. To the union of the States New-York waa, by her position, irrevocably com- mitted, and the early recognized the vast amount of territory it en- abled her to command for her trade. The old Anti-Federalist idea of autonomy had been long abandoned by her.
The failure of the two Canadian campaigns of 1812 brought New- York face to face with the problems of the lake defenses. England preceded us in a naval force on these great inland seas. In 1808, under the general authority to construct gunboats, the president had empowered Lieutenant Melanchton T. Woolsey to contract for two vessels on Lake Champlain and one on Lake Ontario. The latter, a regular brig of war, was armed in the spring of 1809 with sixteen twenty-four pounders. A temporary arrangement being made with England, however, the vessel, which was named the Oneida, was not put on the lake till the next year. The British had several vessels, of which the Royal George, of twenty-two guns, was the largest. In July, 1812, the British fleet had made an attempt to take the Oneida at Hackett's Harbor, but Commander Woolsey, taking position with her at the entrance to the harbor, easily drove the enemy off. In October, 1812, Captain Isaac Chauncey took up from New-York a force of officers, seamen, and ship carpenters, and a quantity of naval stores. He purchased and fitted a number of schooners, which, with the Oneida, carried forty guns and four hundred and thirty men. Before winter set in he chased the Royal George into Kingston, attacked the batteries, and cut out two small prizes, and about the same time an expedition crossed from Black Rock, and assaulted and captured the batteries at the head of Niagara River.
The closing of the harbors by the ice put a stop to all active opera- tions; but numerous vessels were built, and when navigation opened in the spring of 1813, General Henry Dearborn, commanding the land forces, and Commodore Chauncey were ready for fresh oper- ations. A joint military and naval expedition undertook the capture of York (now Toronto), the capital of Upper Canada, where the Brit- ish, under command of General Sheaffe, had one large vessel, the Royal (trorge, and were building another. It sailed, fourteen vessels, on April 25. The town was captured on the 27th, after an action in which Major Benjamin Forsyth, with the American riflemen, distin- quished himself, and General Zebulon M. Pike, commanding the forver, was mortally wounded. The British military stores were de- stroved, and the vessel on the stocks set fire to by Sheaffe. The government buildings were burned by the Americans-an unfor- tunate precedent. The Royal George had sailed two days before.
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The capture of Fort George, on the western side of the Niagara River, two miles from its mouth, was then undertaken by Dearborn. The American troops were commanded by General John P. Boyd, who succeeded General Pike. Major Forsyth commanded the rifle- men, Colonel Alexander Macomb the artillery, Colonel Moses Porter the light artillery, Commodore Chauncey, who had brought down supplies and a reinforcement from Sackett's Harbor, directed the fleet, and Captain Oliver Hazard Perry had hurried to the scene from Lake Erie to take part in the action. The troops were landed on the 27th. Colonel Scott, sup- ported by the light artillery, car- ried the heights, and, the first man to enter Fort George, he hauled down the colors with his own hand. In the absence of the American force at the western end of Lake Ontario, the British gen- eral Proctor and Sir James Yeo, who commanded the fleet (four war vessels, a brig, two schooners, and two gunboats), attempted a surprise of Sackett's Harbor at the eastern end. The enemy ap- peared off the harbor on May 28, 1813, captured twelve of nineteen boats which were bringing up re- ROBERT LIVINGSTON.1 inforcements to the Americans from Oswego, and landed on the 29th. The day was nearly lost when General Brown retrieved its fortunes, and the British took to their boats. Fortunately the Americans had themselves set fire to their stores and vessels.
Other minor actions followed in the course of the summer: A night affair at Stony Creek, where, in an indescribable confusion, both the American brigade commanders were made prisoners, and the British general lost his way in the woods. The American troops, however, made a safe retreat to Fort George. An attempt to surprise the British depot of supplies at Beaver Dam, seven miles from Queenstown, re- sulted in an ambush from which the lieutenant-colonel commanding extricated himself with skill, only to fall into a ridiculous snare. Duped by a trick, he surrendered to an insignificant force, and had the mor- tification to see his men, in spite of the terms of capitulation, stripped of their clothing by the savages. The country was indignant at this
1 Robert Livingston, third lord of the manor, born 1708, died 1790. The portrait is copied from the original in the possession of Eugene A. Livingston, Esquire, of New-York. EDITOR.
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disgrace, and General Dearborn, who commanded the northern de- partment, was removed.1
The third affair was an attack on Black Rock, near Buffalo, where the Americans had a dockyard and storehouses. The surprise, led by the British lieutenant-colonel Bisshop, was complete; the buildings were fired, guns spiked, and the spoliation nearly complete when an American force, hastily gathered by General Robert B. Porter, put an end to their operations and drove them in disorder to their boats. Commodore Chauncey, during this summer, repeatedly tried, in vain, to bring Sir James Yeo to a decisive naval encounter. This officer declined invariably, seeking refuge under the guns of the British fort. On October 8, Chauncey caught a squadron of seven gunboats used by the enemy as transports, of which he took and brought in five with their cargoes of troops. The cam- paign closed with Lake Ontario essentially in American possession.
Meanwhile a memorable naval en- counter had given the United States similar command of Lake Erie. In the winter of 1812-13, two large brigs, to mount twenty guns each 'were laid down at Presque Isle (now Erie, Pennsylvania), where there is a fine harbor; a force of ship-carpenters was sent up from New- York city, and several schooners and gunboats were there constructed. The timber was felled from neighboring woods and used green. All the other material, StephenDecatur iron and naval stores, was transported by land, chiefly from New-York, on wagons. A low-water bar protected the harbor, and prevented the entrance of the British cruisers which held the Lake and hung off the port. Captain Perry, who was then in command of the flotilla of gunboats at Newport, Rhode Island, seeing no chance of getting to sea in a sloop of war, volunteered for the lake service, and was ordered to take command on Lake Erie. He arrived at Buffalo in March, 1813, with a number of officers and a few men. He aided Commodore Chauncey in the disembarkation which captured Fort George. The fall of this post brought on that of Fort Erie, and left the Niagara frontier in control of the American army.
Perry now repaired to his own command, and by June 12 had gotten
1 Henry Dearborn was a distinguished officer of
the Revolution. It was the corps of bayonets un- der his command which, with Morgan's riflemen,
decided the battle of Stillwater (or Saratoga). He was Jefferson's secretary of war through his two administrations.
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the vessels detained on the Niagara River past the enemy's batteries. These vessels consisted of four schooners (one a prize) and a sloop. A few days after, he sailed from the outlet of the lake for the harbor of Presque Isle, slipping by the British fleet, which were in the offing, unobserved until it was too late to intercept him. The two brigs laid down at Presque Isle in the winter and launched in May were now nearly ready for sea. They were the Lawrence, on which Perry hoisted his flag, and the Niagara. The schooners also were in the water. The bar, hitherto a pro- tection, was now a serious ob- stacle to getting out the brigs. It had but seven feet of water, and was half a mile outside the harbor. The Lawrence, lifted over by an ingenious contriv- ance, received her armament out- side, and her guns were instantly trained broadside on the enemy. The Niagara was taken over with less difficulty, the schooners passed easily, and when the Brit- Aguacombes ish fleet appeared on the morning of Monday, August 5, Perry had nine vessels, carrying fifty-five guns and four hundred men. Hardly was his squadron in the water when Captain Robert H. Barclay, who commanded the British fleet,-six vessels, carrying sixty-five guns and about the same number of men as the Americans, his flag-ship being the Detroit, of 19 guns,-sailed up the lake. Perry followed in pursuit, and after cruising several days, went into Put-in Bay, where he drilled his men with muffled oars for a boat attack.
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On September 10, the British squadron was seen and signals given by Perry to get under way. This time the enemy formed into line. Perry did the same, and, as he approached, displayed a blue flag on which was the legend, "Don't give up the ship." Action having begun, the enemy's heaviest ships concentrated their fire on the Lawrence, dis- abling her, and killing so many of her men that she dropped out of the fight, and Perry transferred his flag to the Niagara - Captain Elliott, her commander, passing down the line of the American vessels in a small boat with Perry's order to close up to half pistol-range, and taking command himself of one of the last vessels. A confusion in a manœuver of the English vessels gave Perry the opportunity to sail through the enemy's line, delivering broadsides from both sides. A
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close action ensued, and the British colors were shortly struck. Perry at once sent to General Harrison, who commanded the northwestern army, a despatch announcing his victory : "We have met the enemy, and they are ours : two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop." In this sanguinary encounter, a number of Perry's men were negroes. Congress voted gold medals to both Perry and Elliott, whose great services Perry generously acknowledged in his official report.
On October 23, Perry's squadron trans- ported General Harrison's army to Buf- falo, and on the 25th Perry resigned the command of the upper lakes to Captain Elliott and returned to the seaboard, where he was commissioned captain, his commission dating the day of his vic- tory, and soon after appointed to the command of the Java, a new frigate fit- ting out at Baltimore. By the capture of the British fleet the waters of the lakes on the New-York border were en- tirely cleared of the enemy, and the re- joicings in the city were great. The common council, on October 4, tendered Commodore Perry the freedom of the city in a gold box, and requested him to "Henry Allen' sit for his portrait. Mayor Clinton, in transmitting the resolutions to the com- modore at Newport, alluded to the battle of Lake Erie as "an event without parallel in the annals of our country, which gives you distinguished rank among the celebrated men that reflect lustre on the American name, and which has dis- pensed the blessings of security and tranquillity to a most important and extensive portion of the United States."
At the time of Perry's victory General Harrison had completed his plan of campaign. Governor Isaac Shelby, the old hero of the Revo- lution, was on the march in person with eleven regiments of Kentucky mounted volunteers, who had flocked to his standard when they heard of the battle of Lake Erie. Pressing on, he reached the lake on September 14, in time to meet a part of Perry's squadron; the re-
1 Among the disasters of the year 1813 may be mentioned the kee of the Angus and the death of Lieutenant William H. Alla commanding her. The drove best New York on June Is carrying William H. Crawford as l'aired States minister to Franch Eluting British cruisers she surrat fully handel the minister. Alka then imitated Admiral Paul Jeans cruising in British waters:
in thirty days he had destroyed twenty English merchantmen. At the end of that time the Argus wet the Pelican of the British navy. August 14. Is13 In the severe combat which ensued Allen Was mortally wounded and his ship captured. He was buried at Plymouth with military honors. Allen street New-York. commemorates his name. EDITOR
NEW-YORK IN THE SECOND WAR WITH GREAT BRITAIN 267
mainder of the army arriving on the 15th and 16th. The embar- kation began on the 20th. On the 25th five thousand men were encamped upon the Middle Sister Island. On the 27th Harrison's address to the men was read on each vessel, and the fleet of sixteen armed men-of-war and one hundred boats moved up into the Detroit River. Perry commanded the water movements, Harrison those of the army. Landing a few miles below Malden, the army marched on that town, Governor Shelby in advance. The town was evacuated, and the public buildings were in flames. Colonel Richard M. Johnson with his mounted regiment reached Detroit shortly after, and crossed to Sandwich. A land march in chase of the flying British was agreed upon, while Perry sent a part of his squadron in pursuit of the vessels which had taken the artillery and baggage up Lake St. Clair. Perry followed in person to the mouth of the Thames, and, landing, found General Harrison. General Proctor, constantly flying, to the disgust of Tecumseh, at last made a stand on the river Thames, and awaited the approach of the Americans in battle order on the morn- ing of October 5. Harrison, accompanied by Commodore Perry and Colonel Lewis Cass, took a post on the right of the American army near the river. At the call of a bugle the advance moved forward. The cavalry dashed into and broke the first and second British lines, and, wheeling right and left, attacked the rear. Proctor's army sur- rendered as fast as they could throw down their arms. Proctor him- self fled in his carriage. The bugle ordering the attack on the right was answered by a bugle on the left, and Colonel Johnson led his mounted men against Tecumseh's savages. There was a hand-to-hand fight, but, reinforcements coming up, the Indians broke for the forest. Tecumseh, the last great Indian chief, was slain-tradition says by Johnson's own hand.
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