Captain Fitz

by Enid Mallory

  Accounts have just arrived from Montreal saying that four hundred of our troops have defeated General Hampton’s army of four thousand men.[4]

  The battle Ridout referred to would be known as the Battle of Châteauguay (October 25–26), and would become a proud piece of Canadian history. Armstrong had ordered Hampton to move 4,000 men from New York State up the Châteauguay River to where it empties into the St. Lawrence, close to Montreal, and once there “hold the enemy in check,” while awaiting Wilkinson.

  On the Canadian front, Lieutenant-Colonel de Salaberry led his Voltigeurs, several militia companies, and some Natives a few miles up the Châteauguay where he prepared a defensive reception for the Americans. Hampton sent 1,500 Americans, under Colonel Purdy, on a circuitous 24-kilometre trail through the woods to outflank de Salaberry’s men. They got thoroughly lost. In the morning, Hampton’s main body attacked de Salaberry’s advance picket of 300 militia and a few Natives on the left bank, while Purdy’s detachment finally found and attacked the 160 militiamen on the other side of the river.

  Behind de Salaberry, the Canadian rearguard was led by Lieutenant-Colonel “Red” George Macdonnell, whose 1,130 men sent up a tremendous racket in the woods to unnerve the Americans. Hampton began to withdraw his army up the Châteauguay and back over the border into New York State.

  The Battle of Châteauguay was fought without the British Army. All the defenders were Canadian. Their successful rout of the Americans sent a wave of pride up the St. Lawrence and made young Canadians like Ridout eager to get on with the awful journey east.

  FitzGibbon and the rest of the British also took new heart. They had embarked with the Lake Erie defeat ringing in their ears. Hard on their heels had followed the news of Procter’s defeat in the west. This victory in the east was like a dose of good medicine that they all needed. If they were destined to meet the entire American Army at Montreal, it was good to know de Salaberry and his men would be there too.

  It was becoming evident that they would meet at Montreal. By November 5, Wilkinson’s entire army was on the move through the Thousand Islands: four regiments of infantry, two of Dragoons, and three of artillery. Chauncey had moved his fleet into the river to protect the troops. He would stay there until the army could pass below Prescott, then “use every exertion to get out of the river as soon as possible.” On November 6, Wilkinson wrote to Hampton, “I am destined to and determined on the attack of Montreal if not prevented by some act of God, and to give security to the enterprise, the division under your command must co-operate with the corps under my immediate orders.”[5] That same day, de Rottenburg released his “corps of observation” after the Americans.

  FitzGibbon says they left about ten o’clock at night, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Joseph W. Morrison of the 89th. Fitz’s own regiment was reduced by the previous campaigns to little more than 200 strong. The 89th amounted to 450 men. They had a few artillerymen and two 6-pounder field guns. They travelled in two schooners under the command of Captain Mulcaster (Yeo’s favourite officer) along with seven gunboats and a number of bateaux. Mulcaster’s armed schooners could go no farther than Prescott but his gunboats would take care of any Americans boats that lagged behind downriver.

  Prescott — The Vulnerable Place

  Surgeon “Tiger” Dunlop, an astute observer, declared the Americans could have cut the British supply line with a corps of riflemen and four field guns aimed at the Prescott shore. Later, historians would agree with him.

  At the beginning of the war, Ogdensburg people were reluctant to fight their nearest neighbours and trading partners. In spite of Jefferson’s 1807 trade embargo, trade remained brisk. Prescott people were still crossing the river under a white flag to trade potash and furs and shop in Ogdensburg stores. Even Jacob Brown, who would become an American general, was so heavily involved in trading potash with the enemy that he was nicknamed “Potash Brown.”

  Militia Captain Benjamin Forsyth was the American fly in this ointment of peace. In September 1812, he attacked Gananoque, wounding four men and taking eight prisoners. British leaders rushed to build blockhouses, construct Fort Wellington, and station a garrison there.

  From Ogdensburg, under the command of Brigadier-General Jacob Brown, guns were firing on the British convoys. On September 16, they launched the Durham boat attack on FitzGibbon’s flotilla near Toussaint Island. In February, Forsyth attacked

  The St. Lawrence has never seen, before or since, such a sight as the movement of the American Army of 8,000 to 10,000 men down to Montreal. Three hundred bateaux swept along, as well as a variety of other small boats, followed by 11 gunboats to protect their rear. Thomas Ridout, as he travelled the Canadian shore, recorded the colour and commotion, the splendid pageantry, and the shock wave of alarm as they moved along. From Prescott he wrote:

  It was a grand sight to see an army of 10,000 men going down the Gallette rapids. They fired at us several shots, taking our wagon for artillery, I suppose. Every boat had a gun mounted, and carried about sixty men. About 180 immense boats went down full of men, besides schooners with provisions … The Americans seem confident of taking Montreal. I never witnessed such a beautiful sight as the army going down the rapids.[6]

  Elizabethtown (Brockville), released prisoners from the jail, and captured guns and ammunition. Lieutenant-Colonel “Red” George Macdonnell, temporarily in charge at Fort Wellington, decided to retaliate. He took 580 of his Glengarry Light Infantry out on the ice, pretending they were on their regular drill exercise, then attacked the Ogdensburg fort and barracks, driving the garrison out of the fort. Macdonnell took 70 prisoners, burnt the barracks, two schooners, and the gunboats, and carried off the military stores. For the rest of the war there was no garrison at Ogdensburg.

  Why did the Americans not launch an all-out offensive in this vulnerable place to cut the British supply line?

  Historian Alan Taylor believes a man named David Parish, an Ogdensburg multi-millionaire who had a tract of land along the river, used his influence with the government to keep the war away from his settlement.

  On the Canadian side, Colonel Pearson at Fort Wellington understood the strategic importance of keeping peace across the river. He also understood the value of a little espionage whenever he and his officers were invited over to dine with the Americans. Often, they came away with some useful bits of news.

  The narrow place in the river remained open for travel. The supply line was never cut. The British continued to move their army and its provisions up the St. Lawrence.

  Wilkinson’s army moving through the Thousand Islands was a “grand” but alarming sight to those watching from the shore.

  Lossing, 650.

  While Ridout stopped at Prescott, Morrison’s corps of observation had arrived and collected a detachment of 240 troops commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Pearson, consisting of two flank companies of the 49th, some Canadian Fencibles, three companies of Voltigeurs, and a few militia artillerymen with a 6-pounder gun as well as a few Dragoons to carry messages. Ridout wrote, “Yesterday Colonels Harvey and Pearson left us with 1,500 regulars and eight gunboats in pursuit, determined to attack the enemy wherever they are to be found.”

  Although Ridout guessed at 1,500, Morrison’s force actually amounted to 900 men. They must have looked like a tiny fish determined to bite the tail of a whale.

  A Canadian Paul Revere

  Lieutenant Duncan Clark was 28, a member of the Incorporated Militia, and stationed at Prescott. On November 1, Lieutenant-Colonel Pearson sent Clark to Elliott Point, eight kilometres above Brockville, with precise instructions: “You will upon the appearance of an enemy, instantly take horse, and repair to Prescott, with all possible diligence, alarming the country as you pass down.”

  When Clark saw the American flotilla approaching, his order to “instantly take horse” gave him a problem because he had no horse. With no time to waste, he helped himself to the first farm horse he could find and set out as fast as the old ho
rse could go, yelling out his news as he passed people on the road. At Prescott, he reported to Pearson that the Americans were approaching in 300 boats, bateaux, and gunboats.

  His ride has been compared to that of Paul Revere. Revere had warned the Americans that the British were coming; Duncan Clark warned the British/Canadians that the Americans were coming.

  On November 6, Wilkinson stopped 11 kilometres above Ogdensburg in order to “pass Prescott this night after the setting of the moon.” He landed his men above Ogdensburg and sent each bateau down with a picked crew while gunboats guarded their front and left flanks against the guns of Fort Wellington. Most of the troops — and the powder and ammunition — were moved by land past the British batteries to re-embark below Ogdensburg. Downriver from Prescott, every farmer seemed to be on the shore taking shots at the Americans floating past. When Wilkinson had had enough of this sport, he ordered 1,200 troops to land at Point Iroquois and drive them off. This formidable array of Americans nearly captured young Ridout. In his letter from Prescott he describes his close call:

  Good fortune attends me, for there never was a more narrow escape than when the Yankees landed twelve miles below Prescott. We slept within 200 yards of them. Mr. Green was taken prisoner three minutes after he had left us. Next morning they departed, and Mr. Couche sent me down to reconnoitre and inquire for him. I rode down two and a half miles, but the whole river above and below was covered with their boats; some pulled toward the shore where I was, and came within fifty yards, when a man came running to me and told me by all means to make my escape, for that six boats had landed above me. I instantly galloped back, and passed before they reached the road, as they had landed on a small wooded point 300 yards away. The man told me afterwards that I had hardly got out of sight, when they took three prisoners.[7]

  Fort Wellington at Prescott, started during the war to protect the river route, was finally completed in 1837.

  Gord Mallory.

  After this, Ridout and his party kept behind the “corps of observation,” and Colonel Harvey, who was moving part of the corps east by land, “promised to clear the road.”

  The monument to the Battle of Crysler’s Farm was on land flooded by the Seaway project and has been moved to a hill beside Upper Canada Village, overlooking the St. Lawrence River.

  Enid Mallory.

  From the 2nd of November until the 10th, the weather had been clear, dry, and mild. But on the night of November 10, cold sleet fell, showing no favour to either army. In the vicinity of present-day Morrisburg, British, Canadian, and American soldiers crawled under their boats or huddled beneath lean-to shelters or, if very lucky, found a friendly barn. Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison was snug and dry; he had established headquarters in John Crysler’s big farmhouse. He liked the look of the terrain there as well as any for meeting the enemy.

  An immense mural of a battle scene, painted by A. Sherriff-Scott R.C.A., is displayed at the visitor centre below the monument.

  Gord Mallory.

  The Americans had stopped just below Crysler’s, at the head of the Long Sault Rapids. Wilkinson, unwell for most of this trip, suffered another acute attack of fever. He sent Brigadier-General Jacob Brown ashore with 2,500 men to clear the way to Cornwall. Meanwhile, Brigadier-General John Parker Boyd was to take the troops that could be spared from getting boats through the Long Sault Rapids, and turn back on the British force.

  The rain had stopped by Thursday morning, November 11. The morning was bleak and cold and grey when Boyd’s 2,000 regulars advanced on John Crysler’s farm. The 49th and six companies of the 89th were positioned facing east along a road that ran north from the farmhouse, with log fences for cover. They looked toward a field of fall wheat and beyond it to where the King’s Road crossed two gullies and a large ravine. Between the two gullies and stretching to the river, Morrison had placed Pearson’s detachment from Prescott. Three companies of the 89th, with three 6-pounder guns, protected Pearson’s men on the inland side. Three companies of Voltigeurs were placed in the large ravine as skirmishers and about 30 Natives waited in the woods.

  The Americans soon got past the grey-clad Voltigeurs, but at about two o’clock they were stopped by the 49th and 89th. FitzGibbon, in a letter written years later, said:

  The 49th wore their gray great-coats, while the 89th appeared in their scarlet uniform. General Covington, supposing the men in gray to be Canadian militia, called aloud to his men saying, “Come lads, let me see how you will deal with these militia men,” but on their advancing the 49th, who as yet were calmly standing in open column under the fire of the enemy’s skirmishers, quickly wheeled into line and commenced firing regularly by platoons which soon threw the advancing Americans into confusion and drove them back beyond the range of fire.

  The British regiments were fighting on open ground, in formation, the way they were trained to fight. The Americans tried to get around the British on their left, but Morrison wheeled the 89th around to stop them. Captain Mulcaster’s guns were attacking Wilkinson’s headquarters boat. FitzGibbon finishes the story:

  General Covington being killed, the Americans soon after retreated to their own shore and ultimately went into winter quarters, abandoning altogether their intended attack upon Montreal.[8]

  The final blow to Wilkinson was a letter received the next morning from Hampton, who refused to meet him at St. Regis.[9] Wilkinson, tired and sick on that grey November morning on the St. Lawrence, was facing his own failure. There would be no attack on Montreal.

  Chapter 12

  Devastation at Niagara

  From the St. Lawrence to the ocean an open disregard prevails for the laws prohibiting intercourse with the enemy. The road to St. Regis is covered with droves of cattle and the river with rafts destined for the enemy. The revenue officers see these things but acknowledge their inability to put a stop to such outrageous proceedings. On the eastern side of Lake Champlain the high roads are found insufficient for the supplies of cattle which are pouring into Canada. Like herds of buffaloes, they press through the forest making paths for themselves.

  — Major-General Izard to the Secretary of War, camped near Plattsburg, July 31, 1814[1]

  The end of 1813 was, for FitzGibbon, the end of his association with the 49th. Actually, by then there was little left of the 49th. From a regiment of 10 companies that Brock had proudly called one of the best in 1812, by the time of the Battle of Crysler Farm the 49th had been reduced to 160 men by the ravages of war. At that battle, Thomas Ridout says the 49th lost 60 more men, killed or wounded. Each of the 49th left alive to celebrate that Christmas of 1813 in Montreal must have considered his hold on life a kind of miracle.

  Christmas in Montreal was a time of celebration for Fitz and all the redcoats who filled the streets. The disheartened Americans were camped in winter quarters on the Salmon River, south and east of Cornwall, while British soldiers danced in Montreal. After the privations and sufferings of the year past, it was almost unreal to attend a ball or sleep in a bed or eat Christmas goose.

  Knowing what 1814 would bring, the soldiers enjoyed these brief good times even more. News from the Niagara frontier indicated that this would no longer be a “nice” war involving only professional soldiers and volunteer militiamen. When the Americans left the Niagara frontier to sweep down to Montreal, Brigadier-General George McClure had remained with a handful of troops to guard Fort George. When two new British commanders, Lieutenant-General Gordon Drummond and Major-General Phineas Riall, arrived in Upper Canada, McClure guessed that he was no longer safe in Fort George. On December 10, a cold, damp winter day, he decided to withdraw across the Niagara. Urged on by the Canadian traitor Joseph Willcocks, McClure burned the town of Newark (Niagara-on-the-Lake) after turning 450 women and children out into the snow. He gave them half an hour to carry away something for their survival.

  When Drummond arrived with Colonel Murray of the 100th Regiment, the town was still smoking. The two leaders lost little time deciding to retaliate.<
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  On December 19, Colonel Murray took the flank companies of the 41st and 100th, some militia, artillery, and the Grenadier company of the 1st Royals across the Niagara River. Soon a British flag flew over Fort Niagara. Murray was delighted to seize a large quantity of clothing, tents, and camp equipment, which would help the suffering townspeople at Newark.

  A cannon fired from Fort Niagara was a signal of Murray’s success to General Riall, who waited at Queenston. Riall’s troops then crossed the river and destroyed Lewiston. It was to be a black Christmas for Americans living along the Niagara, caught in a relentless wave of British vengeance. A few nights later, troops again crossed over to burn Youngstown, Tuscarora Village, Fort Schlosser, Black Rock, and Buffalo. A letter from a gentleman at Canandaigua, published in the National Advocate, New York, December 31, portrays the full horror of the time.

  Canadians looking across the mouth of the Niagara found the American Fort Niagara too close for comfort.

  Enid Mallory.

  The Indians and British are in the full tide of successful retaliation: 300 families (says Captain Parish, Indian agent) are now on their way to this place, and the most miserable sufferers, and many children without either stockings or shoes. All here is alarm and commotion, O horrida bella! Horrida bella! Porter’s mills at Schlosser are burnt. Two sons of Benjamin Barton, Esq., are killed.[2]