Читать книгу Upper Canada Preserved — War of 1812 6-Book Bundle - Richard Feltoe - Страница 12

The Frenchman’s Creek Fiasco, November 29, 1812

A victory had been won at Queenston, but it had been bought at the price of losing the one individual with the skills and personality to conduct the British war effort with any sort of vigour. General Sheaffe was a competent officer, but was generally considered by his own subordinates as a martinet, focusing on the minutia of military service to the detriment of larger strategic considerations. To the civilian administration of the colony he proved officious, offensive, and totally without the dynamic leadership qualities of his predecessor, General Brock. Nor did he have the fortitude to circumvent Prevost’s directives for a quiet defensive posture in dealing with the Americans. As a result, instead of launching an immediate counteroffensive against the shattered American forces, Sheaffe agreed to a three-day armistice, which actually stretched on until mid-November, frittering away his temporary military advantage and allowing the badly demoralized Americans to recover and plan yet another invasion.

On the American side, the debacle of Queenston inevitably led to the resignation of Stephen Van Rensselaer, much to the pleasure of his political opponent Daniel Tompkins, who was now certain of being re-elected as governor. Not to mention the smug satisfaction of Brigadier General Alexander Smyth, who was subsequently appointed as commander of the “Army of the Centre” by Dearborn. No court martial or enquiry was ever held over the mutinous behaviour of Smyth, the shambles of the invasion, or the wholesale failure of a militia regimental system that legally permitted troops to refuse their officer’s orders.

Having successfully eliminated Van Rensselaer as his commanding officer and succeeded to his position, Smyth went on to undermine General Dearborn by applying directly to Secretary of War Eustis for an independent command and demanding substantial reinforcements of men, equipment, and supplies. In return, he bombastically promised to pursue an aggressive campaign on the far side of the Niagara that would sweep the defenders away at a stroke. In reality, Smyth’s command was in serious trouble. Many of his officers considered Smyth’s refusal to work with Van Rensselaer as a betrayal and spoke quietly of the need for a change of command. In addition, an official inspection of the regular and militia regiments stationed at Buffalo revealed a shocking state of deficiencies in the army’s organization, as exampled by that of the Fourteenth Regiment, commanded by Colonel W.H. Winder:

The Colonel and Lieut-Colonel appear to have taken great pains to acquire a knowledge of the duties of their stations. The company officers are almost as ignorant of their duty as when they entered service. The non-commissioned officers and privates are generally only tolerably good recruits…. The arms of this regiment are in infamously bad order. They appear to be old muskets that have probably been bought up at reduced prices by the contractors … and are now placed in the hands of men who are almost within gunshot of the enemy … some of the cartridges are said to have been made up in 1794…. All the men are without coats and many without shoes or stocking’s and have been obliged to mount guard … barefooted and in their linen jackets and overalls…. The regiment is composed entirely of recruits. They seem to be almost as ignorant of their duty as if they had never seen a camp and scarcely know on what shoulder to carry the musket … and if taken into action in their present state will prove more dangerous to themselves than their enemy.[1]

— Captain William King, Assistant Inspector, October 5, 1812

Additional problems came with the fact that the defeat at Queenston had led to wholesale desertions from the ranks of the New York militia, to the point where some companies had more officers than men. Nor were the regular troops immune from discontent, as the Fifth and Twenty-third Infantry regiments mutinied when their pay was not forthcoming. Seemingly blind to these disaffections and critical problems, Smyth continued his policy of issuing grandiose proclamations that decreed that victory over Sheaffe and his forces was all but complete:

General Order to the Soldiers of the Army of the Centre …

Companions in Arms!

The time is at hand when you will cross the stream of Niagara to conquer Canada and to secure the peace of the American frontier. You will enter a country that is to be one of the United States. You will arrive among a people who are to become your fellow-citizens. It is not against them that we come to make war. It is against that government which holds them as vassals … Soldiers! You are amply provided for war. You are superior in number to the enemy. Your personal strength and activity are greater. Your weapons are longer. The regular soldiers of the enemy are generally old men, whose best years have been spent in the sickly climate of the West Indies. They will not be able to stand before you, when you charge with the bayonet…. It is in your power to retrieve the honor of your country; and to cover yourselves with glory.[2]

— Brigadier General Smyth,

November 17, 1812

For his part, General Sheaffe took the success of Queenston and the subsequent armistice as an opportunity for calling out additional regiments of militia for patrol and garrison duties along the Niagara frontier and Grand River valley. Away from the front, Sheaffe also sought to eliminate any potential threat from the pro-American segment of the population by issuing a proclamation directing all citizens of the United States to quit the province by the end of the year, unless they were prepared to forswear their former country and take an oath of allegiance to the Crown.

Convinced that Smyth would attempt to outflank his defences with an attack at either Fort George or Fort Erie, Sheaffe awaited the termination of the armistice on November 20. He then tried to pre-empt the American plans by undertaking an artillery barrage from his guns at Fort George and detached earthworks. This cannonade was readily responded to by the American batteries erected along their side of the river, and throughout November 21, 1812, the opposing batteries pounded away at each other and their surrounding structures. By the end of the day, this extensive firefight could only be credited with having set fire to several buildings with hot-shot, inflicting a few casualties on both sides, and causing a lot of gunpowder to be burned. It did, however, produce two stories that entered local folklore on the American side. The first related to the way the officers and crews of the Salt Battery at Youngstown solved a supply problem during the exchange: “These two officers [Lieutenant John Gansevoort and Lieutenant Hains (First Regiment U.S. Artillery)] and their men in the warmest part of the cannonading, having fired away all their cartridges cut up their flannel waistcoats and shirts and the soldiers their trowsers, to supply their guns.”[3] (Lieutenant Colonel McFeeley to Brigadier General Smyth.) In the second story, the garrison at Fort Niagara had the help of a Mrs. Fanny Doyle, the wife of Private Andrew Doyle (First U.S. Artillery Regiment) who had been captured at Queenston the previous month and was now a prisoner on his way to Quebec. Mrs. Doyle served valiantly throughout the day’s action, coming under heavy fire as she helped to load and fire a 6-pounder cannon that was mounted on the fort’s mess-house roof.[4]

Elsewhere along the frontier, Sheaffe was hard-pressed to find sufficient troops to secure the exposed riverbank from further American incursions and was forced to divide his force into pockets of men, each guarding extended lengths of the riverbank. As a result, when the Americans attempted another invasion, the only force covering the actual landing point near Fort Erie were the reduced detachments from the 41st and 49th Regiments, backed by a single Royal Artillery and two militia artillery detachments. On November 25, 1812, Smyth planned to use over seventy boats, each capable of carrying a hundred men, supported by ten scows, each capable of carrying complete gun teams, limbers, and crew, in order to transport 3,000 men across the Niagara at Black Rock. This assault was designed to swamp the defenders and overrun their positions before reinforcements could be brought up from Chippawa. However, the commander of the proposed invasion (Colonel Winder) was so concerned that an epidemic of pneumonia had broken out only three days before and had already killed over 200 men, with 400 more showing symptoms of the disease, that on November 25 he wrote to Smyth asking for a postponement: “Sir … the indisposition of the officers to cross is such, and the real difficulties for the want of a little preparatory arrangement, that I fear the issue will be disgraceful and fatal. I would venture to recommend a delay of the expedition.”[5]

Calling off this attack, Smyth revised his plans and on the morning of the 26th sent a flag of truce over to the British, ostensibly demanding an immediate surrender, but in reality as an opportunity to make a reconnaissance of the proposed landing points for his new operation. This attack was to be a smaller-scale sortie, designed to eliminate the British batteries along the riverbank and secure a bridgehead before following it up with a larger assault and invasion force. Inevitably, on November 27, 1812, Smyth prefaced his planned attack with yet another proclamation:

Friends of your country! The moment you have wished for has arrived. Think of your country’s honor lost, her rights trampled on, her sons enslaved, and her infants perishing by the hatchet. Be strong! Be brave! And let the ruffian power of the British King cease on this continent….[6]

Around 3:00 a.m. on Saturday November 28, 1812, a force of around 420 troops pushed out into the icy water of the upper Niagara River and pulled for the far shore.*[7] The attack was planned to consist of two assault groups, taken from the commands of Colonel William H. Winder and Lieutenant Colonel Charles G. Boerstler, supported by sailors detached from several boats docked at Buffalo. Winder’s target, under the joint field command of Captain William King (Fourteenth Infantry) and Lieutenant Samuel Angus (U.S. Navy), was to eliminate the three artillery batteries opposite Black Rock, just below Fort Erie; while Boerstler’s target was further downriver at the bridge over Frenchman’s Creek. By this it was hoped that the invaders could cut off communications with Sheaffe’s troops stationed at Chippawa while providing a secure bridgehead for the main American force to link up with King’s force and establish a foothold in Upper Canada.

Under cover of the darkness, King and Angus’s troops initially rowed upriver, keeping close to the American riverbank, before moving out into the open water and allowing the current to bring them down onto the Canadian shore. In the darkness, the boats manned by the soldiers found the current difficult to manage and became scattered, while the boats under Lieutenant Angus and his more experienced naval party moved ahead of the pack. Approaching the shoreline, Angus’s boats were detected and fired upon by a detachment of some thirty-five men of Lieutenant Lamont’s 49th Regiment at what was referred to as the “Red House.” This was immediately supported by fire from the gun battery adjacent to the Red House and manned by a detachment of Royal Artillerymen under Lieutenant King (Royal Artillery). Suffering casualties and with one of his craft holed by a cannon ball, Angus’s naval unit landed and, without waiting for additional support, made a direct assault upon the battery, while Lieutenant Lamont and his men rushed into the battery to join the artillerymen in fighting off the attack. As the American Naval surgeon, Usher Parsons later remembered and recorded in his diary:

28 November 1813

Our Commander, Lieutenant Angus unwisely volunteered to cross in the night and spike the enemy’s cannon…. It was about 3 in the morning when the boats were crossing but were undiscovered and not expected until within 50 rods of the opposite shore. They were hailed and fired upon by the Sentinel. Three cheers were instantly returned by our men mingled with the sound of the enemy’s muskets, and in two minutes from the first musket of the Sentinel came a discharge of a 12 pounder, loaded with grape and canister, followed by others. The contents of one of them struck one of the boats and killed & wounded half a dozen. The men sprang from their boats as soon as they struck the shore and it was an incessant crackling of musketry by both sides — and a tremendous yells and uproar of voices mingled with cannon.[8]

In the ensuing fight, the Americans suffered the loss of nine of their twelve officers and twenty-two men killed or wounded before being driven back to the beach. There, they established a defensive position under the cover of the shoreline embankment and continued to fire upon the British in the battery. Meanwhile, Captain King landed three boats undetected slightly further downriver (north) and succeeded in outflanking the northern gun position manned by men of the 1st and 2nd Norfolk militias. Attacking the position from the rear, the Americans charged the guns and, after a fierce hand-to-hand fight, succeeded in overwhelming the position, driving off the militiamen. Having secured this position and spiked the guns, King’s force marched upriver (south) seeking to link up with Angus’s naval force. Because they were dressed in long blanket coats of the style worn by militia forces in both of the opposing armies, Lieutenant Lamont was initially deceived into believing that the advancing men were the Canadian militia coming to his aid. However, he was soon disabused of that notion when King’s men fired a volley into the 49th and charged. After some additional hand-to-hand fighting, Lamont’s surviving seventeen men were forced to retire south toward Lieutenant Bryson’s battery, leaving their wounded behind to be taken prisoner. Capturing the Red House battery and linking up with Angus’s troops, King’s force also headed for Bryson’s battery, only to find that the gun’s crew and its covering detachment of infantry from the 41st Regiment, not knowing of the relatively weak strength of the American force, had already spiked their gun and abandoned the position. Having suffered several casualties, King now looked for the remaining boats of his flotilla to continue his mission, but none appeared out of the darkness, either because they had been swept too far downstream by the strong current or had abandoned the attempt to land once the element of surprise had been lost. Having succeeded in his assigned objectives, King and his men returned to their landing ground, only to find that the naval unit had also gone, abandoning their own damaged boats and taking King’s to transport themselves and the wounded back to Black Rock, leaving Captain King and the remains of his detachment stranded on the enemy’s shore.

Meanwhile at Fort Erie, the commanding officer, Major Ormsby (49th Regiment), responded to the sounds of gunfire by leading a detachment of about eighty rank and file of the 49th in a circuitous route toward the batteries, avoiding the main riverside road that was potentially occupied by an enemy force of unknown size. Receiving information of the capture of the guns from Lieutenant Bryson, Ormsby changed his line of march and cut across the open fields behind the riverbank road, with the intention of collecting additional troops from a detachment of the 49th under Lieutenant Bartley before advancing on the enemy from downriver (north). Approaching this position, however, he found that they too had been involved in a firefight and forced to retire after suffering several casualties.

The source of these casualties was the second flotilla of eleven boats, containing some 250 men under Lieutenant Colonel Boerstler. This assault had fared even less well in their initial approach to the Canadian shore as they came under heavy fire from Bartley’s troops, one of whom, John Chapman, later wrote the following account:

… a large number of bateaux came over filled with men to make an attack upon us. One of them had got near the British shore before we perceived them. We rushed up in double-quick time & began to fire upon them with muskets, but by the time we had fired five or six times, a six-pounder was brought up & fired into them. Three or four of the boats were destroyed, & terrible havoc was made among the men that landed. Our officers gave the command to cease firing, but … the men were greatly exasperated & fired several times after this command had been given.[9]

After being under fire for almost twenty minutes, with two boats sunk and several others holed, the majority of the assault wave abandoned the crossing and retired to their own shore, bailing for all they were worth. The remaining boats, containing a force of perhaps 150 troops, completed their crossing, landed, and advanced on the British defenders. In a sharp skirmish, these Americans forced Bartley’s surviving men to retreat back (south) over the bridge and took occupation of the vital crossing. However, in total darkness, and without guides or any knowledge of how strong the enemy forces were, Boerstler’s troops failed to advance as planned to link up with King’s detachment. Instead, Boerstler retired to his landing ground, while leaving behind a detachment with orders to destroy the bridge.

At the same time, King’s landing party, depleted by casualties and swollen by prisoners, was attempting to solve its predicament of being stranded on the enemy’s shore by searching the shoreline for alternate transport. Unable to locate any boats around the ferry dock, King left detachments to guard the captured batteries and marched north, attempting to reach Boerstler’s position. After more than half an hour of marching around in the darkness without contacting Boerstler, King’s men finally came across two small boats pulled up on shore. Recognizing that no hope of success for the mission remained, King ordered that his wounded, the British prisoners, and then as many men as possible fill the boats and cross to the American side, while he remained with the rest to hold onto the beachhead from a nearby house until the boats could return and take them off.

Notified of the Americans’ capture of the bridge by Bartley’s retreating detachment, Ormsby decided to advance on Boerstler’s position to reopen communications with Chippawa and the relief force that would surely arrive, as Bartley had already dispatched a warning to Chippawa as soon as the American intentions were determined. Approaching the bridge at Frenchman’s Creek, the British again came under fire, this time from the picket guard covering the small demolition team, who were using their bare hands and bayonets in an attempt to destroy the bridge (as the proper tools for the work had been left in the boats). Coming under increasingly heavy return fire from the advancing British, the small American detachment abandoned their efforts and retreated into the darkness to effect their escape. Reaching the beach, they found that upon hearing the sounds of gunfire, Boerstler and his troops had already embarked and quit the Canadian side of the river, leaving them stranded and alone. Having regained the bridge and unable to see his enemy, Ormby acted with caution by holding the bridge and waiting for the approaching daylight to better assess the situation. At dawn, Ormsby’s detachment was augmented by a relief force from Chippawa under Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Clark. Together, the combined units, under the overall command of Lieutenant Colonel Cecil Bisshopp, captured the abandoned Americans and secured the riverbank at Frenchman’s Creek before moving toward Fort Erie and the remaining scattered remnants of King’s troops. Seeing the overwhelming number of enemy troops before them, Captain King and his party of thirty-eight men were left with no option but to surrender.

With their communication lines secure, Bisshopp’s column advanced on Fort Erie. Bands of Native warriors augmented the column and the combined force easily retook the batteries from their American captors, only to see a fresh wave of boats approaching the Canadian shore. This new force, taken from Colonel Winder’s command, was attempting a crossing in support of King and Boerstler’s landing and the intended invasion. However, a few volleys from a quickly formed British line-of-battle and associated field artillery pieces persuaded the Americans to come about and pull out of range, but not before suffering between six to ten killed and twenty-two wounded.[10] Upon inspection, all of the guns in the batteries were found to have been dismounted and spiked but were otherwise undamaged. Without delay, Bisshopp ordered a militia officer, Captain James Kerby (2nd Lincoln Militia Artillery), to oversee the restoration of the barrels to firing condition and the manning of the guns in case the Americans made another assault

On the American side of the river, Smyth watched the remnants of his scheme filter back into camp.*[11] These included three of Angus’s sailors, who had become separated from their unit during the night and hidden until daylight allowed them to locate a small skiff. They then set fire to three civilian houses at the ferry dock and rowed back across the river, fully expecting to be hailed as heroes. Instead, they were arrested and severely censured for having destroyed private property and causing a hardening of attitudes for revenge on the part of the Canadians. Despite this military humiliation, and the fact that the enemy was now fully alerted and ready, Smyth had a force of men embark in boats in full view of the enemy and then sent across a repeat of his previous demand, that Fort Erie and the troops defending it should surrender immediately “to spare further effusion of blood.”[12] On the other side of the river, with his batteries once more in action and with a sizeable force of defenders, Bisshopp ignored Smyth’s bombastic demands and later had the satisfaction of watching the Americans unload their troops and march away from the boats — all without a shot being fired.

The following day, Smyth ordered up the detachments of troops that had been sent downriver to the Navy Yard only the night before, and demanded the completion of repairs to his depleted supply of boats in order that another assault could take place during the night of November 30–December 1, 1812. By now Smyth’s credibility had totally evaporated and, once again, units of the militia refused to participate in any actions beyond their State lines. Even the regular troops procrastinated in the loading of the boats so that by the time the supposed invasion force was embarked, the sun had risen and the fleet would have been an easy target for every musket and cannon on the Canadian side of the river. Totally frustrated in his schemes, Smyth held a council of his officers (that is to say, his regular army officers, as the militia commanders were deliberately snubbed and excluded from the meeting), which concluded that conducting further offensive operations was an impossibility. As a result, Smyth abandoned the assault, blaming everyone but himself for the debacle.

Discipline in the American Army of the Centre then effectively disintegrated and entire companies of men simply deserted in disgust. Smyth was burnt in effigy by mobs of infuriated militiamen, while others went searching for their erstwhile commander, calling for a lynching. According to the diary of Naval surgeon, Usher Parsons:

Monday Nov. 30

The army returned in the course of the day to the Navy Yard, embarked in the boats long after dark with the professed object of going down to Fort Schlosser to cross.

Tuesday Dec. 1

The army did not descend the river but this morning rowed above Squaw Island under the pretence of crossing when all were suddenly and unexpectedly ordered to debark. This enraged the soldiers against Gen’l Smyth, particularly the volunteers. And when he retired to his camp, advertisements were posted offering 1000 dollars for him, dead or alive. All of the volunteers commenced firing in the air which induced the enemy to think they were firing among ourselves and three cheers were given by them expressive of ridicule and contempt.[13]

Brigadier General Porter, previously a supporter of Smyth in the removal of Van Rensselaer, did an about-face and repudiated Smyth’s official report on the debacle. He also publicly called his senior officer a poltroon, scoundrel, and coward, prompting a subsequent face-saving duel in which neither party suffered a scratch. Nevertheless, Smyth was effectively disgraced and within a week was forced to decamp from his own army in fear for his life as unhappy soldiers took potshots in his general direction. He was subsequently “disbanded” from the army (which was a face-saving term used by the army to cover up the otherwise embarrassing need to hold a court martial or official enquiry) whereupon he retired to his home in Virginia, where he sat out the remainder of the war, writing his self-justifying memoirs for posterity.

Politically, the ramifications of the litany of military failures in 1812 shook the American political administration. President Madison held onto his office in the autumnal elections, but was forced to remove Dr. Eustis as secretary of war on December 3, 1812. In his place, Madison offered the post to several senior politicians, but none of them would touch the job. Eventually a former senator and brigadier-general of militia, John Armstrong, was appointed. Militarily, the administration’s claims of having an army, supposedly fully equipped and trained to fight and win a war against the vastly more experienced British army, had been exposed as cruel joke, while its incompetent leadership had become the butt of vitriolic lampoons and political cartoons within the American press. Furthermore, the balloon of myth that had been created during the Revolution, expounding the value of the “Minuteman” militia as the backbone of the “American” army, was now effectively popped. Nevertheless, while several American senior officers thought that a wholesale overhaul of the military system was urgently needed, the political and military leadership was not so perceptive and failed to learn from these disasters, thus creating the conditions for further failures in the future.

Even today the isolated position of the garrison of Fort Erie in winter is clearly seen.

U.S. Secretary of War John Armstrong, who reluctantly accepted the appointment of secretary of war in replacement of the inept Dr. Eustis, but who subsequently failed to improve the record of the American military in the year to come.

From the Conger Goodyear Manuscript Collection, Vol. 9. Courtesy of the Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society Research Library, Buffalo, NY.

On the other side of the border, the New Year’s loyal toasts given by the residents of Upper Canada were made with additional fervour this season. By their reckoning, they had:

 been forced into a war for which they were unprepared and under-supplied in military manpower and equipment;

 been dismissed as potentially treasonous and expendable by their own governor in Quebec; and

 defeated three American invasion attempts.

With these “facts” before them, some of the more devout amongst the populace believed that the only obvious answer to the question of why they were not now living under an American flag was nothing less than divine intervention on their behalf.

On the other hand, while equally pleased with the results of the year’s actions, the more objective of the civilian leadership and military commanders saw things in a more sober light; starting with the recognition that the war was only just beginning. Furthermore, the existing manpower reserves, not to mention the supplies of military food, ammunition, clothing, and equipment, were all severely depleted as a result of the previous year’s campaigning. As a result, until such time as these vital resources could be replaced, it would be practically impossible to consider pursuing any form of offensive action in early 1813. Then there was the problem that the civilian population still contained a sizeable proportion of pro-American sympathizers, headed by several members of the current provincial legislature. But perhaps most serious, in their judgement, was the fact that the senior military commander and now provincial administrator, General Sheaffe, although an able battlefield commander and strict disciplinarian over his troops, was far less able to adapt to the political and social manoeuvring required of his new political responsibilities.

As a result, he was unable to hold together the alliances that his predecessor, Brock, had painstakingly forged. Nor could he persuade Prevost to send vitally needed supplies and ammunition for his troops and Native allies, leading an increasing number of his own officers to question his leadership, discontent amongst his Native allies, and calls from certain members of the Upper Canadian Legislature for his replacement. Matters grew so serious that Sheaffe’s health deteriorated under the strain of the responsibility and, for a short time in January 1813, the various departmental and administrative functionaries did the real administration of the war effort in Upper Canada. Receiving word of these troubles in Upper Canada, Prevost took the extraordinary measure of travelling up to York from his headquarters at Quebec during the coldest and worst part of the winter. After meeting with Sheaffe, Prevost went on an inspection tour of the Niagara positions before returning to express his full support and confidence in Sheaffe, temporarily squashing the incipient revolution.

As the winter progressed, the various strategists and campaign planners on both sides of the conflict looked to their maps to determine where the next stage of the fight for control of the Canadas was to take place, once spring had arrived and the new campaign season had begun. The story of which will be told in the second part of this series.