Pierre Berton's War of 1812 (49 page)

At the palisade, John Richardson feels as if he were sleep-walking. The early call and the six-mile march have exhausted him. Even as the balls begin to whistle about his head he continues to feel drowsy. He tries to fire his musket, finds it will not respond; someone the night before has stolen his flintlock and replaced it with a damaged part. The infantry manual lists twelve separate drill movements for firing a Brown Bess musket and Richardson goes through all of them without effect, but all he gets is a flash in the pan. He finds a bit of wire, tries to fix his weapon, fires again, gets another flash. He
feels more frustration than fear at being fired upon by an unseen foe and not being able to fire back, even though he later comes to realize that if he had fired fifty rounds not one of them would have had any effect on the pickets (and probably not on the enemy, either, for the musket is a wretchedly inaccurate weapon).

To his horror, Richardson notes that the American sharpshooters are picking off the wounded British and Canadians as they try to crawl to safety and that some are making use of the tomahawk and scalping knife. He is still struggling vainly with his useless weapon when he hears his name called. Somebody shouts that his brother has been wounded—young Robert’s right leg was shattered as he applied a match to a gun. Now, in great pain, Robert begs to be carried off, not to the staff section where his father is caring for the wounded, but to another part of the field so that he may escape his parent’s wrath. And there Shadrach Byfield is witness to his suffering.

On the left of the British line, Richardson can hear the war-whoops of the Indians who, with the help of the Canadian militia, are driving directly through the open field in which Lieutenant-Colonel Wells insisted on placing the regulars of the 17th U.S. Infantry. Wells is still at the Maumee. His second-in-command, Major McClanahan, cannot hold his unprotected position. The troops fall back to the frozen Raisin, and the American right flank is turned.

The Americans are in full flight across the river with Caldwell and his Indians under Roundhead, Split Log, and Walk-in-the-Water in hot pursuit. One of the Wyandot overtakes an American officer and is about to tomahawk him when Caldwell intercedes, makes him prisoner, takes him to the rear. The Kentuckian, catching him off guard, draws his knife and slits Caldwell’s throat from ear to ear, but the wound is shallow and Caldwell, who is as tough as his Indian followers, catches his assailant’s arm, pulls the dagger from his throat, and plunges it again and again into his prisoner’s body until he is dead. Caldwell survives.

But where, when all this is going on, is the General?

Winchester has awakened to the sound of musket fire and howitzer bombs exploding. He runs to the barn, borrows a horse from
his host (who, fearing British retribution, is glad to be rid of him), dashes into action. His two battalion commanders, Lewis and Allen, join him, and the three attempt to rally the fleeing men under the bank of the Raisin. It is too late; the troops, pursued by the Indians, are in a panic. Lewis has sent two companies to the right flank to reinforce the regulars, but these too are in retreat.

The three officers withdraw across the river and attempt a second rally behind the fences on the south side. It is futile. The men dash past into a narrow lane leading to the main road. This is suicide, for the Indians are ahead of them and behind them, on both sides of the lane. One hundred men are shot, tomahawked, scalped. Winchester attempts a third rally in an orchard about a mile and a half from the village. It also fails.

The right flank is in full retreat, the men throwing away their weapons in panic. The Potawatomi are in no mood to offer quarter. Lieutenant Ashton Garrett tries to form up a group of fifteen men but finding some sixty Indians running along both sides and in front with their arms at the trail decides instead to surrender. The Indians order Garrett and his men to ground their arms; then, securing all the weapons, they coolly shoot and scalp every one except Garrett himself.

John Allen, shot in the thigh during his attempts to stem the retreat, limps on for two miles until he can go no farther. Exhausted and in pain, he slumps onto a log, resigned to his fate. One of the Potawatomi chiefs, seeing his officer’s uniform, determines to capture and ransom him, but just as he signals that intention a second Indian moves in. Allen dispatches him with a swipe of his sword. The other shoots the Colonel dead and scalps him.

Winchester and Lewis are more fortunate. They fall into the hands of Roundhead, the principal chief of the Wyandot, who, after stripping the General of his cocked hat, coat, and epaulettes, takes the two officers and Winchester’s seventeen-year-old son by a circuitous route back behind the British lines. The battle for the village is still raging, but Winchester, noting Procter’s artillery, dazed by the rout and despairing of any reinforcements from Harrison, has
given up hope. As the Indians return with as many as eight or nine scalps hanging from their belts, he asks to see Procter. The British commander is blunt:

“Some of your troops, sir, are defending themselves from the fort in a state of desperation—had you not better surrender them?”

“I have no authority to do so,” replies Winchester, shivering in the cold in his silk shirt. “My command has devolved upon the senior officer in the fort, as you are pleased to call it.”

Procter now makes the classic answer—Brock’s threat at Detroit, Roberts’s at Mackinac: if there is no surrender he will be forced to set the town on fire; if he is forced to attack, he cannot be responsible for the conduct of the Indians or the lives of the Americans; if Winchester will surrender, he will be responsible for both. Winchester repeats that he is no longer in command but will recommend surrender to his people.

The command of the American forces still fighting inside the palisade has devolved on Major George Madison, a forty-nine-year-old veteran of the Revolution and of St. Clair’s defeat at the hands of the Indians in 1791 and for twenty years keeper of public accounts for the state of Kentucky. At this moment he is concerned about the possession of an empty barn 150 yards from the palisade. If the enemy seizes that building, they will hold a commanding position overlooking the defenders. Madison calls for a volunteer to fire the barn, and a young ensign, William O. Butler, steps forward, seizes a blazing stick of firewood, vaults the fence, and dashes toward the barn under direct fire from the British and Indians on both sides.

Butler reaches the barn, flings the burning brand into a pile of hay, races back through a hail of musket balls, has almost reached the safety of his own lines when he realizes that the hay has not caught. Back he goes, re-enters the barn, fans the hay into a roaring blaze, outstrips the Indians trying to head him off, and with his clothes ripped by passing musket balls tumbles across the pickets and comes to a full stop, standing upright, trying to catch his breath. It is then that a musket ball strikes him full in the chest. Fortunately, it is
spent, and Butler survives. Like his commander, George Madison, he will one day run for governor of Kentucky.

Now comes a lull in the fighting. Of the sixteen British gunners, thirteen are casualties; the remainder are too numb with cold to fire their weapons. Moreover, their ammunition is low; a wagon bearing additional rounds has been shot up and its driver killed by Kentucky riflemen. Procter has withdrawn his forces into the woods, waiting for the Indians to return from the chase before resuming the attack. The defenders seize this interlude to devour some breakfast. This is the moment when Winchester agrees to attempt a surrender.

The Americans, seeing a flag of truce, believe that Procter is asking for a respite to bury his dead. It does not occur to any that surrender is being proposed. When he learns the truth, George Madison is mortified; yet he knows his position is hopeless, for he has only a third of a keg of cartridges left. The reserve supply remains at the Navarre house across the river. He insists, however, on conditions.

“It has been customary for the Indians to massacre the wounded and prisoners after a surrender,” he tells Procter. “I shall therefore not agree to any capitulation which General Winchester may direct, unless the safety and protection of all the prisoners shall be stipulated.”

Procter stamps his foot:

“Sir, do
you
mean to dictate for
me?”

“I mean to dictate for myself,” Madison coolly replies. “We prefer to sell our lives as dearly as possible rather than be massacred in cold blood.”

Procter agrees, but not in writing. Private property, he promises, will be respected; sleighs will be sent the following morning for the American sick and wounded; the disabled will be protected by a proper guard.

Thus the battle ends. Some of the troops plead with their officers not to surrender, saying they would rather die in action. Many are reduced to tears. Others, in a rage, throw down their guns with such force as to shiver the stocks from the barrels. Some joke and laugh. One stands on a stile block and shouts to the English, “You have
taken the greatest set of game cocks that ever came from Kentuck.” But the general feeling is one of despair. Atherton notes that news of the surrender is “like a shock of lightning from one end of the lines to the other.” To Thomas P. Dudley, another Lexington volunteer, “the mortification at the thought of surrender, the Spartan band who fought like heroes, the tears shed, the wringing of hands, the swelling of hearts, indeed, the scene beggars description.”

Only thirty-three men have managed to escape. McClanahan, Wells’s second-in-command is one. Private John J. Brice is another; he gets away by pulling off his shoes and running through the snow in his stocking feet in order to leave tracks resembling those of an Indian in moccasins and so becomes the first man to report the defeat and surrender to Harrison.

Winchester’s loss is appalling. Two hundred Kentuckians are dead or wounded, another seven hundred are prisoners of the British, and the worst is yet to come. The blow to American morale, already bruised by the losses at Mackinac, Detroit, and Queenston, is overwhelming. As for Harrison, the Battle of Frenchtown has wrecked his plans. His left wing has been shattered, his advance on Detroit halted indefinitely. He must now withdraw up the Maumee, out of reach of the enemy. The idea of a swift victory over Canada is gone forever.

FRENCHTOWN, MICHIGAN TERRITORY
, January 23, 1813. William Atherton wakes at dawn, the wound in his shoulder throbbing. He cannot escape a feeling of dread that has tormented his sleep. An ominous stillness hangs over the village where the American wounded are still hived. Procter, fearing an imminent attack from Harrison, has long since dragged his own wounded off on sleds, and since there are not enough of these for the Americans, he has promised to return early in the morning to take them all to Amherstburg.

No one points to the illogic of this. If Procter fears Harrison’s early arrival, why would he return for the wounded? If he doesn’t
fear it, why has he departed, taking everybody with him except one officer, Major Reynolds, and three interpreters? Actually, Harrison, learning of the disaster, has withdrawn his relief force. In the chorus of recriminations that will follow, nobody apparently bothers to ask why. With Procter’s forces off balance and Fort Amherstburg virtually defenceless, he might easily have snatched victory from defeat. But he contents himself with putting all the blame on Winchester.

The camp at Frenchtown is uneasy. Some time in the dark hours of the night, Reynolds and the interpreters have slipped away. Atherton’s fears have been further aroused by an Indian, apparently a chief, who speaks fluent English and who came into his quarters the evening before, seemingly trying to gain information about Harrison’s movements. Just as he left, the Indian made an oddly chilling remark: “I am afraid,” he said, “some of the mischievous boys will do some mischief before morning.”

The sun has been up for no more than an hour when Atherton’s fears are realized. Without warning, the door of the house in which he and some of the wounded are being cared for is forced open, and an Indian, his face smeared with red and black paint, appears waving a tomahawk, followed by several others. Their purpose is loot: they begin to strip the clothing and blankets from the wounded, groaning on the floor. Atherton, near the door, manages to slip out of the room, only to come face to face with one of the most savage-looking natives he has ever seen. This creature’s face is painted jet black. Half a bushel of feathers are fastened to his scalp lock, an immense tomahawk gleams in his right hand, a scalping knife hangs from his belt. He seizes Atherton by the collar, propels him out the front door, leads him through the gate and down the river for a hundred yards to the home of Jean-Baptiste Jerome, where several wounded officers have spent the night. The building has also done duty as a tavern, and the Indians are ransacking the cellars for whiskey.

In front of the house Atherton sees a scarecrow figure, bleeding, barefoot, clad only in a shirt and drawers. This is Captain Nathaniel Hart, commander of the Lexington Light Infantry, inspector of the North West Army, the emissary whom Harrison sent to Winchester
the night before the battle. He is twenty-eight and wealthy, having made a fortune in hemp. Now he is pleading for his life. The previous night, Hart, badly wounded in the knee, was visited by an old friend, Matthew Elliott’s son William, a militia captain who was once cared for in the Hart home in Lexington during a bout of illness. Hart has Elliott’s assurance that he will send his personal sleigh for him in the morning and convey him to his home in Amherstburg. In fact, Elliott has assured all the wounded in Jerome’s house that they are in no danger. The promise is hollow; they are all in deadly peril. Some are already dying under the tomahawk blows of the Indians.