The Invasion of Canada (23 page)

SANDWICH, UPPER CANADA, August 6, 1812. In his headquarters in François Bâby’s half-finished mansion, General Hull continues to vacillate. He has promised his impatient officers that he will attack the fort whether the artillery is ready or not. Now he has second thoughts. In Washington he allowed himself to be talked out of his original proposal: that America take steps to control the water routes. Now he himself is paying the price for that negligence. He cannot float his artillery downriver in the teeth of British gunboats. But his enemies can cross the river at will to harass his supply lines and herd Walk-in-the-Water’s Wyandot followers into Canada to reinforce Fort Amherstburg.

He seriously considers retreat but backs off after a stormy meeting with Colonel McArthur. He broods, changes his mind, calls a council of his commanders, finally agrees to adopt their plan of attacking Fort Amherstburg. He will move against it at the head of his troops “and in whatever manner the affair may terminate, I will never reflect on you, gentlemen.”

Dazzling news!
Robert Lucas, back from the debacle at Browns-town, is exultant: the long faces of his comrades have been replaced by smiles. A wave of good cheer surges over the camp. The sick rise from their beds and seize their muskets; the wounded urge the surgeons to pronounce them fit for duty. Orders are issued for five days’ rations, three to be cooked – pork the staple fare. Ammunition and whiskey (twelve barrels) are loaded into wagons, axes, picks, and spades requisitioned, cannon placed on floating batteries. All unnecessary tents, baggage, and boats are sent back to Detroit.

Then, on the afternoon of August 7, hard on the heels of the news from Brownstown, comes an express rider with dispatches for Hull from two American commanders on the Niagara frontier. Boats loaded with British troops have been seen crossing Lake Erie and heading for Amherstburg; more British regulars accompanied by Canadian militia and Indians are en route from Niagara by boat to the fort. Since the British control the lakes, there is nothing the Americans can do to stop them.

Hull is badly rattled. What is happening? Washington’s overall strategy was to pin down the British forces on the Niagara frontier by a series of attacks that would leave Fort Amherstburg lightly held. Now the British are taking troops from Fort George and Fort Erie, leaving that frontier exposed to attack. That may be of some comfort to his colleagues on the Niagara River, but it is disastrous for Hull; it
is impossible for him “to express the disappointment which this information occasioned.” What he does not know is that Prevost has sent an emissary to discuss an immediate armistice with General Henry Dearborn, the American commander-in-chief. Brock does not know this, either, but things are so quiet on the Niagara frontier that he feels justified in taking a gamble; he will reduce his forces there to a minimum in order to bolster his defence at Amherstburg and frustrate any attack by General Hull.

Both commanders – Hull at Sandwich, Brock at York – are suffering from bouts of gloom and frustration. Half blinded by the myopia of war, each believes his own position to be untenable, his adversary’s superior. Brock, thwarted by timid civilians and a lukewarm militia, expects Hull to attack his weak garrison at Fort Amherstburg at any moment. He is desperate to reinforce it but despairs of holding it against greater numbers. Hull, isolated on Canadian soil, is convinced that: Brock’s combined force is not only stronger but also growing at an alarming rate.

Unlike Brock, Hull is no gambler. He feels doomed by bad fortune: the supposedly friendly Indians turning their coats and crowding into Amherstburg; the blocking of his supply train; now a fresh onslaught of fighting men. The General sees himself and his troops suddenly trapped in an unfriendly country, their backs to the river, their food running out, surrounded by Indians, facing Brock’s regulars and Tecumseh’s braves. Irresolution at last gives way to decision, but a decision tainted with panic. He must get his army back onto American soil, with the barrier of the river between him and his enemies – to Detroit at the very least, and perhaps all the way to the Maumee.

He sends again for his officers and breaks the news. It is his responsibility, and his alone, he declares, to decide the ultimate fate of the army. “Well, General,” says the swarthy McArthur, “if it is your opinion, it must be so, but I must beg leave to decline giving any further opinion as to the movements of the army.”

Hull suggests, hesitantly, that the army might be well advised to withdraw as far as the Maumee. Cass retorts that if he does that, every man in the Ohio militia will leave him. That puts an end to it: the army will withdraw across the river to Detroit, but no farther.

Lewis Cass is beside himself. In his eyes, Hull’s decision is both fatal and unaccountable; he cannot fathom it. Coming after a series of timid, irresolute, and indecisive measures, this final about-face has
dispirited the troops and destroyed the last vestige of confidence they may have had in their commander. Cass is undoubtedly right; far better if Hull had never crossed the river in the first place – at least until his supply lines were secure. A sense of astonishment, mingled with a feeling of disgrace, ripples through the camp. Robert Lucas feels it: the orders to cross the river under cover of darkness are, he thinks, especially dastardly. But cross the army must, and when night falls the men slink into their boats. By the following morning there is scarcely an American soldier left on Canadian soil.

WHILE BROCK is advancing toward the Detroit frontier, intent on attack, his superior, Sir George Prevost, is doing his best to wind down the war. He informs Lord Liverpool that although his policy of conciliation has not prevented hostilities, he is determined to do nothing to exacerbate the situation by aggressive action:

“… Your Lordship may rest assured that unless the safety of the Provinces entrusted to my charge should require them, no measures shall be adopted by me to impede a speedy return to those accustomed relations of amity and goodwill which it is the mutual interest of both countries to cherish and preserve.”

Sir George, who has never believed in the reality of the war, is now convinced it will reach a swift conclusion. Augustus Foster has written from Halifax, en route home from Washington, with the news that Britain has revoked the hated Orders in Council. American ships may now trade with continental Europe without fear of seizure. Madison in June made it clear that the Orders were America’s chief reason for going to war. Surely, then, with Britain backing off, he will come to his senses and halt the invasion.

Sir George sees no reason to wait for the President. Why not suspend hostilities at once – at least temporarily? Why spill blood senselessly if the war is, in effect, over?

On August 2, he dispatches his aide, Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Baynes, with a flag of truce to treat with Major-General Henry Dearborn, the U.S. commander, at his headquarters at Greenbush, across the river from Albany, New York.

The American in charge of the overall prosecution of the war in the north has not seen military service for two decades. A ponderous, flabby figure, weighing two hundred and fifty pounds, with a face to
match, Dearborn does not look like a general, nor does he act like one. He is a tired sixty-one. His soldiers call him Granny.

His reputation, like Hull’s, rests on the memory of another time. As a Revolutionary major he fought at Bunker Hill, then struggled, feverish and half-starved, with Arnold through the wintry forests of Maine to attack Quebec, was captured and exchanged to fight again – against Burgoyne at Saratoga, at Monmouth Court House in ’78, with General John Sullivan against the Indians in ’79, at Yorktown in ’81. A successful and influential Massachusetts politician in the post-war era, Secretary of War for eight years in Jefferson’s cabinet, he is now an old soldier who was slowly fading away in his political sinecure until the call to arms restored him to command.

The American strategy, to attack Canada simultaneously at Detroit, Niagara, Kingston, and Montreal, is faltering. Given the lack of men and supplies it is hardly likely that these thrusts can occur together. It is assumed, without anybody quite saying so, that Dearborn will co-ordinate them, but General Dearborn does not appear to understand.

Strategically, the major attack ought to be made upon Montreal. A lightning thrust would sever the water connection between the Canadas, deprive the upper province of supplies and reinforcements, and, in the end, cause it to wither away and surrender without a fight. The problem is that the New Englanders, whose co-operation is essential, do not want to fight, while the southerners and westerners in Kentucky, Tennessee, South Carolina, and Ohio are eager for battle. There is also the necessity of securing America’s western flank from the menace of the Indians. Thus, the American command pins its initial hopes on Hull’s army while the forces on Lake Champlain remain stagnant.

To describe Dearborn’s prosecution of the war as leisurely is to understate that officer’s proclivity for sluggish movement. He has spent three months in New England, attempting in his bumbling fashion to stir the people to belligerence with scarcely any success. The governors of Massachusetts and Connecticut are particularly obdurate. When Dearborn asks Caleb Strong to call out fourteen companies of artillery and twenty-seven of infantry for the defence of his Massachusetts ports and harbours, Governor Strong declares that the seacoast does not need defending since the government of Nova Scotia has “by proclamation, forbid[den] any incursions or depredations upon our territories.” Governor John Cotton Smith of Connecticut
points out that the Constitution “has ordained that Congress may provide for calling forth the militia
to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections, and repel invasions.”
Since there has been neither insurrection nor invasion, he argues, no such emergency exists. Of course, Governor Smith adds, the militia stands ready to repel any invasion should one take place. Clearly, he believes that will never happen.

Dearborn dawdles. Eustis tries to prod him into returning to his base at Albany to get on with the invasion of Canada, but Eustis is not much of a prodder. “Being possessed of a full view of the intentions of government,” he starts out – then adds a phrase scarcely calculated to propel a man of Dearborn’s temperament into action; “take your time,” he finishes, and Dearborn does just that.

It is an odd coincidence that the Secretary of War and his predecessor, Dearborn, are both medical men, former physicians trained to caution, sceptical of haste, wary of precipitate moves that might cause a patient’s death. One of Dearborn’s tasks is to create diversions at Kingston and at Niagara to take the pressure off Hull; but when Hull crosses the Detroit River, Dearborn is still in Boston. “I begin to feel that I may be censured for not moving,” he remarks in what must be the understatement of the war, but he doubts the wisdom of leaving. To which Eustis responds: “Go to Albany or the Lake. The troops shall come to you as fast as the season will admit, and the blow must be struck. Congress must not meet without a victory to announce to them.” Dearborn ponders this for a week before making up his mind, then finally sets off, reaching Greenbush on July 26, where some twelve hundred unorganized troops await him.

His letters to Washington betray his indecision (“I have been in a very unpleasant situation, being at a loss to determine whether or not I ought to leave the seacoast”). He is woefully out of touch with his command, has no idea who runs his commissary and ordnance departments, is not even sure how far his authority extends, although this has been spelled out for him. In a remarkable letter he asks Eustis: “Who is to have command of the operations in Upper Canada? I take it for granted that my command does not extend to that distant quarter.” These are the words of a man trying to wriggle out of responsibility, a man for whom the only secure action is no action at all. He has been ordered to keep the British occupied while Hull advances. But he does nothing.

This, then, is the character of the commander who is to receive an offer of truce brought to his headquarters by the personable Lieutenant-Colonel Baynes.

It takes Baynes six days to reach Albany from Montreal. An experienced officer with thirty years’ service behind him, he keeps his eyes open, recording, in the pigeon-holes of his mind, troop dispositions, the state of preparedness of soldiers, the morale of the countryside. At Plattsburg he is greeted cordially by the ranking major-general, a fanner named Moore, who gets him a room at the inn. Baynes notes that the militia have no uniforms, the only distinguishing badge being a cockade in their hats, and that they do not appear to have made any progress in the first rudiments of military drill. All the officers at Plattsburg express approval of Baynes’s mission and one of them, a Major Clarke, is ordered to accompany him by boat to Burlington near the southern end of Lake Champlain. From this point on Baynes proceeds with more difficulty; the commander at Burlington is not enchanted by the spectacle of an enemy officer coolly looking over his force. But Baynes finally persuades him to let him proceed to Albany, 150 miles to the south.