1812.]

were in some degree counterbalanced by successes at sea. It had been supposed, and not without reason, that Great Britain would prove especially formidable on that element; yet it was precisely here that she had to suffer the greatest number of discomfitures during the war, and that the Americans were most fortunate. The success, however, did not come at once. On the outbreak of hostilities, Commodore Rogers (who in the previous year had been concerned in the encounter with Captain Bingham) was at Sandy Hook, New York, with a small squadron, consisting of the frigates President, Congress, and United States, and the sloop-of-war Hornet. On the 21st of June he put to sea, in pursuit of a British squadron which had sailed as a convoy to the West India fleet; but, after a slight engagement, the enterprise was abandoned. The first naval triumph of the Americans over the English occurred on the 9th of August, 1812, when the United States frigate Constitution, commanded by Commodore Hull, attacked the British frigate Guerrière, Captain Dacres, off the American coast. The crew of the American vessel requested to be placed alongside the enemy's ship, and for threequarters of an hour the two manoeuvred to obtain the advantage of position. At length, the Guerrière, unable to accomplish her object, advanced towards the Constitution, firing broadsides at intervals; but, on approaching within halfpistol-shot of her adversary, a tremendous fire burst upon her from the United States frigate. The fight was unequal, for the English vessel (besides being of smaller tonnage than her opponent) had only thirty-eight guns, whereas the American had nominally forty-four, and is suspected to have really carried nearly seventy-four. In rather more than thirty minutes, every mast of the former, and almost every spar, was shot away, and she had no choice but to strike her flag. Fifty of her crew were killed, and sixty-four wounded, while the loss on board the Constitution was but small. It was found necessary to burn the captured ship, as so complete a wreck was simply an encumbrance; but her antagonist was ready for action again next day. By a singular coincidence, this brilliant success, achieved by Commodore Hull, took place about the same time that General Hull was being so disastrously defeated by the British.

Before the end of the year, three other equally striking triumphs had been achieved by American over English vessels. In one instance, the United States ship, the Wasp, is said to have had four guns fewer than her opponent; in the other two

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cases, in which the American commanders were Captain Decatur and Captain Bainbridge, it is admitted by American writers that there was a superiority of a few guns on their side. The enormous loss on board the English ships, and the frightful damage sustained by them, while their adversaries got off with comparatively trivial punishment, are facts which seem to favour the British contention that the American vessels were in truth much more heavily armed than they professed to be; and it is worthy of note that the Wasp, falling in with a British seventy-four on the very day of her victory, was captured, together with her prize. There is also reason to believe that many of the sailors on board the American frigates were English fugitives from the navy which had humbled the power of Bonaparte at sea; and, if so, it is certain that they fought all the more desperately from knowing that they fought with a rope about their necks. An American writer has left it on record that not less than half the crews of American ships were British seamen having false protections, and that the English authorities had exercised their asserted right of impressment very sparingly.* Still, after all allowances have been made, the Americans had abundant cause to be elated, and the English to be mortified. More than five hundred British merchant-men were captured by the small navy of the Federation in the space of a few months.

In course of the autumn, Madison was re-elected to the Presidency, though not without some opposition, and Elbridge Gerry became Vice-President in the place of George Clinton, who had died a short time before. Amongst the members of Congress elected at the same time were numerous Democrats; yet the Federals were increasing in strength also. Still, the Ministry had an efficient majority, and Madison met the two representative bodies without much misgiving. In his Message he stated that during the recess the British had offered an armistice, alleging the repeal of the Orders in Council as a reason for coming to terms; but that, as they refused to make any effectual provisions against the impressment of American seamen, the offer had been refused. Congress, in spite of some opposition, passed resolutions approving of this course; measures were taken for enlarging and more efficiently organising the army; and thus the year 1812 came to an end, in the midst of mingled disasters and successes.

* Simond's Tour in Great Britain, Vol. I.

So eager were the Americans to continue the war that they did not suffer the approach of winter to suspend the operations of their armies. The recovery of Michigan was resolved on; companies were formed and equipped in a single day, and ready to march the next. Of course such hasty levies were not well fitted for regular warfare; but in the first instance they were employed in driving back the hostile Indians on the frontiers. The villages of the red men were laid waste; acts of great cruelty were committed, on the ever-ready and too-facile plea of self-defence; and the savages, exasperated by their wrongs, were all the more disposed to attack the Americans with ferocity, and to offer their services to the British. General Harrison, in command of the Army of the North-west, which was concentrated at the head of Lake Erie, took steps to relieve the frontier posts early in the autumn, and Isaac Shelby, a native of Maryland, but now Governor of Kentucky, led a strong force of youthful volunteers from the latter State towards the boundary lines of the Federation and of Canada. At this time, the Army of the Centre, which had recently been placed under Dearborn, was stationed on the banks of the Niagara, while that of the North, where Dearborn had been succeeded in the command by General Hampton, was planted on the borders of Lake Champlain. The chief officer of the English army, now that Brock was slain, was Sir George Prevost, son of the Augustine Prevost (a native of Geneva) who commanded some of the British forces in the Southern States in the year 1779.

For his assistants, he had Colonel Procter in the direction of Detroit, and General Sheaffe in the vicinity of Montreal and the lower portions of Lake Champlain.

Madison's determination to prosecute the war with vigour was cordially seconded by Congress. The bounty and the wages of the soldiers were increased. The President was authorised to raise twenty additional regiments of infantry, to issue Treasury notes, and to borrow money; and provision was made for building four ships of the line,

six frigates, and as many vessels of war on the great lakes as the public service might require. Thus fortified, General Harrison resolved on a winter campaign for the rescue of Michigan, and General Winchester was ordered to proceed in advance to Frenchtown, a village on the river Raisin, twenty-five miles south of Detroit. With eight hundred young volunteers, chiefly from Kentucky, the latter officer arrived, on the 10th of January, 1813, at Maumee Rapids; and three days later he despatched against the British and Indians, concentrated at Frenchtown, a small body of troops under Colonels Allen and Lewis. The position was attacked and taken on the 18th of January, and Winchester arrived with reinforcements on the 20th. The success of the Americans, however, was very short-lived. Colonel Procter, who was at Malden, eighteen miles distant, at once started for Frenchtown, at the head of fifteen hundred British and Indians. Winchester's men had encamped in the neighbourhood of the village, but had taken only slight precautions against a surprise. Early on the morning of the 22nd of January, they were assailed by the enemy, and completely routed. Winchester, who was made prisoner by the Indians, offered to surrender his whole force, on condition that they should be protected from the violence of the savages. Procter replied that he would grant such protection if the surrender took place imme diately, but that otherwise he would set fire to the village, and could not be responsible for the conduct of the red men. On the Americans submitting. Colonel Procter, leaving the wounded without a guard, withdrew to Malden, fearing the approach of Harrison, who was then on the Lower Sandusky. The Indians accompanied their English comrades some miles on the road, but next morning turned back, set fire to the houses in Frenchtown, ari, falling on the injured Americans, committed a shocking massacre, attended by circumstances of great atrocity. It does not appear that Procter knew anything of this tragedy until after it was enacted; but he was loudly denounced by the

Americans for supposed complicity. The action of the Indian tribes, in making war on the Americans independently of the British, had been discouraged by the military authorities of England; but the enthusiasm of the savages was beyond control. General Brock, in a despatch written a little before his death to Sir George Prevost, Governor-in-Chief of the British provinces of North America, spoke in high terms of the order and steadiness of the Indians who joined in the attack on General Hull at Detroit, and stated that their forbearance and humanity were remarkable. It is but too evident that this was not generally the case; but there is nothing to show that Procter was accountable for the massacre at Frenchtown.

On reaching the Maumee Rapids, Harrison learned the defeat of his countrymen at Frenchtown. Being under the impression that Procter would speedily attack him, he retreated on the 23rd of January; but, on the 1st of February, hearing that the English had gone towards Malden, he again advanced to the Rapids, with twelve hundred men, and established there a fortified camp, which he called Fort Meigs, after the Governor of Ohio. This fort was erected on the south side of the Maumee, nearly opposite a post which had formerly been occupied by the British, and a short distance from the present village of Perrysburg. The position was selected as a convenient point for receiving reinforcements and supplies from Ohio and Kentucky, for protecting the borders of Lake Erie, and for facilitating the proposed operations for the re-capture of Detroit and the invasion of Canada. For some weeks Harrison remained unmolested at this spot, but, on the 26th of April, Colonel Procter, with two thousand regulars, militia, and Indians, from Malden, appeared on the bank of the river opposite the fort, erected batteries on some high ground, and began a siege. The Indians crossed the river on the 27th, and took up a position in the rear of the American lines, which by the 3rd of May were severely galled by a battery erected on the left bank. The American General was summoned to surrender, but refused, and, on the 5th of May, General Clay, with twelve hundred Kentuckians, arrived to the relief of Fort Meigs, and ultimately succeeded in driving the besiegers from their works. Shortly afterwards, several of the American troops, with the rashness of volunteers, dispersed themselves through the woods in pursuit of the Indians, though ordered by their commander not to expose themselves to so great a peril. In a little while they were drawn into an ambuscade; the enemy rallied, and forced the Americans to lay down their arms; and the

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latter would probably have been massacred to a man, had not the Indian chief, Tecumseh, restrained his followers from indulging their vengeance. As it was, several were slain, and many more captured; the remainder fled to the nearest settlements, or escaped into the fort, which was still defended with much obstinacy. This determination soon wearied out the Indians, who on the 8th of May deserted the camp, notwithstanding the entreaties of their chief. The British raised the siege on the following day, when General Harrison, leaving Clay in command, returned to Ohio for reinforcements. All operations in this quarter were now suspended, and did not re-commence until a naval force was ready for action on Lake Erie.

The head of affairs in England at this time was the Prince Regent, who, in February, 1811, had become virtual Sovereign of the country, on the final attack of mental incapacity by which his father's latest years were clouded. The Prince, while forsaking his former Liberal associates, and adopting the Tory Administration which he found, appears to have considered himself free to act on his own judgment with regard to America, and to have been less committed than the King to a policy of extreme resistance to American demands. It was after his accession to power that the Orders in Council were withdrawn, and in 1812 he twice proposed an armistice, but without success. Early in the spring of 1813, the Emperor Alexander of Russia offered his mediation, which was accepted by the Government of the United States, and declined by that of Great Britain. President Madison appointed, as his commissioners for conducting the negotiations, in the event of their being brought to bear, Albert Gallatin, John Quincy Adams (at that time American Minister at the Russian Court), and James A. Bayard. But the Emperor Alexander had exhibited so decided a leaning towards the United States that the British Government may well have doubted whether his arbitration, however honourable the feeling by which it was prompted, would have been altogether free from bias. England suggested a direct negotiation instead, and it was ultimately agreed that this should take place at Ghent; but the proposal at that time came to nothing, and the fratricidal contest pursued its course. Its incidents were not such as to flatter the pride of England, and in the Parliamentary session of 1813 several stormy debates took place on the progress of events in the New World. The Opposition fiercely denounced the conduct of Government, but, on the 18th of February, Lord Castlereagh, the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, moved an address to the Prince