Battle of Fort George
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The Battle of Fort George was a battle fought during the War of 1812, in which the Americans defeated a British force and captured Fort George on western Lake Ontario.
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[edit] Background
At the start of the campaigning season of 1813, the Americans on Lake Ontario under General Henry Dearborn and Commodore Isaac Chauncey had gained success at the Battle of York, although Brigadier General Zebulon Pike was killed by an exploding magazine. The American army was transported across the lake to Fort Niagara on the American side of the Niagara River. Dearborn planned to attack Fort George next, but his army required rest and reorganisation. No preparations had been made to accommodate the troops at Fort Niagara, and they suffered considerable shortages and privations for several days.
On May 15, Colonel Winfield Scott took up his appointment as Dearborn's Chief of Staff, having been exchanged after being captured at the Battle of Queenston Heights in the previous year. He improved the army's administration and pushed forward the plans. At the same time, Lieutenant Oliver Hazard Perry, who had arrived from Lake Erie to request sailors and supplies for his squadron and was temporarily serving as one of Chauncey's senior officers, reconnoitred the landing sites at the mouth of the Niagara River, taking bearings and placing marker bouys.
[edit] American plans
The Americans planned to land on the shore of the lake rather than the Niagara River. The force was divided into four waves (limited by the number of boats available). The first wave was to be commanded by Scott himself; the second by Brigadier John Parker Boyd, a professional soldier, and the third by Brigadier William H. Winder, a recently commissioned lawyer. A brigade under a political appointee, Brigadier John Chandler, formed the reserve, together with most of the artillery under Colonel Alexander Macomb.
The troops would be supported as they landed by twelve schooners which could approach the shore closely, each mounting a single heavy cannon. Two larger vessels, the corvette Madison and the brig Oneida would engage the nearest British batteries.
The Army's second-in-command, Major General Morgan Lewis, was in nominal overall command of the landing force. Dearborn, the commander in chief, would observe from aboard the Madison.
As the American preparations proceeded, on May 25, 1813 they began to bombard Fort George from their positions along the river and from Fort Niagara. They were using "hot shot"; cannonballs heated in furnaces until they were red-hot, then quickly loaded into cannons and fired. Several buildings within Fort George burned down, and the women and children in the fort were forced to take shelter within the bastions.
[edit] British situation
The commander of the British forces on the Niagara peninsula was Brigadier General John Vincent. He had 1,200 regular soldiers (the bulk of the 1st battalion of the 8th (King's) and 49th Foot, with detachments of the Royal Newfoundland and Glengarry Light Infantry). There were also up to 500 militia present, including Captain Runchey's Company of Coloured Men.
Although Vincent knew that an assault was imminent, he could not know from which direction it would come. To try and cover the entire threatened front, he split his regulars into three detachments, but placed most of them on the Niagara River, assuming that the Americans would attack under cover of their guns in Fort Niagara.
[edit] Battle
The attack, however, did not come along the Niagara River. Just after dawn on May 27, Scott's troops began landing west of the mouth of the Niagara River, while Perry's schooners silenced the British batteries. Scott's force consisted of the U.S. 1st Rifle Regiment under Major Benjamin Forsyth, two companies of the U.S. 15th Infantry and the bulk of the U.S. 2nd Artillery, fighting as infantry. A company of the Glengarry Light Infantry charged tha Americans with the bayonet as they waded ashore. Winfield Scott had to personally fight off a Glengarry soldier while falling into the water. The Glengarry company was outnumbered and forced to retreat, losing half their men. A company of the Royal Newfoundland also attacked but took heavy casualties from grapeshot fired by the schooners.
Scott advanced from the beach but was counter-attacked by British forces which had been concentrated in a ravine out of the American fire; the remnants of the troops which had already engaged Scott, plus five companies of the 8th (King's), Runchey's company and 100 other militia. Scott was driven back, but once again the fire from Perry's schooners caused heavy losses among the British. Scott's force was reinforced by the leading troops of Boyd's brigade, which was just landing, and the British were driven back in turn.
Vincent realised that he would soon be outflanked and surrounded in Fort George, which could quickly be bombarded into submission. He ordered an immediate retreat south to Queenston. Although he ordered the fort's guns to be spiked and the magazines to be blown up, the task was so hastily performed and Scott pursued so closely that the Americans were able to secure the fort substantially intact. One small magazine did explode, and the blast threw Scott from his horse and broke his collarbone. (Some British women and children had been left behind in the fort in the hasty retreat and would have suffered heavy casualties if the demolitions had proceeded as Vincent ordered).
Although Scott continued to press after Vincent and the American batteries bombarded the retreating British from the other side of the river, an attempt by American dragoons to cut off Vincent's retreat was ineffective. As Scott waited for the dragoons to reorganise before pressing on again, Brigadier Boyd brought him orders from Major General Lewis to return to Fort George.
[edit] Results
Vincent was allowed to continue his retreat to Beaver Dams, near present-day Thorold, Ontario, where he gathered in the other British regular detachments from Fort Erie higher up the Niagara, and temporarily disbanded the militia, before falling back to Burlington at the head of Lake Ontario.
The Americans had inflicted heavy casualties and captured a strongly fortified position with fewer losses to themselves. The victory can be credited to excellent planning and leadership by two comparatively junior officers; Scott and Perry.
When the British abandoned Fort Erie, Perry was able to move several ships which had been blockaded in Black Rock into Lake Erie, and these were to be instrumental in his victory later in the year in the Battle of Lake Erie. However, the Americans bungled their attempts to exploit the capture of Fort George by advancing up the Niagara peninsula, and they allowed Vincent to partially regain the initiative at the Battle of Stoney Creek. They had also left themselves vulnerable to a counter-attack on their base, and only indecisive command by the Governor-General of Canada, Lieutenant General Sir George Prevost, allowed the Americans to fight him off at the Battle of Sackett's Harbor.
[edit] Further reading
- John R. Elting, (1991). Amateurs, To Arms! A Military History of the War of 1812. DaCapo Press. ISBN 0-945575-08-4 & ISBN 0-306-80653-3
- J. Mackay Hitsman (ed. Donald E. Graves), The Incredible War of 1812, Robin Brass Studio, Toronto, ISBN 1 896941 13 2
- Jon Latimer, 1812: War with America, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, ISBN 0 67402 584 9
