War of 1812

V

Second Phase of the War

During the spring of 1813 and through the following winter, the war entered a new phase. British naval reinforcements began to arrive and established an effective blockade of U.S. ports along the Atlantic seaboard. Naval control of Lake Erie passed to the United States, however, as the British could spare only a limited number of ships from Europe for this theater of the war. America’s naval dominance on Lake Erie helped U.S. land forces to regain ground after additional losses following the fall of Detroit. British supply lines were broken, and the Americans could more easily move their own men and equipment to mount new ground attacks.

A

Operations in the Northwest

As soon as news reached Kentucky about the surrender of Detroit, Major General William Henry Harrison, commander of the state's militia, began preparations for the recapture of the fort. He had the enthusiastic support of Kentucky's population of settlers, who feared raids by Britain’s Native American allies. During the winter of 1813, Harrison, who became a brigadier general in the American army, pushed north into Ohio. In January enemy forces led by British general Henry A. Proctor devastated one wing of Harrison’s command on the Raisin River below Detroit. Harrison rested the remainder of his force at Fort Meigs, a post on the Maumee River in northwestern Ohio. In the spring he defended the fort against a siege by British troops and Native Americans commanded by Proctor. Considerable fighting and maneuvering took place throughout the summer in the area around the Great Lakes known as the Northwest Territory.

During the winter of 1812 and 1813, the U.S. Department of the Navy had started building warships on Lakes Ontario and Erie, recognizing that all land operations in the Northwest Territory depended on use of these waterways for transportation. On Lake Erie a small fleet was under construction at Presque Isle (now Erie), Pennsylvania. Commander Oliver Hazard Perry arrived in the spring of 1813 and vigorously pushed construction forward. On September 10 a British squadron based at Amherstburg, near the mouth of the Detroit River, met Perry’s newly completed fleet near the island of Put-in-Bay. The two fleets were fairly matched in numbers of vessels and men, but the Americans had more concentrated gunfire. The fiercely fought battle, in which Perry had to abandon his damaged flagship, resulted in a complete American victory and the capture of the entire British squadron.

The British had always considered control of the lake strategically important, and when Britain’s General Proctor received the news that the Americans had cut his line of supply by water, he immediately retreated to the Niagara frontier. William Henry Harrison then seized the advantage and ferried his army across the lake under Perry's escort. On October 5 he overtook Proctor at the Thames River. The American troops defeated the British largely because of an impetuous charge of the mounted Kentucky volunteers under Colonel Richard M. Johnson. The Native American leader Tecumseh died while fighting in the British ranks, bringing an end to most Native American resistance in the region. Johnson later claimed to have killed the great warrior.

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In the Ontario region, General Dearborn raided York (now Toronto), Ontario, and during the skirmish Brigadier General Zebulon Pike, one of the army's most promising officers, was killed. The ill-disciplined Americans went on a rampage after Pike’s death and burned several government buildings at York. General Dearborn later secured possession of all the forts on the Niagara frontier.

Neither the British nor the American fleets were able to establish command of Lake Ontario, but in May the British launched a naval attack on Sackets Harbor, New York. The assault nearly defeated the Americans, and only the success of Brigadier General Jacob Jennings Brown of the New York militia staved off disaster.

B

Expedition Against Montréal

As the next step in the American war strategy, Secretary of War John Armstrong proposed an advance from both Sackets Harbor and Plattsburgh, converging on the St. Lawrence River and Montréal. From Sackets Harbor, Major General James Wilkinson was to move down the St. Lawrence with a force of about 7000. Major General Wade Hampton had orders to march from Plattsburgh with 4000 men by a route that would enable him to join forces with Wilkinson for a combined advance on Montréal.

Wilkinson set out on October 17, made little progress, and inspired so little confidence among his troops that on November 11 a smaller British force routed his advance guard at the Battle of Crysler’s Farm. Hampton had suffered his own defeat at the Battle of Châteauguay on October 26, and had retreated back to New York. He marched back to Plattsburgh, leaving Wilkinson without support. When Wilkinson learned of Hampton's retreat, he also hastily withdrew from Canada. Each general seemed more anxious to saddle the other with blame for failure than to defeat the enemy.

The British, no longer threatened by the Americans on the St. Lawrence, set out to improve their situation on the Niagara frontier. On the night of December 18, 1813, a British column crossed the Niagara River and made a surprise attack on the Americans at Fort Niagara, capturing the garrison with the loss of only eight men. Later that month, the British and their Native American allies crossed the river again. They successfully drove back the American militia and burned the towns of Black Rock and Buffalo, New York.

C

Action in the South

American forces also engaged in hostilities with the Creek, a Native American people who lived in Mississippi Territory (now the state of Alabama). On August 30, 1813, the Creek, encouraged by the British, killed nearly 250 settlers at Fort Mims on the Alabama River (see Fort Mims, Massacre of). This violence greatly alarmed residents of nearby Tennessee and Georgia. The Tennessee militia, under the energetic command of Major General Andrew Jackson, moved south against the Creek, but shortages of food and the difficult terrain greatly hampered the march. When reinforcements from a regular army regiment arrived at the end of March 1814, Jackson finally cornered a large body of Native Americans in the Horseshoe Bend of the Tallapoosa River. He destroyed them with a ferocity that shocked many people.

D

Naval Reverses

American success at sea declined during 1813. The British navy tightened its blockade of the eastern seaboard. The British stationed a strong squadron in Chesapeake Bay that included several battleships, and they also covered New York, Long Island Sound, Boston, and other ports with smaller blockading squadrons. Each of these squadrons generally included a ship of the line, testimony that America’s 44-gun frigates had impressed the Royal Navy in battles during the previous year. The British blockade inflicted severe economic losses on the United States, and the suffering felt by all citizens helped to make 'Mr. Madison's War' increasingly unpopular, especially in New England. Nevertheless, more and more American privateers helped the navy at sea, and the number of British merchant vessels captured rose to approximately 400 for the year.

Perhaps the worst blow to American morale came on June 1, 1813, through the overconfidence of Captain James Lawrence. He commanded the Chesapeake, the 38-gun frigate whose engagement with the British vessel Leopard had been an early cause of the war. Lawrence took the Chesapeake out of Boston with a poorly trained crew to attack the British frigate Shannon, but fell victim to the superior gunnery and the remarkable ship handling abilities of the Shannon’s captain, Sir Philip Broke. Lawrence was mortally wounded during the battle, and as he lay dying on the deck, he uttered the despairing cry, 'Don't give up the ship!'

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