THE COURSE OF GENERAL WINDER.

95

nothing of military service, and from their habits and pursuits were ill-fitted to endure so suddenly the hardships and exposures of war. They, however, submitted without murmuring, evincing by their patience, their zeal, and the promptitude with which they obeyed every order, a magnanimity highly honorable to their character. "Great as was their merit in this respect," says General Smith,

"It was no less so in the spirit manifested whenever an order was given to march to meet the foe; and at the 'Long Old Fields,' where his attack was momently expected in overwhelming force, they displayed, in presence of many spectators, although scarce any of them had ever been in action, a firmness, a resolution, and an intrepidity which, whatever might have been the result, did honor to their country.'

American writers, in their account of the battle of Bladensburg and the capture of Washington, have attempted to cast odium upon these hastily assembled citizens "worn down with hunger and fatigue," and they seem to forget the difference between a force of raw militia and veteran troops, led by officers of great experience, and armed with novel implements of destruction.3

The course of General Winder'-who never lost the confidence of his fellow-citizens, notwithstanding he was disliked as a Federalist-was that of an officer who felt that he had been hardly dealt with, and had been unfortunate, not through his own fault. He took an active part in the military operations against the enemy at Baltimore, and on the 22d of September, 1814, was sent to the army on the Niagara frontier, "where his services were deemed of importance." He repaired there with the utmost celerity, while William Lownes, Richard Stockton, Morris S. Miller, Charles Goldsborough, Phillip Barbour, Israel Pickens, Daniel Webster, William Cox and Colonel Richard M. Johnson, the congressional committee, were investigating "into the causes of the success of the enemy," and finally deciding that "the military question" "belonged to a military tribunal." The state of affairs on the frontier gave him no opportunity to vindicate his fame at the head of

1 On the straw, in a tent at one time among the Baltimore volunteers, lay wounded William Cooke, James McCulloch, afterwards first Comptroller of the United States Treasury; John P. Kennedy, the author and statesman; Jonathan Meredith, William Gilmor, Richard Dorsey, Nicholas Brice, and Richard Magruder. John E. Howard, son of the revolutionary hero, and Major Wm. D. Merrick, were volunteer aids on the staff of General Winder.

2 General Stansbury says they were fed upon tainted salt beef and old and musty flour.

3 Mr. Palmer says: "The confusion created among some of the best troops of France at the battle of Leipsic, by a rocket brigade, is well known to military men." Hist. Reg. iv., p. 40.

4 Gen. Winder was born in Somerset County, Maryland, February 18th, 1775. After his honorable acquittal by the court of inquiry, he

resumed his command and enjoyed the confidence of the government, but on May 24th, 1815, he resigned, and returned to civil life and the enjoyment of the respect and consideration of his fellow citizens. During the ten years of his life after the war, he was twice elected to the Senate, and at the time of his death his practice was the largest at the Baltimor Bar and one of the largest in the United States Supreme Court. He was Grand Master of the Masonic Order in Maryiand at the time of his death, which was on the 24th of May, 1824. No private citizen was ever before or since honored with such a funeral as his, and in the language of his great contemporary, William Wirt, "Followed by the love and honored by the tears of all who knew him, he has gone down to the grave."

regular troops, and he returned to Washington to urge the inquiry by a competent military tribunal, of his conduct in the command of the 10th military district. He had not ceased to demand this vindication from the moment that he found that attempts had been made, and persevered in, to misrepresent his actions and injure his reputation. At his urgent request a Court of Inquiry, of which Major General Winfield Scott was president, and Colonel John R. Fenwick and Colonel Wm. Drayton, members, was ordered on the 21st of January, 1815, and on the 25th of February, 1815, they made the following report which not only acquitted him with the highest honor, but established the propriety of the views he had given to the War Department when he took command of the 10th military district, and of his subsequent conduct by the sanction of the highest military authority.

"The Court of Inquiry ordered to examine into and report upon the conduct of Brigadier General Winder, so far as it is connected with the capture and destruction of the City of Washington in August, 1814, unanimously submit the following as the result of their investigations.

"The Court, with great attention and much labor, have perused the numerous papers and documents referred to them, from whence they collect-that Brigadier General Winder was appointed to the command of the 10th Military District, of which Washington was a part, on the 2d of July, 1814; that immediately thereafter he took every means in his power to put that District into a proper state of defence; that from the period when well-grounded apprehensions were entertained that the enemy meditated an attack upon the Capital, his exertions were great and unremitted; that through these exertions he was enabled to bring into the field, on the 24th of August, 1814, the day on which the battle of Bladensburg was fought, about five or six thousand men, all of whom, excepting four hundred, were militia; that he could not collect much more than one-half of this force until a day or two previously to the engagement, and six or seven hundred of them did not arrive until fifteen minutes before its commencement; that from the uncertainty whether Baltimore, the City of Washington, or Fort Washington would be selected as the point of attack, it was necessary that Brigadier General Winder's troops should frequently change their positions, owing to which, and alarms causelessly excited on the night of the 23d of August, they were all much fatigued, and many of them nearly exhausted at the time when the hostile army was crossing the bridge at Bladensburg; that the officers commanding the troops were generally unknown to General Winder, and but a small number of them had enjoyed the benefit of military instruction or experience.

"The members of this Court, in common with their fellow-citizens, lament deeply the capture of the Capital; and they regard with no ordinary indignation the spoliation of its edifices, those public monuments of art and science, always deemed sacred by a brave and generous foe; but amidst these mingled and conflicting sensations, they nevertheless feel it to be their duty to separate the individual from the calamities surrounding him, and to declare that to the officer upon whose conduct they are to determine, no censure is attributable. On the contrary, when thay take into consideration the complicated difficulties and embarrassments under which he labored, they are of opinion, notwithstanding the result, that he is entitled to no little commendation; before the action he exhibited industry, zeal and talent, and during its continuance a coolness, a promptitude, and a personal valour highly honorable to himself, and worthy of a better fate."

"W. SCOTT, Major Gen. and President.

"Attest: G. L. NICHOLAS, Lieut. and Recorder.”

THE BATTLE OF CHIPPEWA.

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"The President of the United States having been pleased to approve the foregoing opinion of the Court of Inquiry, Brigadier General Winder will honorably resume his command, and report to the Major General commanding districts Nos. 4 and 10.

“By order of the Secretary of War.1 “D. PARKER, Adj. & Inspr General,”

It is proper here, before resuming our narrative of military and naval events on the waters of the Chesapeake, to take a brief survey of the operations of the army on the Northern frontier.

Early in the spring, Major Hindman, who was chief of artillery under Major General Brown, on the Niagara frontier, was ordered with his battalion, including Captain Towson's company, from Sackett's Harbor, to bear a part in the active operations intended against Canada. These troops, together with the Maryland infantry, were engaged in all the movements of the army up to the battle of Chippewa, which was fought on the 5th of July, 1814, upon an open plain on the Canada shore. In all the intervening engagements they bore a prominent part, and sustained their old reputation for undaunted bravery. After the surrender of Fort Erie, General Scott was ordered to advance with nineteen hundred Americans upon Chippewa. There he met in close encounter and vanquished twenty-one hundred of the best regulars of the British army. The only artillery under Scott's command was his chosen company, Towson's artillery. In this engagement Captain Towson chose his position on the right of the line, and directly opposite to the enemy's artillery.

The number of pieces was equal on both sides, but those of the enemy were twenty-four-pounders, and Towson's only six-pounders. At the beginning of the action, the fire from the enemy was incessant and very destructive; but before it was half over, their guns were silenced, their ammunition wagon blown up, and it was with great difficulty that their guns were saved by the dragoons their artillery horses having been all killed. It is stated that a few days before this battle, Captain Towson had been attacked with an inflammation of the eyes, and being enveloped in the smoke of his own guns, he could not observe the changing position of the enemy advancing to the charge, and nearly in contact with the American line. General Scott galloped up to him, and pointed out the new position which they had gained; Towson immediately poured upon the enemy's ranks an oblique storm of canister, which mowed them down like grass, and materially contributed to their final defeat.

General Wilkinson, writing an account of this battle, says:

"A warm, close, and bloody confiict of small arms and field artillery ensued, in which it was the good fortune of the gallant Towson to silence the enemy's chief battery; at this critical juncture, General Rial took the resolution which should have

1 The Secretary of War, on his return to Washington, found the public feeling so hostile to him that he resigned his office, and never returned to public life. See Wilkinson's Memoirs; Armstrong's Notices of War of 1812;

7-v. iii.

Niles' Register; Ingraham's Sketch of the Capture of Washington; Ingersoll's War of 1812; Williams' Invasion and Capture of Washington; Gleig's Cam paign of Washington; newspapers of the day and private MS.

directed his conduct in the onset; he determined to decide the contest with the bayonet, and commenced his charge, when Towson, relieved from the pressure of the opposed battery, found himself at leisure to turn his guns, and scour the adverse line with showers of canister. This oblique attack of the artillery and the perpendicular fire of the American line were insupportable, and the valourous troops yielded the palm and retreated precipitately, leaving their killed and wounded on the field, but carrying off their artillery. Comparing small with great things, here, as at Minden, the fate of the day was settled by the artillery, and the American Towson may deservedly be ranked with the British Philips, Drummond and Foy." |

1

Three weeks afterwards, on the 25th of July, amid the roar and almost within the spray of the mighty cataract of Niagara, was fought the memorable battle of Niagara, sometimes called Bridgewater, and sometimes Lundy's Lane, one of the bloodiest and most desperate ever hitherto fought by an American army. From sunset until after midnight, the hostile ranks were closely mingled together in the murderous struggle, which left upon the field, killed or wounded, nearly one-fourth of the whole number engaged. Both of Towson's Lieutenants, (Campbell and Schmuck) were wounded; and of thirty-six men who served at his guns, twenty-seven were killed or wounded. In this engagement Major Hindman displayed the greatest gallantry, and contributed largely to the success of the American arms. In the official report of this engagement, the commanding officer says: "Towson's company was the first and last engaged, and, during the whole conflict maintained that high character which they had previously won by their skill and valor.

When the army retired to Fort Erie, Major Hindman with his artillery was placed in charge of the fort. Captain Towson's company, now reduced to forty men, was stationed on the left flank of the encampment. On the morning of the 15th of August, in conjunction with Major Wood, and about two hundred and fifty infantry, they repulsed the right column of the enemy, consisting of fifteen hundred men, in several desperate attempts to 'assault. Such was the continuous stream of flame from Towson's battery, on this occasion, that the enemy called it the "Yankee Light-house," and it was afterwards familiarly named by the American troops "Towson's Lighthouse." General Gaines, in his official report to the Secretary of War, giving an account of the assault upon Fort Erie, after referring to the distinguished services of Captain Towson, says, "Major Hindman and the whole of the artillery under the command of that excellent officer, displayed a degree of gallantry and good conduct, not to be surpassed." And General Ripley, upon another occasion, referring to Towson, says: "I cannot refrain from adverting to the manner in which Captain Towson's artillery was served; I have never seen it equalled. This officer has so distinguished himself that to say simply that he is in action, is a volume of eulogium; the army only to be informed he is there, and, by a spontaneous assent, are at once satisfied that he has performed well his part. I have no idea that there is an artillery officer in any service superior to him in the knowledge and performance of his duty."

1 Memoirs, i., p. 653.

WE now turn from the northern frontier to the Chesapeake Bay and its vicinity, and the events which followed the capture of Washington.

The news of this disaster, and the arrival of the dispirited militia from Bladensburg, spread excitement and apprehension in Baltimore, for it was well known that that "nest of privateers" was an object of special hatred to the British, and was certain to be the next point of attack. The policy of the English with regard to Baltimore and Washington, was thus stated in the London papers:

"If any towns are to suffer, they should be the objects, in order to crush a large body of privateer shipping in Baltimore, and in Washington to destroy a pretty well supplied arsenal, and thus prevent Congress meeting there again, an event much and generally wished for by the people of New York, Philadelphia and the Eastern States. Let the arsenal and naval storehouses be blown up, and no government will be able to get a majority in Congress to vote for their re-erection. To the assembly of the Legislature at Washington, the influences of the Southern Legislators may be ascribed."

An eminent British Statesman declared that Baltimore was "the great depository of the hostile spirit of the United States against England," and Admiral Warren said "Baltimore is a doomed town." Another London paper said: "The American navy must be annihilated; their arsenals and dock yards must be consumed; and the truculent inhabitants of Baltimore must be tamed with the weapons which shook the wooden turrets of Copenhagen." Indeed, General Ross openly boasted, that though the heavens "rained militia," he would make his winter quarters in Baltimore. Thus forewarned, the inhabitants of Baltimore immediately set about making further preparations for defence. Up to this time half a million of dollars had been expended in the defense of the city, under the direction of the mayor, Edward Johnson, and a committee of safety, composed of James Mosher, Luke Tiernan, Henry Payson, Dr. J. C. White, James A. Buchanan, Samuel Sterett and Thorndike Chase. A committee of vigilance and safety, of which Mayor Johnson was chairman, Theodorick Bland secretary, co-operated unceasingly with General Samuel Smith and the military. On the 27th of August, three days after the battle of Bladensburg, this committee issued the following order:

"WHEREAS, the commanding officer has required the aid of the citizens in the erection of works for the defence of the city, the Committee of Vigilance and Safety having full confidence in the patriotism of their fellow-citizens, have agreed on the following organization, for the purpose of complying with the request of the major-general: