Upper Canada Preserved — War of 1812 6-Book Bundle. Richard Feltoe
As a result, Lieutenant Colonel Chrystie was ordered to cross back to the U.S. side of the river, locate Major General Stephen Van Rensselaer, and impress upon him the urgent necessity of getting these recalcitrant troops onto the battlefield.
Meanwhile, at the north end of the village, grievous as the death of Brock was to the morale of the surviving British and Canadian troops, it actually engendered a thirst for revenge on the part of the soldiers, not a desire to flee. In consequence, the remnants of the defenders remained at Vrooman’s Point awaiting orders. Shortly afterward, a band of nearly 200 Native warriors, led by their war chief John Norton (Teyoninhokovrawen), arrived at the battlefield, staying close to the heavy woods west of the village. Meeting with some of the retreating militia and hearing of Brock’s death, many of Norton’s warriors took this retreat as a signal for their own withdrawal and melted into the woods. Still determined to advance, Norton heartened his remaining band of about eighty warriors and led his men in a flanking movement to the right, eventually passing around the American perimeter and reaching the top of the escarpment. Moving across the Chippawa road toward the American left flank, Norton sent a messenger to the British garrison at Chippawa for assistance; he then dispersed his warriors under cover of the trees and began sniping at the Americans. Startled by the sudden war cries and firing from the woods on their flank and rear, Lieutenant Colonel Winfield Scott (Second U.S. Artillery), who had left his own assigned post on the American side of the river to join in on the attack, thought he was being attacked by forces coming from Chippawa. Without orders, he took it upon himself to take command of the troops at that end of the line and establish a line of defence facing south from behind a fence (that separated the open farm fields from the partially wooded military reservation lands that followed the line of the escarpment). Under continued fire, Scott ordered his composite force of infantrymen to make a bayonet charge to clear the enemy Native warriors from his flank. However, while the initial advance forced the Natives to retire, they simply regrouped further to the American right and attacked again. This forced Scott to respond with a series of charges that eventually ended up with his force standing at the edge of the slope of the escarpment overlooking the village of Queenston. Unable to drive off the Natives or fortify their dominating position whilst under fire, Scott and his troops were forced to retire back to the wood line to put more open ground between themselves and the repeated probes of the warriors. By now, Major General Sheaffe had arrived at Vrooman’s Point with the reinforcements from Fort George and was also preparing to advance on the American lines. In addition, a new artillery piece had arrived (Captain William Holcroft) and, joining with the other guns situated there, opened up on the remaining American boats — with deadly results.
Hearing the renewed firing from the heights across the river, Major General Stephen Van Rensselaer finally undertook to join his troops on the Canadian shore. He was mortified, however, when those troops awaiting embarkment adamantly refused to board the boats with him. After studying the increasingly serious situation at the beachhead, he returned to the American side and rode post-haste to the main encampment to persuade the reserve of militia troops to march to their comrades’ aid, only to be soundly rebuffed.
Major General R.H. Sheaffe in later life. He was forty-nine years old in October 1812. Although the technical “victor” of the Battle of Queenston Heights, history has denied him the appropriate credit. Subsequently, as lieutenant governor of Upper Canada, Sheaffe was unable to maintain the alliances developed by Brock and came under increasing levels of criticism. He was eventually replaced and reassigned to Montreal in June 1813.
Library and Archives Canada, C-111307.
… the mass of this … [militia] … was immovable. Neither entreaty nor threats — neither arguments nor ridicule availed anything. They had seen enough of war to satisfy them that it made no part of their special calling; and at last, not distaining to employ the mask, invented by factions to cover cowardice or treason, fifteen hundred able-bodied men, well armed and equipped, who a week before boasted loudly of patriotism and prowess, were now found openly pleading constitutional scruples in justification of disobedience to the lawful authority of their chief.[5]
Humiliated, Van Rensselaer was forced to return to the dock and pen a letter to his commanders on the Canadian side. In it he explained his inability to support their position with additional troops and suggested that if they were unable to retreat to the riverbank their surrender might become inevitable. By this time, the arriving British reinforcements had also been seen by the American perimeter troops in the village. In response, increasing numbers of men deserted their posts and began to filter back to the riverbank, where they endeavoured to recross the Niagara by any means possible. The American position around Queenston was weakening, but the heights were still firmly under the control of the bulk of the American force.
For his part, Major General Sheaffe studied the American positions and determined that repeating Brock’s method of a direct frontal assault would bring needless casualties and probable failure. Instead, he decided to follow Norton’s example, reach the heights by a circuitous route and attack downhill, while a smaller detachment and Holcroft’s artillery held the Americans attention from the front. According to Captain James Crooks of the 1st Lincoln Militia:
On crossing the ravine at Durham’s the fences were let down and we took a course to the right in the direction of St. Davids, where we found an old road ascending the mountain about two miles west of Queenston. Up this road we soon made the top and formed in a ploughed field.…We then moved on and took possession of the main road leading from Queenston to the Falls, there awaiting reinforcements that had been ordered from Chippawa…. Here we began to be pelted with shot from an 18 pounder battery on the opposite side of the river called Fort Gray, but it did no harm, the shot flying over us as we lay on the ground. It was rather trying for Militiamen who had never been in action to remain pelted with bullets from Fort Gray for more than an hour in the face of the enemy. The latter were posted in a young wood, where Brock’s monument now stands, with a worm fence in front, and their bayonets glistening in the sun. At last, the order was given to advance and … at the double quick we soon encountered the enemy.[6]
However, other accounts record that during the course of this hour-long pause Sheaffe unexpectedly issued new orders to several units, which manoeuvred their men by countermarching the column, as there was some perceived confusion of their unit alignment and proper frontage. Completing this complicated manoeuvre, in full view of the enemy, Sheaffe then deployed his force into line, only to realize that his initial formation was correct and that he had just inverted his proper fighting line with his left and right flanks reversed. Consequently, he was forced to order yet another countermarch to properly re-establish his battle formation, all the while having left his force totally vulnerable to an enemy counterattack. Fortunately for him, instead of taking advantage of this error of command, the bemused Americans simply stood and watched as the British force paraded up and down the field in front of them. According to American eyewitnesses of this extraordinary proceeding, they did not attack because they were convinced it was being done deliberately, either to intimidate them or to locate a potential weak spot that could be attacked. Finally taking up his desired position, Sheaffe placed the bulk of the 41st Regiment at the centre of his line with his small artillery pieces and several companies of