The Siege of Fort Erie (4 August to 21 September 1814) was one of the last major military operations of the War of 1812. Following the bloody Battle of Lundy's Lane, a US army retreated into Fort Erie, where it was soon besieged by a British force. Although the Americans withstood the siege, they would ultimately abandon the fort anyway.
Background: Invasion & Retreat
Early on the morning of 3 July 1814, a US army crossed the Niagara River and captured the British stronghold of Fort Erie, beginning the final American invasion of British Canada. Hoping to restore honor to the US Army after a series of humiliating defeats as well as to conquer Canadian territory to use as a bargaining chip for the upcoming peace negotiations in Europe, US Major General Jacob Brown was determined to push up the Niagara Peninsula and seize as much land as possible. After securing Fort Erie, Brown's army moved north and defeated the Right Division of the British Army at the Battle of Chippawa (5 July 1814). Shocked by their defeat, the British withdrew to Fort George to regroup, leading to a weeks-long stalemate as American and Canadian militia units skirmished with one another, consuming the Niagara countryside in blood and flames.
On 25 July, General Gordon Drummond, the lieutenant governor of Upper Canada, arrived to take command of the battered British army at Fort George. Drummond had spent the last few months whipping the province into military readiness, having already imposed martial law and having helped to oversee the executions of eight traitors in the town of Ancaster. Now, he was determined to halt the American attack and marched out to meet the invaders, leading to the hard-fought Battle of Lundy's Lane. Though the battle ended in a stalemate, it was one of the bloodiest actions of the war; by the time the fighting finally died down around midnight, around 1,700 men were left dead or wounded on the field (approximately 850 casualties on each side). General Brown, who had taken a bullet to the thigh, was incapacitated after the battle, meaning that command of the American army fell to one of his subordinates, Brigadier General Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. A more cautious man than Brown, Ripley knew that the American army was in no condition to renew the fight – indeed, they had only about 750 men in fighting condition and were running low on supplies, while the British could afford to wait for reinforcements and fresh provisions. On the morning of 26 July, therefore, Ripley abandoned the blood-soaked fields around Lundy's Lane and withdrew to the relative safety of Fort Erie.
Upon returning to Fort Erie, Ripley still felt exposed and wanted to withdraw back across the river to New York and end the campaign altogether. But Brown, who was livid when he learned of Ripley's retreat to Fort Erie, refused to allow this. Still too wounded to lead the army himself, Brown sent the more aggressive Brigadier General Edmund Pendleton Gaines to take command from Ripley and instructed him to hold Fort Erie at all costs. Gaines knew that it was only a matter of time before the British came to lay siege and immediately worked to increase the fort's defenses. Since Fort Erie was too small to hold Gaines' entire army – approximately 2,800 men by early August – the Americans' first task was to expand it, which they did by extending the wall about half a mile further south. They also constructed new fortifications, including a redoubt dubbed 'Battery Towson' (in honor of its commander, artillery Captain Nathan Towson) built atop Snake Hill, another battery near the lakeshore called the 'Douglass Battery', as well as a dry ditch, filled with sharpened wooden spikes, that surrounded the outside of the fort. The Americans also covered the fields around the fort with obstacles such as felled trees, to obstruct any infantry assault.
The Siege Begins
On 3 August, the 3,000-man British force arrived outside Fort Erie. Prior to laying siege, Drummond ordered a small detachment of troops to cross the Niagara River to attack the American supply centers at Black Rock and Buffalo, both in New York State. His goal was to isolate the garrison in Fort Erie by depriving it of its nearest source of provisions. Led by Lt. Colonel John Tucker, the British were directed to cross over the bridge at Conjocta Creek. When they arrived, however, they found that the bridge had been sabotaged; US Major Lodowick Morgan, in command of 240 New York riflemen, had guessed Tucker's intentions and had pulled the planks off the bridge before their arrival. As the British set about repairing the bridge, they came under fire from Morgan's riflemen across the creek. Although Tucker's men were all seasoned troops, they panicked under this unexpected fire and withdrew, having suffered 11 killed and 17 wounded. Having prevented a British raid on Buffalo, Morgan decided to follow up his victory by raiding the British lines. In one of these raids, however, he pushed his luck and was killed by a bullet to the head.
Drummond, meanwhile, was enraged by what he saw as cowardly behavior displayed by Tucker's troops. Henceforth, he announced that "crouching, ducking, or laying down when advancing under fire are bad habits that must be corrected" and proclaimed that it was "the duty of all officers to punish with death on the spot any man who may be found guilty of misbehavior before the enemy" (quoted in Taylor, 396). Having thusly reminded his men of the importance of discipline, Drummond laid siege to Fort Erie on 4 August. The British constructed several batteries and opened an artillery bombardment on 7 August, but their cannons were too far away from the fort to do much damage. That was, until 14 August, when a British cannonball happened to hit an ammunition magazine in the fort, causing a large explosion. Though the explosion caused no casualties and resulted in minimal damage, Drummond had no way of knowing this – indeed, he believed that the explosion must have devastated the American troops, packed so closely together in the small fort. Hoping to capitalize on this opportunity, the British general immediately began preparing for an assault.
Preparing to Attack
Drummond's assault, scheduled for the night of 15-16 August, was to be three-pronged. The first British column, under Lt. Colonel Victor Fischer, was to storm Towson's Battery atop Snake Hill. Most of the troops in Fischer's 1,300-man column were from the de Watteville regiment, a unit comprised of prisoners of war and deserters from Napoleon's army, taken during the recently concluded Peninsular War (1807-1814). The regiment, therefore, was a mixture of French, German, Dutch, Italian, Polish, and Portuguese soldiers, many of whom spoke little English. These foreign troops would be supplemented by British regulars from the King's Regiment and the veteran 89th Regiment of Foot.
Lt. Colonel Hercules Scott was designated to lead the second British column of 700 men, tasked with storming the Douglass Battery on the lakeshore. Once Fischer and Scott had completed their attacks, the third and final British column – 360 British regulars under General Drummond's nephew, Lt. Colonel William Drummond – would storm the fort's ramparts. Neither Scott nor Colonel Drummond had much faith in the general's plan; just because there had been an explosion did not mean the Americans were vulnerable. Nevertheless, they prepared to do their duty. Scott, sheltering from the rain beneath a hastily thrown-up piece of canvas in the hours before the assault, told his surgeon that "we shall breakfast in the fort in the morning" (quoted in Berton, 739). The younger Drummond, a daring and eccentric officer, was less outwardly optimistic and predicted his own demise. "Now boys," the colonel told his men, "We never will all meet together here again; at least I will never again meet you, I feel it and am certain of it" (ibid). Setting aside these feelings of doom, both Scott and William Drummond wished each other luck as they prepared their men for battle.
The British Assault
The rain was still falling heavily at 2 a.m. on 16 August, when Colonel Fischer led the de Watteville regiment toward Snake Hill. Slowed by the fallen trees and other debris left by the Americans, Fischer's men were soon noticed by the American sentries. Before the de Watteville soldiers knew they had been detected, Towson's cannons roared to life, coloring the night with their bright bursts of fire (indeed, the artillery spectacle would make an impression on eyewitnesses, leading Snake Hill to be renamed Towson's Lighthouse). As they struggled to climb over the thousands of tree trunks, Fischer's men made perfect targets for the American artillery. Many could not even return fire, as General Drummond had ordered them to remove the flints from their muskets so that they would not prematurely discharge their muskets and ruin the element of surprise. With growing desperation, some of the de Watteville troops waded into the lake, hoping to sneak around the battery. Fighting against the swift current and trying not to slip on the stones beneath their boots, the soldiers made slow progress but eventually made it to shore – where they were greeted by two American companies under Colonel Eleazer Wood. As the Americans opened fire, the de Watteville soldiers panicked and rushed back into the water. Some drowned in their efforts to get away, their corpses carried off into the Niagara River.
Meanwhile, having no idea that Fischer's main assault had already failed, Hercules Scott's column was approaching the fort; unfortunately for them, the entire American garrison was on guard, having been woken by the sound of Towson's cannons. It was just after 3 a.m. when the American cannons at Douglass Battery added their own voices to the chorus and opened fire. After the first round of firing, one of Scott's men cried out: "Cease firing! You are firing on your own men!" For a moment, this ploy worked, and the Americans hesitated, horrified that, in the dark, they actually had committed friendly fire. But one American officer recognized the voice had a British accent, and shouted back: "Go to hell!" (quoted in Berton, 743). With that, the Americans resumed their cannonade. Scott's column kept charging and managed to get their ladders on the walls but were eventually repulsed. Unwilling to admit defeat, Scott reformed his column and charged again and again. But by dawn, it was clear the attack had failed, with more than half of Scott's troops becoming casualties.
This left only Colonel William Drummond and his 360 men. Shielded by the gun smoke hanging over the battlefield, they had been able to get close to the fort's walls at its northeastern bastion. Throwing up their ladders, they scaled the walls and took the American gunners by surprise. Most of the gunners turned and fled, while those who stayed to fight were quickly cut down by the British. When Patrick McDonogh, a wounded American artillery officer, tried to surrender, Colonel Drummond shot him through the chest, shouting, "Give the damned Yankees no quarter!" (quoted in Taylor, 397). No sooner had the words passed his lips than a bullet slammed into Drummond's own heart, killing him. Still, his men fought on, streaming over the walls and taking possession of the bastion. As the Americans fell back, it seemed as though the British might succeed after all.
Suddenly, the ground began to shake. As one American lieutenant would recall: "every sound was hushed by the sense of an unnatural tremor beneath our feet, like the first heave of an earthquake". Then "the centre of the bastion burst up with a terrific explosion; and a jet of flame, mingled with fragments of timber, stone, and bodies…[fell] in a shower of ruins" (quoted in Taylor, 397). Indeed, the ammunition magazine beneath the bastion had blown up; whether it had been purposefully detonated by an American defender, or had accidentally been ignited in the fighting remains unknown. The carnage, however, was undeniable; after the battle, American soldiers would find "legs, arms and heads lying in confusion, separated by the concussions from the trunks to which they had so long been attached". One British officer, thrown backward by the explosion, rested his hand on his captain's back to steady himself only to find his hand "in a mass of blood and brains" (quoted in Taylor, 399). And with the explosion, the British assault on Fort Erie was defeated. They had lost an astounding 905 casualties, 221 of whom were dead. The Americans suffered only 62 losses.
American Counterattacks
The assault had been a humiliation for the British. Two of the three British commanders – Hercules Scott and William Drummond – had been killed, along with hundreds of men whose body parts now filled the ditch around the fort. But despite this blunder, and the loss of his nephew, General Gordon Drummond was not quite ready to lift the siege. Instead of looking inward, he blamed the failure on the de Watteville regiment, referring to the "misconduct of this foreign corps" (quoted in Berton, 745). The British resumed their artillery bombardment that, though mostly fruitless, occasionally resulted in a lucky shot – one such shell wounded US General Gaines on 29 August, knocking him out of action. General Brown, who had recovered from his wounds, returned to take command of Fort Erie. As aggressive as ever, Brown was ready to take the fight to the British.
The first major American sortie took place on 4 September when US Brigadier General Peter B. Porter – in command of the militia volunteers from New York and Pennsylvania – sallied out of the fort to attack a British redoubt. Scattered fighting took place over the course of six hours amidst a heavy thunderstorm before the Americans were finally forced back into the fort. Among those killed in this sortie was Colonel Joseph Willcocks, an Irish-Canadian defector who had been fighting for the Americans. Reviled for burning and pillaging Canadian communities, Willcocks' death was celebrated by the Canadians and improved British morale.
By now, Drummond had brought in some 1,200 reinforcements, more than making up for the men he had lost in the ill-fated August attack. With all these additional hands, the British were able to build batteries closer to the fort, allowing for their cannons to fire at closer range. Brown, unwilling to sit still while the British artillery blew his fort to pieces, resolved to launch another sortie against the cannons. He proclaimed to his officers that the men would "prefer to die in the blaze of their own glory, then live dishonoured by captivity or defeat" (quoted in Taylor, 401). Ripley, of course, denounced any such sortie as suicidal, but Brown would not hear it. Porter would once again lead the attack, which was set for 17 September. On the appointed day, Porter led 1,600 men out of the fort, again amidst a heavy downpour. The Americans succeeded in storming the batteries, driving off the British troops, spiking the cannons, and blowing up the ammunition stores. A British counterattack forced the Americans back into the fort, but not before Porter's men had inflicted over 300 casualties and taken 316 prisoners.
End of Siege
The American sortie of 17 September greatly demoralized the British besiegers, who had already begun to run low on ammunition and other supplies. Drummond had actually decided to abandon the siege before the attack but was unable to depart until 21 September. As another thunderstorm rounded out that wet summer, Drummond's miserable British soldiers withdrew to Chippawa Creek where the bloody Niagara campaign had begun nearly three months earlier. The Americans had won the siege, but their control of Fort Erie would not last. In mid-October, the British launched the 102-gun ship of the line HMS St. Lawrence on Lake Ontario. This solidified their control of the lake and made it difficult for the Americans to transfer supplies over to Fort Erie. Faced with the prospect of running out of provisions just before the onset of a bitter Canadian winter, the Americans opted to abandon the fort and retreat to New York. On the day of their evacuation, 5 November, the Americans demolished Fort Erie with mines, thereby keeping it from falling back into British hands. But it would not matter – a little over a month later, the Treaty of Ghent ended the war and restored the prewar borders.
