Battle of Niagara Falls

Miller's gallant exploit secured a victory, not, however, until a terrible hand-to-hand fight had ensued. The British finally fell back. They attempted to retake the battery of some splendid brass cannon, but failed, even after being reinforced by fifteen hundred men sent forward by Drummond from Queenstown. Meanwhile General Scott had been fighting desperately, but sucessfully, and was severely wounded by a musket-ball in his shoulder. General Brown was also severely wounded, and the command devolved on General Ripley. The British were repulsed and the Americans fell back to Chippewa, with orders from General Brown to return after a brief rest, before the dawn, and occupy the battle-field. The always tardy and disobedient Ripley failed to obey the order, and the enemy returned and took possession of the field and also of their battery, excepting one piece of artillery. This conflict is known in history as the battle of Niagara Falls, for it was fought within the sound of the sullen roar of the great cataract. It has also been called the battle of Bridgewater and the battle of Lundy's Lane. It was fought by about four thousand five hundred British troops, and two thousand six hundred Americans. The Americans lost, in killed, wounded and missing, nearly one-third of their whole number; the British lost about eight hundred and seventy-eight, or twenty-six more than the Americans. Both parties claimed the victory.

General Ripley, whose tardiness deprived the Americans of the advantages of a glorious victory they had won, led the army to Fort Erie, where he was soon superseded in command by General Gaines. Drummond, who had been wounded, pushed forward as soon as he was able, and on the 4th of August, began a siege of Fort Erie with about five thousand men. From the 7th to the 14th of that month there was an almost incessant cannonade between the besiegers and the besieged. On the evening of the 14th, just at twilight, a shell from a British mortar came screaming into the American camp, lodged in a nearly empty powder magazine and blew it up. Drummond, supposing he had fired one of the principal magazines, and believing the camp and garrison to be in great confusion, determined to assail the fort in full force. Before the dawn of the 15th, fifteen hundred of the enemy furiously attacked the American lines, and after desperate fighting they gained a bastion of the fort. At all other points they were repulsed. To this stronghold the enemy held with tenacity, until the bastion was blown up with a terrific explosion. A jet of flame mingled with fragments of earth and timber, stones and the bodies of men, rose to the height of more than a hundred feet, and spread a shower of ruins to a great distance. Soon afterward the British broke and fled, and victory remained with the Americans.

For a month after this affair, both parties prepared to renew the struggle for the possession of Fort Erie. General Brown had recovered, and was in command of his army again. The fort was closely invested by the British; but Drummond's force, lying upon low ground, was greatly weakened by typhoid fever. Hearing of this, Brown determined to make a sortie from the fort. He did so on the 17th of September, and after a severe engage ment (in which General Porter was the chief actor, and James Miller, then promoted to brigadier-general, bore a conspicuous part), the British advance works were captured and destroyed. Fort Erie was saved, and the enemy were driven back to Chippewa with a loss of about nine hundred men in killed, wounded, and prisoners. "Thus," General Brown wrote to the Secretary of War, " one thousand regulars, and an equal proportion of militia, in one hour of close action, blasted the hopes of the enemy, destroyed the fruits of fifty days' labor, and diminished his effective force one thousand men at least." So sudden and precipitate was Drummond's flight, that he abandoned some of his stores in front of Fort Erie and destroyed others on the line of his retreat. This victory, following so closely on that at Chippewa and Niagara Falls, and occurring a few days after another won at Plattsburg on Lake Champlain by the Americans, and the expulsion of the British from Baltimore, diffused unusual joy throughout the country, and dispelled, in a measure, the gloom which had recently overspread the whole land because of the capture of the national capital by the enemy. General Brown was highly honored by Congress and the people. The former gave him thanks and a gold medal; and Scott, Ripley, Porter and Gaines received the same reward for their services during that campaign.

General George Izard, the successor of Wilkinson and Hampton in command of the army in Northern New York, who had led about five thousand troops first to Sackett's Harbor and then to the Niagara frontier, arrived at the latter in October, and, ranking Brown, took the chief command. The combined forces, regulars, militia and volunteers, numbered about eight thousand men. With these Izard was preparing to march against Drummond, when the latter prudently withdrew his troops to Fort George and Burlington Heights. Perceiving that further offensive operations on the Canadian peninsula would be imprudent, perhaps perilous, Izard blew up Fort Erie on the 5th of November, and it has lain in ruins ever since. He abandoned Canada, and the troops were wintered at several points in the State of New York.