The War of 1812 in the Champlain Valley

4. War Comes

4 WAR COMES AIthough Congress declared war on .l"l.June 18, it was the 23rd before Governor Tompkins knew it and the 27th before General Mooers in Plattsburgh received word. With his immediate issuance ofdivision orders, the wheels of mobilization started to turn. He continued to receive directions from the governor concerning the militia, but technically, as the governor explained, Mooers was under General Dearborn. This was a sensible recognition offacts by the governor because for the entire first summer of the war Mooers commanded the northern front, which was defended almost entirely by militia. Early in July, for example, the regular army strength in Plattsburgh numbered five men, the highest rank being a lieutenant. "Happy however for us," grumbled a Plattsburgh businessman, "the pacific disposition ofour enemy affords us a better security than the troops stationed among us."I Early in 1812, Henry Dearborn, a colonel in the Revolution, had been called to Washington from the customs house in Boston. He had served as secretary of war in both Jefferson administrations, and his experience prompted President Madison to make him one of two major generals, although he had passed his sixty-first birthday. Augustus Foster, the British minister in Washington, described him as "a heavy unwieldly looking man" of no great military reputation who had accepted his appointment with great reluctance.2 During his two months in Washington, he performed the functions of a chief ofstaff, and by April had developed the outline ofa plan for the conquest of Canada. Its main thrust was to the north along Lake Champlain to Montreal although supporting campaigns were to be launched from Sackets Harbor, Niagara, and Detroit. It was a good plan, and its prompt and vigorous execution might have knocked Canada out of the war in the first season. This is what the British 47 48 THE WAR OF \8\2 IN THE CH.\MPLAIN VAU.EY feared. There was, however, a vast difference between secret plans drawn up in peacetime, and their translation into an army trained and equipped to carry them out in wartime. Assigned the command of a northeastern army not yet in existence, he went first, in May, to supervise the defense of New York City preparatory to turning it over to Brigadier General]oseph Bloomfield . Then he chose Greenbush, across the river from Albany, as his headquarters . The task confronting him was impossible for one man to execute. He was expected to raise troops in New England and New York, then train and equip them for the invasions of Canada. For the sake of the war effort and his own reputation, it is unfortunate that he was not kept in Washington as a coordinator, a job he probably would have done well, but he left the capital without his duties having been made dear. He did not know until August that he was expected to aid General Hull at Detroit, and he did not understand that his direct responsibility included the western borders ofNew York state. Many of Dearborn's troubles were not of his own making. Fumbling in Washington threw many plans out of joint. President Madison's wartime administration came under constant attack from his enemies, whose bitterness increased after each new military failure. An occasional victory might have taken the sting out ofthe attacks and perhaps even have made Madison a notable war president, but there were to be no victories in 1812 and few thereafter. Furthermore, Madison's poor judgment of men and the desperate lack of qualified personnel led him to make weak appointments in the War and Navy departments and the military commands. He involved himself, moreover, in military tactics and strategy more than his background warranted . On the other hand, his modesty, steadiness of purpose, and selfcontrol made him the only symbol of unity that a divided nation possessed. As an agent of a peace-loving president with no military experience, the head of the War Department took on added significance, and Madison was unfortunate in his choices. At the start of the war the secretary was Dr. William Eustis of Massachusetts. Born in 1753, Eustis had served as a surgeon in the Revolution, after which he practiced medicine in Boston. He had been a member of Congress prior to his appointment to the War Department in 1809. If the army had remained small and the country at peace, Eustis would probably have filled the position adequately, but the mere approach of war was too much for...