Ever Hear of It - Battle of Clayton?: Schooner Days DCCCLVIII (858)

by C. H. J. Snider

BATTLE BULLETIN

"His Majesty's Sloop MELVILLE,

East end of Long Island,

2nd November, 1813.

"Sir,

"I have the honor to acquaint you that His Majesty's sloops Melville and Moira, accompanied by four gunboats, formed a junction with the Sir Sidney Smith and Beresford schooners yesterday morning, and I instantly made arrangements with the commanders of those vessels for an immediate attack on the enemy's position at French Creek as soon as we could see through the snow. The squadron weighed anchor and made sail. The enemy had posted a strong detachment of infantry on the bluff at the entrance of the creek to pour musketry on the vessel's decks. The bluff was passed by His Majesty's squadron within hail, receiving the fire of the enemy and returning discharges of grape and canister. They were compelled to abandon their post with precipitation, nor was it again occupied during our stay.

"On rounding the bluff the enemy appeared in great force drawn up in three columns with a battery of two brass 18-pounders in front and a numerous train of artillery on her flanks. I anchored the Melville, Moira, and Sir Sidney Smith in order of battle (there not being room for the Beresford owing to the narrow entrance of the creek). A sharp cannonading now commenced from the ships, which was well returned from the shore for near an hour.

"On a preconcerted signal being made the gunboats under Captain Spilsbury put off and pulling along the eastern bank kept up an animated fire. As the day was closing fast enemy's troops could no longer be descried descried from the thickness of the trees so as to fire at them with precision, and the squadron having received several shot in their hulls and and few between wind and water, I thought it right to haul off for the night.

The wind was too strong for the gunboats to pull in to annoy the enemy in the middle of the night, as had been intended; however, at daylight the wind abated and the squadron again passed in and exchanged fire with the batteries. The enemy had mounted several guns in the night and some hot shot came on board the squadron.

"The scows and batteaux of the enemy were hauled up on the shore. To have brought of or destroyed them would have cost an immense number of mer (considering the fine position o the enemy) which I could not afford, having to guard against the enemy's squadron in the morning.

"One merchant schooner without a soul on board was afloat but a boat came out and cut her cables as we rounded the bluff and she drifted on the rocks. I am happy to say our loss ha been trifling; one seaman killed, Mr. Walter Leslie, master's mate, and four seamen wounded.

"From the manner in which the enemy's troops were exposed I am warranted in saying they must have lost men.

"I have much satisfaction in reporting to you the great exertions of Captains Spilsbury and Dobbs, of Lieutenants Radcliffe of the Beresford and Owen of the Sir Sidney Smith, and all the officers and men, both of the squadron and the gunboats, whom you did me the honor to place under my command."

(Signed by)

Wm. H. MULCASTER, Captain.

OF the four or five hundred yachtsmen flashing about in their eighty white, green, blue, black, grey, yellow and mahogany colored yachts in friendly international rivalry at Clayton, N.Y., last week, in the LYRA regatta, how many guessed that their keels were cleaving the water above cannonballs?

Or that from friendly Bartlett Point, with its green light, and its headland in Prospect park sheltering hosts and guests alike at the genial Clayton Yacht Club moorings, had spat death through snow swirls at an attacking British fleet which dyed its drifts with blood?

The Battle of Clayton in the War of 1812 is unsung history, partly because Clayton wasn't there at the time. The spot was then known as French Creek, period. French Creek is there still, seeking the St. Lawrence through rush bordered loops, entering the bay of Clayton harbour, which lies between Bartlett Point and Clayton town. An inscription plate on the bridge says:

"PENET SQUARE, NORTHWEST CORNER OF A TRACT OF LAND 10 MILES SQUARE CEDED TO PETER PENET BY THE ONEIDA INDIANS, SEPTEMBER 22nd. 1788."

AS ROYAL NAVY FOUND IT

Penet's name may account for the name of the Creek. Clayton was the name given later to the settlement. Sir William Howe Mulcaster, gallant figure in the War of 1812, accounted as quoted for his day before activities there on the first of November, 1813. He was then a captain in the Royal Navy, a junior to Commodore Sir James Lucas Yeo, KCB, Commander-in-Chief on the Great Lakes. The Commodore put out from Kingston in his commodore's barge to learn of the engagement. His men had to row fifteen miles in the November snowstorms, down to Quebec Head and across to Calumet Island or Blanket Shoal or wherever he met his lieutenant.

Mulcaster was in charge of the light vessels of the British fleet, four of that famous Slippery Six which played tag with the superior American fleet all through 1813.

"East end of Long Island" may have been Quebec Head at the turn of the narrow Canadian Channel from Kingston. Long Island is just another name for Wolfe Island, opposite the limestone city. "His Majesty's Sloop" from which Mulcaster reported was not a one-masted jib-and-mainsail craft like the "Rs," "6s" and "8s" in the LYRA fleet of 1948, but a new brig-of-war, two-masted with square sails, and mounting seven guns to a side, launched three months before at Kingston and called the Lord Melville after Robert Viscount Melville, then First Lord of the Admiralty. She was the largest vessel in Mulcaster's squadron, and was under 100 feet in length. But she was called a sloop-of-war because she was commanded by a Captain. A sloop-of-war could be a ship, brig, schooner, cutter, hoy or catboat. The rig had nothing to do with it. The commander's rank everything.

The other brig and two schooners ranged down to 79 feet in length (the Toronto-built Beresford's) or 4 ft longer than Commodore Jas E. Hahn's Nonchalant, shown storming along in the picture under the same 'bluff' a hundred and thirty-five years later. Capt. Spilsbury's four "gun-boats" accompanying the brigs and schooners were just what their name says, rowboats carrying a small cannon apiece; they were no larger than the yachts that played about in last week's regatta.

MONTREAL WAS SAVED

Protected by, their powerful navy and aided by boat brigades, the American army had commenced a painful pre-winter progress by land and water down the St. Lawrence, to capture Montreal. Sir George Prevost reported officially that they had 10,000 men. Montreal was held by 400 British marines and 200 British bluejackets. Prevost's estimate of the enemy forces may have been exaggerated, but 4,000 men were concentrated at French Creek, and at this time the British had only 1,500 effectives in Upper Canada. So with fewer men and fewer ships we fought a delaying action all the way down the St. Lawrence.

The forgotten battle of French Creek was only one item in that valiant and unspectacular defensive measure. The immediate effect of this fight amid the mow squalls was negligible. Maj.Gen. Brown reported ten reluctant Americans—for their hearts were not hardened against us—killed and wounded by our grapeshot, canister and cannonballs in this attack on their encampment. The one little river schooner run on the rocks could not make much transport difference among the hundreds of boats in which they were trying to descend the St. Lawrence. The result of the "engagement"—for so it is enrolled in the records of the Royal Navy—was to bring down Commodore Chauncey's big boys — his ship-frigates, the Pike and the Madison and hi large brigs — out of the deep water of Lake Ontario, and tie them up in the islands and currents of the St. Lawrence, where they were too big to fight or to convoy or convey the troops. Yeo had his two largest ship-rigged vessels, the Royal George and the Wolfe, which he kept at Kingston, now free to menace Sacket's Harbor or keep the invaders away from his base in Navy Bay where he was beginning the super-dreadnought of all time on the Lakes, the three-decker St. Lawrence of 112 guns. When he got her afloat she ended the war on Lake Ontario without firing a shot.

These defensive tactics plus Canadian patriotism crested and shattered the ill-planned, ill-starred invasion, at Chrysler's Farm and Chateauguay. So Canada stayed free to defend freedom against tyranny, shoulder to shoulder with those other sons of freedom who have proved such good neighbors for 135 years after our forgiven and forgotten first meeting where Clayton, N.Y., was to be.

BRITISH WARSHIPS THERE NOV. 1, 1813

Smaller of the war schooners at French Creek was the GEN. BERESFORD, built in Toronto, and first christened PRINCE REGENT, later NETLEY and VINCENT. Picture in John Ross Robertson collection, Toronto Public Library.

The brig MELVILLE, like the MOIRA in the above picture in the John Ross Robertson collection, Toronto Public Library, was built at Kingston also later bore the name STAR in the War of 1812.

AND ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-FIVE YEARS LATER

UNDER BARTLETT'S POINT, Major Hahn's ketch Nonchalant (sailed by his sons) and eighty other yachts, Canadian and American, battled amicably for international honors last week. Two British brigs, two schooners and four rowboats fought four thousand intended invaders there in November snowsqualls 135 years ago, and helped make possible today's wholesome rivalry in sport and service. — Photo by G. H. Lofts, Toronto.

FRENCH CREEK NOW - AT AND UNDER THE BRIDGE

It is difficult to believe that "the bluff" rounded by the gallant Mulcaster was the little steep which now lodges he west end of the highway bridge at French Creek, although his statement that there was not enough in the river mouth for more than three of his vessels at once makes it equally hard to believe that battle was fought under the high bluff of Bartlett's Point, to the west of the present harbour of Clayton, which is a mile vide. Possibly both bluffs were fortified and both were attacked. French Creek has evidently filled in since the construction of the causeway from Clayton leading to the bridge; its mouth may have been much wider in 1813, before it was bridged. — Telegram photos.