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The Governor General, Prevost, reported to the home government in July and August, 1812, that the British still had the naval superiority on Erie and Ontario; but this condition was reversed by the energy and capacity of the American commanders, Chauncey, Perry, and Macdonough, utilizing the undeniable superiority in available resources mechanics and transportation which their territory had over the Canadian, not for naval warfare only, but for land as well.
The British now attempted to invade the United States; the Maine coast was occupied, almost without resistance, as far south as the Penobscot; the Americans were attacked at Fort Erie, on the west side of the Niagara; and a force of eighteen thousand men moved up Lake Champlain to Plattsburg. On September 11 its advance was checked by a field-work and an American fleet under Macdonough.
Before describing it, however, let us speak briefly of four other valiant men, whose deeds redounded to the honor of their country Edward Preble, Charles Stewart, Johnston Blakeley, and Thomas Macdonough. It was said of Preble that he had the worst temper and the best heart in the world.
Always too intent on building more ships instead of fighting with those he had, he is therefore not remembered in the glorious companionship of Perry and Macdonough. This failure to act at the moment when Jacob Brown was so valiantly endeavoring to wrest from the British the precious Niagara peninsula was responsible for the desperate and inconclusive battle of Lundy's Lane.
The raking fire from the "Linnet" had dismounted carronades and long guns one by one, until but a single serviceable gun was left in the starboard battery. A too heavy charge dismounted this piece, and threw it down the hatchway, leaving the frigate without a single gun bearing upon the enemy. In such a plight the hearts of the crew might well fail them. But Macdonough was ready for the emergency.
That September day of 1814, when Macdonough won his niche in the naval hall of fame, was also the climax and the conclusion of the long struggle of the American armies on the northern frontier, a confused record of defeat, vacillation, and crumbling forces, which was redeemed towards the end by troops who had learned how to fight and by new leaders who restored the honor of the flag at Chippawa and Lundy's Lane.
Akin to such a briny book as this but more restricted in scope is The Frigate Constitution by Ira N. Hollis, or Rodney Macdonough's Life of Commodore Thomas Macdonough . Edgar Stanton Maclay in The History of the Navy, 3 vols. , has written a most satisfactory account, which contains some capital chapters describing the immortal actions of the Yankee frigates.
Considering the great naval names of the past, Preble, Hull, Decatur, Bainbridge, Stewart, Porter, Perry, and Macdonough, the two most Southern of whom came from Delaware and Maryland, this ante-bellum assurance was, to say the least, self-confident; but Farragut was a Southerner.
Who stands godfather to his request?" "Marry, with Your Grace's good permission, that do I," said the Earl of Sussex. "Orson Pinnit was a stout soldier before he was so mangled by the skenes of the Irish clan MacDonough; and I trust your Grace will be, as you always have been, good mistress to your good and trusty servants."
By sundown the surrender was complete, and Macdonough sent off to the Secretary of the Navy a despatch, saying, "Sir, The Almighty has been pleased to grant us a signal victory on Lake Champlain, in the capture of one frigate, one brig, and two sloops-of-war of the enemy." Some days later, the captured ships, being beyond repair, were taken to the head of the lake, and scuttled.
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