History of the invasion and capture of Washington, and the events which preceded and followed

Front matter

I'll illl

1 I

APR iiiisia

Preface

The primary motive by which the author of this work was actuated in getting together the materials from which it has heen composed, was the hope of being able to do something to remove the obloquy which, in his opinion, has been undeservedly cast upon the American troops engaged in the battle of Bladensburg. It is true that this obloquy, being shared among so many, was never very severely felt by any individual among them. This, indeed, is the reason why it was so easily thrown upon them in the first instance, and why it has been suffered so long to continue. It was not the business of any one of the crowd, more than of another, to expose the injustice of the imputation cast upon them ; and as " what is every body's busisess is nobody's business," the duty has never yet been discharged. If the troops, as a body, could have called for a court of inquiry into their conduct, and had counsel of ordinary ability to defend them, or if they could have had a voice in the selection of the committee appointed by Congress to investigate the causes of the capture of the City of Washington, there would probably have been no necessity for undertaking a work like the present, or, rather, the necessity would have been transfeiTed to those high dignitaries of the nation whose complacency was not at all

VI PEEFACE.

disturbed, nor intended to be disturbed, by the noncommittal report made by the committee actually appointed.

It may be asked. Why, after the lapse of more than forty years, seek to disturb an arrangement which is admitted to be the most co-mfortalle that could have been made — that is, the one which inflicted the least pain upon individuals ? The troops generally were little inconvenienced by the obloquy, and went about their business as unconcernedly as if nothing had happened ; whereas, if public censure had been concentrated upon a few powerful party leaders, theh wrath and that of their partisans might have thrown the country into an uproar.

It might seem Pharisaical to profess an abstract love of truth, and not imperatively necessary to contend for it as an essential ingredient in history. If works of fiction or parables are written for the purpose of moral instruction, and are found to answer that purpose, why should truth be considered an essential ingredient in history ? or why should any more of such a precious ingredient be used than is necessary to give a flavor of probability ?

But moral instruction is not the sole object of history, which famishes, or ought to furnish, valuable lessons in the art of government and art of war, and these lessons can not be so well learned from imaginary events as from a faithful statement of real occurrences. National disasters, too, are often more pregnant with instruction than national successes, and more may sometimes be learned from a defeat well studied than from half a dozen victories ; and in this

PREFACE. Vll

respect a correct narrative of the battle of Bladensburg, and of the events preceding and attending it, might be considered as highly important and desirable. It fortunately happens that the means of compiling a correct narrative of this battle are unusually abundant — perhaps more so, owing to fortuitous circumstances, than with respect to any similar event in history. The event took place among a reading and inquiring people. It was not only sufficiently extraordinary in itself to arouse the strongest curiosity as to its causes and details, but it was deeply wounding to the pride of the nation. A prompt investigation by Congress was a matter of course, and this inquiry had, at least, the effect of calling forth a mass of evidence, in the shape of statements and official reports from individuals prominently connected with the event, which may be considered as having all the solemnity and credibility of testimony before a judicial tribunal, and which, however conflicting on some points, yet furnish the means, upon patient study and comparison, of arriving at a correct knowledge of the material facts. This fund of information has since been increased by various publications, including narratives of British writers. Probably, at this date, little of importance relatino- to the subject remains to be revealed to the pubHc, except what may be contained in the manuscript papers of Mr. Madison, now in possession of Colonel Peter Force, of the City of Washington. Having been informed that these papers contained some very interesting matter in relation to the capture of the seat of government, we applied to Colonel Force for permission to consult them, stating to him the deep interest

VIU PREFACE.

which we took in the subject. With his usual courtesy he complied with our request, granting us access to the papers as often as we pleased, for the purpose of perusal and study, but declining to allow any portion of them to be transcribed. We gladly availed ourselves of the privilege, and the information thus obtained will appear in its proper place in the following pages.

To the sources of information above-mentioned, and to the author's own personal knowledge of events which he witnessed, he has been enabled to add recent statements from some of those whose position at the time of the capture of the seat of government, and whose high standing in the community at present, give a deep interest to the written communications with which they have favored him. Among these are letters from the Hon. Richard Eush, a member of Mr. Madison's cabinet, and the venerable Major George Peter, of Montgomery County, Maryland, commander of the District Light Corps, which will be found in the Appendix. Other communications of a similar character, which have been useful to us in preparing the work, are omitted, in order that the bulk of the volume might not be unnecessarily increased.

We win here take occasion to remark, in justice both to the living and the dead, that in any reflections which we have been tempted to indulge in on the conduct of Mr. Madison's administration, we have had no intention, and certainly not the slightest inclination, to include Mr. Rush, who was Attorney-general at the time, nor Mr. Campbell, then Secretary of the Treasury. We are well satisfied that neither of them, either

PEEFACE. ix

from his position in the administration or from his pereonal character, was likely to be connected with any plans or movements which had not for their sole and exclusive object the welfare and honor of their country.

It has been our purpose, in compiling a history of the campaign of Washing-ton, to resort as often as practicable to the language of the principal witnesses, and make such use of their testimony that, if the reader is not satisfied with the views which we have taken of the subject, he may substitute other views of his own for them, based upon the facts which we have presented, with an assurance that we have neither designedly omitted, nor presented in a deceptive manner, any information necessary for the formation of a correct judgment. This will account for the multitude of extracts and quotations in the work.

Different persons will draw a different moral from the same story. The moral which we are disposed to draw from the history of the battle of Bladensburg is, not that Americans were too "pusillanimous" to defend their seat of government, and that, therefore, it would be safer to hire an army of foreign mercenaries to defend it for us ; nor that militia troops are not to be depended upon, and therefore a large standing army of regular troops is necessary ; but that politicians of the fairest fame require watching, and will not hesitate to sacrifice or jeopard the interests and honor of their country in order to advance themselves or ruin a rival. We present in this book the grounds which we think justify us in deducing this moral ; and, as we believe them sufficient, we have not hesitated to express our A2

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opinion in plain terms, without respect to the rank or reputation of the eminent individuals implicated. We do not understand — though the Congressional Committee of Investigation did — why truths which may benefit the public, and which the public have a right to know, should be suppressed, or cautiously and fearfully hinted at, rather than boldly spoken, in order to spare any individual reputation or fame, if it were as " sacrosanct" as that of General Washington himself. Nor do we think that men who did not hesitate to calumniate others in order to screen themselves have any claim, however exalted their position in history, to be treated with reverence or profound respect by any of those upon whom their unfounded imputations were cast.

The reader will observe that we have made a distinction between the author and the editor or compiler of this volume. The person who originated the idea or plan of the work, and who sought out and furnished the materials from which it has been compiled, may properly be termed the author of it. At his request, the literary execution of it was undertaken by a friend, now no more, whose progress in the work was much impeded by other more imperative calls upon his time, and who had not advanced farther than the seventh chapter of the present volume, when his death occasioned a suspension of the work. One of his sons, however, undertook the completion of the undertaking. This will account for the difference between the style of the first seven chapters of the work and that of the subsequent portion. Some change, also, which took place in the plan of the work, and the fact th^t the

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first portion of it had not been revised by the writer, rendered it necessary to make alterations, which, it is feared, have rendered the whole production inferior, as a literary composition, to what it would have been had the able pen which commenced it been permitted to continue it to the end.

Washington, August, 1856.

Chapter I

Shadows of forthcoming Events. — Apparent Indifference of Congress and the Administration to the Signs of the Times Page 15

CHAPTER n.

The same subject continued 26

CHAPTER m.

The Administration begins to awake. — Cabinet Meeting of the 1st of July. — Projects of Defence. — Creation of a new Military District 45

CHAPTER IV.

Want of Harmony in the Cabinet. — Selection of a Commanding General 66

CHAPTER V.

Difiiculties in the way of the Commanding General 81

CHAPTER VI.

General Armstrong's Letter to the Editors of the Baltimore Patriot. — Comments upon its extraordinary Disclosures 96

CHAPTER Vn.

Mr. Madison's private Opinion of the Conduct of the Secretary of War 112

CHAPTER VHI.

Landing of the British Troops at Benedict. — Uncertainty as to their Destination. — Nature and Amount of the American Force.— Plan of Operations dictated to the Commanding General 1 24

XIV CONTENTS.

CHAPTER IX.

Eesults of the Reconnoitring Expedition under Mr. Monroe. — ^Advance of the Enemy from Benedict. — General Winder marches to meet him, and retreats to the City Page 157

CHAPTER X.

Cabinet Council at General Winder's Head-quarters at the Eastern

Branch Bridge. — The Secretary of War has no Advice or Plan to

offer. — The Secretary of State undertakes to arrange the Order of

Battle 184:

CHAPTER XI.

The Order of Battle 205

CHAPTER Xn.

The Battle 221

CHAPTER Xni.

Remarks on the Battle and Retreat 239

CHAPTER XIV.

Proceedings of the Enemy in the City 254

CHAPTER XV.

The Capitulation of Alexandria 282

Appendix

No. I. Narrative of General Winder, addressed to the Chairman of the Committee of Investigation 301

No. n. Report of General Stansbnry 331

No. ni. Statement of General Walter Smith 343

No. rV. Colonel George Minor's Statement 355

No. V. From Major George Peter to Colonel J. S. Williams.... 357 No. VI. A Volunteer Corps from Virginia 367

INVASION AND CAPTURE

OF

WASHINGTON.

CHAPTER I.

Shadows of forthcoming Events. — Apparent Indifference of Congress and the Administration to the Signs of the Times.

More than fifteen months before the actual invasion of the District of Columbia, the enemy had plainly indicated -their design to maintain a sufficient force in the Chesapeake Bay to control its commerce. They had repeatedly landed marauding parties on both its shores ; the town of Havre de Grace on the western, and Frenchtown, Georgetown, and Eredericktown on the eastern shore of Maiyland, and Hampton and other places in Virginia, had all been attacked, pillaged, and burned ; many of their inhabitants had been killed, and many had been carried off to their ships of war as prisoners. Maryland and Virginia, it is well known, both border on the District of Columbia, and the towns which have been named as the scenes of the enemy's destructive operations may be said to be in the immediate neighborhood of the seat of government.

These were indications deemed by almost every intelligent and prudent citizen, except those directly connected with the government, sufficiently strong to excite apprehensions that the enemy contemplated an attack also upon the City of Washington. On the 15th of July, 1813, a few days before the adjournment of Congress, and while the House of Representatives were sitting with closed doors upon a message from the President of the United States, which had heen suggested by the presence of the enemy in the Bay, Qeneral Philip Stuart, a member from Maryland, a veteran soldier, who bore the scars of numerous honorable wounds received in our Revolutionary battles, a fearless, cahn, dispassionate observer of passing events, and one, therefore, not likely to sound the alarm when no cause for it existed, introduced a preamble and resolution in the following words :

" Whereas the seat of government, from the unprepared and defenseless state of the District of Columbia, is in imminent danger, if an attack should be made thereon ; and whereas the fleet of the enemy is understood to be within a few hours' sail of the capital; and whereas the immense value of public property exposed to destruction, the great value of the public records, and other deeply interesting considerations, render it peculiarly important that any invasion of the metropolis should be met with vigor and successfully repelled, whereupon

'■'■Resolved, That, in the opinion of this House, a distribution of such arms as are in the possession of the government within the District of Columbia should be immediately made, to be placed in the hands of aU able-bodied men within the district willing to be embodied to perform military duty, and also in the hands

ACTION IN THE HOUSE. 17

of such members of this House as may be willing to receive them, to act against the enemy in any manner not incompatible with their public duties."*

The words of this resolution show that its mover, at least, expected an early invasion, and the preamble discloses the ground of that expectation — " the fleet of the enemy is understood to be within a few hours' sail of the capital." But it had been so from the previous month of April. Other places in the vicinity of the capital had been invaded, and Washington had been undisturbed. This was the delusive ground of argTiment : the enemy did not follow up their successful uu'oads upon Havre de Grace and the other towns by an immediate attempt against the Federal City, and therefore it formed no part of their design to invade it at any time. It was admirable logic, it must be confessed.

The first question raised upon the introduction of this preamble and resolution was whether the discussion of the subject required secrecy; and this "passed in the affirmative." The next vote taken was to lay the matter " on the table," and this " was determined in the negative — yeas 64, nays 74." A motion to strike out the preamble was then made and carried, and the naked resolution was committed to the " Committee on Military Atfairs." On the following day, before it was possible, in the nature of things, that any personal examination on the part of the committee of the preparations for defence, even within the city itself, could have been accomplished, and much less the wh(5le district and the numerous approaches to it, the

* Annals of Congress, 13th Congress, in die.

chairman of that committee made the following report:

" The Committee on Military Affairs, to whom was referred a resolution of yesterday having relation to the present movement of the enemy, report,

" That they have examined into the state of preparation, naval and military, made to receive the enemy, and are satisfied that the preparations are, in every respect, adequate to the emergence, and that no measures are necessary on the part of this House to make it more complete."

That this committee, within the time that intervened hetween the close of one day's session and the opening of the next, could have made a personal inspection of the naval and military strength of the city, is altogether beyond credibility. The report was, therefore, little less than an insult to the common sense of the House. The chairman, it may be, "examined" the secretaries of the two departments of War and the Navy, and received assurances from those oificers respectively that every preparation for defence had been made ; but ought this, under the circumstances, to have " satisfied" the committee ?

The reader will observe that there are here two opinions expressed, diametrically opposite in their nature, and both advanced with equal confidence and boldness in the face of the world by persons whose means and opportunities of obtaining correct information were alike ample and authoritative. The one asserts that the seat of government, "from the unprepared and defenceless state of the District of Columbia, is in imminent danger, if an attack should be

INSUFFICIENT PEEPAEATION. 19

made thereon ;" the other, that the state of preparation for defence " is, in every respect, adequate to the emergence."

It is impossible that any two persons of ordinarycapacity should have differed so widely as to the actual state of preparations in the district to defend the seat of government ; these discordant opinions, therefore, must have been formed from the diiferent light in which their respective entertainers viewed the probability of "aw attack.'" On the supposition that the enemy did not contemplate an invasion of the District of Columbia, it was very natural to believe that no measures were necessary on the part of the House to render the preparations for defence "more complete." But the question for history is, were the means of defence, naval and military, such as to give a reasonable assurance that they would prove sufficient to repel the enemy "if an attack should be made?" And history itself answers this question in the negative ; for, even after the lapse of more than a year from this time, during which some additions had been made to what were regarded as preparations for defense, the enemy did make an attack, which, unhappily, was not repelled.

On the 20th of the same month in which the proceedings just mentioned took place, in the secret session of the House of Representatives, the President of the United States transmitted to Congress a message which, as it is short, and contains, as we think, a clew to the very extraordinary report of the Military Committee, is here presented to the reader without abridgment.

" Confidential. — To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States : There being sufficient ground to infer that it is the purpose of the enemy to combine with the Uockade of our ports special license to neutral vessels, or to British vessels in neutral disguise, whereby they may draw from our country the precise kinds and quantity of exports essential to their wants, whilst its general commerce remains obstructed ; keeping in view also the invidious discrimination between different ports of the United States ;/ and as such a system, if not counteracted, will have the eifect of diminishing very materially the pressure of the war on the enemy, and encouraging a perseverance in it, at the same time that it will leave the general commerce of the United States under all the pressure the enemy can impose, thus subjecting the whole to British regulation, in subserviency to British monopoly ; I recommend to the consideration of Congress the expediency of an immediate and effectual prohibition of expoiis, limited to a convenient day in their next session, and removable in the mean time in the event of a cessation of the blockade of our ports.

"James Madison.

A comparison of the tenor of this message with the report of the Committee on Military Affairs, immediately preceding it, would seem to render it manifest that both were the offspring of the same delusion. Both seem to have been dictated by the conviction that the enemy, though at that moment within a few hours' sail of the seat of government, had no intention what-

DELUSION OF THE PRESIDENT. 21

ever, either then or at any later period, of attempting an expedition against it. In both cases, indeed, the delusive and unstatesmanlike opinion seemed to have prevailed, that a hostile invasion of the District of Columbia, through the instrumentality of the British squadron in Chesapeake Bay, was not within the range of possibility. Otherwise, it is inconceivable on what grounds it could have been asserted, on the one hand, that the defences of the District wanted nothing. to their completeness, or why, on the other hand, the attention of Congress should be called only to the commercial evils which would be likely to result from the continued blockade of our ports.

If it had been an ascertained, indisputable fact, about which there could be no difference of opinion, that the enemy meant to limit their operations in the Chesapeake to the regulation and control of the commerce of which it was the channel, then, indeed, the measure recommended by the President might have been regarded as the most appropriate and suitable one to counteract the design ; but, to say the least, it may be doubted whether the mere assumption of such a fact, and that, too, against strongly-expressed views of a different character, could justify him in his silence as to other than commercial interests in equal want of protection, and which would be in equal jeopardy if assailed. It would certainly have been safer and wiser, and more consonant with a due regard to the general welfare, to have taken into account the possibility, at least, that the enemy might have more extensive designs than those which were apparent to every body.

It can not be considered extraordinary that individuals should differ in opinion as to the prohahility or improbabiHty of any occurrence yet in the womb of time, but it is passing strange that men of equal discernment, haying equal capacity to examine and inquire, and equal authority to draw information from the same sources, should come to opposite conclusions as to a simple question of fact-/-that is, whether there existed or did not exist in the Distiict of Columbia any evidence of preparation to resist an invading enemyA If the Military Committee of the House of Eepresentatives had said, in so many words. We have reason to believe that the enemy now in the Chesapeake Bay have not the remotest idea or intention of invading the District, and therefore we can not conceive that there exists any necessity for providing means of defence, their report might have been regarded as kindly designed to relieve the House from all apprehension as to their own safety ; but when, in speaking of "the state of preparation, naval and military," they make the unqualified assertion "that no measures are necessary on the part of the House to make it more complete," they can be understood in no other way than as meaning to say that they had found it, upon examination, to be^git ready c on^jLeU^— This understanding of it imposes upon us the necessity of inquiring into the correctness or incorrectness of this implied affirmation.

At the moment that this report was made, it was a fact notorious to every inhabitant of the District of Columbia, and which ought to have been equally so to Congress, that [the only fortification, so called, on the Potomac Eivei'rfrom its embouchure into the Chesapeake Bay up to the seat of government on its banks.

ASTONISHING REMISSNESS. 23

had not more than a trace of guns mounted, nor men enough to serve more if they had been mounted.''^ It was a fortification in name only, not prepared to have repulsed even the smallest of the enemy's vessels, had an attempt been' made to pass itTj At the mouth of the Anacostia, or eastern branch of the Potomac, vrhere there now stands an arsenal, surrounded by a neat embattled wall, there was then nothing but an unprotected magazine. From that point to the Navy Yard there was not~ a gun of any description to present even a show of defence, while at the yard itself a few artificers and laborers, and still fewer marines, constituted the sole means of protection.

Such was "the state of preparation" on the approaches to the seat of government by water. The defences on the land routes were in no respect " more complete." Throughout the whole boundary-line of the District of Columbia there was not a single point fortified ; not a redoubt, dike, or ditch ; not a solitary piece of artillery ; not a single battalion of regular soldiers ; not one company of militia or volunteers properly armed, equipped, and disciplined.

The neglect to take advantage of the full opportunity allowed by the enemy, and, it may be added, of the long warning given by them, to place the seat of government in a condition to have defied the utmost force and skill of attack, is utterly incomprehensible to plain common sense. There was not an inhabitant of the District, whether farmer, merchant, mechanic, or laborer, who did not know that the city was totally destitute of defences, and who did not believe in the probability of an invasion. The President and his ministers.

and their friends in Congress, alone entertained a different opinion, and, unfortunatelj, these were the authorities in whom was vested, by the law and Constitution, the sole power of making the necessary preparations.

We dwell upon the treatment which General Stuart's resolutions received longer than it may be thought to deserve, but we do so because we believe that to that treatment may be traced all the misfortunes of the 24th of August, 1814. The necessity of resorting to any measures of preparation was not admitted by Congress or the administration, because, as already intimated, they did not believe that the enemy entertained the remotest design of attempting an invasion of the District of Columbia. By what process of reasoning, or by what unknown facts their minds were brought to this conviction, we do not pretend to know, and will not venture to guess. Whether the Congress imbibed their belief from the President, or whether the latter trusted so implicitly to the prudence and judgment of the former as to deem it unnecessary to bring to their notice what he took it for granted would not escape their foresight, is a question the discussion of which perhaps would be more curious than useful. It is enough to know that both the one and the other labored under a most unhappy delusion, or were guilty of gross negligence and inditference.

The House of Representatives promptly acted upon the message of the President, and complied with his recommendations by passing a bill laying an embargo upon all ships and vessels in the ports and harbors of the United States : a measure which, if his limited view of the enemy's intentions had been correct, would

THE EMBARGO. 25

probably have been the most judicious that could have been devised to counteract them. The Senate, however, entertained a different idea, and did not concur in the proposed embargo. So far, then, as the protection or defence of the District of Columbia was concerned, nothing was done during that session of Congress, which terminated on the 2d of August, 1813, three days after the Senate had announced their nonconcurrence in the bOl of the House of Representatives.

The fact that within a few days after the next meeting of Congress, which took place on the 6th of December, 1813, the President renewed with better success his recommendation of embargo, and again omitted aU allusion to any other measure as being called for by the existing state of things, clearly shows that nothing had occurred during the four months of recess to change his view as to the exclusive purpose of the enemy in holding possession of Chesapeake Bay. Though parties of the troops from their ships of war had been daily committing depredations upon the neighboring shores of Maryland and Virginia, the apprehension that their inroads might, sooner or later, extend to the District of Columbia does not seem yet to have entered into his miad.

B

CHAPTEE IL

The same subject continued.

Scarcely had there been time allowed for the embargo act of the 17th of December, 1813, to reach the more remote ports and harbors of the United States, before the chairman of the Committee of Foreign Relations introduced a bill to repeal it. On the 3d of April, Mr. Calhoun presented a bill to that effect, taking that occasion to address the House in one of his happiest strains of eloquence and argument. The principal ground for the measure now proposed was, that the embargo and non-importation acts were utterly incompatible with the avowed objects of the war, which had been declared for the purpose of defending and maintaining the principles of "free trade and sailors' rights." The wrongs and outrages committed by the enemy were scarcely more abhorrent or destructive of this principle than was the operation of a system which compelled our ships and vessels to lie and rot in port, while it deprived our seamen of their only means of subsistence.