. On the afternoon of the 5th, near
Kingston, he captured six out of seven transports bound thither with
re-enforcements. Of these, two were the schooners taken by Yeo in the
engagement of August 10, which the British had not thought fit to add
to their fleet, but used simply as carriers; mounting their guns on
the fortifications of Kingston. Cooper justly remarks, "This
sufficiently proves the equivocal advantage enjoyed by the possession
of these craft." Chauncey himself, at the end of the campaign,
recommended the building of "one vessel of the size of the
'Sylph,'"--three hundred and forty tons,--"in lieu of all the heavy
schooners; for really they are of no manner of service, except to
carry troops or use as gunboats."[110] The reflection is
inevitable,--Why, then, had he allowed them so to hamper his
movements? It is to be feared that the long ascendency of the gunboat
policy in the councils of the Government had sapped the professional
intelligence even of some naval officers.

The capture of the detachment going from York to Kingston showed that
the British had divined the general character of the American plans.
In fact, as early as October 2, Major General de Rottenburg, who after
an interval had succeeded to Brock's place in Upper Canada, as
lieutenant governor and commander of the forces, had started with two
regiments to re-enforce Kingston, leaving the Niagara peninsula again
under the command of General Vincent. On October 6 Chauncey's squadron
entered Sackett's, where Wilkinson had arrived on the 4th. The general
began at once to remonstrate strenuously with Armstrong against an
attempt upon Kingston, as delaying and possibly frustrating what he
saw fit to style the chief object of the campaign, the capture of
Montreal. The Secretary listened patiently, but overruled him.[111]
Kingston had been the principal object from the beginning, and still
so continued; but, if the garrison should be largely re-enforced, if
the British fleet should enter the harbor, or if the weather should
make navigation of the lake dangerous for the transports, then the
troops should proceed direct for Montreal by the river. Yeo apparently
returned to Kingston soon after this; but when Chauncey left port on
October 16, to bring forward from the Genesee River a detachment under
Colonel Winfield Scott, he still had the understanding that Kingston
was first to be attacked.

On October 19, however, the Secretary reconsidered his de