both passes." He added, "This is the first time that I have
experienced the mortification of being blockaded on the lakes."[282]
The line thus occupied by the enemy covered the entire entrance to
Black River Bay, within which Sackett's Harbor lies. This situation
was the more intolerable under the existing necessity of bringing the
guns by water. Drummond, whose information was probably good, wrote at
this period that not more than fifteen of the heavy cannon needed for
the new ships had arrived, and that they could come from Oswego only
by the lake, as the roads were impassable except for horsemen.
Carronades, cordage, and other stores were going on by wagon from
Utica, but the long guns which were imperatively required could not do
so.[283]

American contrivance proved equal to the dilemma, and led to a marked
British misadventure. A few miles south of Black River Bay, and
therefore outside the line of the British blockade, there was an inlet
called Stoney Creek, from the head of which a short land carriage of
three miles would strike Henderson's Bay. This, like Sackett's, is an
indentation of Black River Bay, and was well within the hostile ships.
The transit from Oswego to Stoney Creek, however, remained open to an
enemy's attack, and to be effected without loss required address,
enterprise, and rapidity of movement. The danger was lessened by the
number of streams which enter Mexico Bay, the deep bight formed by the
southern and eastern shores of Lake Ontario, between Oswego and
Sackett's. These, being navigable for batteaux, constituted a series
of harbors of refuge.

Chauncey directed all the lighter equipment to be turned back from
Oswego River to North Bay, on Lake Oneida, and the long guns to be
placed in batteaux, ready to move instantly, either up or down, as the
movements of the enemy or a favorable opportunity might determine.
Discretionary power to act according to circumstances was then given
to Captain Woolsey, in local command on the Oswego. Woolsey made great
parade of his preparations to send everything, guns included, back
across the portage from the river, to North Bay. The reports reached
Yeo, as intended, but did not throw him wholly off his guard. On May
27 Woolsey despatched an officer in a fast pulling boat to reconnoitre
the coast, while he himself went with the requisite force to the
falls. On the 28th the batteaux, nineteen in number, carrying
twenty-one long 32-pounders, and thirteen li