to do more than give a good account of
themselves on the ocean in single combats, these officers found a
chance on the northern lakes to display a fighting power and skill
which is one of the few redeeming features of the war on the American
side.

In 1812 hostilities began with a feeble attempt on the part of the
United States to invade Canada, an effort whose details are of interest
only in showing how impossible {220} it is for an essentially
unmilitary people to improvise warfare. Congress had authorized a
loan, the construction of vessels, and the enlistment of an army of
36,000 men; but the officers appointed to assemble a military force
found themselves unable, after months of recruiting and working, to
gather more than half that number of raw troops, with a fluctuating
body of State militia. With these rudiments of a military force,
attempts to "invade" Canada were made in three directions--from
Detroit, from the Niagara River, and from the northern end of Lake
Champlain.

To meet these movements, there were actually less than 2,800 British
soldiers west of Montreal; but fortunately they were commanded by Isaac
Brock, an officer of daring and an aggressive temper. He at once
entered into alliance with Tecumseh and the western Indians, and thus
brought to the British assistance a force of hundreds of warriors along
the Ohio and Kentucky frontier. While General Hull, with about 2,000
troops, mainly volunteers from the West, marched under orders to
Detroit and then, in July, invaded upper Canada, the outlying American
posts at Chicago and Mackinac were either captured or destroyed by the
Indians. Brock, gathering a handful of men, marched against Hull,
terrified him for the safety of {221} his communications with the
United States, forced the old man to retreat to Detroit, and finally,
by advancing boldly against the slight fortifications of the post,
frightened him into surrender. Hull had been set an impossible task,
to conquer upper Canada with no sure means of getting reinforcements or
supplies through a region swarming with Indians; but his conduct
indicated no spark of pugnacity, and his surrender caused the loss of
the entire north-west. Tecumseh and his warriors now advanced against
the Kentucky, Indiana, and Ohio frontiers; and the nameless horrors of
Indian massacre and torture surged along the line of settlements. The
frontiersmen flew to arms. General Harrison, with a commission from
Kentuck