Flashman and Madison's War

by Robert Brightwell

  There was a tussle on the far side of the compound from us, at the gate to the fort. Three British regulars were just inside the gate, trying to make sure that no Indians came in with the Americans. Some Indians now seemed to be trying to block the passage of the militia at the gate. An old grey-haired British soldier moved forward to intervene.

  “Oh nichee wah,” he was shouting, which meant ‘friend, stop’ in Indian. It was one of the few phrases the soldiers knew in the Indian tongue and we had been hearing it a lot in the last few minutes. This time it did the soldier no good. While he succeeded in pulling an American through, one of the Indians leaning over the wall behind him levelled his musket and shot the British soldier in the back. For a brief second there was a shocked silence as everyone watched the redcoat slowly topple forward into the mud. A big line had been crossed and all those watching, inside the fort and out knew it. The moment was broken by a wild war whoop from near where the shot was fired. An Indian climbed up on the wall and as he finished his war cry he aimed his musket at the crowd of prisoners and fired.

  Pandemonium broke out then. The Americans started to desperately move around inside the enclosure, but there was nowhere they could go: they were surrounded by enemies. The three or four British soldiers still inside the compound were up over the wall in a flash and running in the direction of the British camp, and from what I could see, the rest of the outnumbered guard of redcoats were joining them.

  “Oh my God, they are going to kill them all,” I muttered.

  “There is nothing you can do, Little Father,” whispered Black Eagle. “They are only ignoring you because they think you are one of us.” He was right. The Indians were shouting and waving weapons all around the low walls of the old fort now, baying for blood. It was like a bear baiting contest before the dogs were released. Another gun fired into the crowd of prisoners. I could see that some had dropped to their knees to pray, sensing death was imminent, while others circled around waiting for the first Indian to charge them.

  It would only have taken another few seconds for the blood bath to start but then two men galloped up on horseback. One stayed back outside the fort; the other rode straight in through the gate and I saw it was Tecumseh. The cheering Indians redoubled their noise when they saw their chief. They evidently expected him to lead them in their massacre, but he just circled his horse staring at them, his face expressionless. Then he noticed the British soldier lying face down in the mud. He dropped down from his horse and turned the old man over to check if he was alive. The noise of the crowd started to die down – this was not how the warriors had expected their leader to behave. Still the chief said nothing, but instead he climbed up on the tallest stretch of wall. Glaring around at those watching him, he waited for silence.

  I have seen a few great orators in my time, Pitt the Younger, William Wilberforce and Mary Clarke amongst others, but few were as impressive as Tecumseh. I say that not understanding a single word of his speech, beyond Black Eagle’s rough translation, but I judge him on the effect he had on his audience. He waited until you could have heard a pin drop before he spoke, quietly at first so that people craned forward to hear him. He pointed down at the dead British soldier and then spoke in an angry tone to his followers.

  “He asks how we can expect to win our freedom if we make enemies of the British as well as the Americans,” whispered Black Eagle. “He says that there is no honour in killing unarmed men, it will create more enemies and hatred.” A man called out something from the crowd and whatever he shouted brought some murmurs of agreement from those watching. “The man says that we have always killed prisoners in time of war,” added Black Eagle. Tecumseh waited for the noise to die down again and then he started to speak, his voice slowly rising as he spoke more passionately, jabbing his finger for emphasis at those watching.

  “What is he saying?” I asked

  “He says we must forget the old ways that have served us poorly. He says we need to think about how we will make a nation for our children and generations to come. Our enemies must fear us in war but respect us to live in peace beside them. Now he is telling them to go back to their camps and make no more trouble for their British allies.”

  From the length of time Tecumseh was talking, I don’t think Black Eagle translated everything. Possibly he made comments critical of the whites or the British specifically, that Black Eagle chose to omit. But whatever he said it had a dramatic effect on his audience. From being on the verge of a catastrophic bloodletting, the hundreds of warriors turned calmly away from the little fort. As they walked back to their camp they busily debated among themselves what they had heard; those that did not speak the Shawnee tongue were probably having the words translated for them too.

  The American prisoners had also watched the speech, like me, with no understanding of what points were being made, but knowing that their lives hung in the balance. As they began to realise that they were safe one of their officers stepped forward and walked up to Tecumseh. He spoke briefly to express the gratitude of the prisoners for the chief’s intervention, but Tecumseh just frowned and looked round for the man who had arrived with him. I saw it was Elliot, the Indian Agency translator who now told Tecumseh what the American officer had said. The chief looked again at the officer and at the men crowded behind him. Then turning back to the officer he gave a brief nod of acknowledgement and wheeled his horse away.

  Chapter 13

  I have heard various stories of Tecumseh stopping that massacre: in some he tomahawked two Indians and in others he urged Procter to put on petticoats, claiming he was unfit to command. Well I was there and the originators of these tales clearly were not. Someone else who was not present at Tecumseh’s speech was Procter – he would have sent more men to guard the prisoners if he had been. After the massacre at the Raisin to send just one company of soldiers to guard the Americans was a foolish mistake. Those redcoats were in an impossible position and it is probably a miracle that only one of them was killed. Around twenty Americans were killed before Tecumseh appeared. But his intervention and speech saved the lives of some eight hundred prisoners, including two hundred wounded.

  During the night after the battle, the Indian end of the camp was filled with the sound of drums and whooping as the warriors celebrated their victory. While Black Eagle joined them, I had no friends among the Shawnee or other tribes and few spoke English, so I spent the evening with my new friends in the Royal Artillery. This time I was welcomed as an honoured guest and Lieutenant Davis even gave me a new shirt to replace the one I had lost in the battle. We drank and told tales and even held a sweepstake on how many days the American garrison would hold out. I don’t know who held the stakes but they must have done well as no one collected on the bet.

  No one thought the Americans would be able to gather another relief force in this remote part of the country before the garrison of Fort Meigs was starved into submission. Many felt that the land around the fort should be given to the Indians, to create a buffer between the Americans and Canada. Oh we spent much time that night discussing what Procter should do when he captured Fort Meigs. It was only the next morning that we discovered that we were being a mite premature.

  I awoke in my new waterproof shelter a short while after dawn the next morning with a hangover. It does not matter where in the world you go and what supplies are running short, soldiers always seem able to find wine, beer or spirits; although whatever we had been drinking the previous night was the roughest sort. My head throbbed and it was not made any easier by an incessant clattering and banging from the camp outside. Why couldn’t those bloody Indians just lie quietly on their blankets?

  Eventually I could stand it no longer and crawled out of the low entrance to my den into an unfeasibly bright day. As I stood a little unsteadily and gazed about, I still could not understand why there was so much noise. Indians were normally quiet in the mornings, but as I gazed across the camp most of them seemed to be awake and industriously working. Then I sa
w that several of them were tying possessions onto horses. While I watched another tore down the wall of his shelter to search for belongings inside; he was clearly not planning to use it again. Eventually a thought began to surface in my booze-soaked brain: the Indians were leaving.

  It made no sense at all. Only one Indian shelter showed no sign of demolition and that was the one on the other side of mine where Black Eagle and Morag slept. I staggered over to it, I knew they were inside because I could hear them whispering and cooing at each other. I also noticed that since the last time I had interrupted them in their den, Morag had built a door, but this was important… at least to me.

  “Black Eagle,” I bawled through the wooden sides of the structure. “Come out, the Indians are leaving.”

  Morag issued a stream of what sounded like vehement curses in Iroquoian and I was at that moment quite glad that I did not understand most of the language. Then Black Eagle chuckled and try to placate her before I heard him moving and the wooden door swung open.

  “What is the problem, Little Father?” asked the huge warrior as he stretched out his muscles beside me.

  “What is the problem?” I repeated astonished at his calmness. “Look, the Indians are packing up. They are preparing to leave before we have captured the fort.”

  “They are going back to their villages to celebrate their great victory over the Americans,” he replied staring at me curiously as though it was obvious.

  “But they can’t,” I exclaimed, stunned that he was not taking in the bigger picture. “You cannot leave a war halfway through, just because you have won a battle. We haven’t captured the fort yet, that is why we came all this way. If they wait a bit longer then it will fall and they will have an even greater victory celebrate.”

  “You are thinking like a British soldier,” Black Eagle told me calmly. “The warriors are not soldiers; they come and go as they please. Many have taken scalps or loot from prisoners and they are pleased to have beaten such a big force of long knives. They have seen how strong the walls of the American fort are and they do not believe that the British guns will ever batter them down. They always celebrate with their tribes after a great victory, it is our way. They want to go home now.”

  I stood stunned for a moment trying to take this in. It was madness, I thought. If the Indians went the Americans would outnumber the remaining British and militia forces. They could break out from the fort whenever they liked and bring in more supplies. Unless the Indians could be stopped our certain victory would turn into a defeat. That thought sobered me up more than a little. I ducked back into my shelter to get as properly dressed as I could without my officer’s coat. There was only one Indian who I thought stood a chance of stopping the Indians leave: Tecumseh. I made my way into the British camp to find General Procter to see if he could persuade the chief to intervene.

  Interrupting a general before his breakfast is rarely a good idea, but I could not afford to wait. The first Indians were already pulling out of the camp. I gave the sentry my name and told him that it was urgent and he disappeared inside the flap of the general’s tent.

  The general emerged a moment later, still in his nightshirt and with a slight frown on his face. “Well, Captain, this is most irregular. I gather you have an urgent matter to discuss that cannot wait a moment longer?”

  “Yes sir,” I told him bringing myself smartly to attention. “The Indians are leaving, sir.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” he retorted sharply before turning to re-enter his tent.

  I was nonplussed for a moment. That was one response I had not expected. “If you stand here, sir, you can see the first of them moving out between that line of tents,” I said pointing in the right direction.

  “They cannot possibly be leaving,” he replied irritably but he turned again and walked to where I was standing and gazed down the line of tents. “That must be a hunting party,” he declared dismissively.

  “You can see that they have their possessions on their backs or on their horses,” I pointed out. “They would not take those hunting.”

  “But they can’t leave,” exploded Procter. “Not now.” I had some sympathy for the old boy as my brain had made the same assumptions just moments before, but then I was not a commanding general on the cusp of my greatest ever victory. I explained to him what Black Eagle had told me and when he still expressed disbelief I told him about how the Iroquois had gone to celebrate their victory after the battle at Queenston.

  “I saw how Tecumseh turned them around at Fort Miami yesterday, sir,” I told Procter and watched as he paled slightly at the mention of the place. “He carries great sway with the Indians. If anyone can stop them from observing this custom it is him.”

  “I will speak to him,” agreed Procter with what I thought was a note of reluctance. “And thank you for telling me, Captain, it is good to know that there are some officers in this army I can rely on.” With that he moved back inside his tent to get dressed.

  Procter struck me as a strangely isolated figure. He evidently did not get on with some of his officers, judging from his final comment, and I gauged that his relationship with Tecumseh was not close either. But I was confident that Tecumseh would persuade the Indians to stay – he, after all, was the person who had pressed for the attack on Fort Meigs in the first place.

  As the day progressed it seemed that my faith was misplaced. I saw the chief moving around the Indian encampment. From what I could tell from his gestures, he was passionately arguing his case but one by one the shelters kept on coming down and the line of men moving out of the camp grew from a trickle to a long and continuous flow.

  My fears seemed confirmed when a weary sentry tracked me down at the end of the day and told me that Procter wanted to see me.

  “Do you know what it is about?” I asked.

  “No sir,” he replied woodenly, “the general did not say.”

  “And of course you do not listen to his conversations through the canvas walls of his tent,” I prompted.

  “Certainly not, sir,” said the sentry, although he grinned as he told the lie. Having thought about it for a moment the sentry lowered his voice, “I would tread carefully with the general, sir, he is in a fearful temper, something to do with the Indians and the militia, sir.”

  Forearmed with that information I cautiously entered Procter’s tent, but the welcome at least was civil.

  “Ah, Captain Flashman, do come in and take a seat,” he greeted me. The sentry had been right, he did seem tense, but he forced a smile and made an effort to be cheerful. “Can I offer you some madeira and a slice of fruit cake? My wife made the cake herself and sent it up with the latest supplies. I took a seat and accepted his offer. I guessed that Mrs Procter must have had a cook when she was growing up for she clearly had not learned the art herself. You could have used the cake to hammer in nails. When the general was not watching I dropped the inedible hard lump into my pocket.

  “I wanted to thank you,” he continued, “for your warning of the Indian departure this morning.” He paused, gritting his teeth for a moment as though it was an effort for him to remain calm. “Unfortunately, as you will have seen, Tecumseh has only managed to persuade less than a hundred warriors to remain with us.” He stopped again to take a deep breath and picked up a silver mounted glass inkwell from his small table and gazed at that while he continued. “In addition I have been informed this afternoon by the commanders of our militia regiments that in the light of the Indian withdrawal, they are also resolved to retire. Their men believe that there is still time to get some crops in and they want to get back to their farms.”

  “You mean we are going to abandon the siege?”

  “Yes of course we are going to abandon the bloody siege!” he roared at me and with that he hurled the inkwell across the tent, to leave a dark spatter mark of ink down the canvas. Seeing the look of shock on my face as I hurriedly stood, he immediately held out his hands in supplication. “I am sorry, I do apologise, Cap
tain, please sit down again. I should not take things out on you of all people. It is just that it is so damn frustrating.”

  “Indeed, sir,” I agreed cautiously, not wanting to provoke another outburst.

  Do you know that the prisoners we captured from the fort told us that they have less than a week’s supplies and typhoid and dysentery are rife among the garrison? That bloody Indian wanted this battle and now his men are abandoning it just when we have victory in the palm of our hand. I begged him, Flashman,” said Procter, his eyes starting to water in emotion. “I bloody begged him to stay and then those Judases in the militia stabbed me in the back as well.” I glanced across at the decanter; there was less than half an inch of the spirit at the bottom and I guessed that Procter had consumed the rest that afternoon.

  “Tecumseh did try, sir, I saw him in the Indian camp for most of the day. Can we not maintain the siege with just the regular soldiers?”

  “No, they are the only regular troops I have or am likely to get. They are the backbone of my force and I cannot risking losing most of them in a battle where they would be outnumbered at least two to one.” He gave a heavy sigh. “We will have to withdraw.”

  The next morning General Harrison must have been rubbing his eyes with disbelief as he watched his enemies retire just when it seemed he was cornered. I hope he had the sense to thank his engineer, for if the walls of Fort Meigs had shown any sign of imminent collapse then I suspect that the Indians and hence the militia would have stayed.

  Travelling downstream was a lot quicker than coming up the river against the current. Two days later Black Eagle and I found ourselves once more on the deck of the Queen Charlotte. This time we were heading back to Amherstburg across Lake Erie, and the water of the lake was surprisingly choppy. Like most of the British fleet, the Queen Charlotte was an old ship that had seen much better days. In the rough swell she wallowed about like a half-filled kettle. The pumps were working around the clock as squads of soldiers took their turn at them while waves broke over the bow, filling the ship with more water.