Engagement at Forty Mile Creek

The engagement at Forty Mile Creek on 8 June 1813, two days after the British night attack at Stoney Creek, was the moment when the American advance into the Niagara peninsula collapsed beyond recovery. Commodore Sir James Lucas Yeo’s Lake Ontario squadron appeared off the American encampment and began a bombardment that, combined with the psychological shock of Stoney Creek, convinced the American commanders to retreat to Fort George.

The American force, now commanded by Colonel James Burn following the capture of both Generals Chandler and Winder at Stoney Creek, had fallen back to Forty Mile Creek (present-day Grimsby, Ontario). The troops were demoralised, their two senior commanders were prisoners, and the supply situation was deteriorating. Burn was attempting to reorganise when Yeo’s squadron appeared offshore.

Yeo’s ships — led by his flagship Wolfe — opened fire on the American camp and the supply depot at the creek. The bombardment was not heavy in absolute terms, but its psychological effect on troops already shaken by Stoney Creek was decisive. Burn ordered an immediate retreat toward Fort George, destroying supplies that could not be transported. Sixteen boats loaded with provisions and camp equipment were captured by Yeo’s squadron.

The retreat from Forty Mile Creek marked the effective end of the American offensive on the Niagara peninsula in 1813. The force that had captured Fort George on 27 May with such élan was now penned into a narrow perimeter around the fort, where it would remain for the rest of the year. The sequence of Stoney Creek (6 June) and Forty Mile Creek (8 June) reversed the strategic situation in forty-eight hours — from an American army advancing into the interior of Upper Canada to an American army retreating to its starting point.

The episode demonstrated the decisive importance of naval power on the Great Lakes. Harvey’s night attack at Stoney Creek had halted the American advance; Yeo’s naval intervention at Forty Mile Creek turned a halt into a rout. Control of Lake Ontario allowed the British to project power along the shoreline, threaten American supply lines, and support land operations at the point of maximum impact. As Andrew Lambert emphasises throughout The Challenge, naval power was the decisive instrument on the Great Lakes as surely as it was on the Atlantic.