Field of Glory: The Battle of Crysler's Farm, 1813

Wesley B. Turner is an associate professor of history at Brock
University and the author of The War of 1812: The War That Both Sides
Won and The Military in the Niagara Peninsula.

Donald Graves has established a solid reputation as a scholarly writer
on the War of 1812. He has produced the best accounts of the Battles of
Chippawa and of Lundy’s Lane and has edited some very informative
firsthand narratives by men from both sides in that conflict. In Field
of Glory, he tackles the complex subject of the major American land
campaign of 1813. In the autumn, one army invaded Upper Canada, while
another entered Lower Canada. The two armies planned to combine and
seize Montreal. “The autumn offensive of 1813,” writes Graves,
“represented the most serious attempt by the United States to conquer
British North America.” However, the invaders suffered decisive
defeats at Chateauguay and Crysler’s Farm; those two victories
“preserved Canada’s independence from its aggressive neighbour.”

The first section of Graves’s book provides background to the
campaign, with discussions of the origins of the war, preparations on
both sides and the difficulties each faced, leadership, naval forces,
and fighting during 1812 and 1813 up to October. The second section
details the invasion by Major General Wade Hampton down the Chateauguay
River toward the St. Lawrence and his defeat by well-trained militiamen
and Indian warriors under Lieutenant-Colonel Charles-Michel de
Salaberry. Hampton thereupon took his army back across the border, but,
still expecting to meet him, Major General James Wilkinson began his
invasion down the St. Lawrence.

In the next section, there is an hour-by-hour account of the events of
November 11, when a “small but professional army … defeated an
opponent superior only in numbers.” The final section deals with
Wilkinson’s withdrawal and an aftermath that included efforts by
American leaders directly involved to shift the blame onto someone else,
improvements made to the American army, and the fate of the Crysler’s
Farm battlefield.

Based on extensive research and supplemented with maps, illustrations,
nine appendixes, endnotes, and a bibliography, this work should remain
the definitive account of the Battle of Crysler’s Farm; it can be
enjoyed by general readers as well as scholars.