General James Winchester, also a veteran of the Revolution, was appointed to succeed General Hull, after the latter had surrendered Detroit. But the Kentuckians, who formed the most important element in the Northwestern army, were unwilling to serve under anybody but Harrison, the hero of Tippecanoe, and the government yielded to their wishes.

General Winchester, who commanded a part of Harrison's army, was defeated on the river Raisin, in Michigan. He surrendered his soldiers to the British general, Proctor, a very brutal person, who, to his eternal infamy, left the wounded Americans who could not march as prisoners to be murdered by the American Indians of his army. The Americans were roused to revenge, and the war-cry of the enraged Western troops became, "Remember the river Raisin!"

When Proctor, whose force was much stronger than Harrison's, sent a demand for the surrender of the Fort Meigs in the present-day state of Ohio, Harrison answered, "Tell General Proctor that, if he shall take the fort, it will be under circumstances that will do him more honor than a thousand surrenders."

In the spring of 1813, General Proctor, with a great force of English soldiers and American Indians under Tecumseh, laid siege to Harrison's small army in Fort Meigs. Harrison and his troops contrived to thwart every endeavor to capture the fort until reinforcements arrived, when the enemy gave up the siege and retired. In the summer following, Fort Stephenson, a weak stockade in Ohio with a single six-pound gun, was brilliantly defended by a young Kentucky officer named George Croghan, with only a hundred and sixty soldiers, against a force many times as strong, commanded by General Proctor.

The American officer Croghan was only twenty-one years old, and the British general Harrison wished him to abandon the post. The English tried to persuade Croghan to surrender to avoid a conflict, but the answer was that when the fort should be given up there would not be found a person alive in it. Croghan shifted his six-pounder from one angle to another, to give the impression that he had several heavy guns. When the fort was assaulted at its weakest part, the Kentucky riflemen opened a deadly fire. But the brave English soldiers at length reached the ditch, and began to chop down the stockade. The six pounder, which had been double-loaded with grape-shot and slugs, and concealed where it covered the whole ditch, was suddenly fired. Hardly a person of the assailing party escaped, and the English army retreated the next morning. During the night which followed, Croghan's people, not daring to open the gate, let down water to the wounded Englishmen outside, and at length, by means of a trench, brought them in and cared for them.

In September, 1813, American commander Oliver Hazard Perry's victory on Lake Erie was won over the British fleet. This turned the scale in America's favor, and opened the way for a forward movement by General Harrison's army. Harrison retook Detroit, crossed into Canada, and pursued Proctor's army, which he overtook at length on the river Thames. In a short and sharp battle, fought here on the 1st of October, 1813, Harrison defeated Proctor and his American Indian allies. The brave chief Tecumseh was killed in this battle, and the English army was utterly routed. Proctor, dreading the revenge of the Americans for his cruelties, ran away in a carriage. The Battle of the Thames, and the death of the warlike Tecumseh, broke up the confederacy of the American Indian tribes, and brought peace to the frontier.

In Harrison's general orders in starting for Canada after Perry's victory he said: "Kentuckians, remember the river Raisin, but remember it only while victory is suspended. The revenge of a soldier can not be gratified upon a fallen enemy."

Though Harrison and his Westerners succeeded so well, the attempted invasion of Canada to the eastward proved a failure under the lead of the feeble old generals who had survived from the Revolution. But the rise of young generals—Brown, Scott, and Ripley—to command changed the aspect of affairs, and an invasion of Canada was made in the summer of 1814. Fort Erie was taken, and the Battle of Erie fought and won by the Americans early in July. The Battle of Lundy's Lane was stubbornly contested, and lasted till midnight. The Americans were left in possession of the field, but the next day they retreated. Before winter set in, the Americans retired to their own side of the Niagara River.

The English, having now peace in Europe, had been able to send reinforcements to Canada, and in this same summer of 1814 they attempted an invasion of the United States, by Lake Champlain, the way so often traveled before by French and English expeditions. But the naval victory won near Plattsburg by American Commodore Thomas Macdonough, and the resistance made by the Americans in the Battle of Plattsburg, fought at the same time, turned the British back again.

But the British invasion, by way of Chesapeake Bay, was more successful. In August, 1814, the British landed in Maryland an army stronger than any that could be brought to meet it. On the 24th of August a battle was fought at Bladensburg [bla'-dens-burg], in Maryland, which resulted in a victory for the English, who entered Washington, and burned the Capitol and most of the public buildings. The same force that had taken Washington attacked Baltimore by land and water, but the vigorous defense of that place forced the British to retire. It was during this conflict that the song called "The Star-Spangled Banner" was written.

The persuasions of Tecumseh and his brother, the Prophet, had incited anger among the Creek American Indians, who dwelt mostly in southern Alabama. A large part of the nation, under the lead of a part American Indian chief named Weathersford, or "Red Eagle," attacked the settlers and on the American Indians of their own tribe who betrayed them in favor of the United States. British agents supplied these American Indians with arms. Weathersford, like Tecumseh, had a prophet to help him, who had been initiated into the office by Tecumseh's brother.

General Andrew Jackson, then an officer of the Tennessee militia and future seventh American president, led a force into southern Alabama, and, after conquering the greatest difficulties and fighting many bloody battles, he broke the power of the Creeks, so that Indian chief Weathersford himself entered Jackson's tent and surrendered. This was in April, 1814. Jackson, from being a commander of volunteers, was now made a major-general, and put in command of the troops in the Southwest.

Florida was at this time in possession of Spain, which was at peace with the United States. But that power was secretly in sympathy with England, and English troops made Pensacola, in Florida, a base of operations against Mobile. With his usual fiery zeal, Jackson marched into Spanish territory, captured Pensacola, and dislodged the British.

Jackson hastened to New Orleans, which was soon threatened by a large British force. With an energy unsurpassed perhaps in modern history, he formed an army out of the people and material within his reach, and built defenses against the British approach. He formed companies of free black soldiers, and he even took the convicts out of prison to make soldiers of them. After several preliminary battles, the English endeavored to carry Jackson's works by storm on the 8th of January, 1815. But Jackson's preparations were so thorough, that the enemy was repulsed with a frightful loss of twenty-six hundred soldiers. The Americans lost but eight killed and thirteen wounded. Sir Edward Pakenham, the British commander, was killed, and the attack on New Orleans was abandoned.

When this battle was fought, peace had already been made, but the news had not yet reached this country.

The treaty of peace was signed at Ghent [pronounce G hard], in Belgium, on the 24th of December, 1814. By the terms of this treaty, neither Great Britain nor the United States gained anything. The right of searching American vessels was not mentioned in the treaty; but the war had shown Great Britain that the right to search could no longer be maintained against a spirited nation, and American ships have never been searched from that time to this.

The war had caused a great deal of suffering and misery in this country, by the derangement of business, the destruction of property, and the loss of life. The news of the peace was hailed with the greatest delight.