Battle of York - Later Attack

Later Attack

Chauncey and Dearborn subsequently won the Battle of Fort George on the Niagara peninsula, but they had left Sackett's Harbor defended only by a few troops, mainly militia. When reinforcements from the Royal Navy commanded by Commodore James Lucas Yeo arrived in Kingston, Yeo almost immediately embarked some troops commanded by Sir George Prevost and attacked Sackett's Harbor. Although the British were nevertheless repelled by the defenders at the Second Battle of Sacket's Harbor, Chauncey immediately withdrew into Sacket's Harbor until mid-July, when a new heavy sloop of war had been completed.

Chauncey sortied again on July 21. Six days later, he embarked a battalion of troops commanded by Colonel Winfield Scott at the Niagara. They first intended to attack the British position at Burlington Heights at the western end of Lake Ontario, but found the defenders to be too strong and too well-entrenched for any landing to be successful. Instead, they decided to make another attack on York, and landed east of the town on July 31. There was no opposition. (The British regulars stationed at York had been rushed to Burlington Heights.)

The Americans burned a barracks and seized 11 batteaux, 5 cannon and some flour. Chauncey returned some private property, and books from the public library, which had been looted after the Battle of York.

The Ontario Heritage Foundation erected a plaque in 1968 near the entrance to Coronation Park, Exhibition Place, Lakeshore Boulevard. The plaque reads:

On the morning of July 31, 1813, a U.S. invasion fleet appeared off York (Toronto) after having withdrawn from a planned attack on British positions at Burlington Heights. That afternoon 300 American soldiers came ashore near here. Their landing was unopposed: there were no British regulars in town, and York's militia had withdrawn from further combat in return for its freedom during the American invasion three months earlier. The invaders seized food and military supplies, then re-embarked. The next day they returned to investigate collaborators' reports that valuable stores were concealed up the Don River. Unsuccessful in their search, the Americans contented themselves with burning military installations on nearby Gibraltar Point before they departed.