Show at va to eai eqi iosim SC aund rel ames liaw iraa ioramo raMO il by ELMO SCOTT WATSON OU probably have hav never heard of tho battle of la IA colle coll mill which was fought years ao ago this month just acro across the canadian border bonier ajust from louses house 71 N Y in that respect yo youre not much different from most of your fellow country g tuen men for this battle tins never yet been considered important enough to win a place in our school histories and even it you have read nebout it elsewhere its not likely that you caro care particularly to remember the story of that en th k vm for it was just another in the long X series of rai failures jures and disasters brought about by blundering american generals which makes the th military history of the war of 1812 with but blit ono one or two except exceptions lons such dreary reading for A a those americans who alle to think that we ns as a nation have been uniformly successful in every ery war we have hav wage winged iq no the battle of ln la colic mill was not tho the I 1 A sort ort of affair to roster foster much pride in the history of american arms in it nn an army of some sollie americans american s was held at tiny hay by only british until red coated reinforcements cume came up tip bring brine gen gel rl NI ing ine their numbers nur up to about 1000 men hut but jam jaetta 3 wilkinson naon n karom durr dur fr ip e C W cult tit A 11 PAC RA c am W C 0 ajah 41 la lacolle colle mill and block houze house N 9 J 1 jo even then outnumbered four to one as they were those stubborn englishmen not only hold held their own but after two hours fighting forced the americans to retreat with alth a loss of 0 13 killed wounded and 13 missing as compared to the british loss of 11 killed 40 wounded and four missing in thus indicating that the rattle battle of la colle colic mill was an ignominious defeat for the anderl american arms let it not be supposed that our soldiers were less brave thlin than the british throughout the battle both officers and men displayed a gallantry and a desper desperate nto valor worthy of the best traditions of the american fighting matt hut but again it was a case of a hindering commander whose incompetence set at nought their heroic efforts lie HP was ion clen james wilkinson who allowed himself to be outsmarted by the commander of the enemy and was the victim of a stratagem as old as the history of warfare in the midst of the assault on the stone mill which gave the battle its name there came from the woods nearby tile alie sound of a bugle by some strange process of reasoning the american commander decided that he was about to be cut oft off by a superior perlor Mi force of the enemy and he immediately ordered a n re retreat trent so one blast of a bugle the clever stratagem of a quick witted british officer turned what might easily have been an american victory into a disgraceful defeat disgraceful not to the american troops but to their lender lossong Lossl ng in ills his gossipy rambling pictorial field book of the war of 1812 11 devotes two pages to this engagement and ends his account thus with the discreditable affair at la colle colic mill the military career of general wilkenson I 1 was closed and in that sentence lies the I 1 importance M of what a later historian has called the insignificant little battle at la colle colic mill for no matter how insignificant it way may have been as it military engagement the fact that it wrote fink finis to tile the opportunity for mischief making by one of the most amazing charne characters teis in american history makes it an outstanding event in tile the annals of our nation of this nun nian john randolph of roanoke Ilon noke who tinted hated him and who incidentally was one of the beat haters baters of all time lime once said la Is the most fint finished shed sen scoundrel undrel that flint ever lived a ream of paper would not contain the proofs r dpn thou though h tile the waspish It Kan andolph dolph believe that the proof could be contained contal neI in a ream of paper r a modern biographer tins has proved that it can be done pretty well in a sahl page book and taking for ills his title he be proceeds to do it ile he Is royal ornan oman shreve and the book Is the finished scoundrel pub recently by company indicative of what the book contains Is the subtitle sub hub title jeneral general enines sometime commander in chief of the army or of the united slates staffs who ninde intrigue a trade and treason a profession and in the first chapter you meet lle and there begin reading the story or of art an itina amalong zing career of one of the most werd ind and impossible characters that ever strutted ills his little batir on the stage of a nation of it man mail who was without doubt the most clever anti ir if not tile tho most dangerous of that eliat small rom romainn linn for whom history reserves the in cen horatio gates lamoin name of traitor corn bora in tidewater md bid in imbi ho he was a scion of the lesser landed gentry with sufficient income to give him a good education at the ago of fifteen ho he was was sent to philadelphia to study medicine with an uncle and there was every indication that lie he was destined for a career of alleviating human distress instead as it turned out of adding to the sum total of human distress at the outbreak of the revolution lie he put by pillbox pill box and lancet and as a gentleman volunteer headed beaded north toward the siege of boston in the camp at cambridge his ingratiating manners pleasing and plausible address education above the average of young gentlemen of tile the time knowledge of drill and discipline beyond that of rustic militia officers soon won him a captaincy in the army it la Is probable that in the camp at cambridge wilkinson made the acquaintance of two men with whom his name was to be linked in the future their names to bo be besmirched while he equally if not more guilty was to have hla his name whitewashed one was benedict arnold then a colonel and the ther other was aaron burr also a a gentleman volunteer from that time on captain wilkinson Is much in evidence in the history of the continental army ile he Is sent on the expedition to canada under general sullivan to support arnold and quite by chance rather than by hla his ability saves arnold from disaster as the tatter latter retreats before the advance of sir guy carleton next we find and the young captain with gates cates who has been placed in command of the northern army pandering to the vanity of gates who makes wilkinson a member of his staff forgetting ills his friendship for arnold wilkinson goes over horse foot and dragoons to gates shares thereafter his jealousy and deprecation of arnold thus wilkinson first appears in his characteristic role of double crosser next he Is with washington nt at the splendid victory at trenton then he la Is at princeton at valley forge and at morristown becomes involved in the conway cabal against washington and again does some double crossing of his fel low conspirators including his friend gates although this time it must be admitted ills his betrayal of the plot was more or less leis unintentional and came about while he was under the influence of liquor ny by tills this time he was a brevet brigadier general albeit over tile protest of some 47 colonels colo who wore were moro more worthy of the promotion pro than he after the winter at valley forge he resigned from the army but bilut 13 months later he was back on tile the payroll again na as clothier general for the army a post which he held until the end of tile tho war and which for it a wonder he handled without becoming involved in any shady deals after the war tie he was a member of the penn ienn syl sylva legislature then finding himself in financial str straits alts lie ho started for the kentucky frontier to recoup his fort fortunes tines there lie rap rapidly rose to prominence helped in the development of the now new state and ami become became involved again in ills favoriti lid tunit of intrigue this time in ibe famous spanish Gons conspiracy piracy which la Is still a I 1 and unsolved unsold mystery although documents m ants have been found la in the spanish archives which seem to prove that wilkinson was nn agent of the king of spain paid by him film to influence kentucky to secede from the alie union and become a spanish ally if lie he was in the pay of spain it evidently enough to support his farally for he went hack back into the Amer american lepri army was advanced to colonel and within a year to the rank of balga dier ler beneral and in 1700 lie he became commander of the army then followed that amazing period in ills career when holding the highest military office in the land he was still there Is good reason to believe in the pay of spain soon afterwards ho he was involved in the burr conspiracy like the spanish conspiracy the burr plot Is 1 still something of a mystery with many angles ns as yet unexplained recent historical research has uncovered evidence which indicates that ITIl kinso instead of burr was tho the arch atch conspirator and d that durr burr was only the tool of the unscrupulous coma ander ln in cliplef according to one theory IV li kinson was tas jeffersons secret agent all along giving burr enough rope with which to hang before exposing tile plot according to another nn other wilkinson used burr for his own ends then double crossed him at the last to save his own skin in tho the light of ills his past career it would seem reasonable to believe that was up to his old tricks playing both ends against tho the middle and quite capable of betraying anyone to further ills own ambitious projects but whatever the truth of the matter the fact remains that although wilkinson narrowly missed indictment on a charge of treason he managed to come through the whole affair without hearing bearing ills his just share of the disgrace that engulfed poor aaron burr and continued on ills way nay or of playing a part in important historical events As commander of the army he sent lieutenant pike oft off upon the exploring expedit expeditions tons that won fame for that young officer lIcer of ile he was one of the commissioners who received the louisiana purchase from the french and at the outbreak of the war of 1812 lie won a bloodless victory by capturing mobile and ousting tile the spanish garrison there then he went north to the canadian border to add to his laurels but succeeded only in wrecking what little military reputation he had left laft still the stormy petrel of tho the army he became involved in a series of jealousies and bicke bleker rings trigs with other american generals who were if any tiang more incompetent than he be the result was the utter failure of his proposed expedition to capture montreal an expedition which had every prospect of success had it been carried through intelligently in march 1814 ho he launched another campaign to vindicate vindle atel himself but instead of success and vindication lie he achieved only inglorious defeat in the insignificant battle of la collo colic mill that was the end of james wilkinson ue ile was relieved of his command and ordered to washington under arrest to awalt await court martial the wait was long the harassed administration attempting to wage war without money without ships almost without soldiers and with generals who achieved disaster with monotonous regularity ul had not time to waste on the trial of ono one of its failures perhaps if he had been tried it would have been with ft ith the usual result for during his career he be lind had been before three courts of inquiry on charges ranging all tile the way from neglect of military mill tarY duty to treason and each time lie he had managed to escape with a coat of whitewash instead of being tried he was allowed to slip quietly into obscurity ile he spent the next few years writing ills memoirs a voluminous nuil verbose MIN alibi for nil all the things that had ever been charged against him and managing his plantation on con the mississippi below now new orleans then we find him in mexico city also adjusting claims of american citizens entrusted to him and in trying to obtain a grant of land on what Is now the site of calveston Oal texas from the th spanish in recognition of services rea rendered deredI ile he died in 1825 and was burled beneath the church of san hil maguel uel in the N mexican capital the exact site of his grave Is unmarked and unknown an appropriate end perhaps to the man who recoiled received so BO much from tits his country and gave so little in return a 0 by western newspaper union 0 t |