Major Hancock, commanding the enemy, having received reënforcements that swelled the number of his men to about a thousand, ordered a sortie, to capture the battery. His troops suddenly burst from the mill, and made a rush for the guns. But this subjected them to a fire from the American infantry, by which they suffered heavily, and they were obliged to return to the mill and the blockhouse. A second and more desperate sortie had the same result, and the enemy then shut themselves up in the house and defied all attempts to drive them out. As the condition of the roads prevented him from bringing up heavier artillery, Wil{253}kinson gave up the expedition and returned through mud, snow, and rain to Plattsburg. The affair had cost him a hundred and fifty-four men, and inflicted on the enemy a loss of sixty-one. The General asked for a court-martial, and was tried and acquitted; but this ended his military career. General George Izard succeeded to his command. Both belligerents were still building ships for service on Lake Ontario. The British had a large one on the stocks at Kingston, and the Americans an equally large one at Sackett's Harbor. All sorts of insignificant affairs took place during the spring and summer along the shores of this lake and Lake Champlain, effecting nothing, but keeping the people in a state of alarm. On one occasion three boats approached Sackett's Harbor, carrying two barrels of powder, with which it was intended to blow up the new vessel on the stocks. But they were discovered and fired at, whereupon the crews hastily threw the powder overboard, fearing it would be exploded by a bullet, and pulled away. Finding that he could not destroy the new ship, Sir James Yeo determined to render her useless by capturing the guns, rigging, and stores intended for her, which were at Oswego. Accordingly he organized an expedition of about three thousand men, {254}the troops being commanded by General Drummond, and sailed for that place early in May. The fort at Oswego, an old affair, in a dilapidated condition, was on one side of the river, and the village-on the other. Lieutenant-Colonel Mitchell, commanding at the fort, saw the approaching expedition early in the morning of May 5th. As his force was too small to be divided, he sent a large number of tents across the river, and had them pitched in front of the village. This convinced the enemy that there was a heavy force on that side of the river, and he confined his attention to the fort. The ships bombarded the work, and a force attempted to land by means of boats. But Colonel Mitchell sent a few men down the shore with one old gun, and as soon as they came within range it made such havoc among the boats' crews that they pulled back to the fleet. One of the boats, sixty feet long, propelled by three sails and thirty-six oars, was so shattered that it was abandoned and drifted ashore.