“It appears that part of the forlorn hope and about half of Watteville’s Light Company, by wading through the water, though the footing was excessively rough and rocky along the Lake-shore, turned the left flank of an abattis which extended from the enemy’s battery on Snake Hill, the left of their position, to the Lake, and part penetrated through the abattis itself, and thereby gained the rear of the enemy’s works. The fire of the enemy at this time being extremely heavy both from artillery and musketry, it would seem as if a simultaneous shock of panic pervaded the greater part of those not in immediate advance; and the forlorn hope, not finding itself sufficiently supported, was reluctantly under the necessity of relinquishing the advantages they had gained, and of retiring again through the water under a most galling fire. They lost many men, and DeWatteville’s Light Company nearly half their number. The Light Company of the Eighty-ninth, notwithstanding they were almost overwhelmed by the grenadiers of DeWatteville in the precipitancy of their retreat, was the only body that preserved its order and remained firm upon its ground. By this act of steadiness they fortunately lost scarcely a man. The main body of DeWatteville’s regiment retreated in such confusion that they carried the King’s regiment before them like a torrent. Thus by the misconduct of this foreign corps has the opportunity been totally lost.” The mortification of Drummond was acute in having to charge both his attacking columns with being panic-stricken: “The agony of mind I suffer from the present disgraceful and unfortunate conduct of the troops committed to my superintendence, wounds me to the soul!” Yet he offered no evidence to show that his troops fled before they were beaten, nor did he explain why he had thought it useless to order the reserve to their support after they had captured the bastion. In reality the battle of Fort Erie was more creditable to the British than the battles of Chippawa or Lundy’s Lane, and the Americans could not admit that in either of the three the conduct of Drummond’s troops was “disgraceful.” The defeat so much weakened Drummond that he could no longer keep the field without support, and immediately sent for two more regiments,--the Sixth and the Eighty-second from Burlington and York,--numbering about one thousand and forty rank-and-file, and making good his losses.[120]