The city was naturally excited at the news that the British had arrived. General Smith, on receiving the intelligence September 11, detached a brigade of Baltimore militia, under General Stricker, to check the enemy if possible, and Stricker advanced that evening about seven miles toward North Point. His force numbered about three thousand two hundred men;[280] and with that body of raw militia, a part of whom had been routed at Bladensburg only a fortnight before, General Stricker attempted to fight a battle with five thousand old soldiers. On the morning of September 12 he formed his troops in three lines three hundred yards apart, apparently in close order, without cover or protection of any kind, standing in fields more or less open, and with an exposed flank.[281] Of all his arrangements, the only one which showed ordinary caution was to send a detachment of cavalry and riflemen a mile or two in his front. As the British advance approached, the American outposts fell back, and General Stricker sent forward some four hundred men, partly rifles, as skirmishers. The British advanced guard coming up, the skirmishing party fired, but was soon driven back. Ross and Cockburn were walking together with the advance, and after the firing ceased, Ross turned back alone to order up the light companies in anticipation of more serious resistance. On his way he was shot through the breast from the wood, and fell in the road, where he lay till he was found by the light companies hurrying forward to the scene of the firing. He barely spoke afterward.[282] The loss of their commanding general was the second heavy penalty paid by the British for their contempt of militia. Colonel Brooke immediately took command, and the advance was not checked; but the loss was not the less serious. When Brooke saw Stricker’s line stretching across the field, he did not dash at them at once with the light brigade as Thornton had attacked the larger force and stronger position at Bladensburg, but deployed the whole army and formed a regular order of battle. Although his force easily overlapped and outflanked the American, the engagement that followed was sharp, and the Americans were not routed without considerable loss to the British, who reported forty-six killed and two hundred and seventy-three wounded,--or more than they reported at Bladensburg. The Americans, though routed, suffered less, losing only twenty-four killed, one hundred and thirty-nine wounded, and fifty prisoners, with two field-pieces.