On the 21st of October the advance down the Chateauguay commenced.  The first move was a rapid march by General Izard with the light-equipped troops and a regiment of the line, who surprised a party of about ten[22] Indians sitting late in the afternoon at their evening meal at the junction of the Outarde and Chateauguay Rivers, and killed one of them.  There Izard encamped and proceeded to establish a road of communication with Hampton.  Word was soon brought to Major Henry, of the Beauharnois’ Militia, commanding on the English River.  Henry sent word to General De Watteville at La Fourche, and had Captains Levesque and Debartzch advance immediately with the flank companies of the 5th Battalion of embodied militia and about 200 men of the Beauharnois’ division.  This was the preliminary move towards the battle.

They advanced about six miles that night up the Chateauguay from La Fourche, when they came to a wood which it would not have been prudent to enter in the dark.  Next morning early they were joined by De Salaberry with his Voltigeurs and the light company of Captain Ferguson, an officer who took a front place in the affair.  De Salaberry brought all these companies about a league up the bank to the place he had fortified, and there stopped.  An American patrol party being observed in front, General De Watteville came over himself, visited the outposts, approved of them, and the work proceeded.[23] That evening the main body of the Americans encamped at Sear’s, about twenty-five miles above the Chateauguay’s mouth.  The engineers had cut a road for the ten cannon, and with great labor and difficulty had dragged them thus far.[24]

Within two days more Hampton’s men had opened and completed a large and practicable road, which is still traceable, from his position at Four Corners twenty-four miles through the woods and morasses, and brought up his guns and stores to his new position, about seven miles from De Salaberry’s. (About Dewittville?)

[Illustration:  Sketch of the battle of Chateauguay—­Oct 26, 1813]

From this point he despatched Colonel Purdy with about 1,500 men, composed of a light brigade (the 1st Brigade of the American Army[25]) and a strong body of the infantry of the line, at an early hour in the night of the 25th, across the Chateauguay and down its right bank[26] at a bend adjoining what is now known as the Cross Farm, with orders to gain the ford and fall on the rear of Lieut.-Colonel De Salaberry’s position, while the main body, under General Izard, were to commence the attack in front.  Purdy’s brigade crossed not far above De Salaberry, and proceeded into the woods of the opposite side.  A cedar swamp, an unexpected stream in which they floundered, and the ignorance of their guides misled and bewildered them.  This was the fault of Hampton, and due to his headstrongness, for the guides had protested that they did not know that side of the Chateauguay;