Quest Biographies Bundle — Books 31–35. Rosemary Sadlier

followed the creek bank, breaking through the brush and tangle of willows, coming upon a spot where a tree had fallen across the water. Pulling up her skirts, she dropped down and crawled across it on hands and knees until she reached the other side. The bank was slimy with mud, and she had to grasp at any protruding roots she could. Her feet sliding from under her, she hung on and managed to pull herself to the top.

      About seven o’clock that evening she reached a steep, wooded embankment and began the ascent, feeling the fatigue in the muscles of her legs. Both her slippers were gone by this time, her dress muddied and torn, her face and arms scratched by brambles. She stumbled on, thinking she should soon see the lights of De Cew’s farmhouse, and what a welcome sight that was going to be.

      Suddenly, pushing her way through the last of the underbrush, Laura found herself at the edge of a clearing. She was surrounded by Native warriors.

      The scene in the moonlight was terrifying. When they saw her, the Indians “all arose and with some yells, said ‘Woman,’ which made me tremble. I cannot express the awful feeling it gave me,” Laura said later, “but I did not lose my presence of mind. I was determined to persevere.”

      She reminded herself that Native warriors had fought and died with the British in the American War of Independence, and with that thought she managed to keep her composure.

      “I went up to one of the chiefs, made him understand that I had great news for Capt. FitzGibbon and that he must let me pass to his camp, or that he and his party would all be taken. The chief at first objected to let me pass, but finally consented, after some hesitation, to go with me and accompany me to FitzGibbon’s station.”

      The Indians, most likely some of Dominique Ducharme’s Caughnawaga, who had recently arrived in the area, helped Laura to walk the last mile in the dark, through De Cew’s field to the farmhouse on the old Mountain Road from St. Davids.

      She had walked for seventeen hours and covered nineteen miles (thirty kilometres), and although she would not be able to tell FitzGibbon how the American attack would occur, nor when, she was confident that he provided the best chance for the British to hold on to Niagara.

      Lieutenant FitzGibbon must have been surprised when a strange woman appeared at the door of his outpost, dirty, barefoot, and obviously exhausted. As Laura wrote later, “I had an interview with him. I told him what I had come for and what I had heard — that the Americans intended to make an attack upon the troops under his command and would, from their superior numbers, capture them all.” Then she dropped onto a chair, and one of FitzGibbon’s men hurried to fetch her some water to drink.

      FitzGibbon questioned Laura until he was convinced that she was not a spy. After all, she had come from Queenston, which was in the hands of the Americans.

      After receiving Laura’s information, FitzGibbon alerted the Natives, and together with his own men they took up positions all night from which they could intercept any attack.

      But first, because Laura was worn out, FitzGibbon had one of his men take her to the Turney farm, far enough away that she would be safe and could get some rest. Mrs. Turney gathered her up like a mother hen, filling a basin with water so that she could wash her hands and face, and finally setting her blistered feet into it. After making sure Laura had eaten, she insisted on putting her to bed.

      Years later, FitzGibbon wrote, “Mrs. Secord was a person of slight and delicate frame and made this effort in weather excessively warm, and I dreaded at the time that she must suffer in health and consequence of fatigue and anxiety, she having been exposed to danger from the enemy, through whose line of communication she had to pass.”

      It had been Laura’s opinion, when she set out that day, that the attack would come the following morning, June 23. But nothing happened right away. The American troops were still back at Fort George, waiting until late evening to leave. They would stop that night at Queenston.

      Laura Secord Delivers Her Message to Lieutenant James FitzGibbon at De Cew’s. Artist C.W. Jefferys.

       >Source: Collections Canada.

      Very early on the morning of June 24, one of Dominique Ducharme’s Indian scouts raced up to FitzGibbon’s headquarters to say they had encountered Colonel Boerstler’s advanced guard on the road between Queenston and St. Davids, and one of the scouts had been killed.

      Laura’s intelligence had been correct. The American army was on its way.

      8

       Ambush in the Beech Woods: The Battle of Beaver Dams

      Although no American troops had appeared on June 23, FitzGibbon did not sit idly by, waiting for something to happen. He sent word of the imminent attack to Lieutenant Colonel Bisshopp at Twenty Mile Creek and to Major Peter de Haren stationed near Shipman’s Corners at Twelve Mile Creek. De Haren’s position happened to be several miles from the place where Laura Secord had earlier crossed the creek.