The Battle of Point Iroquois occurred on November 8, 1813, as part of General James Wilkinson's campaign up the St. Lawrence River toward Montreal. This engagement was situated within a broader combined military strategy that included General Hampton's advance through Quebec, with the ultimate objective of capturing Montreal. Wilkinson's force had departed from Sackett's Harbour in September and by the end of October was positioned to advance along the Canadian shore.
The immediate context for the skirmish involved the narrow geography of Point Iroquois, located in Dundas County where the St. Lawrence River reached its narrowest point at only 500 yards across. On November 5, as Wilkinson's force began their movements on the river, Lieutenant Duncan Clark of the Incorporated Militia, who was formerly an Ensign in Captain Ault's Flank Company of the 1st Dundas Regiment, was assigned to duty on the shoreline with orders to raise an alarm upon detecting any American movements. Upon observing the mass of boats moving down the river, Lieutenant Clark commandeered a sturdy plough horse from a nearby farm and rode to alert the local forces.
The skirmish itself was described as a small engagement fought on the morning of November 8, 1813, on the shores of the St. Lawrence River at Point Iroquois. While the article confirms this action occurred as part of Wilkinson's advance toward Montreal, specific details regarding the tactical outcome, casualty figures, and immediate consequences of this particular skirmish are not provided in the source material.
The American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) grew from colonial resistance to British taxation without parliamentary representation — a dispute that radicalized through the Stamp Act (1765), the Townshend Acts (1767), and the Boston Massacre (1770). Fighting began at Lexington and Concord in April 1775; the Continental Congress declared independence on July 4, 1776. The Continental Army under George Washington faced severe shortages of supplies and troops, enduring the brutal winter at Valley Forge (1777–1778) before French alliance and French financing turned the military balance. Major engagements included Bunker Hill (1775), Trenton (1776), Saratoga (1777) — which secured French intervention — and Yorktown (1781), where British General Cornwallis surrendered to Washington. An estimated 25,000 American soldiers died in service, from combat, disease, and captivity. The Treaty of Paris (1783) recognized American independence and ceded British territory east of the Mississippi, though it left unresolved questions about Indigenous land rights and the status of Loyalists.
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