On the shore of Lake Champlain, Dearborn was in command of the largest and most promising force under the American flag, including seven regiments of the regular army.

Taking personal charge at Plattsburg, he marched this body of troops twenty miles in the direction of the Canadian border.

Here the militia refused to go on, and he marched back again after four days in the field.

Beset with rheumatism and low spirits, he wrote to the Secretary of War: "I had anticipated disappointment and misfortune in the commencement of the war, but I did by no means apprehend such a deficiency of regular troops and such a series of disasters as we have witnessed." Coupled with this complaint was the request that he might be allowed "to retire to the shades of private life and remain a mere but interested spectator of passing events." The Government, however, was not yet ready to release Major General Dearborn but instructed him to organize an offensive which should obtain control of the St.Lawrence River and thereby cut communication between Upper and Lower Canada.

This was the pet plan of Armstrong when he became Secretary of War, and as soon as was possible he set the military machinery in motion.