The scene now shifts once more to the Montreal frontier,
which was being threatened by the converging forces of
Hampton from the south and Wilkinson from the west. Each
had about seven thousand men; and their common objective
was the island of Montreal. Hampton crossed the line at
Odelltown on September 20. But he presently moved back
again; and it was not till October 21 that he began his
definite attack by advancing down the left bank of the
Chateauguay, after opening communications with Wilkinson,
who was still near Sackett's Harbour. Hampton naturally
expected to brush aside all the opposition that could be
made by the few hundred British between him and the St
Lawrence. But de Salaberry, the commander of the British
advanced posts, determined to check him near La Fourche,
where several little tributaries of the Chateauguay made
a succession of good positions, if strengthened by abattis
and held by trained defenders.

The British force was very small when Hampton began his
slow advance; but 'Red George' Macdonell marched to help
it just in time. Macdonell was commanding a crack corps
of French Canadians, all picked from the best 'Select
Embodied Militia,' and now, at the end of six months of
extra service, as good as a battalion of regulars. He
had hurried to Kingston when Wilkinson had threatened it
from Sackett's Harbour. Now he was urgently needed at
Chateauguay. 'When can you start?' asked Prevost, who
was himself on the point of leaving Kingston for
Chateauguay. 'Directly the men have finished their dinners,