The quarter master general of that day, refused to make any advances to them ; the governor was therefore placed in the dilemma of providing as well as he could for them, expenses of every kind, or of permitting, them to return home for want of accommodation, disgusted both with the war and the government; lie issued orders for raising a brigade of volutiteers upon his own responsibility, which greatly distinguished itself on the Niagara frontier, and particularly at the memorable sortie from Fort Erie.

The officers were ail selected by Gov. Tompkins, and their gallant conduct in the field showed his admirable discrimination in this respect. He had previously recommended to the legislature to raise volunteer regiments for the defence of our frontiers and the city of New York ; but by a perversity that seems strange to us at the present day, his patriotic recommendation was rejected. A man of less firmness than Governor Tompkins would have quailed beneath the storm which was raised against him in Albany in the winter of 1S13-14, and the consequence would probably have been that the state would have been overrun by the foe. Not only was the whole western frontier in danger of invasion, but Sacketts Harbor, Plattsburgh and the city of New York. But regardless of censure or disapprobation he called into the field large bodies of militia, and organized a corps of new fencibles for the protection of the city of New York, consisting of one thousand men. In Sej)tember, 1814, the militia in service for the defence of the city amounted to 17,500 men. He was even ready to dispatch a force imder the lamented Decatur for the assistance of Baltimore, which was then menaced with an attack, and iiad not the news of the enemy's retreat been received the succor would have been upon the march to the relief of a sister state.