On the morning of April 27, 1813, 34-year-old New Jersey native Zebulon Pike, the youngest brigadier general in the U.S. Army, stood on the deck of the USS Madison preparing to lead his men in an amphibious landing against the Canadian capital of York (today Toronto).
Overall command of the operation, which included about 1,500 troops and a flotilla of 14 vessels, was under the direction of elderly, overweight Revolutionary War veteran Henry Dearborn. Pike would lead the operations onshore.
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