manuals, making it difficult to manoeuvre any large American force). Scott also purged his units of any remaining inefficient officers who had gained their appointments through political influence rather than experience or merit, and he insisted on proper camp discipline including sanitary arrangements. This reduced the wastage from dysentery and other enteric diseases which had been heavy in previous campaigns. There was only one major deficiency; Scott had been unable to obtain enough regulation blue uniforms for his men. Although they had been manufactured and sent to the northern theater, they had been diverted to Plattsburgh and Sackets Harbor. The United States Army's commissary general, Callender Irvine, hastily ordered 2,000 uniforms to be made and despatched to Buffalo for Scott's other units, but because there was insufficient blue cloth, short jackets (roundabouts) of gray cloth were used instead. When Scott received the gray roundabouts, he gathered up the blue coatees belonging to his brigade and gave them to the 21st US Infantry (one of the units in Brigadier General Eleazer Wheelock Ripley's brigade), because "the black coatees of the 21st are a disgrace to the uniform and soldier of the army of the United States" (G.O. 16, Winfield Scott, May 24, 1814). Niagara campaign By early July, Brown's division was massed at the Niagara, in accordance with Armstrong's alternate orders. Without cooperation from Chauncey, a direct attack on Fort George at the mouth of the Niagara was impossible. Nor was it possible to land large numbers of troops on the southern side of the Niagara Peninsula and advance on Burlington to cut off the British on the Niagara River, because the American squadron on Lake Erie (and the regular troops at Detroit) had been diverted to attempt the recapture of Fort Mackinac on Lake Huron. Armstrong suggested that Brown should therefore capture and hold Fort Erie, opposite Buffalo, while waiting for Chauncey to ready his squadron. Brown assented, but was prepared to push much further than the immediate vicinity of Fort Erie. On July 3, Brown's army, consisting of the regular brigades commanded by Scott (with 1,377 men) and Ripley (with 1,082 men), and four companies of artillery numbering 327 men under Major Jacob Hindman, easily surrounded and captured Fort Erie which was defended only by two weak companies under Major Thomas Buck. After a brigade of 750 volunteers from the militia under Brigadier General Peter B. Porter and 600