Battle of Valcour Island

The Battle of Valcour Island was a navy battle that occured on October 11-13, 1776 and was on Valcour Island, New York. American Major General Benedict Arnold came from a seafaring Connecticut family. He shrewdly chose to force the British to attack his inferior forces in a narrow, rocky body of water between the coast and Valcour Island, where the British fleet would have difficulty bringing its superior firepower to bear, and where the inferior seamanship of his unskilled sailors would have a minimal effect.
The British fleet took up positions at noon around 300 yards (c.300 m) in front of the American battle line with the small gunboats forward, and the five main ships around 50-100 yards behind the gunboats. The British then opened fire with a heavy broadside against the American ships, which continued for the next five hours. During the exchange of cannon fire, Revenge was heavily hit; Philadelphia was also heavily hit and sank later at around 6:30 p.m. Royal Savage commanded by Captain David Hawley ran aground and was set on fire by the crew to prevent the ship from falling in British hands. Congress and Washington were heavily damaged; Jersey and New York were also badly hit. On the British side, casualties began mounting, as well. HMS Carleton was heavily hit as it tried to land a boarding party on the grounded Royal Savage and was forced to withdraw under heavy fire. One small gunboat, commanded by Lieutenant Dufais, blew up and sank from a direct hit. Most of the other small gunboats were also hit, forcing them to withdraw and reform their battle line 700 yards from the American line. Two of the gunboats were so heavily damaged that their crews were forced to scuttle them after the action.
Nonetheless, the battle had gone against the Americans when the sun set on 11 October. Most of the American ships were damaged or sinking, and the crews reported around 60 casualties. The British reported around 40 casualties on their ships. Aware that he could not defeat the British fleet, Arnold decided to withdraw. Arnold managed to sneak his fleet past (and through) the British fleet during the night and attempted to run for the cover of the shore batteries situated at the American-held fort at Crown Point at the south end of the lake. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate, and the Americans were caught short of their goal. As the British pursued, Colonel Guy Carleton mistakenly fired upon a small rocky island, thinking it was an American ship. The small island was later named Carleton's prize. This battle was considered a draw.

I found this work on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Valcour_Island