Standard equipment included a rifle, tomahawk or small ax and a knife. The Crown issued each man a sword, pike and pistol, but most voyageurs sold or simply discarded those extraneous items as soon as possible. Only the British officers retained those weapons.

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The voyageurs were atypical soldiers, to say the least. Their independence made them very poor at parade ground tactics, and they were not amenable to uniformity. Moreover, there were numerous infractions of discipline owing to their ceaseless pranks, drunkenness and constant cheerfulness. British officers charged with instilling discipline in the corps were understandably aghast when the voyageurs appeared on the parade grounds with pipes in their mouths, unshaven for days or weeks, and with their rations of pork and bread stuck on their bayonets. ‘In this condition,’ wrote Ross Cox, a contemporary observer, ‘they presented a curious contrast to…the British soldiery with whom they occasionally did duty.’

Their impertinence sometimes led to temporary confinement, but such measures were usually in vain. The voyageurs were swindlers, bribers and charmers of the highest order, and often managed to convince their guards to pass them food or drink, or even slip them out for a brief leg-stretching. The British observer added that when a fellow voyageur was the sentry, a prisoner could even expect to be allowed out to carouse for the evening, to’sleep with his woman and come back early next morning.’

For all their ill-disciplined behavior, however, the Corps of Canadian Voyageurs played a valued role in the War of 1812. To a man they were skilled at handling boats, accustomed to life in the wilderness, and were naturally suited to the skirmishing that characterized the war in the west. Cox summarized their value by noting that ‘notwithstanding these peculiarities the voyageurs were excellent partisans, and, their superior knowledge of the country being of immense value to the British.’

After years of mingling, intermarriage and business dealings the voyageurs and Indians were on excellent terms. That too proved useful for gathering intelligence about American movements and for maintaining cordial relations with tribes being wooed by the enemy.

It was during one such diplomatic overture that the Corps of Voyageurs was first blooded. October 23, 1812, saw a 31-man detachment encamped at the Akwesasne village of St. Regis along the Lower Canada (Quebec) and New York borders. The Akwesasne, like the other Iroquois peoples, had remained neutral until then, and it fell to 43-year-old Lieutenant Pierre Rottote to determine where their allegiances lay. Serving alongside him was Sergeant John McGillivray, the 22-year-old son of corps Commandant William McGillivray.

Before dawn a 400-man detachment of American soldiers from Plattsburgh descended upon St. Regis and surprised the picket. Lieutenant Rottote and Sergeant McGillivray organized a hurried defense, but the numbers against them were overwhelming. The battle was over before it even began, but not before a total of eight voyageurs fell dead — McGillivray and Rottote among them (the latter earning the distinction of being the first British officer killed in the war). The surviving 23 defenders were captured, the village was plundered and homes sacked, and a Union Jack taken. The Americans boasted it was the first standard taken in the war.

Despite the loss of more than a tenth of its complement, the Corps of Canadian Voyageurs proved of immense value to the British war effort in the following months. It helped keep the isolated forts of the northwest supplied, especially Fort Michilimackinac, the key to controlling the vital region, and it was in no small part thanks to the corps that the British were even able to engage in limited offensives in the west, such as the attack on Frenchtown (or the Raisin River) in Michigan on January 22, 1813.

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