The British under General Jeffery Amherst captured the fort the following year in the 1759 Battle of Ticonderoga. In this confrontation 11,000 British troops, using emplaced artillery, drove off the token garrison of 400 Frenchmen. The French, in withdrawing, used explosives to destroy what they could of the fort and spiked or dumped cannons that they did not take with them. Although the British worked in 1759 and 1760 to repair and improve the fort, it was not part of any further significant action in the war. After the war, the British garrisoned the fort with a small number of troops and allowed it to fall into disrepair. Colonel Frederick Haldimand, in command of the fort in 1773, wrote that it was in "ruinous condition".