The War of 1812 -- an Unequivocal American Defeat?

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Timothy H. Barnes
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The War of 1812 -- an Unequivocal American Defeat?

#1

Post by Timothy H. Barnes » 06 Jul 2007, 07:34

Hi, Everybody

As a new member, I have only made a few postings, none of which seemed to merit a reply. Maybe this will spark more controversy!

The War of 1812 is largely ignored because (a) it was overshadowed by the struggle with Napoleonic France, (b) the numbers on each side in most battles were relatively small, and (c) American propaganda has given the popular impression that it was a "few" brave Americans who prevailed over a "mighty redcoat host".

Don't get me wrong. Far from being anti-American, I am quite the reverse. If you read my posting on "The Unknown War", the basic theme there is that implicitly Canadians and Americans have had a closer bond than almost any other national groups. But in order to read much of the American literature on the subject of the War of 1812, one must have good control of his gag reflex. Outside North America everybody, even in this forum, seems want to give the subject a pass.

There is no way that the United States won the War of 1812. Yes, they had good men and true in that war, but they did lose. Furthermore, they have even claimed battles such as the Battle of Lundy's Lane as a victory, even though the result was that they were kicked out of Canada (Upper Canada)! Can anybody reasonably argue the contrary to these assertions?

Here is what I said in footnote 18 to my posting on "The Unknown War":
When considering popular political sentiment in the west of Canada, the traumatic Canadian experience should not be forgotten that, in the year 1813, Ontario (then Upper Canada) had been almost conquered during the War of 1812. The population of the United States in 1812 had then stood at 8 million, and that of Ontario at barely 80,000. At the outset of war, the Americans had placed 175,000 men on a war footing, while Ontario had fewer than 10,000 citizens capable of bearing arms. There would be a total of twelve distinct invasions of Canada in that war, and 56 separate land and naval battles, of which the majority were won by British and colonial Canadian forces.* The Niagara Peninsula became occupied by Americans, and the capital of Ontario, Toronto (then York), was briefly captured twice (on April 27 and again on July 30, 1813), looted, and its public buildings reduced to ashes.

In a time of primitive land communications, control of the Great Lakes shipping arteries had been vital, but Lake Erie was lost to the British, who, abandoning the west country, retreated to Burlington, at the western head of Lake Ontario. Were control of this single lake, Lake Ontario, also to have been lost, the British would have been compelled to withdraw to Kingston, Ontario far to the east, effectively abandoning Ontario to the invader; ultimately, British strategy was to defend Montreal and Quebec City at all costs. Then came the small but pivotal night Battle of Stoney Creek, near Burlington, on June 6, 1813, in which British and colonial forces, numbering but 700 muskets, put to flight a force of 3,400 American troops. The tide had begun to turn. In larger battles to come, including Chateauguay, Chrysler’s Farm, and Lundy’s Lane, the invaders were pushed back once more to the border.

It is one of life’s enduring mysteries that Americans, who, despite the advantage of vastly disproportionate strength, won only a minority of battles during the War of 1812, none of their victories being decisive (one of their most touted victories, the Battle of New Orleans, actually occurred subsequent to the signing of the treaty ending the War, the Peace of Ghent), have hitherto remained almost universally ignorant of the fundamental, historical fact that, by all reasonable criteria, the United States lost this war unequivocally. Furthermore, while some of them have bemoaned that Washington was partially burnt in 1814, the conclusion is inescapable that the preceding burnings of Toronto (then York) and Port Dover, Ontario by American forces were imprudent and a cause; regarding the fate of Washington, contemporary Toronto inhabitants thereafter considered the job only half-done and their prayers only incompletely answered.

* (G. Sterling Ryerson, “A century later – Canadian memories of the War”, in Morris Zaslow, ed., The defended border: Upper Canada and the War of 1812 (Toronto: MacMillan), 1964, p. 326).
Maybe after 200 years, can we please get even a little interest and historical objectivity here? For most of the War, the British had fewer than 6,000 troops to defend an area from Quebec City to positions far to the north-west of Windsor (much of it trackless wilderness), and only were able to achieve occasional parity in battle by brilliant concentration of forces against incredible odds. Replies anyone?

Tim
Toronto

P.S. Even though many of the battles of the War were small, they were also occasions in which considerable valour was exhibited by both sides, and the fighting was often extremely desperate. At Lundy's Lane, some experienced British officers who were veterans of the Peninsular War against Napoleon were absolutely horrified at the degree of carnage of the toe-to-toe fighting they witnessed.

Also, in a recent survey, after 200 years, a majority of Canadians voted their greatest Canadian hero to be Major-General Sir Isaac Brock, the "Saviour of Upper Canada", who died on the field of victory at the Battle of Queenston Heights. He wasn't even a Canadian (he was from the Isle of Wight, I believe), but he is still deservedly up there at the top of the Canadian list!

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#2

Post by ChristopherPerrien » 06 Jul 2007, 09:33

What's Canada got to do with the War of 1812? :lol:
There is no way that the United States won the War of 1812. Yes, they had good men and true in that war, but they did lose.
Score one for the British for burning the US Capitol , however the US was too big for the British to defeat by 1812. Neither side truely won, but the US did win most of the land and Naval combats in the war.. Past the DC fiasco, the US did really well defeating British frigates in the War and the war was extremely costly to the British in terms of lost trade, merchant ships , and $$$$. Britain could not withstand the war on its commerce that the US was fighting with its Frig-nauts and privateer raiders. The US did extremely well, winning many notable single ship engagements and The Battles of Lake Erie and Lake Champlain, against the "Greatest Seapower in the World" no less. That is part of what convinces many Americans that we won the War of 1812.

On land, I know little about the "little" skimishes in the North and Canada, but there is no doubt that the US army and US Militias would have become an insurmountable problem for further British expeditions into the USA if the war had continued. As you may know US "miltia" beat some of Britain's best Napoleonic soldiers at the Battle of New Orleans. It is another reason that many Amercans think we won that war or would have, if it had continued. InOurHumbleOpinions, we would have kicked much more Red-Coat butt.
We fired our guns and the British kept a'comin.
But there wasn't nigh as many as there was a while ago.
We fired once more and they began to runnin'
down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico.
Chris


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#3

Post by Timothy H. Barnes » 06 Jul 2007, 12:27

Chris,

No offence, but you just proved my point about our needing more objectivity and less chest-thumping chauvinism from a few of you guys.

What do (a) a minority of the 56 battles won by the United States, none decisive, and (b) 12 failed, beaten-back invasions of Canada by the United States mean in plain, everyday English? Is some kind of mathematical proof required to show that the U.S. lost?

Thank you most of all for admitting that you know little about the "little" skirmishes in the North and Canada that seemed so significant at the time to the outnumbered (but not outfought) inhabitants north of the border over which American troops were constantly teeming in their tens of thousands like buffalo on the prairies. That just happens to be the whole point of the posting.

As for the boast about some American naval victories on the Great Lakes against the "Greatest Seapower in the World", this is mainly irrelevant insofar as it relates to the reputation of the British Navy worldwide. Are you aware that British navy warships could not be brought from the Atlantic into the Great Lakes, and that each and every warship on both sides had to be built locally from scratch -- this at a time when Britain was fully engaged and devoting almost all its resources to fighting Napoleon? The result was mainly just a lot of exhausted ships' carpenters. By the way, the Americans never did take Lake Ontario, because they lacked the naval power to do so.

As for the "What If's" -- let's please do us all a favour and concentrate on the historical record.

As for the catchy song, is that supposed to be a reasonable rebuttal? Come on, man. Let's get serious. You're giving me a migraine with that one.

Sorry for the vigorous defence. I did honestly appreciate the courtesy of your reply.

Strength and Honour
Tim

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#4

Post by henryk » 06 Jul 2007, 20:17

But the US won the deciding battle of the War of 1812, when they defeated the British Army which was composed of veterans of the Napoleonic Wars.
See:
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=117673

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#5

Post by ckleisch » 06 Jul 2007, 20:28

I would like to respond to Mr. Barnes inquiry. I note that you are Canadian and so if a citizen likely more versed in your countries history, lore and traditions given to you through schools and education. Within, the US we to have the same tradition as to the teaching of history. However, for over a hundred years within the education field ie teaching of history there is a trend. Highlights are given to the War of Independence, the War with Mexico, a lot on the Civil War and the World Wars. Very little is taught on the subject of the War of 1812 and even then the misbegotten Battle of New Orleans is the highlight. As a historian my expertise is the American Civil War and German Imperialism in the two wars. However, I do have an interest in the campaigns within Canada and perhaps an exchange of information will be of benefit.
Perhaps to start you might recommend some readings that you have perused on the subject from an unbiased American (US) standpoint that would place a proper perspective on the facts. Then we could respond properly as to what you have indicated as are the facts. Do you have any campaign maps or battles you can highlight for us?

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#6

Post by ChristopherPerrien » 06 Jul 2007, 22:59

What do (a) a minority of the 56 battles won by the United States, none decisive, and (b) 12 failed, beaten-back invasions of Canada by the United States mean in plain, everyday English?
I am sorry but your over-estimations of ALL American incursions into Canada as "invasions" are mistaken. As is your basic premise that somehow the main events of the War of 1812 were fought in and over Canada. Canada had little to do with why the USA fought the British Empire in the War of 1812. The primary reason was the violation and ignoring of our nation's soverignty by the British Empire and the English.

As to the idea that the lake battles somehow did not reflect badly on the British just becuase they are lakes , I don't think the An'glish have ever taken any defeat ON THE WATER very well. If they lose, the excuses start immediately flying fast and thick. As the lake battles and more poignantly, the frigate battles in the War of 1812 show. These brought accusations of cheating and unfairness by the British Empire and expose the best example of British ignorance of the inherent superiority of American sailors over the sailors of the British Empire. That is what happens when you have ships crewed by slaves and forced to their job by threats and use of physical punishment rather than ships crewed by "FREE-MEN".

The impressment of Americans into the British Navy was the main reason for the War of 1812. This same impressment of "humans" and the "attitude" of the British Empire is what made America superior to the British Empire both on the water and the war in general. British slaves and subjects were fighting for an Empire, Americans were fighting for themselves and democracy and freedom and a New Age.

I believe most of our incursions into Canada were solely to eliminate the THREAT of Canada being used as a base for the further oppression and disbarrment of America as a nation by the British Empire, not invasions per se'. While it true that some Canadians thought/think that the war represented a victory for "Canada" against an American territorial advancement North, I guess the subjects/slaves of the British Empire failed to realize what they were fighting for(Empire) and what they were fighting against(freedom and democracy). I can only note that America was growing in every direction and continued to do for many years, this growth was the natural result of the "democratic ideals" of America.

Is some kind of mathematical proof required to show that the U.S. lost?
I think your proof that the US lost the War of 1812 is solely based on the fact/idea that the English Canadians managed to remain subjects of the British Empire. Oh well, y'alls victory I guess. But the whole idea of American invasion of Canada in the War of 1812 was just a "side-show" and rather unimportant one at that, as far as America was concerned.
Thank you most of all for admitting that you know little about the "little" skirmishes in the North and Canada that seemed so significant at the time to the outnumbered (but not outfought) inhabitants north of the border over which American troops were constantly teeming in their tens of thousands like buffalo on the prairies.
Constantly teaming ? tens of thousands? I don't think so.
That just happens to be the whole point of the posting.
I'll let you and this topic get to that after this post. You should be more specific and objective :roll: in your topic title, like "American defeats in battles in Canada during the War of 1812", because America did not lose the war of 1812. Since you were vague and seem less than objective yourself , expect alot of "chest-thumping chauvinism from a few of you guys." Excuse my flag-waving , but you started it, and just 2 days after the 4th of July no less.

As for the catchy song, is that supposed to be a reasonable rebuttal? Come on, man. Let's get serious. You're giving me a migraine with that one.
Gives me a headache too , The twang of Johnny Horten, I guess, but it also makes me smile.
Well, they ran through the briars and they ran through the brambles
And they ran through the bushes where a rabbit couldn't go.
They ran so fast the hounds couldn't catch 'em
:)

Regards Tim, I take my leave of this topic as I know little about the battles you are interested in , still less about understanding your Canadian view about it. However I have many more Acadian French anchestors than English ones.

Chris

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The War of 1812 -- an Unequivocal American Defeat?

#7

Post by Timothy H. Barnes » 09 Jul 2007, 11:49

Friends –

My silence over the last few days was owing to indisposition, not lack of respect for the topic at hand. ckleisch, your request for a bibliography and maps is a good one, which I will answer as expeditiously as possible.

I now realize that, by posting such a challenging topic, more contributions will be necessary. Please allow me time to make this in installments. Also, provocative language need not be immoderate – my earlier criticism of American historians was rather unwarranted; some of my own sources, in fact, including my beloved two-volume work by Benjamin Lossing, The pictorial field-book of the War of 1812, are American.

Finally, in this installment, I would like not to address the actual winning or losing of the War of 1812 in the field per se. Rather, I would like to point out that the War of 1812 was, in a larger, geopolitical sense, an irredeemable setback to expansion of the United States -- ironically, the War of 1812 saved Canada from extinction.


The War of 1812: an Irredeemable American Setback to Expansion

Had I not raised the original subject at hand, then many of you might have continued to think that the War of 1812 was a “mere” British-American war, which, of course, in the formal sense it was. But please take note that the crucial theatre of war was not the Atlantic privateering/ commerce-raiding region, nor was it the late-1814 British campaign regions in the Lake Champlain area or the South (these latter campaigns were basically designed and executed to gain advantage at the peace-negotiating table at Ghent). The War of 1812 theatre of primary strategic importance always was the Canadian theatre, for it was there not only that the United States was foiled in the war aim of conquering British North American possessions by force of arms, but it was there that it lost the chance for all time to gain this territory by political absorption by any other means. But for the War of 1812, it is probable in the extreme that all of present-day Canada would now exist under the banner of the Stars and Stripes, and that the United States would be a nation stretching from Atlantic to Pacific, and from Rio Grande to the Arctic Ocean.

Again and again, Canadian historians have made a very vital point, and again and again American historians have, by and large, blithely ignored it. By the second decade of the 19th Century, Ontario (and, subsequently and inevitably, the rest of British North America) was a plum, ripe and ready to fall into the welcoming hands of the great Union to the South. In 1812, the population of Ontario was tiny (60,000 – 80,000 souls), badly-divided politically, and generally considered itself unable to ward off prolonged attack by a much more powerful neighbour.

As Canadian and popular historian Pierre Berton wrote:
In the summer of 1812, with three American armies threatening the border strongpoints – Amherstburg, Queenston, Montreal, and Kingston – the early fall of Upper Canada and the subsequent collapse of Quebec seemed certain. In British North America there were some three hundred thousand souls, in the Union to the south, almost eight million. In Upper Canada, three out of five settlers were newly arrived Americans, people of uncertain loyalties, lured from New York, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut by the promise of cheap land. They scarcely thought of themselves as British, though they were forced into a token oath of allegiance, and they certainly did not call themselves Canadian (that word was reserved for their French-speaking neighbours, many of whom lived on American soil in the vicinity of Detroit). Surely these people would not oppose an invasion by their compatriots!

Nor, on the face of it, would they. There is little evidence of any surge of national pride rippling across the grain fields, swamps, and forests of Upper Canada in the early days of the war; quite the opposite. The main emotion was not patriotism but fear: fear of the invaders who could and did loot the farms to feed themselves; fear of the British regulars, whose task it was to stiffen the backbones of the reluctant citizen soldiers; fear of the Indians; fear of losing a harvest, a homestead, and above all a life. Many of the militia had to be goaded into fighting, while large numbers of settlers expressed pro-American sympathies, sometimes openly, more often privately. It is possible, even probable, that without the war the province would eventually have become another state in the Union. The Americans could have had it by osmosis. But the war intervened. (Pierre Berton, The invasion of Canada, 1812-1813 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart), 1980, pp. 25-26)
As Canadian J.M.S. Careless wrote while he was Chairman of the Department of History, University of Toronto:
Before the war, Upper Canada had been little more than a loose string of settlements along the American border, largely populated from the United States and uncertain in their loyalties. Granted, there were United Empire Loyalists among them, whose own feelings had been sharply defined by their opposition to the American Revolution. Yet the Loyalists’ allegiance had been to the British connection, or perhaps to the old colonies that were no more: they had not yet necessarily identified themselves with their new homeland. Furthermore, the largest single element in the province were those American pioneers who had come in the wake of the Loyalists seeking fertile, empty land. If they had no strong cause to dislike a provincial regime that offered free lands and little taxes, these sons of the republic had no reason either to feel firmly committed to the British colony. In fact, there was a widespread assumption among them that the spread of American settlement into Upper Canada would lead naturally and irresistibly to its incorporation into the United States. The province yet had no real definition or commitment. It was virtually an overflow of the American frontier, which seemed destined to absorb it. (J.M.S. Careless, “Introduction,” In Morris Zaslow, ed. The defended border: Upper Canada and the War of 1812 (Toronto: MacMillan Co.), 1964, pp. 2-3)
Militarily, Ontario in 1812 was ready to collapse. The province’s administrator and commander of all armed forces, Major-General Isaac Brock (later Sir Isaac; he died at Queenston Heights before receiving news of his knighthood), a 42-year-old, 6’ 3” Englishman who was probably the most competent general officer on either side during the War, had 850 British troops under his command to defend all Ontario. Privately he wrote to the new Governor General of Canada at Quebec City, Sir George Prevost, that it was impossible to animate the militia to a proper sense of duty. When he had attempted to muster 500 men at Long Point on Lake Erie to march to the relief of Fort Amherstburg, there had been open revolt.[1] Anti-British dissidents (who later turned traitor) made inflammatory speeches in the colonial legislature. There was a general mood among the citizenry of despair and defeatism.

Then – a miracle happened! War came to Canada. The polarizing effect may be seen in events in the extreme southwest of Ontario, near the American Fort Detroit. When Brig. Gen. William Hull, Commander of the U.S. Army of the Northwest and Governor of Michigan Territory, commanding 2,000 men, arrived at Detroit, with the intention of seizing the British Ft. Amerherstburg in Ontario to the south, his men were practically greeted by the Ontario population nearby with open arms. At the settlement of Sandwich, Ontario, opposite Detroit, many of the inhabitants waved white handkerchiefs and flags, and their welcome was cordial. The colonial militia of Kent and Essex counties, which covered the area, was a disaffected, pro-American rabble. The British commander at Ft. Amherstburg, Lt. Col. St. George, saw his militia force dwindling daily, and was filled with desperation; he considered the men capable of joining the invaders themselves.[2]

Hull, however, issued a witless and bombastic proclamation to the “Inhabitants of Canada”, in which he stated the aim of delivering them from tyranny and threatened that “No white man found fighting by the side of an Indian will be taken prisoner. Instant destruction will be his lot….”[3] Soon thereafter, Hull sent Gen. Duncan McArthur, commander of the Ohio militia, on a raid into Ontario up the Thames River, foraging for supplies. For 60 miles McArthur left a trail of devastation – burnt farms, destroyed grist mills, and slaughtered and stolen livestock.
Yet Hull has overstated his case. These are farmers he is addressing, not revolutionaries. The colonial authoritarianism touches very few. They do not feel like slaves; they already have enough peace, liberty and security to satisfy them. This tax-free province is not America at the time of the Boston Tea Party. Why is Hull asking them to free themselves from tyranny? In the words of one, if they had been under real tyranny, “they could at any time have crossed the line to the United States.”

Hull has made another error. He threatens that anyone found fighting beside the Indians can expect no quarter. That rankles. Everybody will be fighting with the Indians; it will not be a matter of choice. Some of the militiamen who have secretly hoped to go over to Hull in the confusion of battle have a change of heart. What is the point of deserting if the Americans intend to kill them on capture? (Pierre Berton, The invasion of Canada, 1812-1813 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart), 1980, pp. 130-131)
Within a short time, the militia of Essex and Kent were no longer quite so disaffected towards the British cause. The fact that the Americans had promised no quarter was an insult which failed to intimidate. Then the American forces had begun to beggar them by destroying their crops and orchards! Slowly they drifted back to the muster calls. By August 9, parties of them were to lie in wait, determinedly, to ambush Hull’s supply trains, ready to charge in the centre with the bayonet, in concert with Shawnee warriors on the flanks.[4]

It was, in conclusion, a tragically missed opportunity for the United States. Americans of that period would later be considered the enemy across Ontario, having burnt every home along the Niagara River, despoiled Toronto, laid waste the Thames Valley, and ravaged the St. Lawrence. No longer would it be popular to espouse American ideals – for a few short years, anyway.

From a companion volume, Flames across the border, to the one previously quoted of his, I will let Canadian Pierre Berton have the (almost) last word:
Having won the last battle, the Americans were convinced that they won the War of 1812. Having stemmed the tide of invasion and kept the Americans out of their country, Canadians believed that they won the war. Having ceded nothing that they considered important, the British were serene in the conviction that they won it. But war is not a cricket match. The three nations that celebrated peace were beggared by the conflict, their people bereaved, their treasuries emptied, their graveyards crowded. In North America, the charred houses, the untended farms, the ravaged fields along the border left a legacy of bitterness and distrust….

…The War of 1812 was remembered only in terms of catch-phrases: Don’t give up the ship… We have met the enemy and they are ours… Push on, brave York Volunteers [alleged last words of Maj. Gen. Sir Isaac Brock at Queenston Heights]. History gave the conflict short shrift; and yet, for all its bunglings and idiocies, it helped determine the shape and nature of Canada. Like the Battle of Waterloo, it was, to use Wellington’s phrase, “a near run thing.” The balance might have been tipped another way had the leadership on either side been more incisive, the weather less captious, or the Gods of War less perverse. A change of wind on Lake Champlain could have led to the capture of Upper New York State. The sniper’s bullet that killed Isaac Brock undoubtedly helped prolong the struggle.

Events, not individuals, it is said, control the course of history. The War of 1812 suggests the opposite. Canada’s destiny, for better or for worse, was in the hands of human beings, subject to human caprices, strengths, and emotions. If the ambitious Winfield Scott had waited for the army at Lundy’s Lane, if the haughty Commodore Chauncey had deigned to support Jacob Brown at Fort George, could Upper Canada have held out? Tecumseh [the brilliant and charismatic Shawnee leader of the Indian confederation against the United States] was unique. If he had not been born, would another have risen in his place?

Human failings frustrated American strategy. If Kingston or Montreal had fallen, Ontario would be an American state today. But Dearborn and Wilkinson were flawed commanders. An American Brock might have pierced the heartland of the nation and cut the jugular between the two provinces. But the invaders were reduced to hacking vainly at the country’s extremities. (Pierre Berton, Flames across the border (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart), 1981, pp. 424, 426-427)
In future I will try to address other aspects of the war on the Canadian frontier. Obviously your comments will be of great interest.


Footnotes

[1] E.A. Cruickshank, ed. Documents relating to the invasion of Canada and the surrender of Detroit, Canadian Archives Publications, No. 7 (Ottawa: Government Printing Bureau), 1912, pp. 195-196.
[2] Pierre Berton, The invasion of Canada, 1812-1813 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart), 1980, p. 127.
[3] E.A. Cruickshank, ed., op. cit., pp. 58-60.
[4] Milo M. Quaife, ed. War on the Detroit: the chronicles of Thomas Vercheres de Boucherville, and the capitulation by an Ohio volunteer (Chicago: Lakeside Press), 1940, p. 94.


Best wishes,
Tim

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#8

Post by redcoat » 29 Jul 2007, 22:29

henryk wrote:But the US won the deciding battle of the War of 1812, when they defeated the British Army which was composed of veterans of the Napoleonic Wars.
Actually the Battle of New Orleans is famous for being one of the most totally unnecessary battles ever fought ,as the British and USA had already agreed to end the war with the Treaty of Ghent at the end of the previous year, and the British government had even ratified it.
The battle changed nothing.

ps, the battle of New Orleans is often claimed to be the last action of the War of 1812, it wasn't. The last battle was the capture of Fort Bowyer by the same British force which had been defeated at New Orleans, over 350 US regulars being captured.

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#9

Post by waldorf » 31 Jul 2007, 02:30

Does anyone happen to know of any interesting biographies written about either Sir Alexander Cochrane or Sir Edward Pakenham?

Thanks,

Chris

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#10

Post by The_Gang_of_1 » 04 Aug 2007, 12:44

Chris,

Your replies are contradictory (hey, that means you keep contradicting yourself).

Please explain why Canada had nothing to do with the War of 1812. You surely don't mean to tell us the battle of New Orleans (after the war ended) was the be all and end all of that war, do you?

And are you sure it was a good idea to conclude your "argument" with the words of Johnny Horton's song? A guy quotes facts and statistics at you, but you answer with country music. And you expect us to take you seriously???

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#11

Post by ChristopherPerrien » 05 Aug 2007, 00:49

Gang of 1,

Well sometimes, you have to really read my posts, I said , the incursions into Canada were a "sideshow". Obviously there were some people/special interest groups in the US that were interested with gaining land/territory in Canada and this interest went way up into our government(Jefferson being the biggest sinner), to an fair extent, because such "capitalist/manifest destiny" interests, dovetailed nicely with the sound reasoning of knocking out Canada as a base of operations for the British incursions against the north-eastern/mid-western US.

As to the Battle of New Orleans, of course it was fought after the war, but it is anybody's guess what would have happened if the British had seized N.O. My guess is the war would have restarted if the British had won and remained in N.O./La.. So it was best we kicked their butts there and then, instead of having to do so later. Personally, none of the land battles of 1812 seem to have amounted to little more than skimishes ,with The Battle of New Orleans being the only "big battle" ,solely by right of being the bloodiest.
And are you sure it was a good idea to conclude your "argument" with the words of Johnny Horton's song?A guy quotes facts and statistics at you, but you answer with country music. And you expect us to take you seriously???
You're not an "us", Facts and statistics are great, but when you go look up incursions into Canada and find out the sizes of US forces involved and the incompetentcy of the original leaders/officers and the "planning"or lack thereof, you realize that these were mostly smallish (militia)forces of a few thousand led primarily by politicians not generals/soldiers. Sure there were some personal expectations to "conquer" Canada by a few self-centered politicians , but I don't see any real/true U.S. "national will/lebensraum" involved in the Canadian incursions, i.e "No Invasion". I suppose a good debate could be done on Jefferson/Madison/Monroe being "personifications" of some sort of US national growth/will/manifest destiny, but this is not the place/topic to do it.

The song was merely meant as a joke to rile the Gnomes of Avion(English) and to counter this rare? English Canadian view on the war. It was also to note/joke that the Canadian theater was/is not considered historically as being remotely as important as other reasons and events in that war. The U.S. won, we're still here. Canada is still Canada, and I guess if you are English-Canadian that may mean something. The same can't be said for the British Empire. The Revolutionary War and the 1812 sequel has alot to do with that being the case.

As I implied earlier, I think the topic title is "over-broad", as the topic was meant to discuss/debate the Canadian theater battles and their effects in the War of 1812 and not the entire War of 1812; Hence the chest-thumping US chauvanism and gnome bashing and rather bad folk/country music.And I note that I have baled out of this topic as to discussing the battles of Canada as I know very little about them and have nothing "historical" to add.

And are you sure it was a good idea to conclude your "argument" with the words of Johnny Horton's song?
Please take note that the music(not the lyrics) to this corny song, was actually played in celebration right after the battle of NewOrleans by the American forces present and is a rendition of an Irish? folk/fiddle tune "The 8th of January".The same name/day of the battle. Being "serious" or "accurate" about history does not always demand a presentation of figures, sometimes it is or can be "musical".

Good idea?, IDK , but at least it was novel, and it was more "thought out/deeper" than it may have appeared. Have a good topic, I'm staying out of it futher.

Chris

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redcoat
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#12

Post by redcoat » 06 Aug 2007, 13:37

ChristopherPerrien wrote:Gang of 1,

Well sometimes, you have to really read my posts, I said , the incursions into Canada were a "sideshow"
with the two exceptions of the British raids against Washington and New Orleans they were the only 'show' in the war
As to the Battle of New Orleans, of course it was fought after the war, but it is anybody's guess what would have happened if the British had seized N.O. My guess is the war would have restarted if the British had won and remained in N.O./La..
The British had not only signed the treaty, they had also ratified it in parliament and issued orders to their field commanders in North American to return all captured territory. American historians have spent years attempting to find evidence that if the British had captured New Orleans they would have kept it, without success.

Harry92
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#13

Post by Harry92 » 08 Aug 2007, 01:53

redcoat,

Just thought that you would like to know that a new book on the War of 1812 will be coming out on September 15 by a Briton. It is by Jon Latimer who lives in Wales. Go to the link below.

http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/LATWAR.html

HarryA (from the THC board)

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aca
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#14

Post by aca » 18 Aug 2007, 00:30

of course this is an american defeat. us invades british canada and is beaten back by the british who subsequently enter the us and burn its capital.

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#15

Post by TRose » 20 Aug 2007, 19:22

Have to say the War of 1812 was a draw as neither side really gained anything.
But as for the U.S having 175,000 troops, well that might be in theory but not in practice. Most U.S troops where militia and many of the Militia refused to leave their home state .For example at the Battle of Queens ton height many of the New York Militia refused to cross into Canada.. And New England, the part of the U.S closest to Canada refused to have anything to do with the War.
BTW if Canadian/British ever decide to burn Washington D.C down again, please make sure all members of Congress are chained to their desk before you set fire to the Capital. That way we will not hold it against you.

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