While Canadian children learn all about this fairly well in their government schools, the version that is taught in the US government licensed public and private schools is that the British were to blame for this war and we (US) beat them good. Nothing can be further from the truth.
From what I can recall from my own schooling in the 1960s/1970s, there was mention of the British navy “impressing” US sailors into service on British warships. Well, the truth is that this had been happening since the end of the US War for Independence in 1783 by BOTH the British and the US navies as well as navies all around the globe. In fact, the main mission of the US Marines was to go into port and get able bodied sailors for US ships, kidnapping was encouraged for the greater good. There is no way this issue alone triggered this war.
Since war is the health of the state, power and money are usually the top two reasons states go down this path. The lies told to the public citizens so that they will go along and give up their teen and 20-something men to fight in this just cause is justified because the ends justify the means.
To set the stage and context for this war initiated by the US, one has to find the trigger to resort to this decision. Most of what is covered here is readily available in Wikipedia or its equivalent or conversely, one could listen to this podcast by Bad Quaker (Ben Stone) starting at 17:00 until 49:00.
Regarding the money angle for the US to decide to annex/invade Canada by crossing at Fort Detroit in July 1812, one has to know that since the mid-1780s the US enlisted and licensed privateers to confiscate British merchants goods from the high seas. These were not the Johnny Depp or Errol Flynn versions seen in movies of independent pirates going about their plundering but incorporated business more like present day Iraqi War – US Invasion companies like Halliburton, General Dynamics and Blackwater that thrive in times of conflict.
So up until 1805 with the Battle of Trafalgar, where the British navy whipped both the Spanish and French fleets, the US privateers (considered pirated in other countries) had free reign in the Caribbean and Atlantic due to the 600 ship British fleet focusing on other areas of the world. The Americas was a “backwater” area that did not really rate high on the priority of British global interests.
Complicit in this plundering was the fact that when the privateers brought the booty into US ports (mainly NYC and Boston) the US government got their cut from US constitution decreed taxes before the privateers sold these goods to Americans or even sometimes to the British themselves.
After 1805 the US government’s revenue stream from this activity started to dry up and there was much angst around the economic health of the US and its government by 1812.
Power was another angle that has to be considered as there had always been talk of expanding the US both north and south as well as west. During the US Revolutionary War an attempt to get Canada onboard was thwarted, but it seemed to some people who desired empire-building that Canada must be annexed.
It wasn’t enough that the US was able to obtain the Indian Confederacy land in the old Northwest Territory (Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Michigan) as this had been the intent since George Washington commanded ownership of large land swaths in the Ohio Territory.
So on 12JUL1812 US troops invaded Canada and was met with still resistance by the Canadians mainly (50% of the forces as militia) as the small number of British military leaders had no real skin in the game. Most of the elite thought that the US could just walk in .. even Thomas Jefferson!
The acquisition of Canada, this year, as far as the neighborhood of Quebec, will be a mere matter of marching. – Thomas Jefferson AUG1812
At the same time the US was an ally to France’s Napoleon who decided to invade Russia in 1812 and empire building elites in the US eyed Russian holdings from San Francisco bay up to Sitka, Alaska. When Napoleon failed in this endeavor, the US had to back off from their expansion dreams to the west.
The moneyed elites also looked with greed at all the land Spain still had from Mexico all the way to Panama! It is apparent that the immature US government bit off more than they could chew.
Looking just at a comparison of naval vessels, the British Empire had 600 ships at their disposal including some “Ship of the Line” types that had three decks of large cannon numbering from 100-120.
However, they decided to place only the following near this “backwater” region at Halifax, Nova Scotia:
- 1 old Ship of the Line
- 7 frigates
- 9 sloops
The US had the following:
- 8 frigates (including the USS Constitution which is still commissioned and still afloat)
- 14 sloops
Know that the USS Constitution had ONE gun deck and 44 guns, no match for the larger British ships and its fame was won by capturing a 16 gun schooner and a 20 gun sloop!
In fact the British Empire fought a defensive war that only sought to protect trade to the West Indies while the Canadians fought bravely and actually beat soundly the US’s invasion attempt.
The Treaty of Ghent on 23DEC1814 awarded the British and Canadians with all their territories returned that they possessed in JUL1812 while the British offered a condolence prize to the New England fishermen who threatened to secede during the war with prize fishing grounds in British waters off the Canadian coast.
The victory won in early 1815 at New Orleans by Andrew Jackson was mainly fought by US privateers and British commanded Canadians and made no difference in the war’s outcome having come after the treaty was signed in late 1814.
The US gained more war debt and no more territories as a result of this conflict. The US had twice as many killed and wounded than the British/Canadian forces. Would this be a lesson learned or would this repeat itself in another generation?
Stay tuned.
Peace out.
-SF!