War of 1812
1812–1815 conflict in North America / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The War of 1812 was fought by the United States and its allies against the United Kingdom and its allies in North America. It began when the United States declared war on Britain on 18 June 1812. Although peace terms were agreed upon in the December 1814 Treaty of Ghent, the war did not officially end until the peace treaty was ratified by the United States Congress on 17 February 1815.[10][11]
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James Madison Henry Dearborn John Rodgers Stephen Decatur Andrew Jackson William Henry Harrison William Hull |
Philip Broke George Prévost Isaac Brock † Robert Ross † George Downie † Tecumseh † | ||||||||
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Anglo-American tensions originated in long-standing differences over territorial expansion in North America and British support for Tecumseh's confederacy, which resisted U.S. colonial settlement in the Old Northwest. These escalated in 1807 after the Royal Navy began enforcing tighter restrictions on American trade with France and impressed sailors who were originally British subjects, even those who had acquired American citizenship.[12] Opinion in the U.S. was split on how to respond, and although majorities in both the House and Senate voted for war, they divided along strict party lines, with the Democratic-Republican Party in favour and the Federalist Party against.[lower-alpha 4][13] News of British concessions made in an attempt to avoid war did not reach the U.S. until late July, by which time the conflict was already underway.
At sea, the Royal Navy imposed an effective blockade on U.S. maritime trade, while between 1812 and 1814 British regulars and colonial militia defeated a series of American invasions on Upper Canada.[14] The abdication of Napoleon in 1814 allowed the British to send additional forces to North America and reinforce the Royal Navy blockade, crippling the American economy.[15] In August 1814, negotiations began in Ghent, with both sides wanting peace; the British economy had been severely impacted by the trade embargo, while the Federalists convened the Hartford Convention in December to formalize their opposition to the war.
In August 1814, British troops captured Washington, before American victories at Baltimore and Plattsburgh in September ended fighting in the north. In the Southeastern United States, American forces and Indian allies defeated an anti-American faction of the Muscogee. In early 1815, American troops repulsed a major British attack on New Orleans, which occurred during the ratification process of the signing of Treaty of Ghent, which brought an end to the conflict.[16]
Since the conclusion of the War of 1812, historians have long debated the relative weight of the multiple reasons underlying its origins.[17]
During the 19th century, historians generally concluded that war was declared largely over national honour, neutral maritime rights and the British seizure of neutral ships and their cargoes on the high seas. This theme was the basis of President James Madison's war message to Congress on June 1, 1812. At the turn of the 20th century, much of the contemporary scholarship re-evaluated this explanation and began to focus more on non-maritime factors as significant contributing causes as well. However, historian Warren H. Goodman warns that too much focus on these ideas can be equally misleading.[18]
In disagreeing with those interpretations that have simply stressed expansionism and minimized maritime causation, historians have ignored deep-seated American fears for national security, dreams of a continent completely controlled by the republican United States, and the evidence that many Americans believed that the War of 1812 would be the occasion for the United States to achieve the long-desired annexation of Canada. [...] Thomas Jefferson well summarized American majority opinion about the war [...] to say "that the cession of Canada [...] must be a sine qua non at a treaty of peace." - Horsman[19]
Historian Richard Maass argues that the expansionist theme is a myth that goes against the "relative consensus among experts that the primary American objective was the repeal of British maritime restrictions". He says that scholars agree that the United States went to war "because six years of economic sanctions had failed to bring Britain to the negotiating table, and threatening the Royal Navy's Canadian supply base was their last hope". Maass agrees that expansionism might have tempted Americans on a theoretical level, but he finds that "leaders feared the domestic political consequences of doing so", particularly because such expansion "focused on sparsely populated western lands rather than the more populous eastern settlements".[20] To what extent that American leaders considered the question of pursuing territory in Canada, those questions "arose as a result of the war rather than as a driving cause."[21] However, Maass accepts that many historians continue to believe that expansionism was a cause.[20]
Reginald Horsman sees expansionism as a secondary cause after maritime issues, noting that many historians have mistakenly rejected expansionism as a cause for the war. He notes that it was considered key to maintaining sectional balance between free and slave states thrown off by American settlement of the Louisiana Territory and widely supported by dozens of War Hawk congressmen such as Henry Clay, Felix Grundy, John Adams Harper and Richard Mentor Johnson, who voted for war with expansion as a key aim. However, Horsman states that in his view "the desire for Canada did not cause the War of 1812" and that "The United States did not declare war because it wanted to obtain Canada, but the acquisition of Canada was viewed as a major collateral benefit of the conflict".[22]
However, other historians believe that a desire to permanently annex Canada was a direct cause of the war.[23][24] Carl Benn notes that the War Hawks' desire to annex the Canadas was similar to the enthusiasm for the annexation of Spanish Florida by inhabitants of the American South, as both expected war to facilitate expansion into long-desired lands and end support for hostile tribes (Tecumseh's Confederacy in the North and the Creek in the South).[25]
Alan Taylor says that many Democratic-Republican congressmen such as John Adams Harper, Richard Mentor Johnson and Peter Buell Porter "longed to oust the British from the continent and to annex Canada". A few Southerners opposed this, fearing an imbalance of free and slave states if Canada was annexed. Anti-Catholicism also caused many to oppose annexing the mainly Catholic Lower Canada, believing its French-speaking inhabitants unfit "for republican citizenship".[26]
Even major figures such as Henry Clay and James Monroe expected to keep at least Upper Canada in an easy conquest. Notable American generals such as William Hull issued proclamations to Canadians during the war promising republican liberation through incorporation into the United States. General Alexander Smyth similarly declared to his troops when they invaded Canada that "you will enter a country that is to become one of the United States. You will arrive among a people who are to become your fellow-citizens".[26] However, a lack of clarity about American intentions undercut these appeals.[26]
David and Jeanne Heidler argue that "most historians agree that the War of 1812 was not caused by expansionism, but instead reflected a real concern of American patriots to defend United States' neutral rights from the overbearing tyranny of the British Navy. That is not to say that expansionist aims would not potentially result from the war".[27] However, they also argue otherwise, saying that "acquiring Canada would satisfy America's expansionist desires", also describing it as a key goal of western expansionists who, they argue, believed that "eliminating the British presence in Canada would best accomplish" their goal of halting British support for tribal raids. They argue that the "enduring debate" is over the relative importance of expansionism as a factor, and whether "expansionism played a greater role in causing the War of 1812 than American concern about protecting neutral maritime rights".[23]
In the 1960s, the work of Norman K. Risjord, Reginald Horsman, Bradford Perkins and Roger Brown established a new eastern maritime consensus. While these authors approached the origins of the war from many perspectives, they all conceded that British maritime policy was the principal cause of the war.[28]
Honour and the "second war of independence"
As historian Norman Risjord notes, a powerful motivation for the Americans was their threatened sense of independence and the desire to uphold national honour in the face of what they considered British aggression and insults such as the Chesapeake–Leopard affair.[29] H. W. Brands writes: "The other war hawks spoke of the struggle with Britain as a second war of independence; [Andrew] Jackson, who still bore scars from the first war of independence, held that view with special conviction. The approaching conflict was about violations of American rights, but it was also about vindication of American identity".[30] Some Americans at the time and some historians since have called it a "Second War of Independence" for the United States.[31][32]
The young republic had been involved in several struggles to uphold what it regarded as its rights, and honour, as an independent nation. The First Barbary War had resulted in an apparent victory but with the continued payment of ransoms. The Quasi-War against the French had involved single ship naval clashes over trade rights similar to the ones about to occur with Britain. Upholding national honour and being able to protect American rights was part of the background to the US political and diplomatic attitudes towards Britain in the early 1800s.
At the same time, the British public were offended by what they considered insults, such as the Little Belt affair. This gave them a particular interest in capturing the American flagship President, an act that they successfully realized in 1815.[33] They were also keen to maintain what they saw as their rights to stop and search neutral vessels as part of their war with France, and further ensure that their own commercial interests were protected.
Impressment, trade, and naval actions
Britain was the largest trading partner of the United States, receiving 80 percent of American cotton and 50 percent of all other American exports. The British public and press resented the growing mercantile and commercial competition.[34] Historian Reginald Horsman states that "a large section of influential British opinion [...] thought that the United States presented a threat to British maritime supremacy".[35]
During the Seven Years' War, Britain introduced rules governing trade with their enemies. The Rule of 1756, which the U.S. had temporarily agreed to when signing the Jay Treaty, stated that a neutral nation could not conduct trade with an enemy, if that trade was closed to them before hostilities had commenced.[36] Since the beginning of Britain's war with France in 1793, the U.S. merchant marine had been making a fortune continuing trading with both nations,[37] America's share of trans-Atlantic trade growing from 250 thousand tons in 1790 to 981 thousand tons in 1810, in the process.[38]
Of particular concern to the British was the transport of goods from the French West Indies to France, something the U.S. would have been unable to do, due to French rules, during times of peace.[39] The United States' view was that the treaty they had signed violated their right to trade with others, and in order to circumvent the Rule of 1756, American ships would stop at a neutral port to unload and reload their cargo before continuing to France. These actions were challenged in the Essex case of 1805.[40]
With parts of the Jay Treaty due to expire in 1806, a new agreement was sought. The Monroe–Pinkney Treaty offered the U.S. preferential trading rights and would have settled most of its issues with Britain. However, the treaty did not moderate the Rule of 1756 and only offered to exercise "extreme caution" and "immediate and prompt redress" with regard to impressment of Americans. Jefferson, who had specifically asked for these two points to be extirpated, refused to put the treaty before the senate.[41]
In 1806, Napoleon's Berlin Decree declared a blockade of the British Isles, forbade neutral vessels harbour in British ports, and declared all British made goods carried on neutral ships lawful prizes of war. The British responded in 1807 with Orders in Council which similarly forbade any shipping to France.[42] By 1807, when Napoleon introduced his Milan Decree, declaring all ships touching at British ports to be legitimate prizes of war, it had become almost impossible for the U.S. to remain neutral.[43] Between 1804 and 1807, 731 American ships were seized by Britain or France for violation of one of the blockades, roughly two thirds by Britain.[44] Since the Jay Treaty, France had also adopted an aggressive attitude to American neutrality.[45]
While Britain, through a process known as pre-emption, compensated American ship owners for their losses, France did not.[46] French frigates burned American grain ships heading for Britain and treated American sailors as prisoners of war. U.S.–French relations had soured so much that by 1812, Madison was also considering war with France.[45]
As a result of these increasing trade volumes during the Napoleonic Wars the United States Merchant Marine became the world's largest neutral shipping fleet.[47] Between 1802 and 1810,[47] it nearly doubled, which meant that there were insufficient numbers of experienced sailors in the United States to man it. To overcome this shortfall, British seamen were recruited, who were attracted by the better pay and conditions. It was estimated that 30% (23,000) of the 70,000 men employed on American ships were British.[48] During the Napoleonic Wars, the British Royal Navy expanded to 600 ships, requiring 140,000 sailors.[49]
The Royal Navy could man its ships with volunteers in peacetime, but in wartime, competing with merchant shipping and privateers for the pool of experienced sailors, it turned to impressment from ashore and at sea. Since 1795 the Quota System had been in use to feed men to the navy but it was not alone sufficient. Though most saw it as necessary, the practice of impressment was detested by most Britons. It was illegal under British law to impress foreign sailors, but it was the accepted practice of the era for nations to retrieve seamen of their own nationality from foreign navies during times of war.[50] However, in the nineteen years Britain was at war with France prior to the war of 1812 some ten thousand American citizens were impressed into the British navy.[51][lower-alpha 5]
The American ambassador in London, James Monroe, under President Jefferson, protested to the British Foreign Office that more than fifteen thousand Americans had been impressed into the Royal Navy since March 1803.[53] When asked for a list however, the Madison administration was only able to produce one based on hearsay containing 6,257 names, many of which were duplicated. The list also included some who had legitimately volunteered to serve.[54] By 1804, the incidents of impressment of Americans had sharply increased. Underlying the dispute was the issue that Britain and the United States viewed nationality differently.[55] The United States believed that British seamen, including naval deserters, had a right to become American citizens. In reality few actually went through the formal process.[56]
Regardless Britain did not recognize a right for a British subject to relinquish his citizenship and become a citizen of another country. The Royal Navy therefore considered any American citizen subject to impressment if he was born British. American reluctance to issue formal naturalization papers and the widespread use of unofficial or forged identity or protection papers among sailors[57] made it difficult for the Royal Navy to tell native born-Americans from naturalized-Americans and even non-Americans, and led it to impress some American sailors who had never been British.
Though Britain was willing to release from service anyone who could establish their American citizenship, the process often took years while the men in question remained impressed in the British Navy.[58] However, from 1793 to 1812 up to 15,000 Americans had been impressed[59] while many appeals for release were simply ignored or dismissed for other reasons.[60] There were also cases when the United States Navy also impressed British sailors.[61] Once impressed, any seaman, regardless of citizenship, could accept a recruitment bounty and was then no longer considered impressed but a "volunteer", further complicating matters.[51]
American anger with Britain grew when Royal Navy frigates were stationed just outside American harbours in view of American shores to search ships for goods bound to France and impress men within the United States territorial waters.[62] Well-publicized events outraged the American public such as the Leander affair and the Chesapeake–Leopard affair.[63]
The British public were outraged by the Little Belt affair in which the larger USS President in search of HMS Guerriere instead clashed with a small British sloop, resulting in the deaths of 11 British sailors. While both sides claimed the other fired first, the British public particularly blamed the United States for attacking a smaller vessel, with calls in some newspapers for revenge.[64] President had sighted and chased HMS Little Belt trying to determine her identity throughout the afternoon.[65]
The first shot took place after an exchange of hails had still failed to identify either ship to the other in the growing dusk.[66] After 45 minutes of battle, taking place in darkness, Little Belt had received much damage, with several holes to her hull near the water-line and her rigging "cut to pieces".[67] President's Captain Rodgers claimed Little Belt had fired first; but he did not ascertain her size or country of origin until dawn. After sending over a boat, Rodgers expressed regret and apologized for the 'unfortunate affair'.[68]
Little Belt's Captain Bingham claimed the opposite: President had fired first and had been manoeuvering in such a way as to make him think she was planning an attack.[69] Historian Jonathon Hooks echoes the view of Alfred T. Mahan and several other historians, that it is impossible to determine who fired the first shot.[70] Both sides held inquiries which upheld their captain's actions and version of events.[71] Meanwhile, the American public regarded the incident as just retribution for the Chesapeake–Leopard affair and were encouraged by their victory over the Royal Navy, while the British regarded it as unprovoked aggression.[72]
Canada and the U.S.
Whether the annexation of Canada was a primary American war objective has been debated by historians. Some argue it was an outcome of the failure to change British policy through economic coercion or negotiation, leaving invasion as the only way for the US to place pressure on Britain.[73] This view was summarized by Secretary of State James Monroe, who said "[i]t might be necessary to invade Canada, not as an object of the war but as a means to bring it to a satisfactory conclusion".[74] Occupation would also disrupt supplies to colonies in the British West Indies and Royal Navy, and prevent the British arming their allies among the Indian nations of the Old Northwest.[75][76]
Nevertheless, even though President Madison claimed permanent annexation was not an objective, he recognized once acquired it would be "difficult to relinquish".[77] A large faction in Congress actively advocated this policy, including Richard Johnson, who stated "I shall never die content until I see England's expulsion from North America and her territories incorporated into the United States".[78] John Harper claimed "the Author of Nature Himself had marked our limits in the south, by the Gulf of Mexico, and on the north, by the regions of eternal frost".[79] Both saw the war as part of a divine plan to unify the US and Canada, Johnson being its leading exponent.[80]
Others considered annexation a matter of domestic economic and political necessity. Tennessee Congressman Felix Grundy was one of many who saw it as essential to preserve the balance between slave states and free states that might be disrupted by the incorporation of territories in the Southeast acquired in the 1803 Louisiana Purchase.[81] Control of the St. Lawrence River, the major outlet for trade between Europe and the Great Lakes region, was a long-standing American ambition, going back to the early years of the Revolutionary War, and supported by powerful economic interests in the North-West.[82] Madison also viewed it as a way to prevent American smugglers using the river as a conduit for undercutting his trade policies.[79]
All these groups assumed American troops would be greeted as liberators, guaranteeing an easy conquest. Jefferson believed taking "...Canada this year, as far as...Quebec, will be a mere matter of marching, and will give us the experience for the attack on Halifax, the next and final expulsion of England from the American continent".[83] In 1812, Canada had around 525,000 inhabitants, two thirds of whom were French-speakers living in Quebec. Upper Canada, now southern Ontario, had a population of less than 75,000, primarily Loyalist exiles and recent immigrants from the Northeastern United States. The former were implacably hostile to the United States; the latter largely uninterested in politics and their loyalties unknown; unlike the Texas annexation in 1845, they were too few to provide a critical mass of pro-American support, while many followed their Loyalist neighbours and joined Canadian militia.[84] Absence of local backing prevented American forces from establishing a foothold in the area,[85] and of ten attempts to invade Upper Canada between 1812 and 1814, the vast majority ended in failure.[citation needed]
U.S. policy in the Northwest Territory
The Northwest Territory, a region between the Great Lakes, the Ohio River, Appalachians, and the Mississippi, was a long-standing source of conflict in 18th and early 19th-century North America. This arose when settlers from the Thirteen Colonies moved onto lands owned by the indigenous inhabitants, a collection of Algonquian and Iroquoian-speaking peoples, chiefly the Shawnee, Wyandot, Lenape, Miami, Potawatomi, Kickapoo, Menominee, and Odawa.[86] When Pontiac's War was defeated in 1766, they generally accepted British sovereignty but retained ownership of their lands, while the Proclamation of 1763 prohibited colonial settlement west of the Appalachians, a grievance that contributed to the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War.[87]
The territory was ceded in 1783 to the new American government, who encouraged its citizens to settle in the region and ignored the rights of local inhabitants.[88] In response, the tribes formed the Northwestern Confederacy which from 1786 to 1795 fought against the U.S. in the Northwest Indian War, with military support provided by British forts along the Maumee River. After the 1794 Jay Treaty, the British handed over these strongpoints to the U.S., most notably Fort Detroit, and abandoned their indigenous allies, who signed the 1795 Treaty of Greenville with the American government.[89] Under the treaty, they ceded most of what is now the state of Ohio but granted title to the rest of their lands in perpetuity, a commitment the U.S. government had already secretly agreed to ignore.[90]
A key factor in this policy was the acquisition by France of the Louisiana Territory in 1800, which meant the U.S. faced an expansionist power on its northwestern border, rather than a weak Spain. To ensure control of the Upper Mississippi River, Jefferson incorporated the region into the Indiana Territory, which originally contained the modern states of Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin.[91] He appointed William Henry Harrison as governor, ordering him to acquire as much land as possible beyond the Greenville line, using deception if needed.[92] In doing so, Harrison was helped by vague and competing claims, since tribes whose title to the lands was either limited or disputed were happy to sign them away in return for bribes.[93] Although the December 1803 Louisiana Purchase ended the French threat, between 1803 and 1805 he obtained extensive territorial cessions in the treaties of Fort Wayne (1803), St Louis, Vincennes and Grouseland.[94]
The policies adopted by Harrison meant low-level conflict between local tribes and American settlers quickly escalated post-1803.[95] In 1805, a Shawnee leader named Tenskwatawa launched a nativist religious movement that rejected American culture and values, while his elder brother Tecumseh organized a new confederacy to defend their territory against settler encroachment.[96][97] They established a community at Prophetstown in 1808, gaining support from young warriors and traditional chiefs including the Wyandot leader Roundhead and Main Poc from the Potawatomi.[98] The Sioux, Sauk, Meskwaki, and Ojibwe peoples, who lived along the Upper Mississippi and Western Great Lakes, initially rejected Tenskwatawa's message because of their dependence on the fur trade, but continued settler incursions into their lands meant they too became hostile to the U.S.[99]
Britain traditionally maintained good relations with the local people by handing out gifts, including arms and ammunition; after 1795, they ended this policy and advised the tribes to live peacefully with the American government.[100] Their position changed following the 1808 Chesapeake-Leopard Affair, when the Northwest came to be seen as a buffer against an American attack on Upper Canada. They re-started the distribution of gifts and offered the tribes a defensive alliance if war broke out with the U.S., while urging them to refrain from aggressive action in the meantime.[101] The situation worsened after the 1809 Treaty of Fort Wayne; negotiated primarily with the Lenape, it included lands claimed by the Shawnee and Tecumseh insisted it was invalid without the consent of all the tribes.[98]
In 1811, alarmed at the threat posed by Tecumseh and Tenskwatawa, Harrison secured permission to attack them.[102] Taking advantage of Tecumseh's absence, he marched on Prophetstown with an army of nearly 1,000 men; in the ensuing Battle of Tippecanoe, the Americans first repulsed an attack by forces under Tenskwatawa, then destroyed Prophetstown. Fighting along the frontier escalated, while Tecumseh reconstituted his confederacy and allied with the British.[103] This action strengthened American hostility against Britain in the run up to the War of 1812, with many blaming them for unrest on the frontier, rather than government policy. in the ensuing conflict, most of the Northwest nations supported the British, including the previously neutral tribes of the Upper Mississippi.[104]
Internal American political conflict
The United States was in a period of significant political conflict between the Federalist Party (based mainly in the Northeast) and the Democratic-Republican Party (with its greatest power base in the South and West). The Federalists, who favoured a strong central government and openly sympathized with Britain in their struggle against Napoleonic France, were criticized by the Democratic-Republicans for being too close to Britain, while the Federalists countered that the Democratic-Republicans, were allied to France, a country headed by Napoleon, who was seen as a dictator.[105]
By 1812, the Republicans, who were seen as being more supportive of western expansionism, believed that the Federalists in New England were conspiring with the British who were forming alliances with the various frontier Indian tribes while recruiting "late Loyalists" in Canada, to break up the union. Instead, the war served to alienate the Federalists who were ready to trade and even smuggle with the British rather than to fight them. By 1812, the Federalist Party had weakened considerably and the Republicans were in a strong position, with James Madison completing his first term of office and control of Congress.[105]
Support for the American cause was weak in Federalist areas of the Northeast throughout the war as fewer men volunteered to serve and the banks avoided financing the war. The negativism of the Federalists ruined the party's reputation post-war, as exemplified by the Hartford Convention of 1814–1815, and the party survived only in scattered areas. By 1815, after the victory at the Battle of New Orleans, there was broad support for the war from all parts of the country. This allowed the triumphant Democratic-Republicans to adopt some Federalist policies, such as the national bank, which Madison re-established in 1816.[106]
American
During the years 1810–1812, American naval ships were divided into two major squadrons, with the "northern division", based at New York, commanded by Commodore John Rodgers, and the "southern division", based at Norfolk, commanded by Commodore Stephen Decatur.[107]
Although not much of a threat to Canada in 1812, the United States Navy was a well-trained and professional force comprising over 5,000 sailors and marines.[108] It had 14 ocean-going warships with three of its five "super-frigates" non-operational at the onset of the war.[108] Its principal problem was lack of funding, as many in Congress did not see the need for a strong navy.[109] The biggest ships in the American navy were frigates and there were no ships-of-the-line capable of engaging in a fleet action with the Royal Navy.[110] On the high seas, the Americans pursued a strategy of commerce raiding, capturing or sinking British merchantmen with their frigates and privateers.[111] The Navy was largely concentrated on the Atlantic coast before the war as it had only two gunboats on Lake Champlain, one brig on Lake Ontario and another brig in Lake Erie when the war began.[112]
The United States Army was initially much larger than the British Army in North America. Many men carried their own long rifles while the British were issued muskets, except for one unit of 500 riflemen. Leadership was inconsistent in the American officer corps as some officers proved themselves to be outstanding, but many others were inept, owing their positions to political favours. Congress was hostile to a standing army and the government called out 450,000 men from the state militias during the war.[112] The state militias were poorly trained, armed, and led. The failed invasion of Lake Champlain led by General Dearborn illustrates this.[113] The British Army soundly defeated the Maryland and Virginia militias at the Battle of Bladensburg in 1814 and President Madison commented "I could never have believed so great a difference existed between regular troops and a militia force, if I had not witnessed the scenes of this day".[109]
British
The United States was only a secondary concern to Britain, so long as the war continued with France.[112] In 1813, France had 80 ships-of-the-line and was building another 35. Containing the French fleet was the main British naval concern,[112] leaving only the ships on the North American and Jamaica Stations immediately available. In Upper Canada, the British had the Provincial Marine. While largely unarmed,[114] they were essential for keeping the army supplied since the roads were abysmal in Upper Canada.[112] At the onset of war the Provincial Marine had four small armed vessels on Lake Ontario, three on Lake Erie and one on Lake Champlain. The Provincial Marine greatly outnumbered anything the Americans could bring to bear on the Great Lakes.[115]
When the war broke out, the British Army in North America numbered 9,777 men[116] in regular units and fencibles.[lower-alpha 6] While the British Army was engaged in the Peninsular War, few reinforcements were available. Although the British were outnumbered,[112] the long-serving regulars and fencibles were better trained and more professional than the hastily expanded United States Army.[117] The militias of Upper Canada and Lower Canada were initially far less effective,[112] but substantial numbers of full-time militia were raised during the war and played pivotal roles in several engagements, including the Battle of the Chateauguay which caused the Americans to abandon the Saint Lawrence River theatre.[118]
Indigenous peoples
The highly decentralized bands and tribes considered themselves allies of, and not subordinates to, the British or the Americans. Various Indian tribes fighting with United States forces provided them with their "most effective light troops"[119] while the British needed indigenous allies to compensate for their numerical inferiority. The indigenous allies of the British, Tecumseh's confederacy in the west and Iroquois in the east avoided pitched battles and relied on irregular warfare, including raids and ambushes that took advantage of their knowledge of terrain. In addition, they were highly mobile, able to march 30–50 miles (50–80 km) a day.[120]
Their leaders sought to fight only under favourable conditions and would avoid any battle that promised heavy losses, doing what they thought best for their tribes, much to the annoyance of both American and British generals.[121] The indigenous fighters saw no issue with withdrawing if needed to save casualties. They always sought to surround an enemy, where possible, to avoid being surrounded and make effective use of the terrain.[120] Their main weapons were a mixture of muskets, rifles, bows, tomahawks, knives and swords as well as clubs and other melee weapons, which sometimes had the advantage of being quieter than guns.[122]
On 1 June 1812, Madison sent a message to Congress recounting American grievances against Great Britain, though not specifically calling for a declaration of war. The House of Representatives then deliberated for four days behind closed doors before voting 79 to 49 (61%) in favour of the first declaration of war. The Senate concurred in the declaration by a 19 to 13 (59%) vote in favour. The declaration focused mostly on maritime issues, especially involving British blockades, with two thirds of the indictment devoted to such impositions, initiated by Britain's Orders in Council.[lower-alpha 7] The conflict began formally on 18 June 1812, when Madison signed the measure into law. He proclaimed it the next day.[123] This was the first time that the United States had declared war on another nation and the Congressional vote was the closest vote in American history to formally declare war.[124][125] None of the 39 Federalists in Congress voted in favour of the war, while other critics referred to it as "Mr. Madison's War".[126][124] Just days after war had been declared, a small number of Federalists in Baltimore were attacked for printing anti-war views in a newspaper, which eventually led to over a month of deadly rioting in the city.[127]
Prime Minister Spencer Perceval was assassinated in London on 11 May and Lord Liverpool came to power. He wanted a more practical relationship with the United States. On June 23, he issued a repeal of the Orders in Council, but the United States was unaware of this, as it took three weeks for the news to cross the Atlantic.[128] On 28 June 1812, HMS Colibri was dispatched from Halifax to New York under a flag of truce. She anchored off Sandy Hook on July 9 and left three days later carrying a copy of the declaration of war, British ambassador to the United States Augustus Foster and consul Colonel Thomas Henry Barclay. She arrived in Halifax, Nova Scotia eight days later. The news of the declaration took even longer to reach London.[129]
British commander Isaac Brock in Upper Canada received the news much faster. He issued a proclamation alerting citizens to the state of war and urging all military personnel "to be vigilant in the discharge of their duty", so as to prevent communication with the enemy and to arrest anyone suspected of helping the Americans.[130][131] He also issued orders to the commander of the British post at Fort St. Joseph to initiate offensive operations against American forces in northern Michigan who were not yet aware of their own government's declaration of war. The resulting Siege of Fort Mackinac on 17 July was the first major land engagement of the war and ended in an easy British victory.[132]