during the summer months … fishing is a common amusement, easily connected with occasional supplies of provision…. Fashions of dress and modes of living are common to the inhabitants of the lower province and their neighbours in the States…. The habit of smoking is very common among all classes of people throughout the province….[7]
CHAPTER 2
Beating the Drums for War
For Great Britain, the first years of the nineteenth century were extremely turbulent and troubled. The kingdom had been at war with France since February 1793 (except for the illusory Peace of Amiens of 1802–3); and this “Long War,” as it was called, had, by 1812, brought the nation to the brink of bankruptcy as it sought to pay for its on-going military policies. These included:
Constructing, maintaining, supplying, and crewing the world’s largest navy in order to dominate and control the world’s shipping lanes.
Expanding its army to some 207 battalions of full-time “Line” regiments. On top of which were the seven battalions of The Brigade of Guards, three regiments of The Household Cavalry, forty-three corps of “Heavy” (Hussar) and “Light” (Dragoon) cavalry, ten Royal Artillery battalions, The Royal Horse Artillery, three battalions of The Royal Marines, The Rocket Troop, The Corps of Royal Artillery Drivers, The Field Train of the Ordnance, The Royal Engineers, The Royal Sappers and Miners, The Commissariat Corps, The Royal Waggon Train, thirteen “Royal Veterans” battalions, nine “Garrison” battalions, and more than twenty foreign “Allied” regiments. Plus an entire additional strata of military formations, under the auxiliary militia system that raised and maintained an uncounted number of “Colonial,” “Fencible,” and “Yeomanry” militia regiments or battalions, “Volunteer” corps or companies, “Armed Ward Associations,” “Sharp Shooter,” and “Independent” companies of infantry, cavalry, and artillery. To name but a few.
Undertaking the construction, repair, maintenance, garrisoning, and supplying of a worldwide inventory of more than ten thousand military depots, fortifications, camps, and posts of various sizes and function.
Fighting in a series of military campaigns of dubious strategic value that frittered away vast stocks of weapons and military supplies, not to mention the lives of tens of thousands of its soldiers, before finally concentrating upon evicting Napoleon’s armies from Portugal and Spain in 1808.
Spending huge fortunes to subsidize its wavering European allies in a succession of military coalitions, initially against France’s Revolutionary governments and latterly against Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte’s goal to create a European empire.
As if this was not enough, Britain’s domestic economy was also in a state of crisis, the combined effect of a multi-year economic depression and a succession of agricultural crop failures. This had resulted in rampant price inflation and widespread food shortages throughout the nation’s increasingly urbanized population, which in turn created widespread social unrest. Compounding this already volatile situation, Britain’s industrial sector was in the midst of an ideological (and sometimes actual) conflict between its factory owners, who saw the future being dominated by the introduction of increased levels of mechanization into their industries, and their workforce, who saw their economic security, traditional working lifestyle, and their individuality being forcibly stripped away by the soulless “factory” system. Inevitably, without compromise and cooperation, both sides eventually resorted to extremes of action. The owners by invoking the “law” to call out the judges and local militias to arrest or actively (violently) suppress the protesting workers. The workers by forming raiding parties to sabotage and destroy the hated machines under the collective disguise of being the “Luddite army” or “Luddites,” led by the fictitious General Ludd. As a result, the British government was already fully occupied in its own affairs at home and in Europe, and took little time to take notice of new, serious problems developing in its relationship with the United States.
The westward expansionist policies of the U.S. government had allowed white settlement into the previously off-limits treaty lands held by the Native tribes of the Ohio, Michigan, and Kentucky regions. These treaty-breaking incursions had inevitably been met with hostile resistance from the Natives, resulting in the sending in of U.S. military units to suppress the “savages.” The only problem being that these same Native tribes were regularly winning these encounters! Since it was unthinkable that any “modern” army could be defeated by these “primitive” tribesmen, there had to be another reason. And as far as Mr. Grundy, the congressional representative for Tennessee and member of the Foreign Relations Committee, was concerned, the answer — and solution — was obvious.
It cannot be believed by any man who will reflect that the savage tribes, uninfluenced by other powers, would think of making war on the United States. They understand too well their own weakness, and our strength. They have already felt the weight of our arms; they know they hold the very soil on which they live as tenants at sufferance. How, then, Sir are we to account for their late conduct? In one way only; some powerful nation [Great Britain] must have intrigued with them and turned their peaceful disposition towards us into hostilities … I therefore infer that if British gold has not been employed, their baubles and trinkets and the promise of support and a place of refuge if necessary have had their effect…. This war, if carried on successfully, will have its advantages. We shall drive the British from our Continent — they will no longer have an opportunity of intriguing with our Indian neighbours … that nation will lose her Canadian trade, and, by having no resting place in this country her means of annoying us will be diminished.
(November 1811)[1]
For other American politicians and hardline nationalists, this viewpoint simply stated what they too had believed for some time. That the continued existence of a British colonial influence on the continent of North America was a stain on American pride that cried out for immediate correction. Their ultimate goal was to establish a single unified country, stretching from the frozen northern wastes to the tropical beaches of the Gulf of Mexico. Less often mentioned, however, were a number of financial considerations that also held considerable influence in the drive to expel the British from North America.
Under Napoleon Bonaparte, France’s armies had occupied or gained control over most of the European landmass, while the British literally “ruled” the waves, thanks to the might of its Royal Navy. Because neither side could then decisively defeat the other militarily, both combatants chose to use economic warfare as an alternate weapon. The French made the first move by imposing their authority and intimidating the small Baltic states to cut off the vital timber resources of that region to the British navy. In response, Great Britain began to develop the St. Lawrence River corridor as a new and reliable source of timber from the seemingly infinite stocks of Canada’s wilderness. This, in turn, represented an economic threat to the established mercantile interests on the American east coast. Within that circle it was argued that rather than seeing a competitor flourish, bringing those valuable economic resources and raw materials under direct American control would be a desirable and profitable outcome.
Matters intensified further when Napoleon Bonaparte tried to extend his economic war on Great Britain by issuing imperial decrees at Milan (1806) and Berlin (1807). By the terms of these declarations, Great Britain was banned from trading directly with any of France’s allies and subjugate countries in Europe. In retaliation, Great Britain’s Royal Navy effectively swept the French merchant marine from the seas before establishing a total naval blockade of French-controlled European ports. To circumvent these actions, both sides began to use intermediary and neutral shipping — a profit-making situation the Americans were quick to exploit.
Having gained control of most of the trans-Atlantic shipping
