Union and Democracy

by Allen Johnson

The loss of the Chesapeake in a duel with the Shannon, on June 1, 1813, outside of Boston Harbor, left the United States with an available sea-going navy of just two frigates and a few small sloops. All the other frigates were shut up in various ports by the British blockade, which extended from Cape Cod to Florida. The burden of offense during the rest of the war fell upon privateers. During the war more than five hundred fitted out in American ports. In the year 1813 they took over three hundred prizes, while the frigates took but seventy-nine. While British cruisers were blockading the coast of the United States, these craft, with their beautiful lines and wonderful spread of canvas, carried consternation to all British shippers in the English Channel and in the Irish Sea. They "seize prizes in sight of those that should afford protection," complained the London Times, "and if pursued put on their sea-wings and laugh at the clumsy English pursuers." No exploits of the regular navy contributed so much to dispose the British governing class to peace as the depredations of these privateers.

In the remote Southwest, the war assumed a different character. There the enemy on the border was not Great Britain but Spain. The people of the Carolinas and Georgia fully expected to acquire the Floridas while the North was wresting Canada from British control. Had President Madison been given his way, this wish would have been gratified; but Congress refused to countenance the seizure of East Florida, and in May, 1813, Madison very reluctantly ordered the troops to evacuate Amelia Island. No scruples deterred Congress from authorizing the occupation of West Florida. In the spring of 1813, General Wilkinson forced the surrender of the only Spanish fort on Mobile Bay and took possession of the country as far as the Perdido—"the only permanent gain of territory made during the war."

During the first year of the war the younger warriors of the Western Creeks, in what is now Alabama, had been incited to hostilities by Tecumseh, and in the following spring began depredations which culminated in the capture of Fort Mims and the massacre of its inhabitants on August 30, 1813. The horrors of an Indian war brought every able-bodied settler in the adjoining States to arms. Before the end of the year seven thousand whites had invaded the Indian territory and had killed about one fifth of the Creek warriors. The hero of the war was General Andrew Jackson, who at the head of an army of Tennessee militiamen won a decisive battle at Horseshoe Bend on the Tallapoosa River. On August 9, 1814, he forced the chieftains who had not fled across the Florida border to sign a treaty of capitulation at Fort Jackson and to cede nearly two thirds of their lands in southern Georgia and in what afterward became central Alabama. This phase of the war opened up a vast territory to settlement and made the military reputation of Andrew Jackson.

Operations on the Niagara frontier were resumed by the American troops in 1814; but they were now directed by one of the new major-generals, Jacob Brown, who infused a new spirit into his soldiers. On July 5, General Winfield Scott's brigade won a signal victory at Chippewa. Three weeks later, on July 25, the entire army fought a desperate battle at Lundy's Lane, which lasted from sunset to midnight. The Americans claimed a victory, but the losses were about even and the British remained in possession of the field. At the close of the year, despite the valiant fighting of Brown's army, the situation on the Niagara had not changed materially. The invasion of Canada and a peace dictated from Quebec seemed as remote as ever.

The British plans for the campaign of 1814 called for "a diversion on the coasts of the United States, in favor of the army employed in the defense of Upper and Lower Canada." For the first time since the opening of hostilities, British military authorities could concentrate their attention on the war in North America. The defeat of Napoleon on the plains of Leipzig had thrown his shattered columns back upon France. Thither the allied armies had followed him and forced his capitulation. With the end of European wars in sight, Wellington could release his veteran troops for service in America. In early summer eleven thousand seasoned troops were sent to Canada. Four thousand more were dispatched under Major-General Ross, of the Peninsular army, to coöperate with the navy under Admiral Cochrane on the shores of Chesapeake Bay. Later in the year Major-General Pakenham, also a veteran of the Peninsular campaign, was sent with ten thousand troops to seize the mouth of the Mississippi and to force the capitulation of the West by closing the ports on the Gulf.

Those whose memories went back thirty-seven years may well have recalled Burgoyne's expedition, for it was by the old Lake Champlain route that Sir George Prevost began his invasion of New York in September, 1814. His objective was Plattsburg, where an American army of not more than two thousand men was stationed. Accompanying his army, to insure its line of communication with Canada, was a fleet consisting of a frigate, a brig, and a dozen smaller vessels. To this fleet, Captain Thomas Macdonough could oppose only a corvette and a dozen small craft. The fleets met in a battle for the control of the lake on September 11. The resourcefulness of the young American officer saved the day. By winding his corvette, the Saratoga, about, so as to bring her unused guns to bear just when the fight seemed lost, he forced the formidable Confiance to strike her colors. The surrender of the smaller British boats followed. The battle of Plattsburg was decisive of the invasion. Fearing greater disasters if he pressed on without the control of the waterway at his rear, Prevost at once ordered a retreat.

The expedition directed toward Chesapeake Bay was well under way before Prevost's ill-starred invasion began. On August 19, General Ross landed his forces on the banks of Patuxent River, within striking distance of Washington. Marching leisurely across country toward the capital, the British finally met at Bladensburg a motley array of some seven thousand Americans, hastily summoned from the countryside. What followed is not easily described. Some show of resistance was made by the marines from the American gunboats in the Patuxent; but for the most part the Americans were seized with a panic and fled in wild disorder. The President and his Cabinet took to the Virginia woods, leaving the enemy to wreak their vengeance on the government buildings. Having fired the Capitol, the White House, and other edifices, the British forces returned to their fleet and reëmbarked. The historian can take no pleasure in dwelling upon details which are discreditable to all concerned; for if the British committed acts of vandalism, the Americans had provoked retaliation when they burned the parliament houses at York in the campaign of 1813.

An attack upon Baltimore which might have resulted in further outrages was frustrated by the measures of defense which the government of the city had already wisely undertaken. After a skirmish in which General Ross was killed, and an ineffective bombardment of the harbor defenses, the British withdrew.

A visitor to the national capital after its capture described the President as "miserably shattered and woe-begone," and heart-broken at the defection of New England. To prosecute the war, money and men were needed; but both were wanting. The Administration hoped, but hoped in vain, that the victories at Chippewa, Lundy's Lane, and Plattsburg would stimulate enlistments; but recruits were not likely to be lured by promises which every one knew the Government could not redeem. It became clearer every day that unless Congress was disposed to adopt Monroe's plan of conscription, the National Government would have to put its dependence upon state armies. In September, after Castine and the eastern part of Maine to the Penobscot had been occupied by the British, Governor Strong consented to call out the militia of Massachusetts, but he was careful to place the troops under the command of state officers. At the same time he made inquiry of the Secretary of War whether the expenses of the militia would be assumed by the National Government. Monroe replied rather sharply that so long as Massachusetts refused to put her troops under the command of national officers, she need not expect the United States to maintain them. The Governor of Connecticut had already withdrawn the militia of that State from national service. At the moment when Prevost was beginning his invasion, the Governor of Vermont declined to call out the state militia because he doubted his authority to order the militia out of the State. The Union seemed on the point of disintegrating into its original elements.

The anxieties of the Administration were further increased by the action of the Massachusetts General Court, which called a convention of those States "the affinity of whose interests is closest," with the avowed purpose of devising some mode of common defense and of securing a convention of delegates from all the States to revise the National Constitution. In spite of vigorous opposition, delegates were chosen, to meet on December 15 with "such as may be chosen by any or all of the other New England States." The legislatures of Connecticut and Rhode Island responded promptly; but the legislature of Vermont unanimously declined the invitation, and New Hampshire failed to reply. The movement seemed all the more ominous after the fall elections, which resulted in the choice of thirty-nine Federalist Congressmen from New England and of only two Republicans. In the preceding Congress there had been thirty Federalists and eleven Republicans.