WHAT THE HELL …. LET”S HAVE ONE MORE BATTLE IN NEW ORLEANS
The popular opinion amongst historians is that there simply wasn’t enough time to cross the oceans to stop the British attack on New Orleans. I don’t buy it.
The Ghent Peace Treaty was signed on Dec.24, 1814. On Dec. 13th, a British fleet had landed about forty miles east of New Orleans. It must have taken at least a month to get there. The Brits commenced fire on January 8, 1815. The British Commanders and Generals surely must have known that peace talks were in process. So, a prudent thing to do would have been to at least wait to see the results.
And don’t forget that the Ghent talks were initiated way back in August. Even during those negotiations the dastardly Brits had four invasions planned or underway; 1) the destruction of Washington, 2) the destruction of Baltimore, 3) the Battle of Plattsburgh – where 10,000 British troops tried to cut off New England, and 4) and the Battle Of New Orleans. The treacherous British had an Olive Branch in one hand, and a Murderous Dagger in the other.
Two things made this battle so important. First, a victory in New Orleans would have been a major boon for the British giving them access to the interior of the U.S. via the Mississippi River. Secongly, it would have given the Brits greater ability for their desire to seal off the United States from the Gulf of Mexico, further isolating the nation. (Furthermore — and this is my pure conjecture — it could have led to a reversal of the Louisiana Purchase, cutting the size of the United States in half.) But, this much is absolutely certain; it would have given the Brits a major trump card in negotiating the Ghent Treaty.
A popular opinion is that the British would have honored the Ghent Treaty even if they won the battle. Of course, we’ll never know but, I find that opinion enormously preposterous. The Brits, still butt-sore about the beating they took in the Revolutionary War – a war they still would not admit they lost in 1814 – hated America and wanted revenge and destruction. And what history is there of Britain – or any country – winning a huge major battle and then just walking away from it? None. A major victory such as New Orleans would absolutely have resulted in the United States being forced into major concessions. If fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if it would have led to an outright abrogation of the treaty. The Brits were ruthless bastards when it suited them, and never forget, they really hated America.
What should be crystal clear is that far from being a senseless battle, a British victory at New Orleans would have drastically changed the future of America. But, they didn’t win. They were annihilated. Let’s look at some interesting details.
THE BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS …. ONE OF AMERICA’S MOST IMPORTANT VICTORIES EVER
On the other hand, if you want to skip this section, just watch this 3 minute song by Johnny Horton — he does a fine job ‘splaining it! Nice pics too!
The British force consisted of roughly 8,000 troops — including Royal Fusiliers, Highlanders, Light Infantry, and Light Dragoons — disciplined troops with plenty of battle experience, having just defeated the French.
Why capture New Orleans? Lord Castlereagh, the British foreign secretary, said that once the large seaport towns of America were “laid in ashes” and New Orleans captured, that the British would have command of “all the rivers of the Mississippi valley and the Lakes … the Americans would be little better than prisoners in their own country.” The Brits also intended to prevent America from having any access to all of the Gulf Of Mexico.
General Andrew Jackson first had to prepare the city’s defenses … not an easy task. New Orleans had a very diverse population and resisted organization. So, Jackson threatened to blow up the provincial legislature if it did not comply with his demands, one of which was to suspend habeas corpus. So, he declared martial law, turned the city into a military camp, and took over complete control of the city’s resources. This got their attention.
He organized all available manpower—frontiersmen, militiamen, regular soldiers, Indians, slaves, townspeople including the city’s unusually large population of free blacks and even the famous river pirate, Jean Lafitte — about 4,000 in total. And then he built the “Jackson Line” –a defensive line between the city and the approaching British forces. Rodriguez Canal was a ten-foot-wide millrace located just off the Mississippi River. Using local slave labor, Madison widened the canal into a defensive trench. He then built an eight foot tall earthen rampart, twenty feet wide in parts, buttressed with timber, and protected by eight artillery batteries When completed, it stretched nearly a mile from the east bank of the Mississippi to a nearly impassable marsh. Jackson told his men “Here we shall plant our stakes and not abandon them until we drive these red-coat rascals into the river, or the swamp.”
The British commander, Cochrane, felt the area could be taken with minimal forces with the help of the Spanish, Indians, and even the people of New Orleans who he felt would welcome the British as liberators. In retrospect, fairly idiotic assumptions.
The bottom line; it was a hopeless tactical situation for the British with a swamp to the east of the American lines, and the Mississippi River to west. This left the British with only one route of attack—straight into the guns of the American forces tucked inside a dry canal.
Tennessee and Kentucky riflemen laid withering fire against the advancing British lines, killing or wounding more than 2,000 British soldiers, including three generals and seven colonels, in less than an hour. One British veteran of the Napoleonic Wars claimed it was “the most murderous fire I ever beheld before or since.” American casualties were about 13 killed, and 39 wounded.
[NOTE: Considerably more Americans were killed in the skirmishes leading up to the final battle. For example, 6,000 British troops snuck into the British headquarters at Villeré’s plantation. Jackson resolved to attack immediately before the British advance was reinforced and organized. He assembled 1,800 men in a battle called “Night Attack”, and repelled the British, but not before suffering 215 casualties.)New Orleans was a tremendous victory—one which made Andrew Jackson a national hero, and propelled him into the office of President. And, regardless of the reason for the battle, whether or not it was necessary, Madison certainly knew the fine art of Presidential spinning; — necessary war, reluctantly entered, rights, patriotism, and heroes – all in one brief sentence. (He might as well have been talking about Iraq.)
“the late war, although reluctantly declared by Congress, had become a necessary resort to assert the rights and independence of the nation. It has been waged with a success which is the natural result of the wisdom of the legislative councils, of the patriotism of the people, of the public spirit of the militia, and of the valor of the military and naval forces of the country Peace.”
A good detailed account of the battle can be found here: http://www.the-american-interest.com/2014/10/10/the-battle-for-the-big-easy/
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THE AFTERMATH AND LEGACIES: 10 LESSONS
1) First and foremost, let’s be brutally frank about the REAL reason for this war; PRIDE and PATRIOTISM! The Brits didn’t respect our independence. The French didn’t. Spain didn’t. Most of the world thought it was just a fluke. Madison was convinced the country had to prove to the rest of the world, as well as to itself, that this new experiment in republican government was a permanent fixture in the family of nations. And the way to go about that was to confront Britain – the world’s most powerful nation – that violating American rights would not go unchallenged or unpunished. Unbridled Patriotism …so sweet in the Revolutionary War, souring in the War Of 1812, and look where it got us today.
2) The war reinforced the Executive branch’s de facto monopoly over foreign policy. When all’s said and done, this was Madison’s war. Another example: John Quincy Adams would defend Gen. Andrew Jackson’s invasion of Spanish Florida in the undeclared war on the Seminoles. Dissenting members of Congress could do nothing but gripe.
3) A NEW way of looking at the Constitution emerged. Henry Clay said (emphasis mine); —
“A new world has come into being since the Constitution was adopted. Are the narrow, limited necessities of the old thirteen states … as they existed at the formation of the present Constitution, forever to remain a rule of its interpretation? Are we to forget the wants of our country? I trust not, sir. I hope for better and nobler things.” Evidently, the concept of a Living Constitution took root a long, long time ago.
4) The war changed how Americans viewed the military. The Army and Navy became professional. The State Militia took a back seat. Now the nation embraced military spending as a necessity … even during times of peace.
“The most painful, perhaps the most profitable, lesson of the war was the primary duty of the nation to place itself in a state of permanent preparation for self-defense” —— future President John Quincy Adams
Many learned that connection with the military is great for one’s political career. Of the eleven presidents between Madison and Lincoln, seven of them got their start in public life or boosted their public careers during the War of 1812.
It only took 29 years after the end of the Revolutionary War for America to declare its first war. Strangely enough, this war was a complete and utter waste of human and capital resources. The precedent was set. It wouldn’t be the last such time America fought such a war.
5) Politicians learned that with proper spin and propagandizing the people can be rallied to LOVE A GOOD WAR. Precious few citizens were in strong favor of the war when it first started. But, at war’s end, the people were ecstatic. A common refrain throughout the country is depicted in this piece written in 1815 by a group known as “republican citizens of Baltimore” stating that the war;
“ … has revived, with added luster the renown which brightened the morning of our independence: it has called forth and organized the dormant resources of the empire: it has tried and vindicated our republican institutions: it has given us that moral strength, which consists in the well earned respect of the world, and in a just respect for ourselves. It has raised up and consolidated a national character, dear to the hearts of the people, as an object of honest pride and a pledge of future union, tranquility, and greatness.”
War is good for slogans and jingoes. “Don’t give up the ship” and “We have met the enemy and they are ours” and “Uncle Sam” and cute names for war equipment “Old Ironsides”, and populist songs abounded. Symbols, slogans, songs and sayings; that’s how you condition people’s minds as to what it means to be an American. Mold ‘em like clay into whatever form you want. At least there’s no record of Madison proclaiming “America is the greatest country in the world!!”.
6) The war permanently changed America’s economic model. Previous presidents, especially Jefferson, championed an agrarian economy. He hoped that commerce would not dominate America or its politics since that preoccupation would inevitably draw the country into perpetual international turmoil. Shortages caused by the various embargos, as well as the war itself, led to the fast growth of the manufacturing sector in the United States. Manufactures wanted protection from foreign competition once peace was restored, even forming the ‘American Society of the Encouragement of American Manufacturers’, a pro-tariff group. Active promotion of commerce required further expansion of American military strength. In other words, America would promote “free trade” with the government’s help in aggressively opening foreign markets ….. and threatening retaliation in the case of uncooperative regimes by displaying the military card. It wasn’t all that long before “free trade” gave way to mercantilism — a special-interest economic protectionism.
7) The devious and greedy amongst us started to notice that war is damn good racket. Shortly after the war, in 1817, the New York Stock Exchange was founded … born in a bubble created by the war. One year later the bubble burst in The Panic Of 1818. The war showed that hard money was for weenies. Paper money was the way to go, and reams of it was printed so the government could borrow it and finance the war. Note-issuing banks spread like wildfire. Once the war ended, imports swelled which led to falling commodity prices which led to big trouble for war-grown manufacturers. Businesses went bust while simultaneously some became filthy rich. See book —- > https://mises.org/library/panic-1819-reactions-and-policies
8) Politicians learned that war makes government more powerful … and a great way to increase taxes. Albert Gallatin, secretary of the Treasury from 1801 to 1814, said that because of the war, the “people are more American; they feel and act more as a nation ….. the war has laid the foundation of permanent taxes and military establishments, which the Republicans had deemed unfavorable to the happiness and free institutions of the country.”
9) The war ended a political party. The Federalist Party, the party of Washington and Adams, the party that had dominated national affairs during the 1790s, was all but dead after the war. They were staunchly against the war. They were even ready to introduce legislation requiring a two-thirds vote of approval for all future declarations of war, and that legislation restricting trade, such as the embargo, should also require a two-thirds vote. That is, until the stunning news of Jackson’s victory at New Orleans arrived in Washington. They picked the wrong cause. The country was in no mood for an anti-war party. And, within a few years of the war, they just faded into oblivion.
10) Expansionism. The victory over not only the Brits, but also over the Indians in the Northwest and Southwest, opened up the West as never before, and resulted in huge territorial gains. Westward expansion, in turn, indirectly led to the Civil War forty six years later because it was bitter disagreement about the expansion of slavery, rather than its existence in the Old South, which was a key reason for the War of Northern Aggression.
GOOD, BAD, or UGLY?
I originally titled this article “1812: The War That Changed America Forever For Worse”. I’m not sure whether or not that conclusion is 100% accurate. The “inconsequential” war certainly and drastically changed America, of that there is no doubt. Whether for the good, or bad, you’ll have to decide for yourself.
On the positive side, the war did cement American independence. It proved that to defeat America on its home ground, a very, very large army, and a great commitment to prolonged and bloody war, was going to be needed. At the start of the war even Americans wondered whether the republic could survive a real crises. Many felt with Governor Morris did, that — ‘it was as vain to expect the permanency of democracy as to construct a palace on the surface of the sea.’ Now they had their answer.
Americans would no longer be oriented towards Britain. We achieved freedom from Europe. We would turn to developing our own vast resources, and forget about Europe. Our National Government was here to stay.
The end of the war led to a burst of patriotism in the USA as evidenced, in part, by the immediate and widespread popularity of “The Star Spangled Banner” The Nile Register wrote — “Who would not be an American? Long live the republic! All hail! Last asylum of oppressed humanity!” Such a comment would have never been made before the war. A whole new national identity arose in “the dawn’s early light”.
On the negative side; the war left the country with constitutional revisionism, centralized power, protectionism, mercantilism, expansionism, blind patriotism, and militarism. That decentralist small-government thingy conceived by the Founding Fathers didn’t last very long, did it? One must wonder “War, what is it good for? Was it all worth it?”
Source: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-05-30/1812-inconsequential-war-changed-america-forever
The Star Spangled Banner
Francis Scott Key famously saw the American flag flying over Fort McHenry amid the “rockets’ red glare” and “bombs bursting in air.” He wasn’t being metaphoric. The rockets were British missiles called Congreves and looked a bit like giant bottle rockets. Imagine a long stick that spins around in the air, attached to a cylindrical canister filled with gunpowder, tar and shrapnel. Congreves were inaccurate but intimidating, an 1814 version of “shock and awe.” The “bombs bursting in air” were 200 pound cannonballs, designed to explode above their target. The British fired about 1500 bombs and rockets at Fort McHenry from ships in Baltimore Harbor and only succeeded in killing four of the fort’s defenders.
Uncle Sam Came From the War Effort
The Star-Spangled Banner isn’t the only patriotic icon that dates to the War of 1812. It’s believed that “Uncle Sam” does, too. In Troy, New York, a military supplier named Sam Wilson packed meat rations in barrels labeled U.S. According to local lore, a soldier was told the initials stood for “Uncle Sam” Wilson, who was feeding the army. The name endured as shorthand for the U.S. government. However, the image of Uncle Sam as a white-bearded recruiter didn’t appear for another century, during World War I.
There Was Almost a United States of New England
The political tension persisted as the war progressed, culminating with the Hartford Convention, a meeting of New England dissidents who seriously flirted with the idea of seceding from the United States. They rarely used the terms “secession” or “disunion,” however, as they viewed it as merely a separation of two sovereign states.
For much of the preceding 15 years, Federalist plans for disunion ebbed and flowed with their party’s political fortunes. After their rival Thomas Jefferson won the presidency in 1800, they grumbled sporadically about seceding, but mostly when Jefferson took actions they didn’t appreciate (and, worse, when the electorate agreed with him). The Louisiana Purchase, they protested, was unconstitutional; the Embargo Act of 1807, they said, devastated the New England shipping industry. Electoral victories in 1808 silenced chatter of disunion, but the War of 1812 reignited those passions.
Led by Senator Thomas Pickering, disaffected politicians sent delegates to Hartford in 1814 as the first step in a series to sever ties with the United States. “I do not believe in the practicality of a long-continual union,” wrote Pickering to convention chairman George Cabot. The North and South’s “mutual wants would render a friendly and commercial intercourse inevitable.”
Cabot and other moderates in the party, however, quashed the secessionist sentiment. Their dissatisfaction with “Mr. Madison’s War,” they believed, was merely a consequence of belonging to a federation of states. Cabot wrote back to Pickering: “I greatly fear that a separation would be no remedy because the source of them is in the political theories of our country and in ourselves…. I hold democracy in its natural operation to be the government of the worst.”
