different servile war civil war and it's a jarring to hear the

war of 1812 called the civil war and so what i want to do today is try to make the case for why i title this the way i have. the war of 1812 ordinarily flumes fairly small in the americans memory. it's ordinarily forgotten as insignificant because it seems to have ended in a drawl that changed no boundary and changed the policy. now at best americans will recall the four met for a hand full of patriotic icons. the national anthem, the victory of the american war, the constitution known as a lawyer in sight. for the british perfidy and burning of the white house and capitol and then the payback that andrew jackson and the tennessee riflemen to get new orleans and the british army. these images suggest the war was a defense of the united states

against british invasion because all of these episodes, held primarily of the last year of the war and a period in which the british are now mounting. but canadians remember what americans forget which is the war began in most rarely fought as an american invasion of canada. some canadians remember it very different format. they celebrate their victory in the war and i want to invite you if you are ever with a canadian do not stay the united states won the war of 1812, because they take it very seriously. i found this out -- i find this out of it, go through the border through passport control because they want to ask me why i am coming into canada, and i should have learned by now not to tell them the truth. [laughter] i tell them i'm there to do historical research come so of course the next question is what are you researching and then i

make the mistake which is to say the war of 1812. well, this is going to keep me there for about another ten minutes. not that they are more suspicious of me but they just want me to know khanna whammo war and they want to know that i know that. [laughter] so if any of you have been backed up for a long period of time behind my car a lot to apologize to you. what canadians remember is their victory over the american goliath because canada's population of course was much smaller than the american population. and they recall american perfidy and burning their public building's first in the capitol of upper canada then called to work but now called toronto and they have their own patriotic figures, the equivalent of paul revere now famous for a lot of

chocolates'. but what i want to do in this book is not to try to promote patriotism on either side of the border. i think patriotism is fine on both sides of the border but that is not my goal in the book. the book is to attend something i call a border history so as to look at people who experience war along the border experience being invaded and occupied by armies from both side. it's about the relationship of soldiers with civilians, which i think is much more significant than we ordinarily think of when we think about military history. we tend to talk about the army is all very important, but we forget the kind of civilian context in which they must operate because the civilians are essentials in sources of support and food, sources potentially of the trail. the book focuses on the border

lens that extends on the east montreal that the st. lawrence river to the great lakes to detroit. this is the theater for most of the fighting in the war. it is the primary target of american invasion. on the american side of the border, of course it's primarily new york state committee on the british side of the border it's primarily the colony of upper canada. now consequently it is a little different than a conventional history of the war of 1812 which will range over the globe were ever there were american forces and this was a war on the high seas including the pacific, along the gulf coast and along the atlantic coast and especially the chesapeake bay. i have relatively little to say about this topics. when canadians and americans were in this border land that is my central story. to compensate for the somewhat limited geographic range, i

offer greater depth and time so it's a story the begins with the first american civil war, the american revolution which divided americans between those who supported the revolution and those americans who favor the entire instead. so it goes from the revolution from the 70's, 90's, first decade of the 19th century before we get to the war come and then it pays considerable attention to the post war consequences particularly for upper canada during the 18 twenties and 1840's. malae argue that this was a civil war between tendered peoples because the difference between the british and americans isn't as clear-cut as we did it and in hindsight. we tend to think of the american revolution as making a very clean break and creating an american nationality which is

quite distinct from the british. and i argue that that process was only partial as of 1812. the officers on both sides, the soldiers on both sides often experience they see the people that they are fighting against has potential converts to their side, and as people who are culturally essentially similar steve got this great mixing in the united states of irish scots and english people as well as people born in the united states for many generations and african-americans, but to find the same mix of people over in canada. and so often people's perception is not that they are fighting american or british, but that they are and i rushed person who lives in america who happen to be in british regiments posted in canada. september of 1813a british lt. does it hit an american army can't get a message from his commander he had to bring to the

american commander. and mr. icahn as strange when he started meeting the american officers and heard their names. quote, strange indeed did it appear to me to find some names, familiar household words and enemy is the very names of officers and my own army. how uncomfortably like a civil war. he then bantered with an american officer who just returned from shooting birds said to this officer much pleasanter sport isn't it than shooting one's own language and of quote. but a month later in atrocity by american troops led him to denounce the american so serving no mercy in battle, quote, they are worse than frenchman. [laughter] so said the british officer with a french name. [laughter] now in this north american civil

war, brother fought brothers at times in a border land of mixed people, he watched with a mrs. elizabeth robinson and wrote, quote, they are a yankee family and have several relatives in the american army and navy, and of quote. another british officer, william, reported a canadian soldier of the guinn very light infantry shot an american rifleman and then ran up to ponder his corpse. when, quote, he discovered it was his own brother. but then this canadian soldier called the remarked, quote, it served him right for serving the rebels when all the rest of his family fought for king george. this is the war of 1812, it isn't a revolution but for this man and for so many they regard this as a continuation of the revolution but the revolution isn't over for these people.

he concluded, quote, such as the terri hail lens of political rancor it can overcome the ties of nature. to call the war f-18 paul seems jarring because we think we have just one house of war from the 1860's which is a much bigger and bloody year affair than the war 1812. but we need i think if we can recall the war of 1812 as a civil war if we recall just how unstable the american union and the republic was in the generation after the revolution there was a feeling of many people within the united states including many leaders that they were embarked on a very risky experiment in public on this week geographic scale, and they were very conscious of the very powerful regional differences not just between north and south

but also between east and west, and there was a great deal of anxiety that some people were conspiring somewhere to kind of lead their section of secondly and a great deal of wonder of how you balance out these regions in a way that would preserve the stability of the country. then they felt they had a further problem that with native people to the west and they were persuaded the british were meddling with those people arming them, encouraging them, forming alliances with them to block american expansion and that this might blow up the american union if they could fail to expand westward. then there is also concern that grows especially from 1807 and on that the british spies are at work within the united states, perhaps in cahoots with the political minority in the

country, the federalists who are feeling quite alienated from their government under the leadership of the republican party. knott today's republican party but the republican party of thomas jefferson and of james madison. so there is a great deal of insecurity within the united states, and nobody is entirely confident that this is going to endure particularly if the british commander major to the north and canada which is regarded as a source of trouble that could exploit the weakness of the american union and blow it apart. on the other hand, you would find the same people expressing this conviction that the british empire in north america could never last, but the british were and on natural presence in the continent that rightly should have a republican form of government everywhere. and there is anxiety among the british leaders after the

american revolution. they are worried whether they are going to be able to maintain their control over canada. and so no one is certain that the border between the united states between the united states and canada, but in the republic and the entire is fixed and permanent on the contrary most people assume that it's either going to move north or it's going to move south rather than stay put. so the people who live on either side of the border are regarded as in play in terms of their allegiance, and though war is to be open to the possibility of switching their allegiance. deep within the republic, the politics are so bitterly partisan that the republicans regard their opposition, the

federalist as crypto loyalists. in 1812 a writer explained that ideology rather than nationality distinguished the north american republican from a north american loyalist and these people could be found on both sides of the border, both republicans and loyalists. quote come as much as people of the two nations resemble each other and face, it is notoriously evident that there are some in america whose souls are perfectly british. and it is believed that there are some in britain who are americans at heart. it is not where a man is born or what he looks like, but what he thinks, which at this day ought to constitute the difference between an american citizen and a british subject. so it's not national become its ideology. and so this competition between the republic and the employer keeps blurring of the national boundary and the national

identities and north america through the war of 1812. now this overlap of british people and american people become much more complicated after the revolution because people continue to move around. there are two migration streams in particular that plea in to this war. the first is of irish people leading the british i'm tired and moving toward the united states. they are over 60 present of the immigrants who come to the united states between 73 and 1820. and these are people who are mostly feeling quite a lead from the british empire and its rule over ireland. very high proportion of them are politically active and they are concentrated in places that are three politically strategic in american politics particularly the cities of new york, philadelphia and baltimore where they are in positions to swing

elections and contested states and the overwhelmingly support the republican party and the desire for that party and its administration to have a confrontational foreign policy toward the provision higher and they tend to be enthusiasts for the invasion of canada in the hope that it is going to start a process of unraveling the entire mission pioneer the would liberate canada, excuse me, liberty to ireland as well as canada. is it that is one of migration. so we've got a lot of people considered by the british empire to still be british subjects because the british believe, the british leaders believe that once you are born a subject you can never cease to be a subject no matter where you go when the world, no matter what legal process of naturalization you may go through, it is completely

out of the view of british officials. so they believe for example when they find these irish men on american merchant ships they have every right to grab them off the merchant ship and cast them into the royal navy potentially for life. and it is this treatment of former british subjects who believe they have become american citizens that is the prime cause of the war for the secondary cause the american concern over british alliances of native peoples. the second migration stream i want to talk about is that of americans, people born within the united states moving into canada. of course we know about the true loyalists who have to go immediately after the war of the

american revolution because they have no choice. and about 6,000 such people go to upper canada, many more to the maritime provinces of nova scotia and new brunswick and others the west indies and others to england but on top of that migration stream there's a subsequent larger migration stream that comes to be called euphemistically the lethally list and their people who go during the 79 days and during the first decade of the 19th century, and there are at least giving in to cover canada more of these people, about 50,000 compared to the 6,000 troops loyal lists. some of these people it's not true have been passively resisting british forces during the union, but most of them were just people who didn't want to fight in the american revolution and a lot of them were quakers or from pennsylvania and new jersey in particular because

they had a hard time of it during the revolution because patriots felt these people weren't supportive. and others were just people who were looking for cheap land and low taxes which upper canada offered. one of the ironies of the american revolution is it increases the price of frontier land and one way the settlers can avoid paying the high gear price of the frontier land is to move back to the british empire because canada's offering virtually free land to anybody who they could buy any remote definition called a loyalist and that then enables these 50,000 people to move into canada, get free land, take an oath of allegiance to king george, and then go about the business little expecting that a war would come into their next. now these two migration streams of the irish coming into the united states and these

americans mostly from the midlantic region going to upper canada will collide in the war 1812. irish-americans will end up serving in numbers disproportionate to their numbers and the american population they will end up serving in the miller military force and in a way this isn't surprising an aggressive always served in especially large numbers in the regular army of the united states and that continues to this day, and the irish for the number one immigrant groups but it's also the case that the political leaders and their journalists are great enthusiasts for the war tickets to the british empire and encourage the enlistment. the irish serving on the private warships called privateers are serving in the american navy and they are also serving in the american regular army. now when the fight in upper

canada, it turns out the british regular regiments that they are fighting against, almost all were recruited in ireland so there's actually a larger percentage of irish people serving in the british regular regiments in canada than for serving in the american regular regiment's even though they are quite conspicuous on the american side. so there is a civil war between irish people's. it's very clear something on the order of 70% of the soldiers serving in canada during the war were irish. ireland had become a primary recruiting ground for the british army in the period in which the army must expand a dramatically because it is waging a global war against napoleon's empire so they relaxed previous restrictions on protestants serving in the british army and ireland becomes

the primary place for them to recruit troops and it just turns out that the have sent a lot of these troops to canada and would continue to do so as they reinforce those troops during the course of the war. not because the british have been very nervous that these irish soldiers and their regiments might desert and go over to the americans, it's important for them to make a point of punishing american soldiers who happen to be irish who are captured in the american defeat of which there were many in canada. when they would capture these irish-americans soldiers or sailors, they would give them a harsh choice. they must enlist in british forces, become a british soldier or sailor, or they must stand trial as a traitor in which the penalty is death. if any of these people had

previously served in the british military forces and this could be proved, these people were not given a choice, they were just simply executed. iran agreed to the united states without prior military experience or at least prior military experience that can be proved the rich given the choice most people choose to go into the british military. this doesn't mean difficult people, that means most of us would make the same choice and these people are calculating the day is going to come when they can desert and get back to the american forces. in there's another 59 soldiers and later there's another 101 sealers which all refuse to accept going into british forces and their sent to england for trial.

the initial group of 23 become a test case irish-american political figures within the united states make it quite clear to the madison administration that they must have delivered for madison's reelection and 1812 and they are delivering hundreds and thousands of irish americans to serve in american forces and that is going to come to a halt if the united states does nothing should the british and hanging in at least 23 men. so the united states then tells the british government they're going to take 23 captured british officers, turns out most of the more i risch they are captured in canada or most of them were irish and british conceived of irish began held hostage on both sites for the fate of the authors. british commanders said fine we

are setting aside 46 american captured officers for the fate of those 23 that you are holding hostage on top of the initial 23 that we have. the states set aside 46 british officers and in ceos because of that pie they were running out of the captive british officers. and this goes on up with a british double language for the americans set aside as hostages until all the officers and the ngos held prisoner by both sides have been designated as hostages, so that if the british proceed to execute any one of the original 23 it is coming to set up a blood bath. now in the end, the british decided not to do this because they would like to get out of this war from the wouldn't like it to last forever. and so they know that negotiating a peace with the united states must be difficult if both sides have the blood of lots of prisoners on their hands

and then finally i want to talk about needy people which is a dimension of the civil war because native people fight on both sides and a native nations are divided by the war because natives of the same nation live on either side of this boundary which had been run against their will and their mixed in the week of the american revolution and so you have people that we often call the iroquois lit on both sides of the border and to have the shawnee people living on both sides of the border, so you will find the shawnee fighting against the shawnee and this war as allies of the british and of the united states respectively it a the same will play out for the shawnee so this is a north

american civil war might argue one in which americans are fighting americans because those americans are settled with an upper canada are under pressure to serve as a militia against the american invaders so the very first casualty of the war is an upper canadian militiaman shot by an american sniper. the upper canadian militiaman was a canadian by birth. succumbing to -- when american forces go into canada and their opponents will include upper canadian militia it's americans against americans overwhelmingly because the americans who had settled in upper canada were at least 60% and perhaps two-thirds of upper canada's population by 1812. it's also a symbol war of irish people against irish people so it is a civil war within the

british empire over whether the british empire extends river its subjects go in the world. and then finally is a civil war might involving native people who are on both sides of the border and of the war. ultimately by telling the story of this border land war, i want to say that it is less about some sort of nationality understood as ethnicity than it is as a contest between a republican the empire for the allegiance of diverse peoples who lived on both sides of the border. both republicans and here i am talking about people who ideologically are committed to a republican form of government. both republicans and loyalists and here i mean anybody who is committed to the mixed constitution of great britain. republicans and loyalists suspected the continent wasn't big enough for the rival

systems. republika and mixed constitution's. one or the other would have to prevail in the house divided. like the revolution is a soulful war between competing visions of america. either one still loyal to the entire or the other defined by its republican revolution against the entire revolution that was still ongoing but neither side would reap what it expected from the war. frustrated in their fantasies of smashing the other, the loyalists and the republican america had to learn how to share the continent and call coexistence victory on both sides. bye ending in the standoff and concluding the revolution, the war of 1812 ted gup greatest consequences for north america. thank you. [applause]

>> quinby take questions blight will be tossed around, so if you could wait until you get the microphone before asking your question. i will just begin the question if anyone would like to raise their hand they can be given the microphone in the meantime. the civil war i aspect i wonder if you want to say more about what the british hope to gain by the war of 1812. were they really just interested in mutualize in america while fighting the major war in europe sometimes this is portrayed as a war attempted reconquest but plans were prevented, were they not?

>> the entire like the united states to the divided leadership and you are quite right that a majority of you, the predominant view is the british have more important business to deal with in europe which is napoleon. they are fighting for the very survival of their empire and their way of life and their prosperity against despot, and they felt that the united states basically committed a sucker punch on britain that was doing it the world's good deed by contending this a despot who was after the world domination. when you read what the british have to say about napoleon, it is not too far off the british leader said about hitler. and so -- they got a very hard go with it. certainly they prevail on the high seas, but when the war begins in 1812, napoleon as of the crest of his power. he's just launching his invasion with russia and french forces

are still predominant in spain where wellington's army is very heavily engaged. so the british a goal in the war, the goal number one is let's end this as quickly as we can but see if the americans will listen to reason. let's see if we can negotiate a quick exit and avoid sending any more than the minimum number of reinforcement that we need to converting them from wellington to go to canada. so that is the predominant perspective. the minority opinion is those bastards and the american. how dare they attack us when we were down. this shows you cannot trust these people with a republican form of government. wouldn't we love to blow them apart? wouldn't it be great if we could really encourage the new englanders to separate, wouldn't it be great if we could encourage this leaves to run away and wouldn't it be wonderful if we could get in the people to reclaim land south as

far as the ohio? and there are many people in the field either admiral suncoast or generals operating in canada who allow this kind of "wouldn't it be great" thinking to inform their actions and to inform their advice back to their home government. and once napoleon goes down in the spring of 1814, that kind of view becomes a appealing to policy makers in london and they think yeah, we really need to negotiate a tougher boundary and we need to be talking with the new englanders through the back channels and we need to be grabbing new orleans and think about kind of stifling american development in the last that many things might be possible now so that kind of much more aggressive view of the possibilities serve just before during the summer and fall of 1814. diplomatic relations in europe

seem to sour in the late fall of 1814 and it looks like there might be another war in europe and then the older predominant view of the war in north america as a distraction comes back and the british negotiators are given very strict instructions get out of this war. give the americans the term and say we are going to give back the territory reconquer from the united states and restore the boundary that it was at the start of the war. we agree we will talk about the impressive sealers, moot point anyway. we don't need such a big row because napoleon is defeated and we just will go our way and just try to be friendly from now on. it's kind of like these three actors and the longest first act is as you describe it there is this brief second act and which they are toying with the idea of really chongging to blow up the republic and the union and then the third act in which they agree to making peace that allows the union and its republic to indoor -- endure.

>> what was the motivation for the other tribes to fight on either side? i don't think they would have viewed the british or the americans as friends. >> have more reason to view the british as potential friend. the american numbers are much larger, so the united states and in 1810 is over 7 million people. doesn't seem large to us what you are about the 100,000 native people and have a neighbor that is 7.2 million people and then in canada you've got about 300,000 people, so british canada is much less of a threat to come and dispossessed the native people than is the united states at that time and the british recognize they are greatly outnumbered by the american population and so they needed the indian allies. that's why they are making these alliances on the other side of the border which from the british perspective is a border that shouldn't exist anyway.

so the native people, the great majority of them saw the british as youthful allies to have and prefer to fight on the british side particularly when british commanders are promising them that they are going to of rollback american settlements all the way back to the ohio river so that the shawnee leaders can say is the most influential in the indian war chief and is trying to build the confederacy of the indian nations the will be aligned with the british empire. it is a much tougher question to answer why what some native peoples to support the united states? well, they are people who are living on reservations in which they are essentially surmounted or almost surrounded by american settlements. an early in the war, americans tell the american people we don't want you involved. they insist that it is barbaric

for the british to be employing indians and borat and they insisted the americans are going to take the high moral ground by not employing indians. this turns out to be disastrous because the indians are so effective in the forced warfare in which most of the war consists of in canada and contribute mightily to some very embarrassing defeat by american forces that have invaded canada. so come 1813, many american officers are singing okay, we tried the high road, now we want our own indians. and they start putting pressure on these indians with in these reservations that, look, you better come and help us. now there are some native people that have their own reasons to be involved in war in part because young men want to prove themselves as warriors and kind of being stuck in these reservations is no way to do that. so initially there is some warming to this idea on the part

of these indians who end up aligning with of the united states but they will rethink this when they find themselves in combat and the find out some of the people they are fighting against their own. >> phil williams. thank you for a fascinating talk. i really enjoyed this tremendously. could you take a drop on from the northern border a little bit and speak a little bit more specifically about the back channels and the potential for the secession in the new england colonies states in connecticut in particular at that time? >> well, the new england states particularly massachusetts which at that time included mechem and connecticut were very hostile to the war, or i should say the

majority was hostile to the war. one of the ironies is that it is the primary recruiting ground for the american regular regiment's as in newfoundland seven new england is a divided region. there was a republican minority and they are staunch supporters of the war and so american regiments doherty heavily recruited in new england, but the majority of people and new england are federalists opposed to the war, and they just see one disasters after another on folding in the war, and they see their commerce being cut up by the royal navy, and so there is something a little close or there is an economic recession going on in doing with the nec makes people very bitter, and they are feeling that they have been confined to a permanent minority status within the nation that seems will be perpetual the governed by virginians which new englanders had a hard time, most of them getting their mind around it, so

they have washington. he was great, but then along came jefferson. then madison following him, and what looks like monroe is when to follow him. so there is this very kind of a virulent antivirginia attitude that develops in new england this is basically this is a plot by virginians to destroy new england, so if you believe that then you think there is no place for you and the union any more. some of these people start to talk very recklessly and right for a recklessly unless the mainland is allowed to conduct its own defense lawyer going to have to seek a separate peace, and we know the governor of massachusetts sends a secret emissary to consult with the governor of the british builder scotia about what if we were to stop paying taxes to the united states and stop recognizing the

authority of the united states? what britain be willing to extend its protection over new england? the governor of nova scotia says this is a high your pay greater than on and that to decide this. i'm going to have to send to london for this. he sent to london and one of this is all going on, the infamous hartford convention is being held in which these delegates together get together and in effect they say do we dare do this right now? this is the fall of 1814. they decide they don't dare to do it but they will make some provocative demands for a set of the nonstarter amendments to the u.s. constitution including you couldn't have a president from the same state succeed each other. [laughter] okay well that's not very well coated. [laughter] cities are nonstarters, and then they are going to have a convention again in the spring of its scheduled, and they think

the war is still going to be going on and they want to be prepared. if the war is going on, if the united states is faltering, basically bankrupt country, no public credit, it was gone by the fall of 1814 devotees guys might have made the leap in the spring. we will never know because peace comes along to interrupt all of this. islamic since we are here in jefferson, jefferson famous this is the conquest of canada would be a matter of marching, and i was wondering if you got this sense of that either in washington or actually on the ground on the american side of the border that was sort of an active understanding of how this would play out that it would be we would waive our flag and hand out an invitation and there would be no real fighting in the war of 1812. >> welcome there is a widespread belief that there would be some fighting but it would be very

easily won. and it's in large part because they think most these people in upper canada are americans. they aren't going to fight us and that means we have to deal with small forces of british regulars and we will roll for them easily come so jefferson quote is we will be able to get to the gates of quebec in the war and then your number to we will be mopping up and capture quebec and oust the british from north america it's a fantasy to go that far but a lot of people thought he was right about conquering a per canada rather quickly. quebec is a very serious for tracinda would be a very tough match for the american military to have cracked given their lack of much of a professional army at that point. jefferson isn't alone. henry clay says some things and almost the entire congressional leadership thinks this is going to be a cakewalk and they fought

their troubles would come at sea when the royal navy is so powerful and so the irony is the republican political leadership didn't like the navy and didn't want to invest money in it. they solve the army has more cost-effective and the expected to win the war, land. one after another they bring disaster. meanwhile this navy is winning victories that strategically don't amount to anything. but, in terms of moral the british don't expect to ever lose one on one ship battles they just don't do that with the french even though the french have more powerful chips but they are losing them all the time to the americans and it is impossible to understate just how shocking this is to the british. and the americans are thrilled by this and so you get people like calhoun and henry clay that never voted the dollar for the navy before i don't think and now saying our great american

victory of the navy and the start investing in the navy. so it's a war which i would say like all doesn't play out the way anybody expects it to. so these naval victories in that in the long term being very important. that's why i've got the u.s. constitution on my tie today because that is what we remember now is the great naval victories and probably most of us would be very hard-pressed to name the crushing defeats the united states suffered in 1812 and 1813 on the canadian soil. the focus in the book in the upper lakes and canada is a key area to the strategic during the

revolutionary war and the lead up to the saratoga. i know the idea is very similar in terms of using clich champlain as a corridor in the hudson and seeing that is the key to controlling the northern states. >> the interesting thing is the united states potentially has many more military resources in the war of 1812 than the revolution. it's got an up and running government that starts with some public credit, it's got something of an army, something of a navy. it doesn't have to start all from scratch the way the american revolution had. the american revolutionaries despite limited resources are very aggressive about invading panama early because they regard having the british on the northern to be a great security risk particularly because british influence with native people. so the americans do the sensible thing. they invade the natural invasion

route that had been used during the seven years which is lake champlain. is the easiest most direct way to move an army with all of its equipment by water. >> montgomery in benedict arnold. specs the montgomery is going that route and benedict arnold is going through this kind of root of course my beloved state of maine, which he just barely survived for this force, but the targets are the core target of canada, they are montr, which the united states, well that's not the united states, yet, the american patriots captor and then they move on to quebec and the siege that attack and are defeated there and then it is a long roll back during 1776. that would have been the natural strategy to have pursued and this is one that is suggested by jefferson that is what they are going to do, they're going to

target montr and move back to quebec. that is how you win in canada because everything further upstream, which is upper canada is going to fall any way because you are going to cut them off from reinforcements and supplies if you control montreal and quebec and from the rest of the british empire. that is the key to winning. and everybody understood that sort of. the problem is the united states doesn't feel it has enough regular soldiers to take on in the first year of the war an attack against montreal so they are casting about where can we use smaller forces and win something so that we can impress voters before the fall election and build popular support for the war which is a little shaky in the country right now. we need a victory so they are looking for places of easy victory and they decide the upper canada. so even though strategically it makes no sense to invade upper

canada should be invading lower canada we now call quebec. the invade upper canada and from the worst possible place which is from detroit which is that far in both the line because of the fold by an incompetent military commander into believing that he could win a quick and easy victory by invading western upper canada from detroit. it turns out as disastrously as possible because instead after a brief invasion of canada, this general panics, runs back to detroit, he is pursued by the british and indian allies, panics again and serve vendors without firing a shot. so the fall of 1812, instead of having a glorious a tree somewhere in canada, they have got a set of disasters, the worst of which is the loss of detroit and it's going to be really tough going in reaching

this war. >> well, alan sits on the academic advisory board of monticello. he has been immensely supportive so it is a great pleasure to have him back here and we wish him every success with his interpretation of the war of 1812. thank you very much. [applause] this event took place at thomas jefferson monticello in virginia. to find out more, visit monitcello.org. well-known author kitty kelley has written about frank sinatra, nancy reagan, the bush family among other topics and now oprah. does oprah's have a role in the

political will? >> no question. being from one of the most powerful women not just in our country but globally, she has immense power because she is a communicator and she influences millions and millions of people. just ask president obama. really, back in 2000 when george bush was running against all the work, his poll ratings were much higher than bush, but after bush appeared on oprah, she that ties him with her female audience and the poll went up and look what happened. in fact, chris rock comes all the time and says you're the one who elected george w. bush. so yes, she has immense power. >> in fact george w. bush for his decision point just went on oprah's recently to talk about his book. >> it was a first for him. i saw a little bit of it and it

was a very receptive audience for bush to put forward that particular book. >> generally what is an oprah's influence on american culture? >> well, you know, oprah has been on our television for 25 years. so we sort of have grown up with oprah. she has had an immense influence especially with women. that is really her target audience. she has been fabulous. her book club was wonderful. writers adore her and authors would kill to get on her show. i'm afraid this book is not going to make the oprah book club but she does have immense power in influencing people. >> what is your goal as an author? >> as a pornographer michael is not simply to tell the life story of a very powerful person that to bring in the times in

which they operated. now my biographies are what they call unauthorized. i prefer independent, myself, but i don't do them with the authorization of the person. by the time someone is as powerful as oprah winfrey or frank sinatra or nancy reagan, they have already gotten legions of publicists have been telling their story along time, and i try to get behind that methodology to a bitter reality. >> what is your next topic? >> i don't know. i'm hoping for suggestions. reva come after doing oprah winfrey -- she was a biographer's dream. she really gave me such a gift. now it did take -- a data take four years to do this book, and i had to interview for 850 people to get this story. it was a fabulous story. i mean, she was born poor in a

racist state. she's become one of the most powerful, beloved icons really of our century. so it was a gift to be able to write her life story. i don't know who could talk it right now. >> kitty kelley, "obra," a biography, her latest book. a new book out by bloomsbury publishing. blur how to know what is true in the age of information overload. in your book one of the chapters is we have been here before. what does that mean? >> that means we've gone through this dislocation created by an expansion of information time and again throughout history. in fact, newspapers were born at such time when the printing press came into being and

distributed information to people who never had the information about the people in the institutions to control the lives, and it took decades for the public and the industry of information sharing to develop what we call newspapers to create a basis on which people could find information they could trust, and we have gone through this time after time with each new major change in technology. we've gone through a period exactly like this. >> mr. rosensteil, y deneen "-- why the name "blur"? >> people confused. when information is in greater supply, knowledge is actually harder to create because you have to sift through more stings to make sense of it.

so there is a feeling that things are more of a blur lamarca fusion even the we have information at our fingertips. >> how we cut through the blur and find what we need? >> we hope the way that consumers will do it, and the consumers are more in charge now than they've ever been. we are in control of our own media in a way we've never been. as we hope what people will do is develop the skills of what is reliable and not and that is what the book is about. it's about the betrayed craft that once resided in newsrooms shared with consumers. but it's also true that when things are uncertain and confusing that a lot of people just gravitate the news they agree with the part of what we are looking at in the information now is something of a war between people who want to be empirical and provide evidence and show how

information is gathered, and people who want to assert what they believe, offer opinions and mask in audience that way. >> bill kovach, you are also the co-author of the elements of journalism. what is your background? >> excuse me. my background is going on 60 years in print journalism. i began in a little town in upper east tennessee and covered the civil rights movement and the appalachian poverty and then worked for "the new york times" for 20 years, eight years as the chief of the washington bureau the am i was editor of the atlanta journal constitution, spent the last ten years of my active life as curator of the nieman foundation at harvard journalism program at harvard, and i am now retired but working and running an organization that

he and i created called the committee of concerned journalist track that preserve the values over journalism that we can all trust. >> mr. rosensteil commodores background? >> i was a newspaperman also. i spent 12 years of the l.a. times. ten of those as a press critic for the paper. i worked briefly for newsweek, and while i was there i was approached by the pew charitable trust by creating a think tank research institution on the press which we created in 1996 called the project for journalism that's part of the p research center here in washington, and we have the largest content analysis operation in the united states studying with the media actually produced on the fury that conventional press where he wag your finger of the press and say you shouldn't do that really isn't effective anymore, but if you offer an empirical look and

say this is when you're doing, you decide whether it is when you want to do. but that has more leverage. >> is indeed advantage people can get any type of news that they want and when they want rather than wait for the morning paper? >> absolutely. it's marvelous. it's a wonderful system we have now that the only problem is people are now as tom said their own editors of what you're going to bring into their report and their own reporters of who is producing this that i am bringing some people have to become much more aware of the information they are bringing, how it is produced, was it produced to inform or to propagandize to help them understand or to recruit them. this is what this book is designed to do, to help them use the process, the methodology of