the best seamen in the united states. not so. they had to compete with private ears and they usually got the best men because the cruises were shorter and the prospect of profit was greater than serving in the us navy. they had to compete with the army. by the end of the war in order to get people to serve, the war department was offering bounties r that were $134 in cash and 320 acres of land. base based on unskilled labor in those days, that's probably about $30,000 today. there were a lot of seamen who could not resist the lure of that bounty and figures show that about 5% of the u.s. armies were seamen. they asked people what their trade was and about 5% were

seamen. they went where the money was. so the u.s. navy was competing not only with private ears and the u.s. army. certainly didn't have an opportunity to pick the best seamen. most of our crews were british subjects. that was not true. there had been a fair number serves in the navy, but after the chesapeake affair in 1807, the navy department ordered that no more british suggests be employed and most once war was declared, left the us navy any way because they knew if they were captured, they were likely to be hanged. teddy roosevelt who is a great historian reckoned that no war ship had as many as 10% of the crew as british tars. he is probably right about that. they didn't rely on pit crews and british tars. the last part of this myth is

the american myth. because we won a series on the high seas, that we won the war. not so. the british gave about as good as they got in the course of the war. won about as many as they lost and they used their naval power to blockade the coast and that had a devastating impact on the u.s. economy and cut sharply into government revenue. if anybody, the british won the war at city and one would expect that. kentucky and tennessee won the battle of new orleans although this was fought after the war was over. rifles did not play a significant role in the battle. all the evidence suggests the

eight batteries of artillery that anchored jack's line and even the british reported that the canister and grape shot fired from the weapons. it tore huge holes in the advancing lines. u.s. muskets probably played a more significant role. rifles were probably third on the lines. rifles to be used had to be aimed. i don't think people were aiming their rifles or muskets. we have some contemporary reports that simply indicate that the riflemen and musketmen were just holding their weapons above the earth works and pulling the trigger without looking and who can blame them? it was a lot safer that way. that's one of the reasons they were so unbalanced in that battle. the british sustained 2,000 killed wounded and missing.

genson's main line, only 13 kills and wounded. it is also widely believe that is this battle was fought after the war was over. the treaty of gantten, the peace treaty was signed on december 24th, 1814. conventional wisdom holds if there had only been an underwater telegraph to send the message that the treaty had been signed, the battle would have never been fought. that ignores the first clause of the treaty which provided that the war would end only after both sides ratified the treaty. the british ratified three days later on december 27th. it did not reach the united states until february. the u.s. senate signed off it

unanimously on february 16th and later that day when madison put his signature on the treaty in the octagon house, the white house being uninhabitable at the time, that officially brought the war to an end and thus both nations sent out orders suspending hostilities. so this war actually ended on february 16th, 1815, which was about five weeks after the battle of new orleans. number eight, if the british prevailed at new orleans, they planned to sack the city and retain louisiana after peace had been restored. two myths here, the first is that the british planned to sac the city. it was believed in the united states after the war that the sign and counter sign of british troops was beauty and booty. that may or may not have been true, but no evidence that they plan to sac the city. they kept a tight leash on the

soldiers. they surely would have been done the same when they occupied if they occupied new orleans. i see no evidence to suggest they planned to sac the city. is there evidence that they planned to keep louisiana if they succeeded in this campaign. this myth is built on the orders that the commanding british general carried with him. that provided for establishing civilian government in southern louisiana if the british prevailed in this campaign. but that was to be a temporary government. you look at the diplomatic documents and what the british officials were thinking, this whole campaign on the gulf coast wasn't even on their radar. in fact, at one point, the british prime minister, lord liverpool, dismissed the whole campaign saying that new orleans

was the most unhealthy place in america. so if the british conquered southern louisiana, i'm sure they would have restored it just as they did the 100 mile ats the end of the coast, just as they restored mack gnaw island, prairie duquesne and cumberland island in georgia. the peace treaty provided for returning to the status quo antebellum, which meant all territory was to be restored. i'm confidence the british would have done that with louisiana. nine. federal opposition to the war encouraged the enemy and prolonged the war. this was a notion that the federalists, excuse me, the republicans embraced during the war and kept it alive after the war. essentially, what they did was claim credit r for all the victories and blame all the defeats and failure, all the

misfortunes of the war on those nasty federalists who had opposed it from the very beginning. in point of fact, i think federalist opposition in the united states combined with whig opposition in great britain actually shortened the war. i think both nations were more amenable to a compromised peace because of domestic opposition to the war. so, far from prolonging the war of 1812, i think federalist opposition actually shortened it. finally, the united states could have -- canada, but given its successes, it could still claim victory. the armchair generals who fought since 1815 have argued and i think convincingly, that the united states focused its strategy too far west. expended far too many men and resources regaining first waging

war in the old northwest and then after detroit was lost, recovering it. that if only we consecrated against the two british anchors, namely montreal and excuse me, quebec, that we could have won this war. that criticism is not sound, but i don't think any strategy would have won this war. i don't think any strategy would have conquered canada. why not? number one, the u.s. army wasn't just a sad state in 1812. untrained, ill disciplined, enlisted men and leaders with little experience and little come tense. it was a decade of republican neglect came back to haunt us. not only that, but we faced a formidable fall. the british army was a fine army in canada and the british could

count on indian allies. the mere presence of an indian force on the battlefield could tip the battle because such was a reputation of indians for fer osty, that if they were known to be on the enemy's side, that would just cause the air to go out of the sails of the other side and you'd have panic and a flight. finally, the lodgist cal problems, seizing a major british strongholds and holding them, i just don't see that happening. you needed to control the waterways, which we didn't, but even if we had, i'm not sure we had the lodgist cal ability to wage and win a war on the northern frontier. given the state of our army, given the formidable foe we faced and the logistical

problems of waging the war, my own suspicion is that even the best strategy would not have led to the conquest of canada. finally, we have this notion that the united states won, enjoyed enough success on land and at sea that it could claim to win the war. who won the war is still a very contested matter. there's on old song that everybody's happy with the outcome. the americans are happy because they think they won. the canadians are happy because they know they won and the british are happiest of all because they've forgotten all about the war. it only ignores the biggest losers of all and those were the indians who fought on both sides. i think the bulk of opinion, that's because it ended in a draw on the battlefield.

i don't think you can jublg d outcome of a war by what happen ons the battlefield. in this case the united states went to war to force the british to give up some maritime practices. particularly the orders in consult and impressment and we wanted concessions on a number of lesser issues. definition of contraband, violations of territorial waters, abuses of naval blockades. now, the british actually withdrew the orders in consult just about the time we declared war. that left impressment as the only issue that divided the two nations. we had to drop this issue and all the others. the peace treaty did not even mention the issues that caused war, so it looks to me like we didn't achieve our war aims and thus we lost the war.

you might say if it mattered, the wars were over and the british didn't need to engage in those practices. that's true, but they were under no obligation based on the terms of the peace treaty not to rezone those practices and in fact, they did resume some of them during world war i. so it looks to me like we lost this war. that it represented a failure for american policymakers. that's not the way it was remembered, but that's the way it looks to me. okay. that concludes my remarks. what we want to do is take your questions and comments and challenges. we ask that you move up to the microphone to pose your question. so we can get this. right. >> thank you for the talk. it was excellent. you can explain how they did

this impress m, what it consi consisted of and why we were so angry about it? thank you. >> the royal navy expanded in the napoleonic wars. between 1793 and 1812. significantly. its manpower needs went from something like 36,000 in 1793 to i think it was close to 150,000 in 1812. the royal navy was chronically underman undermanned and the royal navy claimed a right to reclaim british suggests. to require them to serve in the royal navy. now, at the same time that the royal navy was expanding and needed all the manpower it could get, our trade was flourishing and expanding. we needed all the experienced seamen we could get and starting employing british tars.

the pay was much better. so the royal navy reserved the right to stop american vessels on the high e seas, muster the crew, inspect the crewmen and remove those who were deemed to be british suggests. the problem with this was that it was very difficult to tell the difference between a u.s. citizen and british suggest. the differences in language and the like was not as great as it is today, so sometimes by accident, american tars were impressed into british service. in addition, sometimes, it was no accident. you'd get a 16-year-old british naval lieutenant boarding an american merchant vessel and simply musters the crew and says you, you, you and you, you come with me. he doesn't care who you are. he needs men and he's not even goin to interview you. maybe you protest. he's going to say -- give that

man 39 lashes for insulting a royal navy officer and that's your introduction to the british navy. under american law, they were required to report and the u.s. government did make an effort to accumulate evidence. if you were an american citizen and dispatched that information, if officials in london found it convincing, they would order your release from the ship you were serving on. but that had to be done through diplomatic challenges and could take years. the rule was that if at any point during that service, you accepted the royal bounty, the enlistment bounty, you were considered a volunteer no matter what your nationality. we think something like 10,000 american citizens were by accident or impressed into the

royal navy. probably between 1803 and 1812, it was 6,000. i think that number is a pretty good estimate. >> thank you very much. a quick one. do we have a handle on the number of casualties and wounded on each side? >> very, very difficult to get at. the official figures for the united states were something like 2300 killed and 4500 wound. based on statistical work i have done, the u.s. probably sustained about 20,000 deaths. that's because a half million militia served sometimes for a couple of hours, sometimes a half million militia served for a couple of day, sometimes for three months. we don't know how many of those militia got a camp disease and went home and died. my estimate if you put all of

the dust that probably occurred, i think probably 20,000 americans perished and 10,000 british and canadians and 7500 indians. a proportion of the population the indians suffered the heaviest casualties. >> did we do anything special for the veterans like benefits or aid or anything like that? then i'll be quiet there. >> the enlistment bounty was very generous. by the end of the war, about $30,000 today. in the years that followed, legislation awarded more and more bounties to those who serve and incapacity, excuse me, in the u.s. ar my. militia or volunteers and i think in the end, we doled out something like 225,000 bounties. land bountbounties, so those wh served. i don't know what the average is, but millions and millions of

acre of land. over time, we did pay out an awful lot to our veterans. the last veteran died in i think 1905. the last pension was paid to the daughter of a veteran in 1946. the veteran's benefits are going to be a third to a half or more of the total cost of the war because you pay them out for 100 years afterwards. >> the war of 1812 in any way precipitated the haiti revolution? >> did it have an impact on the haiti revolution. it began in 1791 and was effectively over with haiti's declaration of independence in 1804. i would say that preceded the war of 1812 and was unrelated to it. it contributed to napoleon and to sell louisiana to the united

states in 1803. so the haitian revolution plays an important role, but well before the war of 1812. >> we enjoyed your talk tremendously, but in reference to the destruction of york and the destruction of washington, are they indeed connected? >> conventional wisdom is that when the united states invaded and occupied york, which is now toronto in canada, on april 27th, 1813, because we burned the public buildings there, the british retaliated by burning the public buildings in washington. but don grace has argued and i think this is probably true, that it's more likely the british were retaliating for later burnings american troops did when we burned st. david's

dover, the settlements around dover. i think don graves is probably right that that played a greater role in the british decision to burn the public buildings in washington. but the evidence really isn't that conclusive and the british had every right to burn those public buildings. in war, you have every right to burn any public property belonging to the enemy. now mostly, armies will target military property, but they do, i believe under international law, have every right to target any government property. and if it were truly a parallel to what we had done, the british would have torched all of washington and they didn't. now, the british admiral, george coburn, actually wanted to torch the whole city, but the decision was made by major general robert ross, who was skeubsequently killed out in front of baltimore. he said no, we're just going to burn the public buildings, so we maybe got off a little bit easy on that.

>> maybe more pertinent because it would be closer to home. did the british actually occupy detroit or was it just the fort and not the village? and if so, why and how long? >> well, the british took control of detroit and all the territory along the detroit river as a result of hall surrender on the 16th of august in 1812. they subsequently placed the michigan territory under marshall law i believe for the duration of their occupation, which took place until they retreated after perry's victory, which would have been december or rather september 10th, 1813.

the british withdrew from the detroit frontier and we reoccupied it. now, i think they yes, they occupied more than the fort, more than the village and actually claimed control over the entire michigan territory as a result of hall's surrender. okay. back here. >> if the british had such great control over their soldiers, how do you account for the behavior of major general proctor when he occupied detroit in his, the way he treated the french habitants who were then american citizens and the way they behaved at the river raisin, when they looked the other way when tecumseh and his men came in and slaughtered

all the prisoners who were lying there waiting to be transported? >> well, you tell me what he did to the french inhabitants of detroit because i don't have any information that he treated them bad. >> well, i, this is in wofford's book. book on judge augustus woodward, who was a hero to the french because he was the only remaining representative of the united states government. everybody else left with hall. hall was just the wrong man, the wrong time and the wrong place and he left where all the other judges and the other appointed officials and woodward insisted that brock follow the rules of war, which was that you feed the civilian population and brock said, what do i care about the french? let them starve. less people to feed.

i don't have enough food to feed my own men. and judge woodward insisted that he do that because he had a lot of the indians to break into the french houses and steal their cattle and their food they had. he didn't stop them from doing that and they were as a matter of fact leading the kentucky militia around in dog collars. and the french were saying, oh, you can't do that to that soldier. he said, if you don't like it, buy him and you could then we won't treat him like that anymore. >> i think you have repeated a number of myths about the war. >> these are all myths -- >> not all. let me give you my take on it. >> yeah, i think -- we're even. because the british wouldn't, didn't believe detroit until 13 years after the revolutionary war, so they had a very bad reputation when it came to terms of giving back and following the

laws of the treaty. they occupied detroit after the american revolution. >> they did retain control of seven forts and built an eighth on u.s. territory after the treaty of paris of 1783 was signed and ratified and they didn't give up those forts until 1796 under the terms of the jay treaty. the united states however was also in valgs. of the treaty of paris in 1782 3i8. both nations violated the tre treaty. both accused the other of doing it first and that remained a contentious issue until the jay treaty of 1794 revolved that. but let's not hang all this on the british. >> and they -- >> more immediately, let's address the issues you've raised. the british were under no obligation to feed the civilians. they were under an obligation to feed prisoners of war, but the civilians were expected to look after themselves. now, the problem here was the

indian allies were just that. they were british allies. the british could not always control them. but the british made a concerted effort to purchase, to ransom those prisoners that the indians had taken to they wouldn't be subjected to torture or death and i think proctor, brock and proctor actually did a pretty good job of managing the michigan territory during the british occupation. >> i think proctor was probably an outstanding soldier and a main man given the conditions of war, but i think that mr. brock would have a very hard time saying that he behaved in a humane manner toward the americans. >> interesting, brock has the much better reputation today for being the greater man and general. >> that's not the way i read it that recent book on proctor of

that. lieutenant colonel in the british army, just came back from the iraq war and wrote a recent book. >> that's john riley. he's a lieutenant general. >> right. >> better biography of brock by wes turner, who's a canadian. two biographies came out about the same time. i recommend wes turner's. >> on brock or proctor? >> on brock. the best account of the war in the northwest from the british perspective and from proctor's perspective is sandy. it's a very fine study and i recommend it. let's get down to proctor's role in the massacre. after proctor and his troops and indian allies defeated the americans in the second battle of french town on the 22nd of

january 1813, proctor withdrew with the walking wounded. >> right, took them all to the hospital -- >> let me finish if i may, please. he withdrew because he thought harrison was nearby with a much larger american army. now, he hoped that he left a few british soldiers that and hoped they could maintain order among the indians. they could not and thus, we ended up with the river raisin massacre. did proctor bear some kulpaablety for that? yes. was he holy responsible for it? i don't think i would say that. >> yeah. >> let's see if we have another question. >> yes, because the british stated very, at the very beginning, that they told the native americans look, you join us in this war and we're going to give you the whole west back. we just want the gre