cuts, carol, jones and duvall. her mood was surprisingly composed as she told ludroatrla was so unfeminine as to be free from fear. in the hub bub of the moment, few of the documents talk about the saving of the portrait of george washington. this, however, was the moment she most wanted remembered. it's what she most wanted remembered about her years as a president's wife. indeed, the years that she reigned over washington. it was not dolley madison as a hostess or a conciliator of political factions or as the arbiter of fashion. it was dolley madison as the

hero heroine of the war of 1812. in 1834, we have now skipped 20 years. in 1834, she finally got her chance to present her interpretation of events. the occasion for this was that she received a request from margaret baird smith, the wife of the editor of the national intelligencer and also writer and novelest, to supply smith with material for a bigragical sketch of mrs. madison for the third volume of the portrait gallery of distinguished americans. dolley seems to be ambivalent. she sent smith little about her origins and of that, some was intentionally incorrect. she was concerned about her privacy and that of her husband and she instructed her niece, mary cuts, not to give smith, quote, anything of importance in

my own eyes. dolley stalled, leaving smith (z largely to write from her own memory. but in one particular matter, dolley mailed margaret smith a letter. the letter she told smith she sent her sister lucy in august of 1814. it was clearly important. quote, if you have lost or omitted to give it to her, it will be much to my injury, she instructed her nieces. so they passed on dolley's document. what exactly her nieces handed smith is controversial. dolley only sent a copy of an alleged original, not the original document itself. she told smith she didn't have it. lucy did. she told her niece, mary cuts, that mice had eaten it.

moreover, the letter is and someone yesterday alluded to it, talking about this in an article for the white house history. the letter that dolley sent to margaret smith is surprisingly unhurried for something written in such tense circumstances and oddly purposive and formal. the letter of august 14 is about courage and bravery and her determination to prevail against the enemy and champion american independence. and it worked. to this day, when americans were recalling dolley madison, they thank her for saving the portrait of george washington, emblem of america. they imagine her standing up to the enemy. their picture is of a woman who might be placing a flag in front of the troops, victorious in her goal.

in this letter given to margaret baird smith, dolley madison stamped her own image. the question of who, exactly, saved the washington portrait and how they did so, however, became a matter of controversy in the 1840s. now we have skipped even later. by this time, of course, james madison is dead. dolley does not die until 1849 and she becomes part of this newspaper discussion of what actually happened. in april of 1847, a man named robert depester, a new york merchant living in connecticut sent a letter to a philadelphia newspaper. he introduced jacob barker, then living in new orleans, a patriot and warm supporter of the war of 1812 and presented the narrative barker had written spelling out

his own version of how george washington's portrait had been saved in 1814. he stated his purpose was to make sure that mrs. madison received the credit for saving the portrait of george washington in august of 1814. what followed was barker's tale of events in which he insisted dolley instructed him and depester to save the portrait and that while she rode off in a carriage, the two men had taken the painting, released it from its frame, but kept it on its stretcher and taken it to northern virginia. there, they found a widow to hold on to it temporarily and a few months later, the two men presumably retrieved it and returned it to its rightful owner. what appears to have set him off and inspired barker to write his tale was a rumor. supposedly circulated through andrew jackson that it had been

an man named john mason who had saved the portrait. depester wrote dolley on may 5, 1847 that it was his wish to publish barker's narrative, quote, relating to the saving of the portrait of washington. credit has been given to others. he sent barker's piece to dolley. silence then ensued for ten months. presumably, dolley did not respond. ten months later, he said daneial carol, a new actor in the drama said credit belonged to his father, not to her. would dolley send a note confirming their claim dolley ordered the picture saved, this is depester saying would dolley please send the note, confirming she had ordered the picture saved and delegated that task to depester and barker.

dolley complied, on may 29, 1848, depester advised her daniel carol was still crusading for the reputation of his father. thus -- then in 1865, and this is after dolley was dead, but i just want to add this one piece. there was an additional contender for who saved the national icon. that was 1865. the contender was already dead for a year at that time. but that makes four, other than dolley, john mason, charles carol and jacob barker. let's look at who they were. john mason, who plays the most minor role here was a friend of the madisons. the son of george mason, father of the bill of rights, a merchant, banker and businessman who served in the war of 1812 and lived on an island now known

as roosevelt island in the potomac river between georgetown and virginia. he never claimed glory, but there was gossip jackson asserted the honor for mason. it's not known why. we do know that john mason was with james madison on the 23rd and 24th and not in washington, d.c. john pierre was born in france and immigrated to the united states around the time of the french revolution. president madison hired him as a chef and he remained in that position until the british razed the building. thereafter, he worked at the bank of the united states and bank of the metropolis. he was the madison's caretaker for the house on la fayette square down the block after they acquired it from the cuts family.

dolley and he remained in touch throughout her life. he did not die until 1864. in their correspondence, there's no whisper of him being responsible for taking down the washington painting. but then he wanted her to remain -- wanted to remain her friend, her aide, and in her employ and would have had no reason to contradict her version of the events on august 24th. he never claimed the honor but james madison's butler, paul jennings, did so for him, and may i point out that we have the pleasure this morning of having a direct descendant of paul jennings with us. in the former slave memoir, which was published in 1865, one year after his death, jennings recounted that while it had often been asserted when dolley escaped from the president's

house, quote, she cut out from the frame the large portrait of washington and carried it off. this is totally false. rather, quote, john and mcgraw, the president's gardner, took it down and sent it off on a wagon. that leaves us with a question, why would paul jennings say it was suisaux and not madison who was responsible for saving the portrait of george washington? sit, of course, possible that he was one of the men who took down the painting and thus should have received some measure of credit. the greatest argument against that scenario is that jennings wrote that he used a penknife to cut the painting out of its frame.

we know, however, when the painting underwent renovation, in the 20th century, quote, the artist found on examination the canvas had never been cut. that doesn't mean it didn't come out of the frame, it stayed on the stretcher, but the picture was not cut with a penknife. the interesting thing about paul jennings is he did have an agenda. jennings was born in 1799 in montpelier. he was a slave and skilled domestic worker who at various times was probably a footman, a waiter, and a porter before he became james' valet. his father was white. his mother was a combination of black and native american. he served the madisons for many years as a trusted slave/servant. there were real and painful problems in the relationship with his mistress. after james' death, dolley took paul to washington, which

separated paul from his wife fanny, which meant they could only see each other occasionally. this remained true, even after she took a serious fall in 1844 that led to her death. dolley then gave him leave to go and mourn and grieve back in orange county. in 1845, dolley waffled about him, even drawing up emancipation documents then decided not to do that, but rented him out to president polk. in 1846, she sold him to an insurance agent for $200. six months later, senator daniel webster bought jennings for $120, then allowed him to purchase his own freedom at $8 a month. jennings was freed in 1847 and therefore became an abolitionist.

he probably was before, but he became a more active aboliti abolitionist who surely must have been upset at the treatment dolley meated out on one of her slaves who tried to escape to freedom on the ship called the "pearl" in 1848. by the time jennings wrote his memoir, he must have disliked his former mistress. as a black man and former slave to president madison, he could not say this publicly. so, he included the one hurtful thing he could that dolley had not saved the washington portrait. the man had no motive to promote himself, but jennings did. daniel carol cared very much about who got the credit for saving the portrait. he presented the motive as dual to give credit to his father and reveal what he felt were barker's concealed but self-serving motives. carol said as much in his letter to the editor of the new york

herald when he wrote the professed objective of the publication was to do justice to the venerable mrs. madison, but, he continued, the most superficial observer could not fail to perceive that while credit is awarded to that venerable lady, much more is claimed for mr. jacob barker himself. charles carol was a member of a wealthy catholic family. he moved to washington in 1811. in 1813, he purchased dumbarton house frauf joseph nurse. he was a member of the board of bank of washington and a supporter of the president. charles carol may or may not have been at the mansion and may or may not have been due credit, but his son daniel undermined his testimony when he asserted carol ate dinner that day at the president's mansion. it's highly unlikely dinner was served or eaten that day. later, daniel carol, according

to barker, offered to produce witnesses, but did not reveal names, thus, raising the question of anonymous witnesses. the question raised is why did daniel carol harbor ill will against jacob barker? it's possible he simply wanted the credit to stay in the family and felt injured by barker's testimony, especially as barker originally misidentified his father as charles carol of duddington rather than of bellevue. it is possible an issue lay between them which this author is not aware. it is possible daniel carol felt barker was using the incident of the portrait to bolster a political career of which he, carol, disapproved. jacob barker was campaigning to

become a member of the house of representatives from new orleans in 1847. barker was born a quaker. he was nominated to the position of congressional candidate at an independent convention. he was a democrat and supported zachary taylor for president. jacob barker proclaimed, quote, slavery was the greatest curse that was ever inflicted on the south. his race coincided with his bid to be recognized, not as a hero of the wear of 1812 but as the major ally and defender of its greater heroine, dolley madison. carol had two possible motives for his claims. he may have disliked barker either personally or politically, and he may have felt his father simply deserved the credit he had never received and if you're curious, no, barker did not win the election. finally, there were jacob barker

and robert depester. barker, by personality was an assertive man. he was known to be resilient, flamboyant. and pugnacious, but his claim to have carried out dolley's orders was backed by three specifics. to begin with, he was a strong supporter of james madison and the war of 1812. thus, when dolley asked for or received his help, it was not from a passing stranger. money was hard to come by after the war, especially after the new england banks refused to lend any to madison's administration, and barker was one of the four men who lent money. he opened up a subscription to fund the effort. accounts of carting the picture off and bringing it back several weeks later. he supported dolley's account and in turn she supported his narrative in a letter she wrote him in 1847.

her confirmation was argued by her nephew james cox who gave an argument before the historical society, but in it he not only reprinted the two letters from dolley that barker had included in his own memoir, but stated dolley gave the orders and mr. jacob barker and robert depester of new york aided by two colored boys took the portrait from the floor where mrs. madison left it. cuts only knew what his aunt told him. in 1814, he was 9. cuts wanted to reinforce any version his aunt told. cuts certainly had the motive, feeling a loyalty to support dolley's version of event. depester and barker for their part may have believed that the tale would help barker win his election that he ultimately lost, or they may have been defending their memory of what actually happened. or both.

historians cannot establish with absolute certainty what happened to the portrait of george washington on the afternoon of august 24th. as i have said, the best evidence we have is dolley's letter to mary elizabeth. the portrait was an icon of tremendous international importance. had the british captured it, they might have burned it in effigy or paraded it around the streets of london. that the americans saved it, a symbol of prowess. it is quite possible dolley did in fact order the painting to be saved. she understood its iconic value but there's no certainty. so, what do we learn from the story? the first is the story of evidence, which historians and journalists have repeated endlessly which is you need to

be certain what your evidence is and that you need to know what were the motives of anybody saying anything because all of us have a reason to say what we say. and finally, we need to be cautious that into a space that is empty, something will prevail. in this case, it was dolley's own letter. we learned something about dolley madison. we learned number one she wanted to be know as the savior of george washington's portrait. she wanted to be honored for bravery and courage in war. most important, she felt the single anecdote could save her husband's reputation on the day the british raised the white house. when she sent a letter to margaret baird smith and then confirmed that version in the 1840s, she not only promoted her own image, but also did what a

wife should do to create the best possible public relations for her husband on a disastrous day in american history. >> now, let me just add here, what i haven't included and didn't have the time and space to include are all the negative things that were being said about the madisons at the time. so, as a backdrop to dolley's determination to put the best face forward, we also must remember she was doing this with this, if you will, this background for her that she had been criticized and her husband had been criticized. it's not simply that dolley had some ego, she did, but she was a loyal champion of her husband. she would have gone out of her way at any point in her life to defend james madison.

[ applause ] any questions? is my evidence so conclusive no one has any -- [ inaudible question ] >> the previous speaker said that monroe came back about two days after the burning. when did she come back -- >> at about the same time. the first night she -- oh, what was happening during the next two days before the madisons returned to washington, d.c. they were both floating around the countryside. there are various legends about this. it seems as if dolley went to the house of a mrs. love, whose parents actually were at her wedding to james madison, but

she, herself, was also a member of the lee family, a very federalist family. love would visit the madisons during his presidency in the white house, but her father would not. then she apparently went to a tavern and there are stories about the tavern and people said oh, we have been destroyed in washington and we won't let you into the tavern, how can we admit you into this space? what do we know? we know it's in the newspapers. we don't have any -- that's what i'm trying to say. we have very little evidence. they were too busy to write and it's possible if something had been written, dolley or james would have destroyed it. >> it's a wonderful talk, so, if i could encourage people to come to the mike, by the way, but if i could ask, so you have the wonderful collection of letters.

i remember reading some of her letters where she's sleeping with the saber under the bed. can you talk about the letters, the timing of them? they feel like public relations campaign and i wondered if that was true? >> i don't think so. i think she really wasn't afraid. why she wasn't afraid is embedded in who she was. she said yes, she was not afraid. she kept a tunisian saber by her side, slept with a tunisian slabslab saber by her side. i think the publicity campaign really was this two-day letter, supposedly written to lucy in august 23rd, 24th, 1814 because that went public. that went public in a publication of note. she was the only woman who would be included in that volume. margaret baird smith was a woman of great repute, a noted writer, and margaret baird smith

republished that letter. that's how we have the letter. we don't have her copy of it, we have the -- well, we do, but what people know is this printed version that margaret smith included in her portrait, or if you will, the first biography of dolley madison in 1834. i think that was a spin or a public relations campaign, which is why we have to treat it as that. that's why i say that her letter in december of 1814, to me, is better evidence than this famous letter school children still read. >> in the washington, d.c. tour guide. there's quite a few tour guides here. i have a question. this is not been mentioned at all. i understood, i learned that she not only saved the wonderful

portrait of george washington, but she also saved her portrait. was that saved at the same time? i haven't heard nobody mention that. thank you. >> he may have evidence, i don't. i have no evidence for that whatsoever. i would put that down to rumor and conjecture. but i absolutely don't know. >> that's how most of us learned that. >> you know, there was also a part of the urban legend about dolley is she saved the state papers, and in fant, it was steven pleasanton who saved the state papers. he was the clerk in the state department. so there was a famous, reasonably famous picture done in the early 19th century about the macedonian -- who mentioned that yesterday?

andrew lambert did, that dolley madison has perhaps trampled on it. we have no evidence of that, either. but the portrait shows her trampling on the flag and it shows james madison at the dinner and in 1840s, when those who were around during the war are trying to preserve what they consider accurate memory, edward coles, her cousin and james madison's secretary said, well, james madison wasn't there. dolley was there and she was standing with edward coles. if you go to the digital edition, you can find that picture, but the picture is a lie. or it's myth. or, it's a wonderful, sort of popular culture image that portrays something about dolley

madison that wasn't true but carries a kind of truth that we want to believe. >> last question -- >> you said something that could be taken here as sacrilegious. i think most of us don't know what you meant and we would like an explanation. you referred to george mason as the father of the bill of rights. >> all right. fair enough. george mason. yes, okay. i stand corrected. >> when i first heard your talk and you quoted the original letter of dolley madison, there was the phrase cabinet papers. could it be -- now, do you know what she meant? could it be that there were notes of cabinet meetings? >> could.

>> that are different than the bill of rights and constitution and declaration of independence? >> exactly. there was a paper in the white house history about stephen pleasanton that i haven't read yet, but we should probably all read that. >> there is an article by jesse craps in our hand out on saving the records during the war of 1812. >> isn't there something also in the white house historical society? >> i don't know. >> so, it says here, this is a copy of her letter from the dolley madison digital edition. at this late hour, a wagon has been procured. i have filled it with plate and valuable portable articles belonging to the house. let's see.

my husband desired me to be ready at the moment. i have pressed as many cabinet papers into trunks that fill one carriage. that is what you are referring to. the answer is they may have been in -- they didn't have filing cabinets. be stephen pleasanton had taken the state department papers but there were other papers that needed to be saved and they were in a cabinet. and she did not say anything beyond that. there's no evidence she actually did that other than she said she did that. 20 years later, i don't -- i think we need to take it with a grain of salt and not worry about it too much. what we really need to understand is what dolley madison was trying to achieve for herself and her husband.

>> i think the problem is the cabinet was on the second floor of the white house. >> you know much more about that than i do. >> and the papers, the famous papers, the state papers were in a different building entirely. >> pleasanton took them from the building and she stuffed what she could into these trunks. was it a cabinet? >> a cabinet room. >> it was a cabinet room, all right, so we have it here on authority that interprets this. so it makes sense. she took what was from the white house or as much as she could take on her husband's instructions. again, we don't -- what i'm trying to say here is, did she? we know she said she did and maybe she did. i'm not saying she didn't. i'm saying we don't have conclusive evidence that she did.

so, whether that kind of conclusive evidence is important to you as a citizen, as an interpreter, as a historian, a journalist, you know, i'm a documentary editor. i stand corrected by ken boling and i should actually add that into a note that specifies it for the dolley madison digital edition, but we only know what we know. >> we are out of time. >> okay. >> may i ask one more question, please? [ applause ] here are some highlights for this coming weekend. friday, live at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span, the nebraska supreme court will hear an oral

argument on the keystone xl pipeline, saturday at 6:00 p.m. on the communicators, michael cops and robert mcdowell. with campaign 2014 gearing up, watch the latest debates on c-span. sunday at noon, debates between incumbent democratic senator kay hagan and thom tillis. and from the california governors race, jerry brown and republican nominee neel kashkari. friday night at 8:00 on c-span2, john yew shares his poin on international law and what effect it has on the behavior of powerful nationals. mike gonzalez and how hispanics can make gains in the vote. and sunday, our three-hour conversation and your phone calls with the former chair on civil rights. friday night at 8:00 eastern on american history tv on c-span3, authors and historians talk about the burning of washington dern tduring the war of 1812.

saturday, the building of the hoover dam, and 8:00, the anniversary of the pardon of richard nixon. find our schedule at c-span.org and let us know what you think about the programs you're watching. call us at 202-626-3400, send us a tweet, or join the conversation, like us on facebook, follow us on twitter. also from the symposium on the british burning of washington, d.c. during the war of 1812, remarks from ralph eshelman. he's a historical consultant to the national park service for the star spangled national historic trail. this is about 50 minutes.

our final speaker this morning, ralph will provide us with more historical fact about some of the historical myths that have grown up around the war of 1812. resources in maryland, the national parks service and protection program and served as a consultant for the star spangled trail. he has published five books in the district of columbia and a guide to historic sites in the district of columbia and has appeared in six documents on the war of 1812. in 2009 he was designated an henry colonel of the ft. mchenry guard by the national park service. that's a far greater honor than being designated as the colonel of the d.c. militia. in the war of 1812, obviously. so it's my pleasure to welcome colonel eshelman to the podium. [ applause ]

good morning, everyone. thank you. that was a kind introduction. i have never been called colonel when i'm been introduced. thank you very much. i want to add to the accolades expressed about the wonderful job the partners and all the individuals have done to put this symposium together. i have thoroughly enjoyed it. i hope you have as well. we still have an afternoon to go as well. itis not over and i'm looking forward to it. before lunch, which is an important thing for all of us, i have a few words i would like to say about some of the myth that surround washington, d.c. specifically, i'm going to talk about three myths. i'm going to present them to you in the form of a question. the first one is did the british really burn washington city? question number two. is the white house really called the white house because it was

painted white because of the scorch marks when the british burned it in 1814? the third one is, did the great storm that came through this region, not just washington, but the following afternoon, put out the fires and save the city? now, because we are talking about myths, i guess you have already figured out the answer to all of these. but, i would be curious with a show of hands, how many of you have heard of the myth of the great storm? whether you believe it or not? okay. i was correct in taking the observation that many people have heard about that. the title is slightly different from what you have in your program but myths from the war of 1812, i think sounds better than myths during the war of 1812. some of these actually came about after the war, not necessarily during the war. let's go ahead and jump in and tackle this thing.

i wanted to acknowledge there's already been a book that's been done by don hickey. you heard from don this morning. he was the first speaker. he did an excellent job. he's done a whole book on the myths of the war of 1812. this is the cover page for it. in it, he has a quote and i will read it. the war of 1812 is a conflict that carries an unduly heavy burden of mythology. much of it propagated by 19th century historians and arriving mainly from national chauvinism. i would like to add to that, many scholars, writers, historians, teachers, professors were continuing to propagate a lot of that. we are never going to be able to get rid of these myths and misunderstandings of history. it's just a part of the fabric of history today. it behooves us to try to know what are the kernels of truth.

that's why i enjoyed holly's paper. she helped us understand the myths and misunderstandings behind dolley madison. the first question, did the british really burn washington? i'm going to start out in a peculiar way. i am showing you the actual logo and title of this very symposium. i'll just read it to you. america under fire. mr. madison's war in the burning of washington city. one of the very myths i want to talk about today. i'm going to go off on a tangent and you'll understand why. if you look at the artwork, the image that is there, and if you remember during dinner last night, bill seal talked about the burning of the white house. he mentioned that some of the british sailors and soldiers had javelins wrapped in rags, soaked with oil.

on the command by the officer you can see on the right hand side, when he fired a pistol, they all simultaneously, supposedly threw these javelins through the broken windows of the upper level of the white house to set it on fire. now, this is an account. it exists. i ask you, is it real? because when i think about that, i have a lot of questions about it. number one, would the british have actually carried javelins from their landing at benedict? i don't think that's very likely. but, it is likely that the british were carrying pikes, an anti-boarding weapon that was used by sailors and we know at the battle of cox field, which took place a few days earlier from now, 200 years ago, they just had a big celebration august 31st, we know there were

40 pipemen that were part of the british contingent that attacked an american unit over on the eastern shore of maryland. so, maybe it's more likely that if, in fact, this occurred, they were probably pikes. that's my guess. if you're not familiar with a pike, it's an elongated wooden handle with a sharp, metal point on the end of it. but, wouldn't it also make sense if you are going to take the time to take all of these flammables and pile them up as bill talked about last evening, and then put oil on them, why wouldn't you just go ahead and light it and then run out of the building? this is a big deal according to this account. the only reason i'm going through this with you this morning is there are two additional accounts of how the british burned some of the public buildings in washington. they are very different from this account. so how do we know? just like holly was talking

about, how do we know what might have happened there. even though this happens to be an account by the british. so, take a look at some of the book that is have been written. very good books. the first one, which is on your left is the burning of washington, the british invasion of 1814 written by anthony pitch. an excellent book. i have read it from cover-to-cover. i refer to it frequently. tony, in my opinion, did the best job up to that time that's ever been done on our understanding of what happened in washington when the british occupied washington. it's interesting he chose the title, "the burning of washington." if you look at the right hand side, this is a book not as well known, but also an excellent book by carol and it was published in 2005. the title of it is "august 24, 1814: washington in flames." you can stee burning of the

white house. well, there's other books as well and i can't go into all of them or we'd be here all morning. it's interesting if you go to andy tully's book, "when they burned the white house," that was published in 1961. and then "the man who burned the white house" which is essentially a biography of george coburn, who we have already heard a lot during this particular symposium and this was 1987. here are two books where they don't talk about the burning of washington in the title. they talk about the burning of the white house. just in case you haven't had enough of that, there's the most recent book by peter snow, when britain burned the white house. all of these books are great but

the question -- or maybe the point that i'm trying to make is that to the average person when they read a title like that, it's going to give them an impression that is not necessarily what really happened in washington, d.c. and i find it ironic that we have three books that talk about the white house, a very important public building, no question about it, where the president lived and it hurt the morale when you burn the president's house. no question about it. but to me, of all of the buildings that were burnt, the most significant was the capitol building. that's where the seat of government existed. and none of these books have that in their title. just interesting to me. and just so that you know they are all in good company, this is the title of a chapter in one of my books. "washington is burning." we all do it.

almost all of us that have been talking today at the symposium have said it. but how accurate is it? this is the only eyewitness contemporary account -- i shouldn't say account -- illustration which is referred to as the burning of washington. and you can find this online from the library of congress and the first thing that i noticed when i pulled this up and took a look at it is that it was upside down and i'm happy to tell you that i went to the library of congress and told them that it was upside down and they corrected it. when you go online today, it's in its accurate position, and for those of you with good eyes, you may be able to make out that the guy who did this, willian thornton, you can see his name is right there on the left-hand side. the title of it was "the burning of washington" and i'm sure that

thornton himself did not give it that title. it was somebody at the library of congress who was helping people identify this and after studying this, it's very clear to me that this is not the burning of washington at all. it's the burning of the washington navy yard. if you look closely there, you can make out, for example, the sheds where some of the ships would have been kept, and where the masts and the spars and the timbers would have been kept. and if you look even closer, that building right there tells me that's latrobe gate. that's the entrance to the shipyard. for those of you familiar with t. you know that's what it is. and i can't be quite as sure, but when i look at this building right there, the roof line reminds me very much of the tingey house and that house is where the commandant of the shipyard lived and that house survives today as does barracks

b or building number b, and as does latrobe gate. those structures were not burnt but almost everything else was. and so this is what it is titled today when i notified the library of congress and they now call it "waterfront fire probably burning of the washington navy yard, 1814, washington, d.c.," and that's a much more accurate description of what that image represents. now, if you also pay attention, where are most of the flames coming from? right there in the center of that image. and i don't want to put more into this than maybe what thornton was trying to do, but this is a blow-up of that. and if you look very carefully at it, these do not appear to be buildings to me. and i say that because you can see how they are cantilevered over on the edges. those are the burnings, in my

opinion, of some of the ships at the navyyard. and we know there were two frigates that were kept inordinary. these were ships no longer active but still good enough that they didn't need to get rid of them but they just kind of kept them in a mothball and they would sometimes do that by having them floot alongside a wharf, but other times they would literally take them out of the water and you would take all the masts and the rigging and everything down and you might build some type of temporary structure over the top of it to protect the decks. and i believe what we are looking at right there are two of the frigates that burned at the navy yard that night and they are probably the boston and the general green. very interesting. this is a noncontemporary drawing done by peter wadell and

for those of you at the dinner last night when you came into the decatur house, you may have noticed on the left-hand side there was an exhibit area. i hope you took the time to look at some of those exhibits. you may have an opportunity to do that again tonight. i'm not sure. but hanging on the wall were several other paintings done by peter. i like his work a lot. what you're looking at here is his depiction of the burning of the navy yard. so you're standing in latrobe gate and you're looking into the navy yard, which i have done myself many times, and you can make out on the left that's quarters b or building b or whatever you want to call it. and you notice it's not on fire. the tingey house, which is where the commandant would have lived, would be to the left of that and it's out of perspective of this particular image. and in the background, you can see the flames all about the buildings and you can also see ships in the background that are on fire. and for those of you that may not know what is standing right

here in the middle the tripoli monument, which was first erected in the united states as a tribute to those sailors who fought and lost their lives in the barbary wars. and tradition holds that when the british came into the navy yard, not on the night of august the 24th because the navy yard was burnt by the americans, what you're looking at here is the burning that was caused by the u.s. navy, ordered by the secretary of the navy, to keep it out of the hands of the enemy. the next day, the british came back and they checked out the navy yard to see if there was anything that possibly might still deserve some destruction. something that might have escaped the hands of the americans. and there were a few sheds and there was the cooper's quarters, whatever you want to call it, that they further burned that next morning.

but at the same time, they supposedly caused vandalism to that particular monument. now, what's interesting is that that monument was then moved to the west grounds of the capitol. and when the capitol was expanded, it had to be moved a second time. and it was moved to the naval academy where it resides today. so here's a monument that's been in three different places during its history and it has a tie to the war of 1812. this is out of the imax movie that if you have not seen it, i highly recommend it, it's called "star spangled banner anthem of liberty." it was released about a month ago. it has some wonderful illustrations as well as animations about some of the aspects of the war of 1812. and what you're looking at here is a still -- and i know the lighting is not very good here and so you probably can't see it that well because of the extreme light that we have. but it is showing the navy yard

burning on the night of august the 24th, 1814. and if you were able to look at it very closely, you would be able to see ships that are in the water, ships that are in ordinary up on land, all of them burning as well as most of the structures. but you can look and you can see, right there, that latrobe gate is not burning. the tingey house is not burning. quarters "b" is not burning. but what's also interesting is that, can you make out -- there's two additional bridges that are burning and these are also structures that were burnt by the americans. they were not burnt by the british. so we're talking about the stoddard bridge, the upper bridge, that's the bridge that would be essentially where east capitol street is located today. and then this lower bridge would be essentially the bridge that would be referred to as pennsylvania avenue today or the sousa bridge, whatever you

prefer. and if i have one qualm with this particular image that they've done is that bridge should actually be much closer to the navy yard. because of those of you who are familiar with that bridge, you know that essentially it exits right next to where the naval station is. just in case you were wondering, according to "the u.s. navy observatory," sunset on august the 24th, 1814, was at 6:52 p.m. before daylight savings time. the stoddard bridge was set on fire by the americans somewhere between 2:00 and 4:00 in the afternoon. i don't know that it would still have been burning to the extent that you see in this illustration. the pennsylvania avenue bridge was set on fire at about 8:20 p.m. so we're well an hour after sunset. and the navy yard was set on fire approximately 8:30 p.m. the reason i'm going through all

of this detail with you is that when the british are marching into washington, they reach the capitol and they begin to do their first burning, which is actually a structure known as the sewell belmont house, which is two blocks from the capitol. and this takes place at about 9:00. what this means is that as the british are marching into washington, d.c., they can already see parts of the city on fire. not by them but by the americans. and i know that you cannot see this and it's not important that you can, but this is a may 1815 drawing showing the navy yard as it -- they hoped it would appear when they rebuilt it. because this is a letter that was being done trying to estimate the amount of money that it's going to cost to replace all of these structures that were lost in that burning.

and i'm going to come back to that in a minute. this is what the navy yard looks like today and where you have that red bar, that separates below that bar the navy yard that existed in 1814 and then the addition to the navy yard after 1814. so the navy yard was actually bigger today than it would have been in 1814. and if we overlay the two of them, you can see how things have changed over the years. this is the tingey house and the upper left and there's quarters "b" or building "b" on the right that still survive. and this is latrobe gate. so at the bottom, that's what latrobe gate looks like today and up at the top, that's the design drawings for the original for the latrobe gate and what i have out leaned in red is all that remains today of that original gate. the rest of it has been incorporated into this enlarged

structure that now hides the original major portions of latrobe gate. so here is that burning scene again, and i would just ask you to take a look at the details of the tingey house and ask you if in fact that does not look very similar to what you see right there. and if you lay it out, that's exactly where you'd expect it to be in relationship to latrobe gate, in relationship to the rest of the burning navy yard. and i'm going back to that same document that i know you can't see very well. but the reason i'm showing it to you is that up at the top it says, probable cost to refurbish the following buildings. and where i've just circled is the mast shed. and there it says, to be made of old brick. underneath of it is the timber sheds, to be made of old brick.

underneath of that, the rigging loft, new brick. underneath that, can't even read it. the smith's shop. so that's where the blacksmith shop would be, for example. and there it says, old brick. what's going on in the minds of the u.s. navy within a year after the burning of the navy yard is they want to replace these buildings but they don't want to replace them out of wood. they're concerned about the enemy coming back. they're going to try to spent that extra money to make these out of brick. they've learned a lesson. and then the last one is the sawmill which is also made out of new brick. now, this is the navy yard around circa 1833, well after the fire. but you can still see latrobe gate right there. you can see the capitol, you can see what we would call pennsylvania avenue bridge, and then over here on the left you

can see what's known as the long bridge. that actually existed in 1814. that's the bridge that connected washington with alexandria. and the reason i'm showing it to you is that this is the only structure that i know of that was burnt by body the americans and the british at the same time. the americans burnt the side of the bridge over in alexandra, and the british burnt the side in washington, d.c. that was the following day. we're going to get to that in a minute too. i'm going to read this to you. it's a little bit long but i think it will help to give you an understanding. this is by the commandant of the navy yard. describing what had happened. "the buildings destroyed by the yard were the mast shed, the timber shed, the joiner and builders shop, the loft, all is offices, the medical store, the plumber and smith shops, the blockmaker shop, sought mill and the block mill with all apparatus, tools and machinery, the buildings for the steam engine and all combustible parts of its machinery and materials,

the rigging loft, the apartments for the master and the bosun of the yard with all the furniture, the gun carriages, makers, painters shops, with all the materials and tools therein at the time, also the hulls of the old frigates, "boston," "new york," "and "the general green." that's a lot of destruction there, folks. now this is a list, i'm not going to go through the whole thing because it would take me about 15 minutes to read to it you. but on the right-hand side under blue is everything that was burnt by the americans. and on the left-hand side under red is everything that was burned by the british. and the important thing that i'm trying to point out to you here is that if you look at what the americans burnt, most of it is in the washington navy yard. and every one of those things that you read there with one possible exception, they were all made out of wood. now let's go and take a look at what the british burned and we have the u.s. capitol, which is

made out of stone and brick. we have the white house that's made out of stone and brick. we have the treasury which was made out of brick. we have the belmont-sue wall house which was made out of brick. the georgetown -- george washington townhouse on capitol hill which was probably accidentally started on fire by a spark from the capitol. that was made out of brick. the tomlinson's hotel, we don't have absolute proof that this was burned. but there's -- most of the evidence tends to point to it but there's some contrary information there. that was also made out of brick. now, these other buildings that you see below it, it says "houses that were possibly burned," this is based on newspapers' accounts. and there's only one reference and these are in various different newspapers. i can't honestly tell you if these are houses that actually burnt or whether it's mistakes that the newspapers make, because just like we've heard