Reginald Horsman

I’ve accumulated quite a few books about the War of 1812, one of the more unfortunate conflicts in American history. Since the American performance in the war was dismal to the point of farce, most books I have by American authors stress the few American victories – the naval war (A Call to the Sea: Captain Charles Stewart of the USS Constitution; Warships of the Great Lakes 1754-1834; Knights of the Sea; Six Frigates; and a number of unreviewed books) and the Battle of New Orleans (The Battle of New Orleans). The overall descriptions of the war I have are usually by British authors (1812: War with America) and the current one, The War of 1812, by Reginald Horsman.

Horsman’s work dates from 1969, but I doubt there’s a lot of new information since then. He devotes a lot more space to the origins of the war than the Latimer book linked above; the United States had tried to avoid war by diplomatic and economic means but had no real leverage against an England that was fighting Napoleon. The US declared war out of frustration, but was woefully unprepared to fight it; despite the arguments of some American jingoists that the capture of Canada would be simply “a matter of marching” it turned out to be the Canadians that marched into the US; at one point it looked like the US would have to cede northern Maine, the Louisiana Purchase, and all the territory west of Lake Michigan.

Horsman doesn’t spell out the reasons for the poor US performance explicitly, but it seems like the US political leaders – starting with Jefferson – actually believed their own myth of the Revolutionary War; that it had been won by yeoman farmer militia who took their rifle down from the mantlepiece, smote the Redcoats, and returned victorious to home and hearth. Thus the defense of the US was left in the hands of State militia, plus a tiny professional army mostly on frontier duty. This arrangement was horrendously ill-suited in a war of conquest; in the first two years of the war, American generals seemed to surrender at the first sign of any action by the British/Canadians. And as it turned out the militia model wasn’t effective in a war of defense either; in 1814 sailors and marines from Admiral Cochrane’s fleet made numerous raids on the US East Coast, brushing aside militia with contemptuous ease).

It was a little different on the water; here it was the US that was helped by British contempt. Although such actions as Constitution vs. Guerriere boosted morale, the real important naval actions were fought on fresh water –Lake Erie and Lake Champlain, and both were decisive American victories.

Horsman is quite a bit harder on the Canadians than Jon Latimer. While American militia units were usually horrendously bad, the Canadian units were not that good either. While Latimer says only a few Canadians went over to the Yankees, Horsman claims desertions to the US were substantial – from both Canadian militia units and British regulars. There were supposedly 8-10 desertions per day from British units in contact with Americans – even when the war was going badly for the US – leading to the idea that the best strategy for the US might have been to simply welcome deserters without fighting at all. There’s an astonishing claim that eight Canadians were hanged, drawn and quartered for treason at Burlington Heights in 1814. I find this a little dubious, since the last such execution in England took place in 1789; as near as I can tell from googling the sentence was commuted to simple hanging.

When the US finally got around to enlarging the regular army, in 1814, they performed creditably – notably at the Battle of the Thames; and militia from the frontier states, used to fighting, also performed well: at the Battle of the Thames, in the Creek War, and at New Orleans. But it was too little too late and the US was lucky to get away with the status quo ante bellum at the Treaty of Ghent. Horsman argues that the US has Tsar Alexander to thank for this; Alexander was sympathetic to American claims since Russia had also suffered from English economic warfare and impressment while it was a neutral. The British didn’t want the Tsar to get involved but possibly relaxed some of their treaty demands, perhaps to placate him.

Clearly written. There are maps of the major theaters of war, although I would have liked some more of specific battles – The Thames and the various battles on the Niagara Frontier. Contemporary illustrations. The bibliography is good but perhaps dated, and I found the index sparse and had a hard time finding some things I wanted to look up.… (meer)