breathed freely. Harrison had forever freed the Ohio country from the fear of an Indian outbreak. Immigration at once turned toward the late Indian lands. Clay and the other western members were thinking of Tecumseh and the frontier when they had urged war with England.

On June 1, 1812, Madison had sent a message to Congress which declared the causes for war: The impressment of thousands of American citizens, the "sweeping system of blockades'' which had "plundered our commerce in every sea," and "the warfare just renewed by the savages on one of our extensive frontiers" due to "British traders and garrisons." British cruisers had been in the practice of violating the rights and the peace of our coasts. They hovered over and harassed our entering and departing commerce. "On the side of Great Britain," he said, there existed "a state of war against the United States, and on the side of the United States, a state of peace toward Great Britain."

CHAPTER XXIV

THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE

1812-1815

The population of the United States in 1812 was about 8,000,000; that of England, about 20,000,000. Our annual revenue was $9,000,000; hers was $350,000,000. The war cost us $30,000,000 a year, so that we were obliged to go in debt about $98,000,000. England, in 1815, had a debt of $4,300,000,000, which was not felt as a burden. Our loans were at a discount, because our financial system was not settled, and Congress had refused to recharter the United States Bank in 1811. In England the war, whether against Napoleon or America, was very popular.

We were a divided people. The Federalists opposed the war, nicknamed it "Madison's War," and gave the government a lukewarm support. Something of the spirit of faction is suggested by a speech of a Federalist, Josiah Quincy, of Massachusetts, in Congress, when the bill to admit Louisiana into the Union was under discussion in 1811. "If this bill passes," said he, "it is my deliberate opinion that it is virtually a dissolution of the Union; that it will free the states from their moral obligation; and as it will be the right of all, so it will be the duty of some, definitely to prepare for a separation; amicably, if they can, violently, if they must." This was going further than the Kentucky resolutions of 1799.

The regular American army consisted of six thousand seven hundred men. So unpopular was the service that the government offered pardons to deserters if they would return. During the war, the army became thirty-four thousand men, including officers. The British army was commanded by officers of whom Wellington was chief. Ours was commanded by civilians and by aged Revolutionary heroes, mostly as incapable as they

were infirm. chance.

The younger and abler men were given no

Our navy consisted of twelve vessels, of which the frigates Constitution, President, and United States, each of 44 guns, were the largest. Our navy was manned by 5,500 sailors, of whom 1,500 were marines. The English navy consisted of 830 vessels, manned by 150,000 seamen, and had power to impress without limit. Of these vessels, 230 were larger than our largest. Moreover, England had been at war so long, her fleets were in perfect training and equip

ment.

The war might be called "The English and Indian War," for it was fought over much of the ground of the old French wars, and Indians fought on both sides. It was bound to rage along our frontiers and our coasts, and sea-fights were likely to occur in any quarter of the world.

Could a cablegram have been sent from London to Washington on the 23d of June, 1812, just five days after Congress had declared war, Madison would have been notified that the odious orders in council had been rescinded. Commissioners would have been appointed and war prevented. Again, after a treaty was signed, two years and a half later, a cablegram would have prevented the battle of New Orleans. If science makes war more destructive, it also helps people and nations adjust their differences.

In November, 1812, Madison was re-elected President, receiving 128 electoral votes, and Elbridge Gerry VicePresident, receiving 131. They had been nominated by a congressional caucus. In similar way, the Federalists nominated De Witt Clinton, of New York, and Jared Ingersoll, of Pennsylvania. Clinton received 89 electoral votes; Ingersoll, 86. Louisiana, admitted April 30th, the eighteenth state, chose its electors by legislature, as did the six states that thus chose them in 1808. Congress was overwhelmingly Democratic.

As to a deliberate, carefully chosen, well-supported, and well-conducted plan of war, in 1812, we had none. The regular army was only a squad. The state militia were not in hearty co-operation with the general government. Most of the land-fights were in the wilderness, along the frontier.

1812]

THE PLAN OF WAR

341 But viewing its military events as a whole, this was the "plan of war": to invade Canada; to drive the English and their Indian allies out of the Northwest (Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin, as the country now is); to drive the British from the Great Lakes; to keep the Indians quiet in the Southwest; to destroy British commerce; to fight English men-of-war wherever found, and to defend our Atlantic coast. So the war was offensive by sea and defensive by land.

In the summer of 1813, Oliver H. Perry built a fleet at Erie, Pennsylvania. He launched it in September; bore immediately up the lake in search of the British squadron, caught sight of it near Cleveland; ran up on his flagship, the Lawrence, a pennant with the motto, "Don't give up the ship"; boldly attacked the two largest of the enemy's fleet; lost his own ship; coolly changed to the Niagara in the heat of battle; broke the line of the enemy; captured his entire fleet, and on the 10th of September sent the famous message to General Harrison, "We have met the enemy, and they are ours; two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop." Evidently the British had struck another one of those Americans whom Washington would call a "fighter." Perry's victory settled the question on the lakes.

In 1812, Captain Lawrence, of the Constitution, met the notorious Guerriere, and after a brief contest, sent her to the bottom. The United States brought in the Macedonian as a prize. In 1813, the Constitution captured the Java; the Hornet sent the Peacock to the bottom of the sea; the Enterprise brought the Boxer into Portland harbor. But the Chesapeake struck to the Shannon; the Argus, which had "carried the war into Africa," by destroying more than twenty ships in the English Channel, struck to the Pelican. The motto which Perry had put on his pennant referred to a terrible battle between the Chesapeake and the Shannon, which had challenged the former to a fight off Boston. Lawrence, though not fully prepared, accepted. "Don't give up the ship," he whispered, as mortally wounded and defeated he was carried below by his men.

Never before had the navy of England had such disastrous experience. Defeat such as was heaped upon her

during 1812-13 was a novelty. She declared the United States blockaded and scattered her ships from Eastport to New Orleans; Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland, and the District of Columbia were invaded.

In 1812, our invasion of Canada was planned. One expedition, under Van Rensselaer, from Niagara should move against Queenstown and join a second from Detroit, under General Hull, against Toronto; a third, under General Dearborn, should proceed over Lake Champlain, against Montreal, and all, victorious, were to unite against Quebec. But the plan proved difficult. Hull fled from Canada, fell back upon Detroit, and in a panic on the 15th of August, surrendered it and the whole Northwest to the British. Van Rensselaer was defeated and hurried out of Canada. Dearborn just reached the boundary-line. ada was safe.

Can

Perry had saved the day. Harrison, a soldier, succeeded in 1813, by the victory of the Thames River, in Canada, in permanently defeating the British and Indians and winning back the Northwest.

In 1814, some of the "veterans of 1776" were retired. Winfield Scott, Jacob Brown, and Andrew Jackson came into command. Scott was victorious at Chippewa, Lundy's Lane, and Fort Erie (July 4th, 25th, August 15th). Commodore McDonough, on Lake Champlain, in co-operation with a land force, was victorious at Plattsburg, September 11th.

In August a British fleet, under Admiral Cockburn, and a land force under General Ross, came up the Chesapeake. Five thousand soldiers marched without opposition from the Americans, save one pitiable attempt to stand at Bladensburg, and captured Washington. The Capitol, the public buildings, and the White House were burned and pillaged. The archives of the nation were scattered to the winds. Then Ross quickly retreated to his ships and sailed away to attack Baltimore. But he bombarded Fort McHenry in vain. Ross was killed* and Cockburn, following General

* General Ross was buried in St. Paul's Cathedral, where his monument commemorating the destruction of Washington may still be seen. The Americans had burned York, in Canada, in 1813.