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SPECIAL NOTICE.

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Fest of

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Henry W. Long Leitor,
of Cambrid, C.
(Vol. III 0·1; 3-6.)

THE

CANADIAN MONTHLY

AND NATIONAL REVIEW.

VOL. 6.]

JULY, 1874.

HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE WAR OF 1812.

[No. 1.

THO

HOSE readers who have followed ness to the sketch, it is necessary rapidly to with interest, in the pages of "For glance briefly back to the beginning of the King and Country," the course of the War war, and to the complications in which it of 1812 up to the battle of Queenston originated. These latter are naturally traceHeights, may be further interested in a rapid able to events which occurred in the preresumé of the succeeding events of a war ceding century; to the smouldering sparks which, independently of its special interest of hostility left between England and her for every Canadian, is as full of heroic deeds, revolted colonies when the flames of the brilliant exploits, thrilling adventures and War of Independence had been quenched picturesque situations, as many a more cele- in the blood of so many of her children. brated campaign. Being out of the stream The mother country had not yet, perhaps, of European history, and dwarfed by the forgiven her vigorous but somewhat insubgigantic proportions of the then European ordinate scion for the rough repudiation of conflict, it has hardly attracted the attention her authority, nor had the revolted child got it deserves; but those who have leisure over the acrimony of the separation. The and opportunity to study its details as pre- Americans did not know, or could not sented in the various histories of Canada, appreciate the fact, that the Government of and more fully in Colonel Coffin's interest- the day was not England—that a large poring Chronicle of the War, will find them- tion of the British people had thought them selves amply rewarded. In the meantime, ill-used, and had sympathized with them in those who have no very definite knowledge their struggle for constitutional liberty; and of the course of its events may find a sketch so there existed among them a latent and of them, in outline, both interesting and too-easily excited hatred of everything profitable. To give continuity and complete- British. In Canada, on the other hand, the

settlers, being chiefly composed of old British soldiers, and of United Empire Loyalists, who had left their homes in the United States and come to make new ones in Canada, under the shelter of their dearly loved Union Jack, reflected the British feeling to an intensified degree. An animosity, more bitter because the neighbourhood was so close, had sprung up between the two countries.

To this train of inflammable material the great disturber of Europe indirectly applied the torch. Not only did his stormy career excite the most opposite sympathies in the two nations, but his arbitrary "Decree," Decree," declaring all British ports in a state of blockade, led to the British retaliation of the celebrated "Orders in Council," which became, at least, the ostensible casus belli. This declaration, asserting the constructive blockade of all French ports, and declaring all products of countries under French rule liable to be seized under any flag, bore very hard upon neutrals, especially upon the Americans, whose merchant marine had, during the engrossment of Europe in war, almost monopolised the carrying trade of the world. On every sea American mer chantmen, bound to or from French or British ports, were encountered and captured by cruisers of the hostile nation, but as the British cruisers were by far the more numerous, they did by far the greater damage. To the exasperation occasioned by these events was added, through the selfwilled action of a British commander, the "last straw" which seemed to make war, sooner or later, almost inevitable.

It was an affair very similar to that known about a dozen years ago, as the "Trent Affair," which, had not Britain been more forbearing than America was in similar circumstances, might have provoked another

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American station, Captain Humphries, of the Leopard, overhauled the American frigate Chesapeake, and made a demand for deserters whom he knew to be on board. The demand, being refused, was enforced by a broadside, which compelled the Chesapeake to strike her colours and surrender the deserters, who were afterwards tried and convicted of piracy at Halifax, and one of them executed.

This unauthorized act was officially disavowed by the British Government at once, before a word of remonstrance from America could reach them. could reach them. Both Admiral and Captain were recalled, and it was further explained that "the right of search, when applied to vessels of war, extended only to a requisition, and could not be carried into effect by force."

But the echoes of the Leopard's guns had awakened a storm in America not easily appeased, and still further stirred up by the inflammatory appeals of demagogues and journalists. The cry "To arms!” seemed to be the cry of the nation. Even clerical dignitaries wrote to the President, Jefferson, asserting that forbearance would be cowardice. Jefferson afterwards claimed the credit of having averted actual hostilities at a time when no other man in the Republic could have held in leash the "dogs of war." Yet, notwithstanding, he did not exercise. the forbearance of waiting for the reparation and disavowal which came so promptly and spontaneously. Without even asking for reparation, he resorted to the proclamation of the celebrated "embargo," excluding British ships from all American ports. doing this, he declares that he wished to avert war; to introduce into the disputes of nations "another umpire than that of arms;" and it is to be presumed that he was sincere.*

In

* Yet the permission, without disavowal or reparation, of such acts as the attack and capture, by the garrison of Fort Niagara, of seven merchant vessels

quietly passing on the Niagara River, did not look like

a desire to avoid hostilities, and led Brock and other

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