Canada

This campaign includes all operations in the Canadian-American border region 
except the battle of Chippewa and Lundy's Lane. The invasion and conquest of 
western Canada was a major objective of the United States in the War of 1812. 
Among the significant causes of the war were the continuing clash of British and 
American interests in the Northwest Territory and the desire of frontier 
expansionists to seize Canada as a bargaining chip while Great Britain was 
preoccupied with the Napoleonic Wars. In the first phase of the war along the 
border in 1812, the United States suffered a series of reverses. Fort Mackinac 
fell (6 August), Fort Dearborn was evacuated (15 August), and Fort Detroit 
surrendered without a fight (16 August). American attempts to invade Canada 
across the Niagara Peninsula (October) and toward Montreal (November) failed 
completely. Brig. Gen. William Henry Harrison's move to recapture Detroit was 
repulsed (January 1813), but he checked British efforts to penetrate deeper into 
the region at the west end of Lake Erie, during the summer of 1813. Meanwhile, 
in April 1813, Maj. Gen. Henry Dearborn's expedition captured Fort Toronto and 
partially burned York, capital of Upper Canada. On 27 May, Brig. Gen. Jacob 
Brown repelled a British assault on Sackett's Harbor, New York. An American 
force led by Col. Winfield Scott seized Fort George and the town of Queenston 
across the Niagara (May-June 1813), but the British regained control of this 
area in December 1813. A two-pronged American drive on Montreal from Sackett's 
Harbor and Plattsburg, New York in the fall of 1813 ended in a complete fiasco. 
Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry defeated the British fleet on Lake Erie 
(10 September 1813), opening the way for Harrison's victory at the Thames 
River (5 October), which reestablished American control over the Detroit Area.


Chippewa

An American advance from Plattsburg in March 1814, led by Maj. Gen. James 
Wilkinson, was checked just beyond the border, but on 3 July 3,500 men under 
General Brown seized Fort Erie across the Niagara in a coordinated attack with 
Commodore Isaac Chauncey's fleet designed to wrest control of Lake Ontario 
from the British. In subsequent troop maneuvers in the Niagara region, Brig. 
Gen. Winfield Scott's brigade (1,300 men) of Brown's command was 
unexpectedly confronted by a large British force while preparing for an 
Independence Day parade (5 July 1814) near the Chippewa River. Scott's 
well-trained troops broke the enemy line with a skillfully executed charge, 
sending the survivors into a hasty retreat. British losses were 137 killed and 
304 wounded; American, 48 killed and 227 wounded.


Lundy's Lane

After Chippewa Brown's force advanced to Queenstown, but soon abandoned 
a proposed attack on Forts George and Niagara when Chauncey's fleet failed 
to cooperate in the operation. Instead, on 24-25 July 1814, Brown moved back 
to the Chippewa preparatory to a cross-country march along Lundy's Lane to 
the west end of Lake Ontario. Unknown to Brown, the British had concentrated 
about 2,200 troops in the vicinity of Lundy's Lane and 1,500 more in Forts 
George and Niagara. On 25 July, Scott's brigade, moving again towards 
Queenstown in an effort to draw off a British detachment threatening Brown's 
line of communications on the American side of the Niagara, ran into the 
enemy contingents at the junction of Queenstown Road and Lundy's Lane. 
The ensuing battle, which eventually involved all of Brown's force (2,900 men) 
and some 3,000 British, was fiercely fought and neither side gained a clear 
cut victory. The Americans retired to the Chippewa unmolested, but the battle 
terminated Brown's invasion of Canada. Casualties were heavy on both sides, 
the British losing 878 and the Americans 854 in killed and wounded; both 
Brown and Scott were wounded and the British commander was wounded 
and captured. British siege of Fort Erie (2 August - 21 September 1814) 
failed to drive the Americans from that outpost on Canadian soil, but on 5 
November they withdrew voluntarily. Commodore Thomas Macdonough's 
victory over the British fleet on Lake Champlain (11 September 1814) 
compelled Sir George Prevost, Governor General of Canada, to call off his 
attack on Plattsburg with 11,000 troops.


Bladensburg


After the surrender of Napoleon, the British dispatched Maj. Gen. Robert Ross 
from France on 27 June 1814, with 4,000 veterans to raid key points on the 
American coast. Ross landed at the mouth of the Patuxent River in Maryland 
with Washington as his objective on 19 August and marched as far as Upper 
Marlboro, Maryland (22 August) without meeting resistance. Meanwhile, Brig. 
Gen. William Winder, in command of the Potomac District, had assembled a 
mixed force of about 5,000 men near Bladensburg, including militia, regulars, 
and some 400 sailors from Commodore Joshua Barney's gunboat flotilla, which 
had been destroyed to avoid capture by the British fleet. In spite of a 
considerable advantage in numbers and position, the Americans were easily 
routed by Ross' force. British losses were about 249 killed and wounded; the 
Americans lost about 100 killed and wounded, and 100 captured. British 
detachments entered the city and burned the Capitol and other public buildings 
(24-25 August) in what was later announced as retaliation for the American 
destruction at York.


Fort McHenry


While the British marched on Washington, Baltimore had time to hastily 
strengthen its defenses. Maj. Gen. Samuel Smith had about 9,000 militia, 
including 1,000 in Fort McHenry guarding the harbor. On 12 September, the 
British landed at North Point about 14 miles below the city, where their 
advance was momentarily checked by 3,200 Maryland Militiamen. Thirty-nine 
British (including General Ross) were killed and 251 wounded at a cost of 24 
Americans killed, 139 wounded, and 50 taken prisoner. After their fleet failed 
to reduce Fort McHenry by bombardment and boat attack (night of 13-14 
September), the British decided that a land attack on the rather formidable 
fortifications defending the city would be too costly and, on 14 October, sailed 
for Jamaica. Francis Scott Key, after observing the unsuccessful British 
bombardment of Fort McHenry, was inspired to compose the verses of "The 
Star Spangled Banner."


 New Orleans

On 20 December 1814, a force of about 10,000 British troops, assembled in 
Jamaica, landed unopposed at the west end of Lake Borgne, some 15 miles 
from New Orleans, preparatory to an attempt to seize the city and secure 
control of the lower Mississippi Valley. Advanced elements pushed quickly 
toward the river, reaching Villere's Plantation on the left bank, 10 miles below 
New Orleans, on 23 December. In a swift counter-action, Maj. Gen. Andrew 
Jackson, American commander in the South, who had only arrived in the city 
on 1 December, made a night attack on the British (23-24 December) with 
some 20,000 men supported by fire from the gunboat Carolina. The British 
advance was checked, giving Jackson time to fall back to a dry canal about 
five miles south of New Orleans, where he built a breastworks about a mile 
long, with the right flank on the river and the left in a cypress swamp. A 
composite force of about 3,500 militia, regulars, sailors, and others manned 
the American main line, with another 1,000 in reserve. A smaller force—
perhaps 1,000 militia—under Brig. Gen. David Morgan defended the right 
bank of the river. Maj. Gen. Sir Edward Pakenham, brother-in-law of the 
Duke of Wellington, arrived on 25 December to command the British 
operation. He entrenched his troops and, on 1 January 1815, fought an 
artillery duel in which the Americans outgunned the British artillerists. 
Finally, at dawn on 8 January, Pakenham attempted a frontal assault on 
Jackson's breastworks with 5,300 men, simultaneously sending a smaller 
force across the river to attack Morgan's defenses. The massed fires of 
Jackson's troops, protected by earthworks reinforced with cotton bales, 
wrought havoc among Pakenham's regulars as they advanced across 
the open ground in front of the American lines. In less than a half hour, 
the attack was repulsed. The British lost 291 killed, including Pakenham, 
1,262 wounded, and 48 prisoners; American losses on both sides of the 
river were only 13 killed, 39 wounded, and 19 prisoners. The surviving 
British troops withdrew to Lake Borgne and reembarked on 27 January for 
Mobile, where, on 14 February, they learned that the Treaty of Ghent, 
ending the war, had been signed on 24 December 1814.







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