Posted on 11/05/2008 6:29:45 AM PST by stentorian conservative
Vancouver-based artist and author Douglas Coupland hopes his new military monument will help stop what he calls a "creeping revisionism" of the War of 1812.
Douglas Coupland's Monument to the War of 1812 was unveiled Monday in Toronto. (CBC)
"I've grown up and a lot of people have grown up thinking 'Oh, Americans lost that one didn't they?"' Coupland said Monday after unveiling the Monument to the War of 1812 outside a condominium near Fort York in Toronto.
"But once I began getting involved in the project and doing research, I began noticing that the Americans are now starting to change history and they're saying, 'Well actually we won that,' or, 'Actually, we didn't lose' or whatever.
(Excerpt) Read more at cbc.ca ...
But we lost huh?
FYI: The History Channel is currently running a marathon of the series The Presidents.
Battle Of New Orleans Lyrics
Artist(Band):Johnny Horton
In eighteen-fourteen we took a little trip
Along with Colonel Jackson down the mighty Mississipp’
We took a little bacon and we took a little beans
And we caught the bloody British in the town of New Orleans
We fired our guns and the British kept a comin’
There wasn’t nigh as many as there was a while ago
We fired once more and they began to runnin’
On down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico
We looked down the river and we seed the British come
And there must’ve been a hundred of ‘em beatin’ on the drum
They stepped so high and they made their bugles ring
We stood beside our cotton bales, didn’t say a thing
Old Hickory said we could take ‘em by surprise
If we didn’t fire muskets till we looked ‘em in the eye
We held our fire till we seed their faces well
Then we opened up our squirrel guns and really gave ‘Em well
Yeah they ran through the briars and they ran through the brambles
And they ran through the bushes where a rabbit couldn’t go
They ran so fast that the hounds couldn’t catch ‘em
On down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico
We fired our cannon till the barrel melted down
So we grabbed an alligator and we fought another round
We filled his head with cannonballs and powdered his behind
And when we touched the powder off the ‘gator lost his mind
If we lost, how come we’re not now Loyal Subjects of the Crown????
Flip side, ‘Sink The Bismark’. Haven’t heard it in over 10 years.
In no sense would I call it a loss for the U.S. The Battle of New Orleans, though fought after the treaty was signed, was the largest engagement of the war, and the British were completely defeated. If they had won that battle there would have been no guarantee they would have kept to the terms of the agreement, so in that aspect alone it was a U.S. victory.
Didn’t the British pullout because of an Irish uprising and they figured holding Ireland was more important than trying to win back the colonies?
I haven’t heard that one in awhile. Thanks.
Yup, we lost. The British never sailed again on the Great Lakes, their line of supply/communication to the interior of the N. American continent was severed from two separate directions, and thus they never had any meaningful presence in the area. The Americans got whupped.
The War showed Britain we could stand toe to toe with them and sowed the seeds for the inevitable reapproachment after the Civil War.
Grant County Indiana has the largest re-inactment of the 1812 war in October each year; battle of Mississinewa Way. I attended this year for the first time. What a history lesson. I loved it. The re-inactment takes place in almost the exact same spot as the original. We have several historical markers in the area and a Miami Indian cemetary.
"The Star-Spangled Banner" is the national anthem of the United States of America. The lyrics come from a poem written in 1814 by Francis Scott Key, a then 35-year-old amateur poet who wrote "Defence of Fort McHenry"[1] [spelling is accurate] after seeing the bombardment of Fort McHenry at Baltimore, Maryland, by Royal Navy ships in Chesapeake Bay during the War of 1812."
The war was a draw without any meaning full strategic objective being won by either side.
Washington, DC was captured and burned but not held.
The American invasion of Canada was repulsed by the British but the British invasions of Baltimore and New Orleans were repulsed by the Americans.
The Royal Navy successfully blockaded American ports but American privateers caused significant damage to British commerce in the West Indies.
All in all, the War of 1812 was a minor sideshow on the World stage. At the time, the British had their focus on defeating Napoleon and the French and, there, Britannia were definitely on the right side of History.
We did well in the south and west, less well in the north and east (sound familiar?). Jackson beat the British in New Orleans after the treaty was signed. The treaty basically took everything back to the way it was before the war, which for us was a victory since it meant England essentially finally recognized the US. Burr also went insane (more insane than before) and came really close to getting New England to secede.
So, a loss? No. Our most resounding victory ever? Not that, either. It also set up the split between the Jackson people and the Whig people.
ping
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