Britannia's Fist: From Civil War to World War: An Alternate History

by Peter G. Tsouras

  As Wolseley reviewed the situation, he found he could count on about ten thousand men in the Voluntary Militia from Lower Canada (Quebec) and about fifteen thousand from Upper Canada (Ontario). Several thousand more could be found in the Maritimes. The process of consolidating the many independent companies into battalions had begun.

  Three Canadian militia infantry battalions were brigaded with one British battalion for wartime operations as well as for training. The British Army had also provided several hundred officers and noncommissioned officers (NCOs) to train the Canadians. Nevertheless, there was a limit to how much soldiering could be passed on in the short training periods the Canadian colonial government was willing to pay for.

  BRITISH ARMY HEADQUARTERS, MONTREAL, CANADA, 2:00 PM, SEPTEMBER 3, 1863

  That afternoon, Wolseley reviewed the strategic defense of British North America with General Williams, Colonel Wetherall, and the rest of the staff. He said, “We face the unique military problem of an immensely long border with no strategic depth behind it. The inhabited regions of Upper and Lower Canada are rarely more than fifty miles deep. At the same time, the British forces in Canada and the Maritimes would show clearly that all of our scattered regular forces do not amount to a single corps in General Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. Our Canadian militia has an effective strength of even less than that. Because of the necessity to defend key points, there is no possibility that these forces could ever be consolidated into a single, large field army.”

  Although Wolseley considered his regulars more than a match for veteran American troops if war came, he also knew that the unblooded Canadians would have to be used very carefully until they had become seasoned. “We face another problem: Canadian officials tend to lose all interest in defense matters when the immediate cost is waved about. The attitude seems to be that since they are part of the British Empire, the empire will damn well have to defend them. If I remember correctly, that is one reason Brother Jonathan refused to pay his fair share for the Crown’s expenses in the Seven Years War. And we know where that attitude led.

  “Case in point, gentlemen, let me read you this comment from George Brown’s newspaper, the Globe: ‘We cannot agree to the dogma that Canada should provide entirely for her defence when she is not the author of the quarrels against the consequences of which she is called to stand upon her guard.’9

  “On a more positive note, I am glad that the Canadian Volunteers are as splendid men as can be wished for. They are, after all, blood of our blood, bone of our bone. Unfortunately, the provincial authorities have been rather feckless in the selection of their officers. Social standing seems to be the primary consideration. They may well have considered Cromwell’s standards when he said, ‘If you chose godly, honest men to be captains of horse, honest men will follow them.’ So, gentlemen, a major task is to nurse along these provincial officers as best we can until they approach the quality of the men they lead.” As only British officers were present, there were no objections to his characterizations. If anything, there was knowing laughter.10

  Wolseley continued. “Luckily the authorities have authorized an increase to thirty-five thousand, but they have to be recruited, organized, and trained. The authorities have agreed to begin organizing the next wave of battalions, from number twenty-four to sixty, though this will depend on the Crown arming and equipping them. Most of the militia companies already exist to be consolidated into battalions, and we can expect about a dozen to be established this month. Seven will be from Lower Canada and five from Upper Canada. A majority of the first twenty-three battalions are from Lower Canada, but they consist mostly of Her Majesty’s English-speaking subjects; Her Majesty’s French are less inclined to serve, though they have contributed several fine battalions.

  “But getting them in shape to fight will take time; an element the enemy always tries to deny us. So the question becomes, What form would an American war take? Upon that answer rests our ability to plan for the most effective use of imperial forces. The Americans won’t wait; they are an aggressive and even precipitous people. In 1776 and 1812, they immediately attacked Canada upon the commencement of hostilities. We cannot rely simply on history repeating their mistakes in those attempts.

  “The Army’s 1861 war plan, devised during the Trent Affair, plainly took that history into account and worked on the premise that the best defense was a good offense. It had recommended a major landing to capture Portland and occupy the entire state of Maine as well. British-held Maine would then form a strategic shield for the otherwise vulnerable Lower Canada and the Maritimes. It had two vital advantages, gentlemen. First, we would gain complete control of the Grand Trunk Railway to secure British North America’s internal line of communications. Second, by offensive action we would put the Americans’ forces on the defensive, which otherwise would inevitably and immediately attack Canada.

  “So far, so good. Then for some inexplicable reason, this political assessment was also included. I read it for your edification.

  The interests of Maine and Canada are identical. A strong party is believed to exist in Maine in favor of annexation to Canada; and no sympathy is there felt for the war which now desolates the U. States. It is more than probable that a conciliatory policy adopted towards Maine would, if it failed to secure its absolute co-operation, indispose it to use any vigorous efforts against us. The patriotism of Americans dwells peculiarly in their pockets; & the pocket of the good citizens of Maine would benefit largely by the expenditure and trade we should create in making Portland our base & their territory our line of communications with Canada.11

  Wolseley snorted in disgust. “What utter claptrap. Written, no doubt by some gentleman in London who had never been to North America much less Maine. I just hope someone in the American government is not making the same assessment of Canada.”

  His recent trip to Maine indicated that its people would do more than resent an occupation. He had not forgotten Sharpe’s account of the stand of the 20th Maine at Gettysburg either, nor how proud the people of Maine were of him and the rest of their regiments.12

  He was also aware that if American politicians were assuming that the people of British North America would gladly look on forcible incorporation into the United States, they were equally delusional. The French had come to the conclusion that they would lose their exclusiveness that British rule allowed if absorbed in the huge sea of the Union. The Irish Canadians who had settled there in numbers as a result of the Great Famine were loyal to their new home; those who had hated the Crown had found the States more congenial and moved south. And as usual, the Scots were a bulwark to the Crown.

  Though inclined to let others pay for their defense in the event of war, the people of British North America would fight. The Canadians had not understood the British outrage when the militia bill that would have funded much of the Canadian military expansion had caused the MacDonald government to fall in 1862. For them, the bill had simply been the proximate cause of the fall of a government that was on its way out. The Crown had swallowed its anger and provided a two million–pound subsidy that had allowed Canadian military preparations to continue. The new government was happy to spend that money, buying one hundred thousand Enfield rifles, uniforms, and ammunition, and using it to pay for the consolidation of militia companies into new battalions.13

  ROYAL NAVY BASE, HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA, 12:00 AM, SEPTEMBER 4, 1863

  As they often did, the whale oil lamps burned late at the headquarters of the Royal Navy’s base in Halifax. The commander of the Royal Navy’s North American and West Indies Station, Rear Adm. Sir Alexander Milne, was known as the foremost administrator in the Royal Navy. The closest he had come to combat in his thirty-six years in the Navy was to escort British and French troop transports in the Crimean War, which he had done with an efficiency that was uncharacteristic of the war. He ran a taut organization and tolerated no slack work. He showed a genuine concern for the enlisted men of the station and made improvements to mak
e their lot easier. Milne came from a Navy family; his father, Adm. Sir David Milne, had distinguished himself against the French in the Napoleonic Wars and had been impressed with the American naval performance in the War of 1812. The impression had had an ominous cast. He concluded, “I most sincerely wish to see their naval power nipped in the bud, for if they ever get it to any extent they will give us trouble enough.”14 The son had inherited his father’s ability, but his opinion of the Americans was more judicious. He would not over or underestimate them.

  Milne’s exacting nature was not a surprise to the officers of the station. Naval officers were used to hard work; they had to know their profession to the smallest degree, or their warships, the most complex technological and organizational structures of the era, would simply cease to function. British Army officers were not, as a rule, so keen, especially in the aristocratic preserve of the cavalry regiments—work was too much like trade. It took more abuse to stop the functioning of a British infantryman or horse than the complex machinery of a ship. The Army officer, all too often, thought he had done his duty by dying well.

  The late-working officers were surprised by the amount of work necessary to prepare for the Army’s assistant quartermaster general for British North America’s visit to Admiral Milne. The admiral’s flag lieutenant, Basil Hall, could have enlightened them on the purpose of that visit to guide their labors, but he considered it too confidential to be batted about the mess.15

  Instead, he had discussed it with Milne at tea that afternoon. Milne was a direct man, saving Hall from endless guessing games. The admiral leaned back in his stuffed chair by the great upper glass windows of the headquarters that looked out over the harbor and its sea of masts. It was a grand sight, the material evidence that Britannia did indeed rule the waves. Milne knew that that was a nice sentiment, but as an organized man, he wanted to add the numbers.

  “Hall,” he said, “Wolseley has an uncommonly good head for an Army officer. I much appreciated his observations from Washington and his discussions with Captain Hancock. It is his opinion that the Americans and we are sailing right into another crisis, similar to the Trent Affair. I read the American newspapers closely, Hall. I wish Lord Russell did as well. I’m afraid we continue to act under a badly written law that only threatens to drag us into a war by the very provocations it tolerates.

  “You were not with me in December 1861 when I prepared a plan to be employed if we had gone to war with the Americans then. The desire for war burned hot in London at the time. We would have crushed their Navy. Now I am not so certain. Their Navy has grown in size, ability, and with the number of monitors they have…” He did not finish the statement but stared out the window for a moment as he sipped his tea.

  Milne turned back to the flag lieutenant and put down his tea. “I prepared a plan that would have driven their Navy and commerce off the sea, broken their blockade, and thrown a counterblockade across their own ports. But then, the gentlemen in Whitehall never answered my question of ‘what next’ if the Americans did not sue for peace immediately.”

  “Oh, surely that would not happen, sir,” Hall replied. “What country could survive such a blow? The shock alone would bring them to their senses.”

  “Really, Hall? And how many times did we do just that to the French and still have to fight long, grinding wars of exhaustion?”

  Hall hesitated.

  “And the Americans are not the French by any means. They spring from our own blood, as rude and arrogant a people as so many of our countrymen prefer to see them. In our two wars with the Americans, may I remind you of the number of ship-to-ship actions we lost?”

  Hall began to look unsettled at the analogy.

  “Cheer up, Hall, it is my job to see things without illusion. It is yours to be my sounding board. Now let me tell you of the improvements I have in mind for the war plan.”

  Milne first reviewed the original plan. It was based on the strength of the North American and West Indies Station that currently had a compliment of forty-two ships (totaling 70,456 tons), 14,551 men, and 1,319 guns. Of this number, there were eight battleships or ships of the line and thirteen frigates and corvettes. Every ship was steam powered. All of Milne’s ships, however, were purpose-built warships whereas most American warships were converted commercial ships of one sort or another and armed with lighter ordnance.16

  Milne noted that the most common gun in the fleet was the old 32-pounder, outclassed by the new Dahlgren guns the Americans had been producing in great numbers. That brought him to the problem that had been gnawing at him for months now. In 1861, the rifled Armstrong gun in various calibers had been issued to the fleet. It was hailed as a technological innovation of profound importance with a 1.5-mile point-blank accuracy and a reach of 5 miles for the 32-pounder Armstrong, seven times better than the comparable muzzle-loader. It had solved the problem of the great stress in the powder chambers of old cast-iron guns by shrinking wrought iron spirals over a wrought iron barrel. Being a breech-loader, the Armstrong did not have to be run out, reducing the movement of the gun in action. It had proved in practice, however, to be a profound disappointment. For such an advanced concept, the Armstrong guns were useless against the armor on American monitors for which they had never been designed. There were technical deficiencies as well that made the guns unreliable. The gun carriages were too low and forced the crews to stoop to operate the gun. The breeching bolts in the ships’ sides were unable to resist the recoil of the gun, which Milne said was “so exceedingly violent that the gun and carriage was lifted bodily from the deck and came in with a crash, enough to tear everything to pieces, and the men were obliged to retire from near the gun.” The lead shell covering, which was meant to mold to the rifling grooves, sometimes “puffed out,” making it impossible to load. The heat of the tropics in which the ships of the station rotated tended to deteriorate the rubber fuse washers and the tallow-filled lubricators.17

  The biggest problem was the poorly designed vent piece that frequently blew out when the gun was fired. As one observer noted, “I believe it occurred more than once that the block [vent piece] found its way into the main top to the discomfort of the men there.” Milne had been unhappy when the Royal Navy purchased one hundred of the 110-pounders without trials, even though the manufacturer had stated that he did not think them suitable for such large calibers and for use at sea. Milne had more reason for his dismay with the guns as their deficiencies manifested, believing them overcomplicated and prone to malfunction in quick firing. He pointedly noted, “Americans won’t look at them.” Even Lord Lyons had noted to Russell that Union authorities relied on the “simplicity and stolidity” of Dahlgren’s guns and had no confidence in breech-loading weapons.18

  Milne had kept by him the report of Capt. George Hancock of the Immortalité, who had toured American ordnance facilities and spoken extensively with Admiral Dahlgren. The report was already eighteen months old but that only added to his disquiet. Even then, the Americans were producing more than thirty of the Dahlgrens a week. Milne had complete confidence in Hancock’s judgment, and when the captain characterized the American guns as the “most efficient weapons of the day,” he took it very much to heart. Dahlgren had devised a method to avoid the great weakness of all guns, the manner in which the trunions, on which the gun pivoted, were mounted. The shorter American gun carriage allowed the guns to be fired at a greater elevation than comparable British guns. The guns’ soda bottle shape also meant that their center of gravity was not so near the ship’s outer wall and reduced the ship’s rolling, especially in heavy weather. The muzzles also extended beyond the gun ports more than British guns, reducing the chance of igniting the wooden sides of the ship or, when on the upper deck, of setting fire to the rigging. That last danger was the subject of special complaints Milne had made to the Admiralty. Hancock also noticed that the Americans had cut a hole behind each gun up through which powder charges were passed, thus eliminating the frantic rushing up and down the m
ain hatchways of men carrying powder charges.

  With all this in mind, Milne was preparing a report to state that although the Armstrong guns were “admirably manufactured and of great precisions,” they were “not suitable for service afloat.” That conclusion was a constant worry for Milne. The Armstrong guns were a large proportion of the station’s guns. He had decided to request that they should be replaced with more reliable muzzle-loaders with particular emphasis on the 68-pounder that British testing had indicated would penetrate the 4.5 inches of side armor of American ironclads at two hundred yards.19

  The backbone of the fighting power of the station was its ships of the line with their three decks of guns, which seemed from another world, and indeed they were. Most were laid down more than twenty years before. They were typified by HMS Nile, Milne’s flagship. She had been laid down in 1839 and converted to screw in 1854. In 1862 she had been up-gunned with sixteen Armstrong guns of various calibers, though she still carried sixty-two of the venerable muzzle-loading 32-pounders.20

  Milne’s war plan had three basic elements: to destroy any American fleet or ship that dared to oppose the Royal Navy; to blockade the Union coast from Cape Henry, Virginia, to Maine; and to conduct powerful raids against coastal targets. He also wanted to seize sites in the vicinity of Martha’s Vineyard as coaling stations. Inherent in this plan was breaking the Union blockade of the South at Charleston and possibly Galveston. The First Lord of the Admiralty, the Duke of Somerset, had written him as the Trent Crisis mounted, “In the event of war I do not send from here any plan of operations as you have probably better means of judging what to do, but the first objective would probably be to open the blockade of the Southern ports and without directly co-operating with the Confederates, enable them to act and to receive supplies.”21