1812: The Navy's War

by George Daughan

  Concerned about the president’s frame of mind, Charles Goldsborough, chief clerk of the navy, alerted two prominent captains who were in Washington at the time, William Bainbridge and Charles Stewart, and they protested loudly to both Hamilton and Madison. The two distraught officers explained the negative consequences of confining the fleet to port: British marauders would have the sea to themselves, they argued, with dire consequences for American trade and defense. They saw no reason to allow Britain such a luxury. When properly deployed, they maintained, the American navy could have an impact out of all proportion to its size. If the Admiralty had to contend with enemy frigates and sloops of war operating singly or in pairs over the vast ocean, it would be forced to employ a substantial fleet to convoy merchantmen, blockade ports, and hunt down America’s elusive warships. Furthermore, Bainbridge and Stewart insisted, the individual ships in the U.S. fleet were better than their counterparts in the Royal Navy, and the American officer corps welcomed the chance to prove it.

  While skeptical of Bainbridge and Stewart’s claims, Madison paid some attention to their advice and rejected the recommendation of Gallatin and Hamilton. But he still did not commit himself to an alternate strategy. He remained uncertain. The only thing he was sure about was that the pipsqueak navy would not matter.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The United States Declares War

  MADISON APPROACHED HIS call for a declaration of war with great reluctance, so much so that some historians later claimed the War Hawks forced him into it. This view, however, overlooks the president’s inner strength. He had a backbone that could withstand any political pressure. His desire for peace was the result not of a weak character but rather of deeply held convictions. Over the years, as leader in the House of Representatives, as secretary of state, and finally as president, he had worked hard to reconcile America’s differences with Britain over free trade and impressment. And he continued to do so in the winter and spring of 1812. He tried to convince Prime Minister Perceval that American complaints about the Orders in Council and impressment could no longer be ignored, that the United States preferred war to dishonor.

  But Perceval ignored the president’s warnings. Had Congress passed the proposed naval expansion bill in January, or approved internal taxes to pay for a military buildup, or if New England Federalists had not been so relentless in their attacks on Madison, perhaps Perceval might have been more attentive. But no matter what the president said or did, the prime minister clung to his conviction that the Orders in Council and impressment were necessary for survival, even though they might lead to war with the United States. Perceval preferred that the Americans not declare war, of course, but he would not alter his policies to prevent it. And he did not believe for an instant that either Madison or Congress had the stomach for a fight. He thought that in the end the United States would swallow whatever indignities he heaped on her, because internal divisions and a miniscule army and navy would keep her leadership restrained. On May 30, only two days before Madison called for a declaration of war, the British ambassador in Washington reaffirmed to Secretary of State Monroe that the cabinet would not repeal the Orders.

  It did not help matters that the British ambassador was thirty-two-year-old Sir John Augustus Foster, an upper-class Tory snob, with a pronounced dislike for the republic and an inability to understand its people or their politics. Foster was singularly unable to grasp Madison’s determination to fight rather than submit to Perceval’s indignities. The ambassador kept reporting to London what Perceval wanted to hear—that the president had no intention of asking for a declaration of war and the divided Congress had no intention of passing one. The pathetic state of America’s armed forces was so notorious, and so often commented on in Congress and the press, that right up until war was actually declared, Foster believed that when the president or congressional leaders threatened war, they were bluffing. The ambassador was encouraged in his views by British sympathizers in the Federalist Party like Congressman Josiah Quincy of Massachusetts, the Federalist leader in the House of Representatives, who met with Foster regularly and confirmed that the president and the Republican Congress were not really contemplating war. It was not until May 1812 that Foster, responding to what he was hearing generally in Washington, began warning London of the possibility that Madison might be serious. But by then it was too late.

  On the first of June the president delivered an impassioned appeal to Congress, urging a declaration of war against Great Britain for threatening “the United States as an independent and neutral nation.” In listing America’s grievances, Madison pointed first to impressment. “American citizens,” he wrote, “under the safeguard of public law and of their national flag, have been torn from their country and everything dear to them; have been dragged on board ships of war of a foreign nation and exposed, under the severest of their discipline, to be exiled to the most distant and deadly climes, to risk their lives in the battles of their oppressors, and to be melancholy instruments of taking away those of their brethren.”

  The president then condemned “British cruisers [for] . . . violating the rights and peace of our coasts. They hover over and harass our entering and departing commerce,” he wrote. “To the most insulting pretensions they have added the most lawless proceedings in our very harbors, and have wantonly spilt American blood within the sanctuary of our territorial jurisdiction.” He further charged the British with “plundering our commerce in every sea.” And he accused them of instituting a “sweeping system of blockades, under the name of orders in council . . . [which have established a] monopoly . . . for her own commerce and navigation.” Lastly, he abhorred British encouragement of the Indian nations to war against America on her extensive frontiers. He said that the warfare spared “neither age nor sex and [was] . . . distinguished by features peculiarly shocking to humanity.”

  The House of Representatives immediately took up the president’s appeal. In presenting the war measure to his colleagues, Congressman John C. Calhoun declared, “The United States must support their character and station among nations of the earth, or submit to the most shameful degradation.” On June 4 the House approved the declaration of war 79 to 49. The Senate voted on June 17 and narrowly passed the measure 19 to 13. Madison signed the bill the following day. All thirty-nine Federalists voted against going to war; the Republicans in both houses voted 98 to 23 in favor.

  Opposition was more of a party matter than a sectional one. To be sure, Federalist strength was centered in New England, but Federalists existed throughout the country, including in Virginia, South Carolina, and Maryland. Only in New England, however, did the party control state governments, as well as finance, shipping, and manufacturing. Republicans were spread across the country as well—even in New England. No area of the United States was completely under the control of either party. While the West and the South generally favored the war and the Northeast opposed it, the surest guide to one’s position was his political party.

  In addition to Federalist opposition, members of the president’s own party, like Congressman John Randolph of Roanoke Virginia, spokesman for the Old Republicans or the so-called Quids faction of the Republican Party, also opposed the war. In May, as war approached, the eccentric Randolph appeared on the House floor in hunting garb, complete with boots and spurs, a whip, and a favorite hound. He shouted in his high-pitched voice, “Go to war without money, without men, without a navy! Go to war when we have not the courage, while your lips utter war, to lay war taxes! When your whole courage is exhibited in passing resolutions.”

  Randolph insisted that war would endanger the South’s way of life. Citing old fears slaveholders had of war loosening “habits of subordination,” he predicted uprisings that would destroy the easy life plantation masters and their families enjoyed. Randolph declared that as bad as Britain was, Napoleon was much worse. He said that if the French navy dominated the oceans instead of the British, Napoleon would make life hell for the United States. Why,
Randolph asked, would Americans associate themselves with a tyrant who was worse than Attila the Hun?

  The declaration of war exacerbated the country’s already deep political divisions. Federalists were outraged that the president and his party were committing the country to a de facto alliance with Napoleonic France. They viewed Britain as America’s natural ally. On June 26, eight days after Madison signed the declaration, Federalist governor Caleb Strong of Massachusetts issued a proclamation famously calling for a public fast on July 23 to protest the war resolution “against the nation from which we are descended and which for many generations has been the bulwark of the religion we profess.” Governor Strong wanted, among other things, to allow the vehemently antiwar Massachusetts clergy to rail against Madison’s war from their pulpits. The lower house of the Massachusetts legislature urged citizens to “let the sound of your disapprobation of this war be loud and deep.” Josiah Quincy told his constituents that the war was “an event awful, unexpected, hostile to your interests, menacing to your liberties, and revolting to your feelings.”

  A sickening incident in Baltimore demonstrated the degree to which political differences were tearing the country apart. Four days after the war declaration, on June 22, a Republican mob attacked Alexander C. Hanson’s Federalist newspaper, the Federal Republican. Readers could depend on Hanson to bitterly oppose Madison no matter what he did, but when the disgruntled publisher heard war had been declared, he was apoplectic. His June 19 issue was so vehement in its denunciation of the president that the next day a Republican mob broke into his newspaper, smashed the printing presses, and destroyed the building, shutting down the paper—they thought for good.

  The fiery Hanson was not so easily silenced, however. With help from his partner, Jacob Wagner, he removed to Georgetown and in five days put out a paper again, distributing it in Baltimore as well as Georgetown and Washington. That was not good enough, though; Hanson was determined to go back to Baltimore and set up his operation again. He asked Revolutionary War heroes General Henry (Light-Horse Harry) Lee and General James Lingan to find a suitable fortresslike edifice in Baltimore where he could set up a new press. He also elicited help from a number of Federalist friends who wanted to defy the Republican mob. In a remarkably short time, Hanson began publishing out of a well-fortified brick building in Baltimore. His first newspaper hit the streets on July 27, and, predictably, he defied the Republican goons by lambasting the president.

  That night, a menacing crowd gathered outside Hanson’s building. Inside, two dozen armed supporters waited nervously, and when the mob pressed forward toward them, they fired into the crowd, killing Dr. Thadeus Gale, one of the mob leaders, and wounding several others. In a fury, the Republicans left the scene and procured an artillery piece, whereupon Baltimore’s authorities intervened and persuaded Hanson and his men, including the venerable Lee and Lingan, to move to the protection of the city’s jail. Not to be deterred, a vicious gang of Republicans broke into the jail after the guards had retired for the evening. The frenzied mob attacked the defenseless prisoners, killing General Lingan, bludgeoning Lee (who remained crippled for life) and Hanson, while maiming nine others.

  Federalist newspapers throughout the country, but especially in New England, expressed horror. They denounced the Republican massacre, likening it to deadly Jacobin rampages in France. Federalists accused Madison of condoning the violence and predicted he would soon attempt to suppress opinion throughout the country.

  Just the opposite was the case, however. The mob’s violence upset the president and most other Republicans, and it no doubt influenced them to be more tolerant of Federalist dissent. Madison had nothing but contempt for the Baltimore miscreants. He had no intention of suppressing political opinion, as the Federalists tried to do when they passed the sedition law during the Quasi-War with France. Madison was determined to allow all opinions to have free rein—even in wartime. Hanson’s Federal Republican remained in circulation throughout the war, viciously criticizing Madison with impunity.

  IRONICALLY, AFTER MADISON finally decided to go to war, the British government unexpectedly changed. On May 11, a man named Bellingham, for reasons wholly imaginary and personal to him, put a bullet through Perceval’s heart as he entered Parliament, killing him instantly. The prime minister was on his way to attend a meeting of a parliamentary committee to urge continued support for the Orders in Council, which had become increasingly unpopular with a growing number of members.

  Confusion followed as the British tried to form a new government. The prince regent, who had assumed the duties of monarch from his father George III, who was mentally ill, had trouble finding a leader who was willing and able to fashion a new government. Time passed. Finally, the veteran Lord Liverpool, secretary of state for war and the colonies, a member of the House of Lords, and a loyal Perceval supporter, took on the assignment and on June 8 announced the formation of a new cabinet.

  Liverpool believed his tenure as prime minister would be brief, but he was to serve in that stressful post for the next fifteen years. His longevity can be accounted for by his extensive experience in high office before becoming prime minister and for his consistent pragmatism. His political strength derived from an ability to get along with his colleagues and a willingness to adjust his policies to the changing views of Parliament and the country.

  When Liverpool took office, war with the United States was becoming more likely, and he moved to head it off. Avoiding a war with America was the one matter that the cabinet and Parliament were agreed on. Liverpool and his colleagues had a high appreciation of the mortal danger Napoleon presented, and they were hearing loud cries to reopen the huge American market from distressed merchants, manufacturers, and workmen. On June 16 Foreign Minister Castlereagh (Liverpool’s leader in the House of Commons) told members that the ministry intended to suspended the Orders in Council, and on June 23 it did.

  At last, a British government appeared willing to do what Madison and Jefferson had long hoped—ease its maritime restrictions on the United States. But it was too late; the news did not reach Washington in time. Had it, Madison’s hand might have been stayed. But by the time he learned of the repeal, he had already made the decision for war, and the British had said nothing about impressment, which Madison considered an even greater affront than the Orders in Council.

  The president insisted that he had done everything possible to honorably avoid a rupture with Britain. “Arguments and expostulations had been exhausted,” he wrote, and “a positive declaration had been received [from Perceval] that the wrongs provoking [the declaration of war] would not be discontinued.” For Madison, war “could no longer be delayed without breaking down the spirit of the nation, destroying all confidence in itself and in its political institutions . . . [and losing all hope of regaining] our lost rank and respect among independent powers.” If Americans did not fight for their rights on the high seas now, Madison argued, they were “not independent people, but colonists and vassals.”

  On the day Congress declared war, Ambassador Foster was chagrined by an event he had long predicted would never happen. He was so rattled he failed to inform the governor-general of Canada, Sir George Prevost, that war had been declared and Canada was threatened with an invasion. (That vital piece of intelligence would have to come from the alert agent for the British North American Company in New York.) Knowing his government did not want a war, Foster hurried to the White House and asked the president for a suspension of hostilities until he could obtain London’s reaction to the declaration. But Madison turned him down.

  Unaware the Orders in Council had already been repealed, the ambassador then asked if repealing them and beginning negotiations on impressment would be enough to change the president’s mind. Again, Madison said no. He did not want to forfeit the advantage of immediate military action before the British were ready, when he had no idea if London would change its policies. What’s more, the president’s Canadian invasion depended on a prompt a
ttack.

  The following evening Foster attended Dolley Madison’s weekly levee at the White House—as was his habit—and found her and the president shaking hands with guests, congratulating each another on the declaration of war. Foster later claimed that the president was “white as a sheet,” but the New York Evening Post, which opposed the war, reported that he was “all life and spirits.” Actually, Madison was deadly serious, neither elated nor afraid. He felt the enormous burden he had taken on, and he was willing to bear it. Foster was understandably bitter that he had misled his government about the president’s willingness to fight, thus playing a not insignificant part in bring the war about.

  A few days later, on June 23, a more realistic basis for a suspension of hostilities appeared when the National Intelligencer reported Perceval’s assassination. Believing this presaged dramatic changes in policy, Foster hurried back to the White House and again asked for an armistice until a new cabinet could make its views known. He thought it likely the next ministry would repair relations with the United States.

  Madison again rejected the idea, however, and Foster was furious. “As our councils appeared likely to become weaker,” he wrote, “the American cabinet felt stronger, and had a disposition to bully. They now insisted on the impressment question as the main point at issue and declared that a modification, or even a repeal of the Orders in Council would not suffice without a final settlement of the questions of impressment and blockade; and, as the Congress were separating, the Government declared they had no power during recess to do more than listen to our proposals.”