The Burning of the White House

by Jane Hampton Cook

  Jefferson’s offer was also a political gift to Madison. It signaled that life should go on. The government could continue as it was before and rebuild. While not explicitly addressing the issue of relocating the capital city, the gesture underscored Madison’s determination that the British invasion should be only a temporary interruption, not a permanent one.

  “I learn that the library committee will report favorably on your proposition to supply the loss of books by Congress,” Madison responded in a letter that signaled he was following up on his friend’s offer. “It will prove a gain to them, if they have the wisdom to replace it by such a collection as yours.”

  He also discussed the war with his predecessor. The outcome would depend on two things: the ability of the peace commissioners to negotiate with the British and how well General Andrew Jackson would lead the southern army to defend Louisiana.

  Madison also wrote Jefferson the latest information on peace: “We have just received dispatches from Ghent which I shall lay before Congress today. . . . Our ministers were all present and in perfect harmony and of opinion on the arrogance of such demands.”

  Jefferson understood the challenge that Madison faced when it came to peace. The war over impressment and trade rights appeared to have shifted. The enemy had changed the end game, as he’d written to Madison.

  “The war,” Jefferson explained, “now that these [impressment and trade rights] are done away by events, is declared by Great Britain to have changed its object, and to have become a war of conquest, to be waged until she conquers from us our fisheries, the province of Maine, the [Great] lakes, states and territories North of the Ohio, and the navigation of the Mississippi, in other words till she reduces us to unconditional submission.”

  Madison agreed. As he responded to Jefferson, he longed for the British government to change its demands but feared it would not. He thought a “rupture of the negotiation” was possible. He hoped that new events, such as the outcome of a likely battle in New Orleans, would pressure the Brits to reduce their demands. Because leaders in Europe were meeting to divide Napoleon’s territories, this might change the dynamics in America’s favor.

  A want-to-be member of the presidents’ club, Senator King, found himself receiving disapproval from a friend. His phoenix-like rise to support congressional action met with disapproval from his Federalist friend Gouverneur Morris. More extreme in his views than King, Morris was in a fit over the Federalists’ fall of 1814 plan.

  “I feel myself bound in duty and honor to declare that anything like a pledge by Federalists to carry on this wicked war, strikes a dagger to my heart. Whoever shall utter a word of that sort will repent it,” Morris wrote to King.

  He accused King of being cheated by contrivers. “What are you to gain by giving Mr. Madison men and money?”

  Morris’s objection was about finances. “If you go on at this present rate . . . you wage war at an expense which no nation can bear. Patriotism is one thing, but food is another, and tho’ patriotism may turn out soldiers it cannot buy bread.”

  Morris didn’t believe the enemy ever intended to attack New York. He knew his criticism of King was hurtful, “Hard words if you please, but they break no bones.”

  King and Morris agreed on one thing. Both believed the British’s main objective now was to capture Louisiana, specifically New Orleans, and control the Mississippi River. In this way they could live to fight another war and thwart western expansion by the United States in the future, as King wrote: “If N.O. [New Orleans] passes under the dominion of the enemy, the war will be continued for many years.”

  How King longed for an end to the war. How he hoped that New Orleans would end it. Now more than ever he hoped that Madison would obtain a victory, one that would lead to a lasting peace for the United States of America.

  Still highly focused on the war, Madison directed the resources of the War Department toward New Orleans. By ordering James Monroe, now war secretary, to send a letter to General Andrew Jackson, he unknowingly directed the next steps of two future presidents, both Monroe and Jackson. During the third week of October, Monroe communicated the president’s wishes, noting that Madison had approved of how Jackson had conducted himself on behalf of his country. This move was to fix the insult Armstrong had thrown at Jackson for promotion.

  Monroe concluded his letter to Jackson, “Very important interests are committed to you, and great confidence is entertained that you will meet the expectation of the government in the discharge of your duties.”

  Madison, Monroe, and Jackson knew that the British had changed their focus. They were now heading south. Cockburn had headed toward Georgia while another squadron was preparing to attack New Orleans.

  “It is thought very probably that the British forces, expected from Europe, under Lord Hill, will be directed against Louisiana,” Monroe conveyed on Madison’s behalf to Jackson. “To enable to meet this prospect, 7,500 men have been ordered from Tennessee, 2,500 from Kentucky, and alike number from Georgia, and it is expected that warriors of all the friendly tribes of Indians will be received by you, on our side.”

  The government was also sending money and blankets and other articles to ready Jackson’s men for service.

  Once again, a member of the presidents’ club gave Madison an opportunity to express his confidence in peace. Former President John Adams had forwarded him a letter from his son, John Quincy Adams, who was one of the peace commissioners. John Quincy had written his father asking for a history of the fishing rights on bodies of water used by both Americans and Canadians. He wanted to know how those rights had been determined in the negotiation to end the Revolutionary War. Though John Adams had participated in those negotiations, he had sent his son’s letter and request to President Madison.

  “I have caused the archives of the Department of State to be searched with an eye to what passed during the negotiation for peace on the subject of the fisheries. The search has not furnished a precise answer to the enquiry of Mr. Adams,” Madison thoughtfully responded to Adams.

  All they could find was that Congress had supported the common right to fish three leagues beyond the shores of Canada in instructions for a commerce treaty with Britain years earlier. The information was not specific enough to resolve the problem in the current negotiations.

  Madison then shared the latest information that he had about Adams’s son. “The view of the discussions at Ghent presented by the private letters of all our ministers there, as well as by their official dispatches, leaves no doubt of the policy of the British Cabinet.”

  Outlining the challenge the peace commissioners faced, he continued, “The point to be decided by our ministers is, whether during the uncertainty of events, a categorical alternative of immediate peace, or a rupture of the negotiation, would not be preferable to a longer acquiescence in the gambling procrastinations of the other party.”

  He knew that it was possible a rupture had happened. Even if this had taken place, he assured Adams of his confidence in his son’s skills. “It is very agreeable to find that the superior ability which distinguishes the notes of our envoys, extorts commendation from the most obdurate of their political enemies.”

  Recognizing John Quincy’s abilities, Madison also caught a glimpse of the diplomatic skills that would launch John Quincy Adams as the nation’s sixth president, in ten years.

  As the nation’s fourth president, Madison had been directly touched and influenced by the first three. He had also been a touchstone for the next three by directing the destinies of Monroe, John Quincy Adams, and Jackson.

  In the autumn of 1814, though Madison remained worried that peace had not yet come, he had three reasons to hope it was still achievable. He had used his presidential power to give the peace commissioners instructions that would lead to peace. He’d also directed resources to Andrew Jackson in New Orleans, and he’d sent an important signal to members of Congress.

  While not directly communicating his intentions to Mr. G
ales at the National Intelligencer, he coyly reminded an intermediary that when it came to the removal of the capital by Congress, he held the power of the veto. And more than that, he would use it.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Uplifting News

  “The decision of the House of Representatives has, as we anticipated, put to sleep for now, and we trust forever, the project of a removal of the seat of government from Washington.”

  Nine votes. That’s all. The final vote was that close. Seventy-four members voted for moving the capital city, while eighty-three voted against it. As relieved as he was optimistic, Gales printed the happenings in the National Intelligencer on October 18, 1814.

  The cause of justice had triumphed. Knowing the president all too well, Gales had decided that Madison would’ve vetoed the measure if it had passed. This newspaperman had changed a bit, however, since the burning of the White House and Capitol. Concluding that it was time to show a little distance and independence from the president, Gales made it clear that he had not spoken to Mr. Madison directly on the matter: “We take this opportunity to disclaim any direct knowledge of the sentiments of the chief magistrate in respect to the seat of government.”

  Yet, he knew that the president’s recent actions of convening Congress in Washington and moving with his wife into the Octagon House, among other decisions, signaled his intention not to go anywhere anytime soon. Gales didn’t run a state or official government paper, but he understood the criticism that he had been too chummy with the administration. He also knew Madison’s character and sensed his views on the issue, and printed his thoughts. “Entertaining that opinion which we do of his patriotic spirit and zeal for the integrity of the union, with the light afforded us by the part which he took in the proceedings of Congress in 1791 in regard to this subject, we would not doubt but he [the president] would reject any bill for the removal of the seat of government which should’ve passed Congress by bare majorities only.”

  Party lines and region played a role in the outcome. Forty-four of fifty-three Federalists voted for removal while only thirty of 104 Republicans voted for removal. Most northern members voted for removal, while most southern members voted against it.

  The vote was most divided in Pennsylvania, the state most likely to benefit from moving the capital. Nine members from Pennsylvania voted for removal while seven opposed it. Party allegiance and a desire to spite the enemy by keeping Washington as the capital city prevailed.

  The vote didn’t stop the enthusiasm of Washingtonians to continue to court Congress. Launching an effort from local residents to contribute money and supplies to rebuild, the city council created gravel sidewalks around local boardinghouses to ease the discomfort of members of Congress as they endured the city’s muddy streets. This gave lawmakers more reasons to stay.

  Gales had come to America because his father had sought freedom of speech and of the press. Despite Cockburn’s efforts to destroy Gales’s business, this man with a nose for news rose from the ashes with a strong determination to not let the enemy win. He used freedom of the press to persuade others to keep Washington as the permanent capital city of the United States of America.

  Less than two weeks after the vote, John Van Ness had even more reason to smile. Thomas Munroe, superintendent of public buildings, gave Congress a report on the feasibility of rebuilding the U.S. Capitol and White House. Because Munroe had been a clerk and bookkeeper under the original three-member board of commissioners for the District of Columbia mandated by the 1790 residence act, his credibility and experience were respected by residents and lawmakers alike.

  Munroe reported on October 29, 1814, that the remains of the buildings had been surveyed carefully by “architects and master builders, all of whom report it as their opinions that the walls of the President’s House, and both wings of the Capitol, with some inconsiderable repairs, will be safe and sufficient to rebuild on.”

  The big question was cost, as Van Ness knew intimately. Munroe estimated $460,000 for rebuilding the government buildings. Local bankers like Van Ness offered to loan the government $500,000 “exclusively to the purpose of rebuilding or repairing the President’s House, Capitol, and public offices.”

  In the House of Representatives, Joseph Lewis of Virginia reported a bill authorizing the president “to cause to be forthwith rebuilt or repaired the public buildings on their present sites; and for this purpose exclusively to borrow such sum as necessary for the purpose from the banks or individuals within the district.”

  Van Ness was now as personally invested as possible. Madison appointed him along with a few others to be part of the commission to oversee repairing the buildings. Within a few months, the president would provide strict guidance for the commissioners to return the buildings to their original appearance. “In carrying into execution the law for rebuilding the public offices, it will best comport with its object and provisions, not to deviate from the models destroyed,” he wrote.

  General Van Ness understood Madison’s meaning. Not only were the U.S. Capitol and White House to be rebuilt, but they were also to look the same as they had before. That gave him a big reason to smile.

  The time was now right for Van Ness to put his opinions into writing on the failures leading to the Battle of Bladensburg and the destruction of Washington City. He was one of many that members of Congress had called upon. Each witness was to submit a statement on paper. Van Ness dated his letter November 23, 1814. His testimony was one of the most damaging, especially toward General Armstrong.

  Van Ness’s revelation that Armstrong continued to deny Washington as the British target was highly persuasive. His assessment of the military failures at Bladensburg was also important. Why did America fail to repel the British there? Raw troops. Unsupplied troops. Fatigued troops. No battle plan. Failing to harass the British as they arrived in Benedict and as they departed. Focusing too much on Baltimore. In the end, Van Ness once again placed the blame squarely on Armstrong.

  “Although I cannot think the means we had on the spot were used to the best advantage, still I think General Winder was by no means furnished with sufficient or timely means; which I always considered it the special duty of the war department to have attended to.”

  Relieved that Congress had decided to keep Washington as the nation’s capital and thrilled to serve on the commission for rebuilding its monuments, Van Ness believed it was his duty to tell the truth. In his statement’s conclusion, he wrote, “Considering your call as imperative, and having always been of opinion that it was due to the American people that the facts and circumstances connected with the fall of the capital should be fully developed, I transmit it to you.”

  In this way Van Ness, like the many others who testified, showed that the militia system wasn’t working. In order to have a secure country in the future, America would need to improve and expand its military. The country would need to shift from depending on militia to relying on regular troops for its independence. In the years to come, it did just that.

  On December 3, 1814, Congress received a report of “all the many contradictory statements” leading to the fall of Washington. The committee leader “declared that the committee, with great labor, had collected all the facts in relation to the military movement, but expressed no opinion on it, leaving it to all to judge for themselves, what ought to have been done.”

  Many members were unhappy. Who could blame them? Though Congressman Ingersoll later used the report as a starting point for writing his Historical Sketch of the Second War between the United States of America, and Great Britain, he chafed at the failure of heads to roll, except for Armstrong’s. “So far from clearing up the causes of our failure, it covered up a most disgraceful transaction, in a mass of prolixity and detail. Although the enemy landed within fifty miles of Washington, and 1200 of their army overcame all the force collected there, after two months’ notice no opinion was expressed of these circumstances.”

  Ingersoll also held distinct op
inions about Ross and Cockburn. He saw them as very different personalities. “General Ross was less rapacious, more clement, and stricter in punishing military excesses, than, secondly, Admiral Cockburn, who was the evil genius, delighting in pillage and destruction.”

  He reflected on how different the outcome would have been if Ross had been killed in Washington and not Baltimore. “If the murderous shot fired at Ross, as he rode into Washington, and killed his mare, had killed the rider, it seems to be universally believed, that, instead of the public buildings burned, Cockburn would not have left a house standing, public or private.”

  Ingersoll calculated the cost and determined that “the public property destroyed at Washington exceeded two millions of dollars worth.”

  While a high amount, thanks to Ross, the British didn’t burn everyone’s house in Washington City. If they had, Ingersoll believed that Congress would have relocated the nation’s capital to another city.

  Ingersoll blamed Washington’s destruction on the lack of a stern, unyielding chief. “Seldom, says Voltaire, is anything great done in the world, except by the genius and firmness of some one man, contending with the prejudices of the multitude and overcoming them.”

  What Ingersoll failed to see is that while a lack of leadership and eagle eyes led to the city’s fall, the rise of Washington as the nation’s permanent capital was through the firmness and genius of many phoenixes: Madison, Gales, Van Ness, Rodgers, Key, and Dolley.

  “The fate of New Orleans will be known today—on which so much depends,” Dolley wrote to Hannah Gallatin.

  It seemed that everyone in Washington was waiting to know the outcome of a battle in New Orleans and peace negotiations in Europe. Longing for news of a treaty, she added, “We hear nothing from Mr. Gallatin, but expect every day, some arrival. Our anxieties cannot be expressed.”