This year we Americans commemorate the beginning of the War of 1812, an unpleasant final chapter in our separation from the Crown that began off Virginia, provoked in part by Thomas Jefferson's Louisiana Purchase (1803), and acquisition of the Port of New Orleans. The United States of America was birthing as a sea power, and by that fact, becoming an international power. The British Crown had forbid the Americans to trade with France, our ally and Britain's perennial adversary.
Every war has an ignition point, or two, and they were in the Chesapeake Bay in the first decade of the 19th century. Sailors who had left the Royal Navy blockade of French trade were recruited to the Chesapeake at the Washington Navy Yard, and when the Chesapeake appeared off Cape Charles, Virginia, the Royals detained,boarded the ship, and took off with 3 Americans and a Brit.
It was a humiliation of American independence and a test of American power. The American public would have none of it. U.S Naval Commanders were ridiculed and a new resolve for independence was ignited. President James Madison urged the legislature to war, and war he got when he signed the declaration on June 18, 1812
The war raged up the U.S.coast, into the Great Lakes, and down to New Orleans where Andrew Jackson cinched his fame. In the Chesapeake, as the British pillaged and burned their way from Norfolk to Havre de Grace, and places like Bloody Point earned their names. President Madison evacuated the Presidential Mansion as the British came ashore at Bladensburg, Maryland, took Washington D.C, and burned the place down in August of 1814. On the British Army went to Baltimore where the tide was turned at Fort McHenry. By Christmas 1814 the Treaty of Ghent was done and the war had ended. There is much more to this history, and my apologies for the sacrifices not mentioned.
Please join us as we sail from Norfolk to Baltimore on June 12, 2012 in the company of tall ships, including the 1812 Privateer replicas Pride of Baltimore and Lynx and celebrate in the shadow of Fort McHenry.
Visit the Bicentennial of the War of 1812 for all the events!
Every war has an ignition point, or two, and they were in the Chesapeake Bay in the first decade of the 19th century. Sailors who had left the Royal Navy blockade of French trade were recruited to the Chesapeake at the Washington Navy Yard, and when the Chesapeake appeared off Cape Charles, Virginia, the Royals detained,boarded the ship, and took off with 3 Americans and a Brit.
It was a humiliation of American independence and a test of American power. The American public would have none of it. U.S Naval Commanders were ridiculed and a new resolve for independence was ignited. President James Madison urged the legislature to war, and war he got when he signed the declaration on June 18, 1812
The war raged up the U.S.coast, into the Great Lakes, and down to New Orleans where Andrew Jackson cinched his fame. In the Chesapeake, as the British pillaged and burned their way from Norfolk to Havre de Grace, and places like Bloody Point earned their names. President Madison evacuated the Presidential Mansion as the British came ashore at Bladensburg, Maryland, took Washington D.C, and burned the place down in August of 1814. On the British Army went to Baltimore where the tide was turned at Fort McHenry. By Christmas 1814 the Treaty of Ghent was done and the war had ended. There is much more to this history, and my apologies for the sacrifices not mentioned.
Please join us as we sail from Norfolk to Baltimore on June 12, 2012 in the company of tall ships, including the 1812 Privateer replicas Pride of Baltimore and Lynx and celebrate in the shadow of Fort McHenry.
Visit the Bicentennial of the War of 1812 for all the events!
