Plattsburgh, 1814 - Dr. Richard Barbuto

all right so we're gonna go ahead and begin so if you please take your seats grab some brownies last minute hi my name is Joey I'm a member of the dull si B Student Advisory Board and I'd like to welcome you to the dole Institute of Politics and thank you for attending today's program the dole Student Advisory Board is composed of K U students committed to the work of the dolt Institute we attend regular meetings assistant events just like this and plan an essay be sponsored program that was just getting compliments that happened last night members of the SI b receive great opportunities to network with our special guests and if you are a student and would like to join please contact the dole Institute the Dole Institute would like to hear from you if you enjoy today's program please let us know by contacting us on facebook twitter or through our website email your attendance and feedback help shape future programming to view past events visit our online video archive at WWDC to org a video of tonight of today's presentation will be available on our website soon before we begin I'd like to remind you to please turn off your cellphone's app before the presentation and after it we will have some time for audience question and answers if you have a question please raise your hand and I will come by with the microphone to help you please make it just one brief one if at any time during the program you have difficulty hearing please alert one of our staff members or a student volunteer here in the hall and they can assist you and finally I would like to let you all know about a very special program coming up next week on Thursday April 10th at 3:00 p.m. the Dole Institute will present America's Heroes Medal of Honor recipients from the Civil War to Afghanistan author and director of the military history department at the Army Command and General Staff College dr. James Wilbanks will discuss Medal of Honor recipients who stood courageous in the face of grave danger and wrists or sacrificed their lives for the lives of others the accounts tell a story of valor and the diversity of ethnicity and culture which broadens our appreciation for these Americans several of the Medal of Honor recipients appear to the Dolan stitute dedication so it's fitting that the originator the originator of our popular Fort Leavenworth series should review some of these courageous stories and with that please welcome dr. mark Girgis who will be introducing our guest speaker thank you I'm also from the US Army's Command General Staff College and welcome to the the third of the Fort Leavenworth lecture series this one on the unknown decisive battles yeah it's my honor today to introduce dr. Richard Barbiero who's a professor of history and serves that the debt as the deputy director of the command general staff Scott College Department of military history he's a 1971 graduate of the US Military Academy West Point he served in the Army for 23 years as an armor officer where he served in Germany Korea and in Canada he was also an exchange instructor at Canadian Forces Command and General Staff College in Toronto he received his Masters of Arts in a degree in history from Eastern Kentucky University and his PhD from University of Kansas he specializes in the US Army in the early republic in the war of 1812 and to just say that and then talk about what he has written is kind of an understatement because what you're going to get this afternoon is really a recognized specialist and author in the field when the US Army was looking to do commemorative pamphlets for the bicentennial of the war of 1812 rich was asked to do two of the commemorative pamphlets by the center of military history he's authored Niagra a 1914 fourteen American vaids Canada as well as numerous other monographs and articles he's a writing a book length study on the New York State in the war of 1812 so I hope everybody had a chance to have a brownie they're just wonderful I come for the brownies there was a time 200 years ago you know we remembered 9/11 we were attacked by our enemies on our own soil 200 years ago not only were we attacked multiple time by our enemy but they were intent on grabbing our territory taking it back taking it back from us after the American Revolution that's we're gonna talk about today the war of 1812 starts with the war of a French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars particularly between a revolutionary Napoleonic France and Great Britain France is fighting other enemies Great Britain is one we're going to talk about today they can't come against one another Britain is sovereign on the seas France is sovereign on the lands they can't come to grips so they launched economic warfare Napoleon launches a Continental System British goods are not welcome on any port in Europe that's under my control which was just about all of them Britain comes back with fine nothing is going to get into your ports so Britain blockades the ports of Europe but worse than that they send ships on warships onto the high seas stopping any cargo on the high seas heading to Europe to see what it is in the ten years leading up to the war of 1812 over a thousand American vessels cargo vessels are stopped cargoes and ships seized which is bad enough but worse than that is that the Royal Navy captain would grab the crew and have them all line up and speak to them and if they spoke in a British accent clearly they were born in Great Britain and therefore they owed their military service to Great Britain and they were impressed impressed is the same as the draught how many of you saw a master in commander a bunch of you and wasn't that great life on a British warship everyone's just singing songs and doing good work and weather is usually good and everyone's having a great time how many of you saw Ben Hur yeah life on a Royal Navy vessel was much closer to being a Roman galley slave scholars today say that up to 16,000 sailors serving on American ships most of them born in Britain but naturalized Americans some of them born in Britain JumpShip not naturalized in carrying false papers so still British citizens technically and a bunch who were born a bunch were born in the United States seized off the ships thrown on Royal Navy vessels and had to serve for the duration of the war so it's pretty nasty business while all that's going on American settlers are moving West Native Americans are pushing back and when they have conflict the Americans are finding that the natives are being armed with British weaponry and therefore the conclusion that is drawn is that the British are inciting Native Americans to oppose westward expansion to make war on the settlers as they're moving west Thomas Jefferson can't solve that problem he turns it over to President James Madison Madison brings all this evidence that I've shared with you to Congress and in a matter of days Congress declares war and here are the war goals this is our first foreign war it is the first war conducted under the United States Constitution Madison wants to force Britain to respect our neutral shipping rights enter whatever port we want carry whatever cargo we want to stop impressing our sailors and to stop inciting the Indians now we can't come to grips with the Royal Navy on the seas we just can't do it we've got six frigates they've got 600 okay what we can do is seize Canada so the plan is we will seize Canada and offer back to Britain if you give us those three things you'll get Canada back if you don't we're keeping Canada for two years we launched a total of 11 raids major raids and invasions of Canada one of them is partially successful they're beatin us back at every at every turn it is humiliating two years later Napoleon's defeated Britain's greatest soldier the Duke of Wellington is called to Britain and an asked for his opinion on how to conduct war against America Napoleon's gone Britain's Got forty or fifty thousand trained experienced troops hundreds of war vessels sitting around doing nothing the what Britain wants to do is go back into America and punish punish America for having the effrontery of starting the war and and securing Canada by taking as much of American territory as they can and Wellington gives his best advice if you want to do that you have to control the Great Lakes in the rivers you have to control the water the roads are lousy if you want to move men and equipment and food you have to put it on ships and therefore you have to control the Great Lakes and if you can't do that get out of the war if you can do that then you can do what you want to do so the government in Britain in the spring of 1814 sends instructions to Sir George Provost Provost as in Quebec City he's the governor-general of British North America which is the four provinces of Upper Canada Lower Canada New Brunswick and Nova Scotia and his orders are this year we want you to advance the border southward we want you to destroy American naval power on Lake Erie Lake Ontario and Lake Champlain Provost has been running a very good defensive war for two years he's given about 20,000 British troops they're on their way over to Canada to a system and he's not sure exactly what to do and how to go about doing it so he does a mission analysis of it all and he consults the Royal Navy commander on Lake Ontario Sir James Joe and he says what we want to do is destroy Sacketts Harbor Harbor Saget's Harbor is a major American shipbuilding yard Naval Yard on Lake Ontario the American squadron is about the same as the Royal Navy squadron in Kingston yo has been trying to do this for two years but he was building a large vessel ship of a ship of the line the largest thing on Lake Ontario he says I'm not gonna get on to the lake until this ship is built it's the st. Lawrence and when will that be well it'll be October previs says that's too late I have to go else or yo says once you try it on Lake Champlain and destroy American naval power there in 1814 in 1815 will Clear Lake Ontario so Provost decides to do that use a close-up now of Lake Champlain Lake Champlain is the invasion route between Montreal in New York City its water most of the weight on Lake Champlain we are de Naval Yard at Plattsburgh we have other naval facilities too but that's the main one the Royal Navy squadron is at Illidan womp on the Richelieu River and that's the goal is to take out Plattsburgh destroy American naval power maybe occupy Plattsburgh for the winter and see what happens after that into the the following year America's got about 5,000 soldiers of Plattsburgh there are 10,000 British soldiers of Montreal and the Secretary of the army in Washington DC orders 4,000 of those American troops to march from Plattsburgh all the way to the Niagara River to break the siege of Fort Erie there's a whole division of American troops surrounded by the British at Fort Erie and he does not want them to disappear to be captured General George is 'red major journal is 'red sends word back to Washington DC the minute I marched 4,000 troops away 10,000 British troops arguing marching into Plattsburgh I've got about 1,500 soldiers left and most of them are convalescence in a hospital the militia is inexperienced they might rally to me but they're not fighters they're inexperienced I really don't want to do this and I don't think you want me to do this Secretary of the war responds you have your orders start marching yes sir it takes 4,000 his best troops marches to Albany eventually gets the Niagara River in October he puts Alexander Macomb Brigadier General in charge of what's left at Plattsburgh as soon as he leaves 10,000 British soldiers crossed the border enter New York State heading for Platts for the next four days there's a delaying action every step of the way where the American regulars and some New York militia are opposing the British they're firing from behind trees and stone walls are firing a shot to volley and then moving back a half mile than doing it again and and then doing it all the way back to Plattsburgh the British Army doesn't even break formation they continue marching along the roads as if nothing is happening and they pull into Plattsburgh most of the people in Plattsburgh has gotten out of town because they know what'll happen if they're occupied by the British remember that the memory of the American Revolution is very fresh in the minds of these people no gentlemen Johnny Burgoyne in 77 came through this same area they know what warfare is like and they don't want to be around it when it happens so September 6 9,000 British soldiers show up in the outskirts of Plattsburgh ok here's a picture of the New York militia both images are correct on the right you have the farmer who's training with the broom and the officers are socially upscale they're their upper middle class or or upper class and they can afford the uniforms the militia soldiers can't after two years of war the New York militia is still untrained and inexperienced because according to the Constitution they don't have to cross a national boundary you can't order them into Canada so they're avoiding the fighting the second view of the New York militia is the guys on the left these are the folks who are have aspirations for what social upward mobility these are the shopkeepers and the lawyers and the plantation owners and the people have a little bit of money they form companies of volunteers they buy their own uniforms they buy their own horses their own equipment their own weapons they train on their own schedule it's a social organization these people are looking for upward mobility today these people would all be wrote Aryans but in those days they join the military unit they're well trained but in experience these guys have not fought notice the color of their jackets the American militia on the right when they finally do deploy into into the fight looking around them and they see these cavalry men in red jackets they'd swear that these are British troops and therefore they send reports we are being surrounded by the British the militia that's already kind of skittish says oh we don't want that to happen and they withdraw out of combat so the New York dragoons who are the only cavalry men wearing red because the British cavalry wears blue jackets aren't mistaken on the battlefield and cause a lot of bad things to happen I'm going to show you something you're the first audience ever to see this I was going through the archives in in Washington and I was going through the Plattsburgh archives and I came across an actual photograph that was taken between 3 & 6 September in 1814 it was taken by a British combat photographer and I'm gonna show it to you now you're the first audience ever to see this okay all right the original photograph was in black and white I had this one colorized but this is what Plattsburgh Bay and Plattsburgh look like it's autumn Bay its sheltered that's why it's a Naval facility most of Plattsburgh is north of the Saranac River there are a few part of the villages south of it the three squares there are three readouts they are mounds of dirt they are hollowed out what he said a square of dirt surrounded by obstacles with artillery inside and this is how the Americans are going to defend the regulars a McComas put it as regulars into those three forts there the squadron is going to be in Plattsburgh Bay and that's where the naval battle is going to be fought so this is in crab island what Macomb did is he took all of his convalescence and he moved as hospital out of the fort area onto crab island to keep the people safe from the battle now he also gives them to our Torrey pieces and they actually get to fight during the naval battle themselves okay here's what Plattsburgh looks like in 1814 it's the capital of the county seat of Clinton County in those days 85% of the people do not live in settlements larger than 500 people 85% are our independent farmers they're out there in this text but the center of their services if you will in government are or are in places like the county seats so you see what they have there all these retail and services and whatnot in Plattsburgh had maybe 1500 people living there maybe 1500 living pretty close to Plattsburgh and the rest in Clinton County County notice that they have two newspapers it's amazing how many small towns in America two hundred years ago had two newspapers one for each of the two political parties it's like having MSNBC and Fox News in your town and that in there and the rivalries and the political partisanship were every bit as fierce as they are today maybe more fierce well in those days they kill their enemies or and I don't think we're doing that today but other than that these are real fierce and the Federalists have opposed the war a whole lot of people in northern New York are Federalists their trade is not south to New York City in Plattsburgh their trade is north to Montreal and when you stop that trade smuggling is rampant so the people in northern New York and northern Vermont are our moving drew they're driving cattle up to the border they're going to the local tavern having a drink when they come back out to where they dropped off the cattle there's a bag of silver and that's how they smuggled cattle the British soldiers the 10,000 I'm talking about they were being fed on American beef okay Thomas Macdonough he's the naval commander he's a man he's eventually a master comment on Delaware was a midshipman he was on the party that burned the Philadelphia in Tripoli remember the Philadelphia got got grounded and we were trying to get it back so he decided just to burn it to the waterline and he was on that party too he's given command at Lake Champlain he's got almost nothing to work with with a little bit of money he has he starts building vessels and he's buying civilian vessels and he's creating a squadron and in 1813 s he's a master commandant master and commander in the Royal Navy's the same as master commandant in the US Navy so it's like commander today so roughly a lieutenant colonel and they come in vessels remember what Nelson said at Trafalgar England expects every man to perform or to do his duty and then inspired the British sailors McDonough's got a riff on that he doesn't say America expects every seaman to do his duty he says impressed seamen he says all your peers the 15,000 of them that are serving on Royal Navy vessels guys this is your chance to strike a blow to get those got to win this war and to get those guys back so it resonated with his crews the other hero of Plattsburgh is Alexander McComb this guy is really smart really competent he comes from New York family but he was born in Detroit the statues to Macomb are in Detroit joins the army at a very young age his rise in the US Army in peacetime is meteoric typically if you can finally make captain after 12 years as a lieutenant you're probably gonna end your career as a captain maybe a major if somebody likes you this guy just skyrockets because people recognize how smart how competent he is he's an engineer he's in the first class at West Point but because he was already commissioned and the other 12 cadets or not he's not considered West Point's first he's not considered a graduate of West Point but he was in the class with the cadets so he's largely an engineer in those days of you're an engineer he can't command troops he's called a Washington before the war he's made the adjutant general he's the guy signing all the orders and getting people commissioned and sending orders out to people to to mobilize the army and he really wants a field command so he gets promoted to full colonel in the artillery so this is the first time he's commanded a real military unit as opposed to being a technical expert in the in the Corps of Engineers he commands his regiment the third artillery very well they fight his infantry some of the main guns but by and large he's commanding a regiment of infantrymen his expertise again is rep is recognized he's promoted a brigadier general very early in the war and that's why he's out of Plattsburgh he's one of the three brigadier General's out there is there takes two of them with him to the west and he leaves the Macomb in charge of everything that's left at Plattsburgh okay Major General Benjamin Moore's commands the New York militia in upstate New York as you can see here message a lot of people in New England moved to that part of New York they just shifted west for all the business opportunities that were he's a lieutenant of revolution that's his only military experience he does have some combat experience as the war is ending he moves into Plattsburgh he's one of the first settlers becomes very well established prosperous not not rich not not really wealthy but prosperous the people kind of sort of liked him and he was one of the guys that elects James Madison and I know what you're gonna ask next after the war did this guy start the painting business he did not this is not the Benjamin Morris start of the painting but so just if he had that question no there are only three major generals in the New York militia and he's one of them so he's well thought of in the in the political system in New York he's smart and he's competent but other than being a lieutenant revolution he's never fired a shot in anger so his job really is to get the militia onto the battlefield he's not a battlefield commander but he does the command the respect of the militia and they respond to that so that's good the picture on the right is kind of what a New York militiamen would look like with his staff officers so you know they have the gaudy hats and everything like that and and they really dressed the part and and he's one of those guys ok this is the plant house in Plattsburgh one the original may be the original Brook building there this photograph was taken around the Civil War if you have any of you ever been in Plattsburgh ok have you have you seen that yeah that house is still there kind of sort of looks just like this okay the British show up in Plattsburgh most of the people are gone one of the brigade commanders Brigadier General Robinson and his staff officer are looking for a place for the staff to live in the city they don't live in tents they commandeer a house and they move into the house that's just how you did things in those days so Robinson and staff officers ahead of them and he's galloping up and he sees this old man sitting on the porch in Plattsburgh now all the other citizens are gone but he's still there and the staff officer rides up to him and says old man who are you in general Robinson says well lieutenant you have been well answered nonetheless they move into the house and captain Platt stays there he's the brother of the founder of Plattsburgh and they have banter every day the British and him are just kind of joking back and forth well he's not joking how long they're going to stay there and of course the British are sure they're gonna be victorious and and Platt says we're gonna drive you out of this place so it was kind of fun banter back and forth and it was a good relationship the British soldiers who serve in this campaign especially the ones that came over from Europe from that Bering peninsula are in a nation now where the people speak a language similar to them it's mutually understandable and they kind of live at this with the same level of what technology that these people would have saw in Britain now yes it's backward but it's not real backward it's all recognisable these people are our kindred spirits and of course they know the American Revolution and all that so the British soldiers behaved extremely well in northern New York and the Americans are very appreciative of that and we're gonna see where that ends us after the war is over okay here's another view of Plattsburgh so we have the peninsula that's occupied see the three forts there four Brown Fort Monroe and Fort Scott are my regulars and the rest of the peninsula is armed there are batteries in various places the British roll into town and they immediately set up these batteries you can see them marked on the north side of the Saranac it takes them days just days to throw up an earthen wall and to find lumber and to put the lumber down - as a gun platform and as soon as they get the guns mounted they open up fire on particularly fort Brown but the rest of Plattsburgh as well and the American artillerists who actually have more and better artillery than the British - have been firing back the reports out of there was four days of non-stop firing 24/7 between the two sides well this is going on what the British did is they would if they were building a gun battery they'd bring out a hundred 150 people - was to throw up the wall and they bring 100 or 150 people to guard them while they did it all the work is done at night because otherwise they'd be perfect targets for the American artillery captain McGlashan up there in the upper left-hand side one night he just gets kind of tired about all this he grabs 50 for his company 50 soldiers they thought they know of a place on the Saranac River to wade across the British don't know about in the darkness they wade across the river lower bayonets and overwhelmed that battery there now it didn't have any guns that had yet but they were working on it he drives off all the workers and all the people guarding the battery and boy was the British artillery commander peeved the next morning when he realizes that a platoon of troops just forced his people off the site now when the glassing gets there there's nothing to destroy really so he takes his people back in into a plattsburgh into the peninsula there but the morale of the Americans after hearing this because they'd heard all the noise wandering in the dark wondering what's going on and to get the battle report to the next day their morale just went sky-high I right at the bottom what happens if the British win the land battle now there's a couple thousand Americans on that little Peninsula where do they get to go they're trapped every one of them knows it it's the Alamo these people realize that if the British come in there's only one way the Americans are leaving and that's as POWs or they're dead and every one of them understands that there aren't enough boats to get them out of there and they and they wouldn't be able to do it so the Americans are very determined that they're going to defend this piece of land and Macomb and his officers inspire all of that there's an American battery see the bridge there from Plattsburgh into the sawmill that's a wooden bridge the Americans took off the top of it the the roadway off of it but the superest the wooden super sure is still there and the Americans have teenage snipers American Rifleman up in the sawmill firing across the river at the British the British don't have rifles they're using muskets they are up in the second floor of the houses along the saranac firing at the Americans day after day after day McComb gives the order for his artillery to heat up the shot red hot hot shot fire it into the houses across the river to burn them down so that the British snipers would have no easy perch up high to fire at the Americans the British soldiers the next day see these fire starting in the houses they try to put out the fire so a British party goes up to the bridge waving the white flag had a little parley and he says what we would like is a ceasefire long enough for us to douse out the fires in the houses and the Americans say we're doing this intentionally and the British say oh I'm sorry true story it was at that point there where the British commander realized these Americans are so desperate they will destroy their own homes that the people are gonna have to come back and live in rather than lose this battle here's a early view of the battle this is the bridge we're talking about the wooden bridge so we have the Americans on the right the British on the Left they artillery firing back and forth and the naval battle going on in in plattsburgh Bay so that's an early view of what this looked like in America this victory was just a godsend to America and we'll talk about that a little later why that's the case and so it became what iconic in America the battle of Plattsburgh across the river oh gosh less than a hundred yards yeah that's a good question the battle of Plattsburgh is buying a large a naval panel and I showed there will be a test so I hope you know copy these numbers I want to there's two kinds of guns on naval vessels in this day there's the long guns this is the gun line on the Constitution those are 24-pounders a lot of the American vessels were armed with with heavy long barrel guns like this with long range a lot of the guns are carrying aids and that's what you see in the upper right hand big muzzle short barrel it'll fire a forty eight pound iron ball and if it hits you it's gonna punch right through the side of the ship but the range is only about maybe five hundred five hundred yards so these things are short-range guns but when they hit they make a difference and and the size of them is much larger they're much more momentum hitting a ship than a twenty four pounder I used to know the physics behind it I forgot that a long time ago anyway but but the point of this here is that the Royal Navy throw weight throw weight is if you added the weight of all the shot for every gun and it fired one in volley what would be the weight of that shot and you can see there that the Royal Navy guns would fire twelve hundred twenty four pounds of iron at you there Karen aides would fire 922 so they have an advantage at long range they want to stay away from the Americans the Americans are just the opposite the long range guns are only seven seventy nine so they have much less throw weight than the Royal Navy vessels but they're Karen aides are much more numerous and throw a larger throw weight in the Navy people understand that what George Downey the squadron commander needs to do is to stand off 501 yards from the American vessels so the american karen aides can't reach him he's got the standoff and he could destroy the American squadron with his long-range guns all of his officers understand these sailors understand that so that's an McDonough understands that too they have almost perfect intelligence on each other squadrons they've got spies everywhere so they understand what each fleet looks like gunboats we talked about gunboats this is what a gunboat looks like in those days so it's 50 or 60 people pulling oars one or two guns on it it also has a sail the advantage of gunboats even though they only have two guns on them because they're Road if the wind is zero these are the only people move it on the water the big vessels are there and they're not moving and they can't even hardly turn if there's no wind to give them propulsion these guys can go wherever they want in the bay and fire wherever they want and these gunboats the Americans and the British both have them that some of the long guns some have Karen aides some have both so there's a lot of these vessels involved here okay 11th of September now George Downey takes command on the 1st of September he's got all he has officers and sailors he does not know who they are they're at Illinois his largest boat a frigate the the coffee Anse is the largest vessel in in his squadron but also larger than anything in the American squadron the conference launches on 3 September it is not ready to sail they spend the next week bringing on guns and ammunition the Carpenters are on the ship 24/7 fitting it out so the people can fight the vessel George Prevost who's accompanying the Army in Plattsburgh and his headquarters is in Plattsburgh is peppering George Downey at Illinois to come on down we need both in a land and a sea battle going on at the same time if this is going to work will not be pressured by Provost he comes back I'll go as soon as my final vessel is ready I'm not gonna attack before that time he sails his squadron down the Richelieu River into Lake Champlain with carpenters still on the Conn fianc fixing it and getting it ready to fight - man the Conn fianc he had to grab sailors and officers from all of his ships and pull them on the confidence - man it both squadrons are vastly undermanned the Royal Navy actually let the sailors out of prison if they volunteered to join that crew so the quality of the of the sailors isn't good the Royal Navy officers did not know who their sailors were the sailors did not have any particular confidence and their officers but they were all Royal Navy and that was probably going to be good enough finally there's a wind out of the north downey brings the squadron down lake champlain he gets a right around Cumberland head he HAP's in a little boat sails there pulls out the telescope and counts what he's got and he sees the American fleet anchored in a line across the bay so he goes back to his vessel calls his captains together and they they they they come up with a stratagem and what Downey tells the people to do is pull in opposite the American ships he tells your boat will go against that boat and they all understand where they're gonna line up pull off to the side drop anchor we're gonna exchange fire under five hundred yards and to this day nobody knows why he chose to do a short range battle when he was at the disadvantage nobody knows okay as soon as they get the their boats around Cumberland head the wind dies and there is a current in the bay the water does move and they describe the wind as light and variable so the royal naval vessels are trying to tack into position and as soon as they get a bad eleven hundred yards away the Americans are opening fire on them what McDonough has done when he anchored all of his vessels he did he did he did two things they're called Springs he takes the anchor off the back of the boat and runs it up to the front the boat and drops it so the cable runs from the front of the boat to the back of the boat and he does the same on the other side from the back of the boat to the front boat again these cables are on capstans so that the sailors walking in a circle can draw the cable together and the boat will rotate up to 180 degrees so he has all of his vessels do that what this means is McDonough says I'm not gonna sail so all you sailors that are up there on the yardarms and stuff like that come on down you're now part of the gun crews and all the guns on the port side of the vessel aren't aren't gonna fight so all those gun crews can come to the starboard the right-hand side of the vessel to man all the guns there he's not going to move his vessels and all of the sailors will be serving the guns and so he could really reduce the manpower that he needs and I think we don't know but I think down he kind of picked up on what was going on Downey comes in it takes a while for his vessels to come on line like they do and they open up an exchange and very and interestingly enough on the second American volley from the frigate Saratoga into the con fianc the iron ball hits the muzzle of the Royal Navy cannon that cannon still exists got a big dent in it the cannon is forced back runs over Downey and kills him the lieutenant in charge of the vessel the second-in-command wants to signal captain David Pring who's on another vessel he's on the the the Chuck the Linnet to tell him you're now in charge of the squadron nobody can find the signal book to tell him what signals to run up to say I'm now in charge you are so it is until the end of the at all the Pring understands that he was in charge all the time he just didn't know it and the lieutenant was good for kind of this battle but he certainly wasn't good for commanding a squadron now while they're firing back and forth we and it's a whole rendus fire at close range the chub is damaged it can no longer steer itself it starts drifting the Finch at the bottom the same thing the current kind of picks it up it can't it doesn't have enough wind to do anything it's going to drift away and same with the Preble the Preble intense fire from british gunboat so what he does is he just cuts his anchor to get away to get out of it it's just the fires too intense for him and that goes on for about an hour all the while the land assault that's supposed to be taking place doesn't the British troops are all ready to go to cross the Saranac River into attack and they don't get the order to attack until pretty late in the game so the Royal Navy squadron down he's dead is expecting this land attack to help support them and it doesn't occur okay one of the shots from the confi ansan to the Saratoga hits a chicken coop opens it up a rooster flies up into the rigging of the American vessel and he's ticked and he starts crowing crowing non-stop during the battle and it's it's it's tremendously loud with all the can of fire but the crew underneath is just tickled that this guy up theirs is crowing and it kind of boosts the morale of the American sailors while they're doing this if you know anything about naval vessels firing it's not the cannon ball I get you it's when it hits the wall and it causes all the splintering on the backside of the wall and there's these wooden splinters just going out and causing horriffic castle teas on both sides if you're dead they clear the deck they pick up the body and they throw it over the side because they have to clear the deck if you're wounded if you can crawl your crow calling down to the bottom of ship and hopefully someone is there to cut off your arm or leg or whatever they need to cut off so that's what's going on blood is getting on the deck they are throwing sand on the deck so that people don't slip on the blood I mean it's it's almost beyond the imagination what this fighting is like this is a modern-day shot of the conference being surrounded by both a Saratoga and the Eagle and eventually the conference is just all but shattered the Saratoga now has all of its guns on its starboard side have been knocked out this is what the gun deck might have looked like it doesn't matter if this is American or British the American Navy is modeled on the Royal Navy they dress the same they look the same they give the same orders and that's why these sailors can serve in either Navy because they're doing the exact same thing so that but this is what the gun deck might have look like on the frigates or the Briggs rizzo there's two frigates the rest are Briggs okay an hour into the fight now things kind of get ugly McDonough has lost all of his batteries on the starboard side he orders the people to the the captains and they rotate the vessel he's got all fresh guns the lieutenant on the coffee ants tries to do the same thing he gets his officers and his men to bring an anchor up front to drop it he has men running around in circles trying to pull the on the cable to rotate the vessel and him when he gets 90 degrees around so he's looking straight at the Saratoga all the guns of the Saratoga and he's got no guns Saratoga fires one of the shots goes right down the center of the ship pills or wounds the people running the windlass and they say we ain't doing this anymore and they scatter so now the con fianc is stuck facing into the Saratoga and can't return fire so the lieutenant strikes his colors the British gunboats see that and they flee on crab island where the Finch has there all the American convalescence there go up there and capture the ship so they're all they feel pretty good about that colors are being struck the two fleets are so battered that it's over two hours later before McDonough can send a party over to the confi Anse which isn't very far away to accept the surrender of the cruise people are just taking care of the wounded they know that the battle is over and word gets back into Plattsburgh people the civilians came back to the city got up on the high ground to watch this naval battle and all the sailors who could got to the shore to watch it as well and the British Army finally gets the word we've lost the naval battle and oh by the way we're supposed to be attacking okay this is about what we have in in Plattsburgh at the time a bunch of British regulars a lesser number of American regulars the militia there shows up 2,900 people most of these are New Yorkers a lot of them are from Vermont now Vermont's been smuggling for two years the governor of Vermont is a federalist he's not supporting the war the Constitution says nothing about ordering your militia to invade another country he his militia hasn't been called up by the federal government this happens too fast so the governor of Vermont sends the word out to his militia commanders on Lake Champlain I can't order you out but if you want to form volunteer companies to cross the lake that's okay with me and I'm not gonna pay him because they're not being officially mobilized okay hundreds over at well over a thousand of Vermont militia show up at Lake Champlain and every vessel on the New York side that can crosses the lake picks up a bunch of Vermont militia and shuttles them across to New York they show up on the battlefield these people are inexperienced but they're there to fight a fight like when they defeated gentlemen Johnny and we're going in 77 they're gonna repeat that because the British have crossed the line it's okay if they buy our beef but they got to do it in Canada they can't do it in New York okay here's the British plan British have three brigades two brigades are gonna make that main attack in the south the other brigades gonna split up its troops some of them are going to show up that bridge in the north some of them are gonna go to what looks like a forward in the middle of the Saranac they're gonna demonstrate they're gonna draw the Americans in that direction the two brigades in the South actually get to the Saranac River there's a Ford their pikes ford they climb up the slope on the other side and the New York and Vermont militia are there for them and they open up a firefight and the American militia fires falls back fires falls back their orders are to do that not to defend the river line but to stay between the British and the three forts and then all of a sudden and orderly from general prayer vocês office gallops up to general robinson who's leading this attack hands him orders to break off the attack and a return to camp and these troops that have fought under Wellington very successfully and are very used to victory and they can see those three forts in front of them and they've got ladders and they're ready to go and their taste in blood are being called back and they are angry about it all and of course they blame Lieutenant General Provost nonetheless they obey orders they retrace their steps they go back to the British camp Provo says I can't stay now that my naval squadron is destroyed there aren't enough wagons in New York to resupply you from Montreal I can't keep you here we have enough food to get back to Montreal and that's it we can't stay here so that night he orders a retreat the British Army very surreptitiously withdraws from their positions and they start the long march back to Montreal and they are demoralized because they were utterly convinced if they had conducted that attack they would have won this is the cache this isn't the naval battle casualties these are the casualties on land over the entire campaign so casualties aren't particularly high considering the number of troops that fought but noticed the desertion there from the British Army on the way back that many British soldiers said I've had enough of the fighting while I'm in New York I'm leaving I can get a job down here and they do and so the British have the humiliation of returning to Canada - 239 people who desert some of these people will end up at the US Army most of them will go in hinterland and hire themselves out after the war most of them will stay in the United States I think a few of them will go back to Britain but I don't know very unclear on the numbers but most of them will stay and eventually settle why did the battle turn out the way it did the British land attack and the sea attack was not synchronized had they both come at the same time or if the land attack had come first so the land attack destroys the Americans on the peninsula it's hard to say that McDonough would have stayed in the bay with the Navy on one side and the British army on the other he might have tried to get away so they weren't a synchronized attacks McDonagh optimized his defenses in Plattsburgh Bay with those tricks he used Downey chose a weaker attack plan he should have stayed off at long range he came in at close quarter fighting McDonough and macomb were were firm in their resolution that they were going to defend to the last man utterly can thats what they were gonna do and they communicated that with their troops and if the troops maybe didn't sign up for it they understand what was expected of them Provost he was not quite so resolute about what he was going to do in New York because of this battle George Provost who's the governor-general of British North America as soon as the war is over gets recalled to London for an inquiry of why he botched this campaign because all those generals and officers were sending letters back to their family you won't believe what Provost did we were this close to winning and he called us back Prevost was a very fortunate man in the inquiry he died before was conducted so there's no record of the testimony plattsburgh was one of four things being attacked in the war we have the battle Bladensburg outside of Washington DC in the British Bern Washington humiliating to the United States of America we can't even defend their own I don't the British occupy a hundred miles of the coast of Maine and they're going to keep it and they administer oaths of loyalty to the people up there in Maine who swear their loyalty to the king and they've gotten that far they plan on keeping that now you all know that the Battle of New Orleans is going to happen later but there's a whole bunch of troops heading on their way to the Gulf of Mexico to New Orleans to seize it so that's another major British counter of British offensives in all this then September comes we have the Battle of Plattsburgh a couple days later we have the defense of Baltimore in the star-spangled banner Baltimore's the fourth largest city in the United States and it survives when it probably shouldn't have and so that was a glorious victory Fort McHenry which you see out front there and finally those that whole division that was being surrounded - Fort Erie and and the Secretary of the army was so afraid that they would be destroyed on their own they break out from Fort Erie and they overturn the siege and go on the offensive on the Niagara River Ezard finally shows up after the siege is broken he shows up about three weeks there okay I'm here what can I do for you so this is a month of miracles if you will how many of you been to Fort McHenry okay do you know that in the daytime when they take down the little flag and put up the big flag that if you're at Fort McHenry they will let you do it it is to you it's really too cool I happened to be there one time they say hey we need some volunteers to pull on the lanyard and bring the flag down and fold it up and and change flags and whatnot and I got my wife took pictures of me doing that so it's kind of cool anyway you can do that I think it's like nine o'clock in the morning kind of neat there's only a couple places in America where the American flag flies 24/7 Fort McHenry is one of them okay meanwhile in Ghent Belgium the negotiators get word of all these cool victories that America has in September and Wellington call talks to the government and he says we lost this isn't good if you continue this it's going to cost you ungodly amounts of money and we might not win we did you didn't do what I told you to do who gained gain the Great Lakes Wellington advises the government call off the war now we'll withdraw to our side of the border they'll withdraw to their side of the border and we'll call it even so the negotiators come around to that and on Christmas Eve in 1814 they sign the treaty status quo ante bellum which basically means everything goes back to the was before the war okay the war is not over what does the Constitution that James Madison wrote say about treaties ratified in the Senate Parliament ratified it immediately they want out of this it's not until February when the treaty shows up in DC Congress calls the emergency session Senate ratifies it the president that night signs it into effect so on February 18th the war is over what happened between September 1814 and February of 1815 the Battle of New Orleans so when people say what's significant about the Battle of New Orleans it was fought after the war was over wrong the war was ongoing it was legal to British Tinh to any things they weren't supposed to do only Andy Jackson did it a lot better this is that wooden bridge is replaced by a stone bridge so that's the bridge we're talking about in downtown the the view on the bottom Bentsen lossing drew that himself around the American Civil War that's Fort Brown closest to the Saranac River but it gives you some sense of the the dirt walls and how large they were but of course that the whole battlefield was eroded and now it is part of Plattsburgh but I want to read the inscription that's on the bridge in commemoration of the gallantry and successful resistance of the American troops to the repeated attempts of the British Army to cross the bridge over the Saranac River at this point September 5 through 11 1814 erected by the faculty and students of the Plattsburgh Normal School January 1895 those are the days when you actually commemorated victories I don't think we've done that since World War two but they were very proud of that all those teenage riflemen up in the sawmill Congress voted them new rifles and made presentations to all those guys they're probably in their 20s by the time they got him but Congress wanted to recognize the bravery of those teenage kids up in the oven the sawmill what happened to McDonough mcdonoughs brevet admire general so he's a young Brigadier and now he's a private Major General eventually he will be promoted to Major General and he is the commanding general of the United States Army he's the top guy like the chief of staff of the Army from 28 to 41 and he this is a bad time for the army the Army's done 7,000 people but he guides it through all of that he gives really good leadership if you will and there's his statue in in Detroit what happens to Thomas Macdonough both of these guys get gold medals from Congress and they're really cool because they they would do that in those days he's promoted a captain he's continues to serve he command ships he commands squadron gets tuberculosis tuberculosis was a huge killer in the 19th century there was no way out of it once you got it you were goner and it took year for you to slowly deteriorate until you finally died and people recognized her for what it was it was a death sentence and he's in the Mediterranean commanding a ship when he's finally he's on his last legs and he's wants to get back to America to die and so they put him on a fast vessel back to the United States and as he's passing the Straits of Gibraltar he passes away and that's his Monument in Plattsburgh that's a McDonough monument in Plattsburgh well thank you all very much yes please oh I'm sorry did what was going on in the spring in Buffalo and Black Rock have any effect on the positioning of the British troops coming to Plattsburgh the British showed up with those reinforcements showed up we're in four brigades Provost sent one of those brigades to Kingston to give to general Drummond to add to his forces at the siege of Fort Erie and the other three brigades did this does that answer your question yeah so he was he was doubling the anti yet on on the Niagara and those guys showed up and they were they were good they did fine I had a question about the British regulars in the Army in it true that when they took the King's shilling a lot of these poor sods out of the cities and all that they were basically enlisting for life birthday I'll call him my expert here mark yeah it's a lifetime for those guys yeah it's a hard life and then you go through America and you look around say I could settle here yes please did the teenage snipers on the American side have an advantage with rifles as opposed to the British muskets yeah No very insightful a rifle much more accurate than a musket especially these ranges here the muskets firing what 50 60 metres across the river house to house and whatnot it has the range it doesn't have the accuracy we don't have any statistics of what the casualties were on either side all I know is McComb was glad he had them because it kind of kept the British away from the bridge so they can't come in the night and lay down a new road bed or anything like that so they served a valuable service but I don't yes and the rifles were probably the reason why yes please no I'll tell you where I am going in June Macomb Illinois which is named after Alexander Macomb has their big Heritage Day ceremony and so I'll be going there to give this presentation and one other so that's where I'll be this summer yeah but I'm not gonna get up to Plattsburgh there's a bunch of experts up in Plattsburgh who probably wouldn't be happy if I showed up in their doorstep no I haven't is that where in Burlington or in for okay virgin yeah and I guess there's one keel that there that that has been preserved but I'm not sure what that was from all the cellulose has gone from the wood yeah hey Armand army guy okay yep thank you sir British regulars and the during this commander throughout no coming up we'll say to Plattsburgh Prevost just really in Wellington ran his his army in Nigerian peninsula he kind of didn't care what your uniform looked like you had to have a serviceable weapon a sharp bayonet and a pack full of bullets and a serviceable canteen and heating care which a war so about two-thirds of the British soldiers making this attack are from his army when they show up in Montreal and provost takes a look at the officers walking around practically dressed as civilians and the troops kind of sort of wearing whatever they brought with them from Spain he does not want them infecting his troops with these slovenly habits and he writes in order to the whole army telling him to buck up their appearance and the officers who served with Wellington are just incensed at this that somehow it was good enough for the Duke of Wellington but it's not good for this two-bit who the hell are you George Provost they got off on the wrong foot immediately and so when the attack was called off it was preordained that the the British brigadiers and and the troops that have fought in Spain were just going to again be incensed at the decision so the commands the other thing was wrong in the command structure is the brigade commanders and Brigade staffs were these regulars who were very well-trained and fought a war very successfully the division staff are the British officers who had served in Canada for years and they weren't very good staff officers so the brigade commanders would expect routes to be scouted out crossing sites to be identified food to show up on time and the division staff couldn't make that happen and so a lot of these guys from the Peninsular army said what kind of a route step unit have I joined these guys don't know how to conduct war so you had that tremendous tension that plays out on them and plays out in the campaign you mentioned they Macomb was named after the comb Illinois yeah was he from that area or just it just not at all he's his family's from New York and his family was fairly prosperous there in the fur trade he's born out in Detroit his political connections are in New York I don't know why they they named him that Macomb has I know a dozen children or something like that the next one who's born he names him Saranac it's a good thing they weren't on the Guadalupe River I don't know just and a boy what would the repercussions have been if the British had taken Plattsburgh I'm sorry what what would the repercussions have been if the British had taken Plattsburgh if they had taken over the fort yeah they would have destroyed the Naval Yard they would have burned all the public buildings which means everything that had ever gone into public service all the wharves all the warehouses any boats they found there all the forts and they would have marched the troops into POWs in POWs status back to Montreal from Montreal they would go to Halifax and you can you imagine how cold it is in the winter and a half ax so that's what it would have happened there I don't know what James Madison if he would have survived the burning of Washington and the loss of Plattsburgh and lost the Baltimore I mean wherever Congress was when it was all over I think James Madison's presidential career would've been over yeah it was it was sad and the border would have been brought down to at least Plattsburgh the actual plan was that America would own no land on any of the Great Lakes that the border would been pushed south of the Great Lakes that the Michigan territory the Old Northwest would be taken away from the United States and made a neutral Indian state bordering between British North America and the United States and the British would have guaranteed the sovereignty of that Indian nation that was all in the books so between Baltimore New Orleans and Plattsburgh that didn't happen yes please record of the war where would you come down on there's a saying that the happiest people are the Americans because after the war they were told that they want it because of the Battle of New Orleans because when the news of the Battle of New Orleans reaches the East Coast late in January a couple weeks later the treaty shows up an American newsmen journalists at the time made the and the people made the connection we win New Orleans we have a peace treaty we didn't lose any territory therefore we won the war so the Americans are happy because they think they won the war the Canadians are happier still because they know that they won the war the war of 1812 is their American Revolution they're celebrating at big time for the past two years the happiest all of all are the British because they don't even know the war existed no this this is a tie at best it's a time we got out with our with our skins and that's it I mean you just like oh glad we dodged a bullet there follow up on that question what about the Native Americans every which direction and I mean where did they not where did they come down but what ramification on them is resolved to this day 200 years later scholars do not know who won the war of 1812 but we are all in agreement of who lost it the Native Americans lost that war to come sup and his Confederation was destroyed in 1813 there are still lingering pockets of resistance but once the war is over and the creeks the Red Sticks in in Alabama they had their uprising Jackson put them down brutally so the Native Americans said that uprisings is not we're gonna have to accommodate with these people because there's no way we can challenge them militarily and it's not until Blackhawk has a small uprising which is which is a spinoff of this war even though it's what eighteen years later and that's kind of the last time that the Indians in the Central the United States can militarily challenge the United States after that it's the Plains Indians who pick up the fight yeah but they was bad news for the Native Americans just utterly bad news for them and as you probably know Jackson had friendly Creek Indians fight the Red Sticks in the south and after the war is over he writes the treaty and he takes away half of creeks land to include the land from the friendly creeks so the creeks allied with Jackson in the hopes of being on the winning side they were and it didn't matter yeah these were these were not good times yes please okay well that's probably a good point you know you shouldn't start a war that you haven't thought through that you don't know how it's gonna end that you're gonna finish I mean don't take that first step unless you've thought your way through to the last step and in 1812 we didn't do that but we did put a lot of money into the Navy into the army to raise the troops we did we started too late to make a difference they didn't start expanding the army until January of 1812 declared war in June five months is not long enough to raise an army get officers there get a trained and put it on the road to Montreal it was it was never enough time but Madison thought it would be okay Thomas Jefferson thought it was a great idea well in his correspondence with Madison Thomas Jefferson says you know we're probably gonna lose some of the opening battles he says but our best guys are gonna rise to the top because we're a meritocracy in 1813 we're gonna have replace the generals and our army will be experienced and we're gonna win and moreover we will incite a revolution in Great Britain because the poor commoners there will see what we're doing and they're gonna rise up against the their British masters of course that didn't happen so it's like Jefferson as brilliant as he was did not have his fingers on the pulse of what's going on in the war in the world he miss called that and I think between him and Madison they're they're both they did not think this was true and they're both my heroes but they didn't think this one through sir ain't going there but but yes I mean it Clausewitz tells us and every strategist will tell you the same thing don't take the first step unless you know what the last step is going to look like and I got it that that there's friction and there's chance and all those other things occur but if you haven't thought this one out you know from top to bottom and back again if you haven't walk the dog the entire trip don't even take the first step you're not gonna like what comes out the other end Braemore about what this war meant to the canadians cuz i I don't for one have a good understanding of oh yeah you know Canadian history in Canada and I lived there for two years and I know a lot of Canadian officers the myth in Canada and their scholars call it a myth too they recognize it in Canada for 200 years in the schools their children were taught that it was the Canadian militia with a couple British regulars who came over to help out it was the Canadian militia that defended Canada and through the Americans back across to their side the border or what 11 times during the course of two and a half years that's what they were taught and all the military scholars even in Canada say well that that's really a myth and they try to kind of change minds but that's a mind that does not want to be changed they're very comfortable with that it's like it to come to come so there's four heroes in Canada from the war Laura Secord who does start the chocolate no she doesn't start the chocolate giving Laura Secord to come some let's see Isaac Brock who we kill it at Queenston and who's the fourth one they've got let's see a Native American a female military guy I forget who the fourth their fourth hero is but they chose their heroes based on a cross-section of their population and they appear on the stamps and in the lectures and and in all the the history books that were taught in school for four decades did it make what kind of an impact I mean did did British you know like did they see how they saw themselves differently and how Britain saw oh yeah yeah well interestingly enough Britain during the 1830s and 1840s came to the realization that there was no way they could defend Canada against the United States which is one of the major reasons why Confederation occurred in what 1867 I guess it's like yeah you know it looks like we're granting you your independence but we're really saying is defend yourself we can't do it and the Canadians are they knew what was going on that they were on their own but they built the Rideau Canal so they weren't sharing a water border with the United States they built the Welland Canal for the same reason we had an agreement to demilitarize the Great Lakes which was really good for both sides and after a while trade picks up the British burned every house except one along the Niagara River 37 miles of it they burned down in in December of 1813 every house burned and they let loose the Indians who took their share of scalps is pretty brutal on the Niagara Frontier and we burned a couple of their towns on the other side of the border too I mean it really was tit for tat and whatnot and that leaves a level of animosity that takes at least a generation to to overcome but they're very proud of the war and their part in it and you know they beat off those those they beat back the Americans and good for them time for brownies thank you thank you very much

Channel: The Dole Institute of Politics

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Keywords: Barbuto, 1814, 2014, Ft. Leavenworth, Series, Robert J. Dole Institute Of Politics (Building), Dole Institute, Dole Institute of Politics, KU, University of Kansas, Fort Leavenworth, Military History, Richard Barbuto

Id: IM77HsROoZQ

Length: 76min 52sec (4612 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 03 2014