Page 32 - NS-2 Textbook

THE GROWTH OF AMERICAN SEA POWER 25

States would cease importing from any nation that did used up. Several hundred useless little gunboats built by
not do a\vay \l\Tith restrictions on U.s. trade. Jefferson lay rotting in rivers and harbors along the East
In response, Napoleon quickly repealed all French Coast. The same congressmen who voted the nation into
decrees against U.S. shipping, hoping this would bring war had, only seven months before, voted down a plan
the United States into the war against Britain if the to build a dozen large ships-of-the-line and twenty
British did not follow Sttit. Britain did not repeal the frigates.
Orders in Council, so Madison enforced the law against Britain, on the other hand, had more than 600 men-
importing British goods. This angered the British and of-war, including some 250 ships-of-the-line and frigates.
made them think that the United States was teaming up Forhmately for the United States, most of this fleet was
with France against them. Britain kept up the impress- in Europe blockading the ports of Napoleon's France.
ment of sailors on the high seas and harassment of Faced with these odds, the U.s. naval strategy was clear:
U.S. ships, and "Freedom of the seas!" became the War try to protect the nation's sea trade while harassing the
Hawks' slogan. Britain and the United States were mov- British Navy and sea conunerce 'Ivith small squadrons
ing toward war. and individual commerce raiders.
Matters reached the boiling point in April 1811, when In the early days of the Wa!~ u.s. land forces
the British frigate Guerriere, thirty-eight guns, stopped a launched an invasion into Canada, but because it ,vas
u.s. merchantman off New York and impressed one of poorly planned and met with stiff British and Canadian
the ship's seamen, a native of Maine. Commodore Jolm opposition, it was unsuccessful. TIle Canadians captured
Rodgers was sent to sea in the forty-four-gun President to a u.s. fort at Mackinac Island in Lake Huron, giving the
protect u.s. shipping. On the evening of 16 May off the British control of the upper Great Lakes region. Then the
Virginia capes, the President came upon a ship that re- British chased the Americans out of Detroit, built a fleet
fused to identify herself. It is unclear who fired first, but on Lake Erie, and helped Tecumseh and his Indian allies
the President soon silenced the stranger by pouring continue fighting in the Northwest Territory.
broadsides into her. The ship drifted away in the night,
but the next morning Rodgers saw her a short distance THE WAR AT SEA
away in great distress. The ship huned out to be the
British sloop of war HMS Little Belt, twenty guns. She Things at sea went considerably better for the United
managed to limp into Halifax, Nova Scotia, with thirty- States at first. Several significant victories were won by
two dead and wounded crewmen. Rodgers was hailed as American warships in one-on-one encounters with
a hero for getting revenge for the Chesapeake. British men-of-war. The first of these occtu'red on 19 Au-
Also in 1811, the British incited Tecumseh, a gust 1812, when the USS COllstitutioll, commanded by
Shawnee Indian chief, to unite the tribes in the old Captain Isaac Hull, one of Preble's Boys, encountered
Northwest Territory against white settlers. The usual HMS Guerriere off the coast of Nova Scotia. Of all British
horrors of Indian warfare took place in the Indiana and ships, Americans hated Guerriere most, because of her
Ohio Territories. In November 1811, General William role in impressing American seamen a year earlier.
Henry Harrison led a well-trained U.S. frontier army
against the Indians at Tippecanoe Creek in Indiana. He
won an important victory, and Tecumseh fled to Canada
to join British forces.
New England senators and congressmen did not
'want to go to war, for in spite of the harassment at sea,
their voters back home would get rich if oniy one ship in
three made it to port. But the War Hawks, tmder the
strong leadership of Henry Clay, Speaker of the House,
and Senator John C. Calhoun, finally persuaded Madison
to ask Congress to declare war. On 18 June 1812 the
United States declared war on Britain, for impressment,
interference with neutral trade, and British plots with the
Indians in the Northwest.

THE WAR OF 1812
The U.S. Navy in 1812 had only sixteen ships, seven of Seamen and gunners of the USS Constitution cheer at the start of
them frigates. Many were in need of repairs, and all were action with the British frigate Guerriere. British shot bounced off
short of crew. Wood for shipbuilding and stores had been the hull of the U.S. ship, giving her the name "Old Ironsides."