Canada under British Rule by Sir John George Bourinot (mobi ebook reader .txt) 📕

objects. Subsequently, the administration of the United States refused to renew the Jay Treaty when it duly expired, and as a consequence the relatively amicable relations that had existed between the Republic and England again became critical, since American commerce and shipping were exposed to all the irritating measures that England felt compelled under existing conditions to carry out in pursuance of the policy of restricting the trade of neutral vessels. Several attempts were made by the British government, between the expiry of the Jay Treaty and the actual rupture of friendly relations with the United States, to come to a better understanding with respect to some of the questions in dispute, but the differences between the two Powers were so radical that all negotiations came to naught. Difficulties were also complicated by the condition of political parties in the American republic and the ambition of American statesmen. When the democratic republicans or "Strict constructionists," as they have been happily named, with Jefferson at their head, obtained office, French ideas came into favour; while the federalists or "Broad constitutionalists," of whom Washington, Hamilton and Adams had been the first exponents, were anxious to keep the nation free from European complications and to settle international difficulties by treaty and not by war. But this party was in a hopeless minority, during the critical times when international difficulties were resolving themselves into war, and was unable to influence public opinion sufficiently to make negotiations for the maintenance of peace successful, despite the fact that it had a considerable weight in the states of New England.

The international difficulties of the United States entered upon a critical condition when Great Britain, in her assertion of naval supremacy and restricted commerce as absolutely essential to her national security, issued an order-in-council which declared a strict blockade of the European coast from Brest to the Elbe. Napoleon retaliated with the Berlin decree, which merely promulgated a paper blockade of the British Isles. Then followed the later British orders-in-council, which prevented the shipping of the United States from trading with any country where British vessels could not enter, and allowed them only to trade with other European ports where they made entries and paid duties in English custom-houses. Napoleon increased the duties of neutral commerce by the Milan decree of 1807, which ordered the seizure of all neutral vessels which might have been searched by English cruisers. These orders meant the ruin of American commerce, which had become so profitable; and the Washington government attempted to retaliate, first by forbidding the importation of manufactures from England and her colonies, and, when this effort was ineffective, by declaring an embargo in its own ports, which had only the result of still further crippling American commerce at home and abroad. Eventually, in place of this unwise measure, which, despite its systematic evasion, brought serious losses to the whole nation and seemed likely to result in civil war in the east, where the discontent was greatest, a system of non-intercourse with both England and France was adopted, to last so long as either should press its restrictive measures against the republic, but this new policy of retaliation hardly impeded American commerce, of which the profits were far greater than the risks. The leaders of the Democratic party were now anxious to conciliate France, and endeavoured to persuade the nation that Napoleon had practically freed the United States from the restrictions to which it so strongly objected. It is a matter beyond dispute that the French decrees were never exactly annulled; and the Emperor was pursuing an insidious policy which confiscated American vessels in French ports at the very moment he was professing friendship with the United States. His object was to force the government of that country into war with England, and, unfortunately for its interests, its statesmen lent themselves to his designs.

The Democratic leaders, determined to continue in power, fanned the flame against England, whose maritime superiority enabled her to inflict the greatest injury on American shipping and commerce. The governing party looked to the south and west for their principal support. In these sections the interests were exclusively agricultural, while in New England, where the Federalists were generally in the majority, the commercial and maritime elements predominated. In Kentucky, Ohio, and other states there was a strong feeling against England on account of the current belief that the English authorities in Canada had tampered with the Indian tribes and induced them to harass the settlers until Harrison, on the eve of the war of 1812, effectually cowed them. It is, however, now well established by the Canadian archives that Sir James Craig, when governor-general in 1807, actually warned the Washington government of the restlessness of the western Indians, and of the anxiety of the Canadian authorities to avoid an Indian war in the north-west, which might prejudicially operate against the western province. This fact was not, however, generally known, and the feeling against Canada and England was kept alive by the dominant party in the United States by the disclosure that one John Henry had been sent by the Canadian government in 1808 to ascertain the sentiment of the people of New England with respect to the relations between the two countries and the maintenance of peace. Henry's correspondence was really quite harmless, but when it had been purchased from him by Madison, on the refusal of the imperial government to buy his silence, it served the temporary purpose of making the people of the west believe that England was all the while intriguing against the national interests, and endeavouring to create a discontent which might end in civil strife. Under these circumstances the southern leaders, Clay of Kentucky, and Calhoun of South Carolina, who always showed an inveterate animosity against England, forced Madison, then anxious to be re-elected president, to send a warlike message to congress, which culminated in a formal declaration of hostilities on the 18th of June, 1812, only one day later than the repeal of the obnoxious order-in-council by England. When the repeal became known some weeks later in Canada and the United States, the province of Upper Canada had been actually invaded by Hull, and the government of the United States had no desire whatever to desist from warlike operations, which, they confidently believed, would end in the successful occupation of Canada at a time when England was unable, on account of her European responsibilities, to extend to its defenders effective assistance.


SECTION 2.--Canada during the war.


In 1812 there were five hundred thousand people living in the provinces of British North America. Of this number, the French people of Lower Canada made up at least one half. These people had some grievances, and political agitators, notably the writers of the _Canadien_, were creating jealousies and rivalries between the French and English races chiefly on the ground of the dominant influence of the British minority in the administration of public affairs. On the whole, however, the country was prosperous and the people generally contented with British rule, the freedom of which presented such striking contrast to the absolutism of the old French régime. The great majority of the eighty thousand inhabitants of Upper or Western Canada were Loyalists or descendants of Loyalists, who had become deeply attached to their new homes, whilst recalling with feelings of deep bitterness the sufferings and trials of the American revolution. This class was naturally attached to British rule and hostile to every innovation which had the least semblance of American republicanism. In the western part of the province of Upper Canada there was, however, an American element composed of people who had been brought into the country by the liberal grants of land made to settlers, and who were not animated by the high sentiments of the Loyalists of 1783 and succeeding years. These people, for some years previous to 1812, were misled by political demagogues like Wilcox and Marcle, both of whom deserted to the enemy soon after the outbreak of the war. Emissaries from the republic were busily engaged for months, we now know, in fomenting a feeling against England among these later immigrants, and in persuading them that the time was close at hand when Canada would be annexed to the federal republic. Some attempts were even made to create discontent among the French Canadians, but no success appears to have followed these efforts in a country where the bishop, priests and leading men of the rural communities perfectly appreciated the value of British connection.

The statesmen of the United States, who were responsible for the war, looked on the provinces as so many weak communities which could be easily invaded and conquered by the republican armies. Upper Canada, with its long and exposed frontier and its small and scattered population, was considered utterly indefensible and almost certain to be successfully occupied by the invading forces. There was not a town of one thousand souls in the whole of that province, and the only forts of any pretension were those on the Niagara frontier. Kingston was a fortified town of some importance in the eastern part of the province, but Toronto had no adequate means of defence. At the commencement of the war there were only fourteen hundred and fifty regular troops in the whole country west of Montreal, and these men were scattered at Kingston, York, Niagara, Chippewa, Erie, Amherstburg, and St. Joseph. The total available militia did not exceed four thousand men, the majority of whom had little or no knowledge of military discipline, and were not even in the possession of suitable arms and accoutrements, though, happily, all were animated by the loftiest sentiments of courage and patriotism. In the lower provinces of Eastern Canada and Nova Scotia there was a considerable military force, varying in the aggregate from four to five thousand men. The fortifications of Quebec were in a tolerable state of repair, but the citadel which dominates Halifax was in a dilapidated condition. The latter port was, however, the rendezvous of the English fleet, which always afforded adequate protection to British interests on the Atlantic coasts of British North America, despite the depredations of privateers and the successes attained during the first months of the war by the superior tonnage and equipment of the frigates of the republic. But the hopes that were entertained by the war party in the United States could be gathered from the speeches of Henry Clay of Kentucky, who believed that the issue would be favourable to their invading forces, who would even "negotiate terms of peace at Quebec or Halifax."

The United States had now a population of at least six millions and a half of whites. It was estimated that during the war the government had a militia force of between four and five hundred thousand men available for service, while the regular army amounted to thirty-four thousand officers and privates. The forces that invaded Canada by the way of Lake Champlain, Sackett's Harbour, the Niagara and Detroit Rivers, were vastly superior in numbers to the Canadian army of defence, except in the closing months of the war, when Prevost had under his command a large body of Peninsular veterans. One condition was always in favour of Canada, and that was the sullen apathy or antagonism felt by the people of New England with respect to the war. Had they been in a different spirit, Lower Canada would have been in far greater danger of successful invasion and occupation than was the case at any time during the progress of the conflict. The famous march of Arnold on Quebec by the Kennebec and Chaudière Rivers might have been repeated with more serious consequences while Prevost, and not Guy Carleton, was in supreme command in the French Canadian province.

I can attempt to limn only the events which stand out most plainly on the graphic pages of this momentous epoch in