Author: John R. Elting, Colonel, United States Army (retired)
Pages: 353
Illustrations: 19 black and white reproductions of uniform plates and battle paintings in a center folio.
Maps: 9 showing different campaigns and theaters of war and 7 showing tactical battlefield terrain details.
Footnotes: 402, conveniently placed at the bottom of the where the footnote appears.
Appendices: None, but there is an Epilogue which offers an old proverb: "God looks after little children, idiots, drunken sailors, and the United States of America."
Bibliography: 91 listings, including books, journals, and primary sources. Includes an "Essay on Sources" with valuable descriptions of the sources organized by subject (general sources, "War in the West", "War in the South," etc.
Index: 492 listings.
Publisher: Da Capo Press, New York
Publication Date: 1995 softcover reprint of a 1991 edition by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
Binding: Paper (softbound)
ISBN: 0-306-80653-3
Price: $14.95
Summary: The best one-volume history on the War of 1812 in North America, long out of print, is now available in paperback. Full of detail, John Elting's work is illuminating, sometimes humorous, and always insightful.

It is a widely held consensus that the Vietnam War was the most disastrous in American history. Those who hold this point of view note the widespread opposition to the war, its errors in military policies, and the political mistakes that led to eventual withdrawal under a cloud of shame. The War of 1812 makes the Vietnam failure pale in all of these regards.

For a good part of the war, the main source of provisions for the British army in Canada was Americans (mostly in New England) who gladly committed treason for profit, convinced that it was not "their war." The military leadership repeatedly sacrificed hard-earned gains through incompetence and indecision. President Madison and his administration tried to fight the war on a shoestring, which eventually led to the loss of the White House itself.

Elting's book is an ambitious work that attempts to provide a political and strategic overview as well as detailed accounts of the major actions of the war, both military and naval. The story he has to tell is filled with all of the color of the period. It will appeal to the specialist and general reader alike.

The War of 1812 has been written about extensively, but there are few good single-volume summaries of the entire war. Probably the best of these were J. Mackay Hitsman's The Incredible War of 1812 (University of Toronto Press, 1966) and J.C.A. Stagg's Mr. Madison's War (Princeton University Press, 1983). Unlike these earlier writers, however, John Elting is not out to prove a point. He is simply applying his superb storytelling skills to a historical period that badly needs them.

Of the seventeen chapters in Elting's book, six deal with the strategic and political-military situation at various times during the war, nine deal with the main campaigns, and two with the naval aspects of the war. His focus is clearly on the land campaigns of the war, and he covers both sides with admirable even-handedness.

He not only covers the main actions like the Battle of the Thames and operations around Baltimore and the Niagara Theater, but also covers such minor actions as the capture of Fort Mackinac and the struggle for Prairie du Chien (now in southwest Wisconsin) in the far west. He presents the war as an improvised, "come as you are" affair in which both sides seemed at times to be struggling to lose rather than to win.

Elting is especially hard on the senior officers of both sides. Andrew Jackson and William Henry Harrison, who ended the war as widely hailed heroes, draw considerable scorn from Elting (Chapter Sixteen is entitled "The Confusions of Andrew Jackson").

The naval and British commanders suffer no better. Of Isaac Chauncey, the American commander on the Great Lakes, Elting writes: "Chauncey's conduct remained inexplicable. His command included Lake Erie; in fact, in appointing him Hamilton had stressed that Lake Erie was strategically more important than Ontario. Chauncey could not help but know that future American operations in the west hinged on the cooperation of the Lake Erie squadron...yet he practically ignored Lake Erie... probably Chauncey shared Dear-born's inability to think in strategic terms." The summary of Sir George Prevost, overall British commander in Canada, was that he was "brave in action and capable of planning offensive action, he was however hagridden by doubt and indecision."

Elting's real disdain, though, is reserved for the American high command and the leading U.S. generals. The Secretary of War, William Eustis, is described as "a miserly detail chaser with neither administrative ability nor foresight"; Henry Dearborn, recalled to duty as the senior officer of the army, was "immersed...in politics and detail chasing."

James Wilkinson, the second-senior American general and commander of the main army in the North, is termed a "confidence man in uniform and traitor extraordinaire." These men, and President James Madison, appeared to believe that war could be fought on the cheap.

Where Elting does praise, he does so freely. A number of junior officers on both sides come out of his account with considerable honor, especially then-Lieutenant Colonel Winfield Scott (later to command the U.S. Army in the Mexican-American War and at the beginning of the Civil War), and Colonel Zebulon Pike (of Pike's Peak fame, killed in action in 1813). Lieutenant James Fitzgibbon of the 49th Regiment of Foot gains deserved praise for his coolness under fire and ability to panic American commanders into surrender to "save them" *om Indians. Similarly, Lieutenant Colonel Charles-Michel de Salaberry of the Canadian Militia receives Elting's approbation for defeating an American militia force five times his own unit's size.

This reviewer was surprised at the level of professionalism displayed by the small force of U.S. regulars in these battles, much of which has never been presented before in this level of detail. Elting has particular admiration for Scott and his Second Artillery Regiment. While they mostly fought as infantry, at various times they served as artillerists, combat engineers, construction engineers, and boat crews. Although most of the regular units started out as ill-trained as the militia, they became a steady and reliable force by the war's end. The problem was that they were too few in number, in keeping with American traditions of relying on militia for the bulk of its military needs.

One of the surprising features of the War of 1812 in North America was the extent to which the British engaged in town burning. In those days, the destruction of public property (these included courthouses, legislative buildings, and the like) was considered legitimate, while the destruction of private property was not. On the northern frontier, this custom was observed, at least at the beginning. Along the Atlantic, and especially in the Chesapeake Bay, the Royal Navy scoffed at such distinctions.

In the Chesapeake, of course, the year 1814 brought the famous "burning of Washington, DC," which was, in fact, limited mostly to public buildings. It is fortunate for the citizens of Baltimore that the British were turned back both in a land assault against the city, and then in a sea assault against Fort McHenry. The Battles of Baltimore ended the town burnings in the Chesapeake, as the British reconsidered their strategy and opted to send their forces to assault New Orleans.

In the end, the town-burning strategies backfired for both sides. The Americans simply had too much area to defend to stop British raids on the coasts and in the wilderness. The British failed to understand that their strategy cost them many friends among the "neutralist" Americans, and their use of Indian auxiliaries on these raids only deepened the American resolve to end the "Indian menace" by eliminating British backing for the tribes.

As Elting says, "The United States survived only because handfuls of American soldiers and sailors, ill-supported and almost abandoned by their central government, ignored and often betrayed by their fellow countrymen, made head against all odds until England at last wearied." Looking at the balance of forces, particularly in 1812 and 1813, it was the survival of Canada that seems the miracle

There are a few minor flaws in the Da Capo reprint. The sixteen maps cover all of the important terrain features, but do not show troop dispositions or movements (the latter appeared in the original hardcover book). Elting mentions "considerable pro-American sentiment" among the Canadians several times, but does not detail its basis or utility to the American cause. Finally, he does not really detail what the two sides thought they were fighting for, although perhaps that is understandable, given that there seemed to be considerable confusion on that issue at the time.

This book is an excellent and fascinating read. The mix of character descriptions and military narrative makes a compelling story. It is highly recommended.

Reviewed by Doug Ferguson

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