Theyre also very different. And i suspect that the truth is somewhere in the middle here, and i couldnt tell you which one is better. And this is another one. This is an image that came out of one of the books that i did and it is showing the british piling up material, and this is in the Capitol Building. And if youll notice, the guy on the left, on the back, hes carrying a backpack that would carry two cases for a congrieve rocket. Rocket and if youll notice the man standing on top of the pile, hes literally taking the projectile material that would have been inside of that rocket and hes sprinkling it over the top and then thats how they would light that fire and here is the actual account and this is by Benjamin Henry latrobe. There was no want of material for the conflagration. For when the number of members of congress was increased the old platform was left in its place and another raised over it giving an additional quantity of dry and loose timber. All the stages and seats of
In the war of 1812, obviously. So its my pleasure to welcome colonel eshelman to the podium. [ applause ] good morning, everyone. Thank you. That was a kind introduction. I have never been called colonel when im been introduced. Thank you very much. I want to add to the accolades expressed about the wonderful job the partners and all the individuals have done to put this symposium together. I have thoroughly enjoyed it. I hope you have as well. We still have an afternoon to go as well. Itis not over and im looking forward to it. Before lunch, which is an important thing for all of us, i have a few words i would like to say about some of the myth that surround washington, d. C. Specifically, im going to talk about three myths. Im going to present them to you in the form of a question. The first one is did the british really burn Washington City . Question number two. Is the white house really called the white house because it was painted white because of the scorch marks when the britis
And most of them i think were built around either boston or philadelphia. In supporting the war, and particularly the naval war, did jobs ever come into any of the equations in 1812, or looking longer through American History, when did jobs become an issue of National Policy . All right. When did jobs start driving our defense policy . Yes. Not during this war. I dont see any evidence that federalists said, well, weve got to support expanding the navy because thats going to be jobs in our commercial ports where were often in a majority. Ive not seen that hint of that. And this is a rare war, in that the we really did bad economically during the war. Sometimes we do very well during a war, i think its more typical that the massive spending in the ploumt, world war ii being the best case probably, generates economic activity. But not in this war. And thats largely as Andrew Lambert will be happy to remind us, because of the overwhelming power of the british navy. Which established a bloc
Thank you very much. A great honor to be here, and thank you to the u. S. Capital Historical Society and the White House Historical sorry for including me in this great honor. I thought i would take on i thought i would take on the myth that the british marched to washington to avenge the burning of york or what is today toronto in canada. As i was starting to think about this paper back in april, i was wondering, do i really need to make this argument . Do people still really think that . Now that were well into the bicentennial, i can tell you, yes, people still really think this. In fact im kind of biased, because i do think tthe Washington Post is our nations finest newspaperened they have this terrific section called kids posts. This was the headline a couple weeks ago. Revenge hungry british set d. C. Afire. The story tells us after americans set fire to new york, now toronto in canada, the british decided to do the same thing to washington. I know from experience if you dont mak
Eshelman for the National Historic trail. Now, from day two of the symposium on the british burning of washington, d. C. , during the war of 1812. Hosted by the White House Historical society, the u. S. Capitol Historical Society, and James Madisons mount pillier. Donald hickey talks about his book of the war of 1812 a forgotten conflict. This is about 45 minutes. Donald hickey is a professor of history at wans State College in nebraska. He was called the dean of 1812 scholarship by the new yorker, hes written seven books on the conflict. Most notably, the war of 1812, a forgotten conflict, available in a bicentennial edition. His book on Andrew Jackson and the battle of new orleans is forthcoming from Johns Hopkins university press. Professor hickey is editor of a fine series with monographs on the war of 1812. So its my pleasure to welcome professor don hickey. [ applause ] thanks for that introduction, don. I was asked to come here to talk about the politics of the war of 1812. You