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
Test. Test. Test. Test. Test. Test. Test. Captioning performed by vitac it was really inspite of rather than because of anybodys wishes. Americans at the time considered Political Parties, political faxes dysfunctional. The european record seemed to be that factions led to civil war, so no one really favored the development of american Political Parties, but they emerged anyway. The initial division was over hamiltons Financial Program. That division widened after the french revolution went into its more radical stage in 1793, 94 95, and i think the parties were pretty well solidified by the time the United States ratified the jay treaty with Great Britain in 1795. The federalists reluctantly supported that treaty, the emerging democratic republicans who are deadset against it. They deepened still more during our undeclared naval war with france in the late 1790s which was a byproduct of the jay treaty, one of the down sides, though we did pretty well thats truly or forgotten conflict.
Accounts are not necessarily the most accurate thing in the world. But if these had been supported by other information, primary documents, id be more likely to believe that they also burned but i cant find any of that. I just want to remind you that the americans were very upset about what was going on and when they talked about what had happened to washington, they tend to embellish the true facts. And then if you go down below, these were the things that were burnt after the evening of august 24th. So a better way to look at all of this is to compare what was actually burned on the evening of august the 24th. During that night. And you can see theres a very, very big difference there. And when we talk about the british burning washington, were leaving the average citizen with this impression that the british came in and they burnt the entire city of washington, d. C. And if you look at this, you can see that the americans burnt a heck of a lot in the city, but you dont hear anybody
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