US War of Independence

[Frankychan]

Re: US War of Independence

Originally posted by Toby Rowe

...

The chap also mentioned in detail the British refusing to allow exansion Westwards in case the native peoples got even more angry, and cited it as a major cause of frustration for all, pro and anti.
...


Toby

Yes, the British were at least a little more farsighted than the colonists were. When America first used germ warfare against a people, then tend to gloss over that in most history books.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by notyoueither
I say 'won', because from a Candian perspective, we did 'win'. They invaded and 'we' trounced them.

I might remind you that you were occupying 1/4 of our country before the war even began. After the war, you weren't. You were the mightiest empire in the world, and we threw you out of our country.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by notyoueither


Matters not to you. Insignificant to you. You lost.

We won. To us, it is a significant event on the bumpy road to modern Canada.

You back stabbers jumped the Brits when they had their backs turned. Your dear leaders thought you'd stroll in and add us to your jacobin nightmare while the British Empire was elsewhere occupied. Well, Madison thought wrong. We loyalists kicked your Yankee asses so hard that the numbers 54 and 40 have disappeared from the American ability to enumerate to this day.

No.
1) You invaded us first, and got sent packing by a much smaller force. The US "invasion" of Canada was in fact a pursuit of the invading force. British forces never attempted another invasion from the north, so the mission was accomplished.
2) The US government was never jacobin in nature. In fact the US had a brief war with revolutionary France 16 years before.
3) The whole 54 - 40 thing didn't exist for another 30 years.
4) We didn't stab you in the back, you staqbbed us. Your forces were on our soil even before war was declared. Furthermore your navy actually seized and impressed US citizens on the high seas outside of the declared blockade zone.
During the Napoleonic Wars the British Empire ran amok in the world outside of Europe in a manner that almost would have made Nappy proud. I say almost because Britain's attempts to seize Mexico, Cuba, Venezuala, Argentina, Egypt, Syria and the US all failed miserably.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by notyoueither

And if you've never heard the expression 'more British than the Brits' used to describe certain areas and populations of Canada, don't blame me for your ignorance.

Thank about it, indeed.

Having been to lovely Victoria during the Commonwealth Games I can confirm it was indeed very British- like Adelaide in South Australia.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


I might remind you that you were occupying 1/4 of our country before the war even began. After the war, you weren't. You were the mightiest empire in the world, and we threw you out of our country.

Unfortunately the British were preoccupied fighting someone more important and more powerful than a few tightarsed tax evading aristos lite- the French (and their allies, the Dutch and Spanish). The French navy actively threatened British holdings in India, seen to be far more valuable economically than the germ colonies in the north.


Many Americans fail to appreciate the role played by the Bailli of Malta, Admiral Pierre-André de Suffren Saint-Tropez.

http://www.xenophongroup.com/mcjoynt/fleets.htm

The war for American independence was fought elsewhere than on, or in, the waters off the North American continent. Probably the last formal engagements were fought on the other side of the globe and had no American present. These were part of a naval campaign that received significant notice in A.T. Mahan's The Influence of Sea Power Upon History (1660-1783) as he assess Suffren's "brilliant" naval campaigns in the Indian Seas, 1782 and 1783. More than one historian has defined André de Suffren as France's finest admiral of the era.

http://www.xenophongroup.com/mcjoynt/suffren.htm

[chequita guevara]

Wrong war, Molly.

[JimmyCracksCorn]

Having been to lovely Victoria during the Commonwealth Games I can confirm it was indeed very British- like Adelaide in South Australia.

Don't feed the Anglophiles.

Oooh, interesting question.

The answer is no, I think.

Did canada have any slaves?

Yeah, but no more than the North had at the time. I.e., not many.

Its actually an interesting question though. Canada may well have stayed fairly rural, since there would be no reason to build up an industrial base with one already existing more easily and naturally in the Northeast (US). And who knows what kind of people would have been moving up to the newly aquired Canada... could have been southerners looking for more land to farm. You never know.

Edit: And its also interesting to note that Britain and Canada were essentially Southern sympathizers during the Civil War. So it makes you wonder...

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
Wrong war, Molly.

I know. I was just over-excited.


I was just reminding the Americans about their huuuuuggggggeeeeee debt to the French in the War of Independence.


However, the British were having problems at the time with another rather able French commander- Napoleon Bonaparte. And he was a lot closer and a lot more dangerous than planter aristo wannabes in Washington.

The British send a truce party to negotiate with the Americans:

"Such being the intention of General Ross, he did not march the troops immediately into the city, but halted them upon a plain in its immediate vicinity, whilst a flag of truce was sent in with terms. But whatever his proposal might have been, it was not so much as heard, for scarcely had the party bearing the flag entered the street, than they were fired upon from the windows of one of the houses, and the horse of the General himself, who accompanied them, killed. You will easily believe that conduct so unjustifiable, so direct a breach of the law of nations, roused the indignation of every individual, from the General himself down to the private soldier.

All thoughts of accommodation were instantly laid aside; the troops advanced forthwith into the town, and
having first put to the sword all who were found in the house from which the shots were fired, and reduced it to ashes, they proceeded, without 'a moment's delay, to burn and destroy everything in the most distant degree connected with government. In this general devastation were included the Senate House, the President's palace, an extensive dockyard and arsenal, barracks for two or three thousand men, several large storehouses filled with naval and military stores, some hundreds of cannon of different descriptions, and nearly twenty thousand stand of small arms. There were also two or three public rope works which shared the same fate, a fine frigate pierced for sixty guns and just ready to be launched, several gun brigs and armed schooners, with a variety of gunboats and small craft. The powder magazines were, of course, set on fire, and exploded with a tremendous crash, throwing down many houses in their vicinity, partly by pieces of the wall striking them, and partly by the concussion of the air whilst quantities of shot, shell, and hand grenades, which could not otherwise be rendered useless, were thrown into the river."

"The sky was brilliantly illuminated"

[JimmyCracksCorn]

I was just reminding the Americans about their huuuuuggggggeeeeee debt to the French in the War of Independence.

Everyone knows that. Francophobia is just one of the many gifts Americans inhertited from the mother country.

But seriously, the US Revolutionary War, by its end, was fought largely between French and Hessian troops.

[chequita guevara]

Actually, anti-French feeling dates from DeGaulle in this country. We loved France for a long time, and it wasn't until the 1890s we were reconciled with the mother country.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by JimmyCracksCorn


Everyone knows that. Francophobia is just one of the many gifts Americans inhertited from the mother country.

I don't think that dislike for the French existed in this country until the reign of General Degaulle. I'm not counting a general disgust with the French version of revolution from 1790 to 1815.

But seriously, the US Revolutionary War, by its end, was fought largely between French and Hessian troops.

Not quite. There were fairly few German troops at Yorktown. The colonials had a nasty habit of offering generous land grants in exchange for surrender to the German mercenraies, many of whom were actually abducted from neighboring German principalities. There are tales of German troops charging Yankee lines, throwing down their guns, taking off their uniforms, then after a brief almost symbolic period of imprisonment, being shoiwn to some nice pristine American land for them to farm. There are places in rural Virginia near where some of revolutionary POW camps were located where you'd be hard pressed to find a non-German name on a mail box. Likewise, while French troops were present at Yorktown, they were not the majority of Washington's troops.

[techumseh]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


I might remind you that you were occupying 1/4 of our country before the war even began. After the war, you weren't. You were the mightiest empire in the world, and we threw you out of our country.

Can you explain this bit?

[techumseh]

Originally posted by JimmyCracksCorn


Edit: And its also interesting to note that Britain and Canada were essentially Southern sympathizers during the Civil War. So it makes you wonder...

The British Government favored the Confederates, since the south was a source of cotton for the British textile industry. The industrialized Northern US was, on the other hand, a competitor. Popular sympathy for the South was minimal.

There was little, if any, sympathy for the Southern cause in Canada itself, which was the northern terminus for the Underground Railroad. Many escaped slaves reached Canada and settled here.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by molly bloom
I was just reminding the Americans about their huuuuuggggggeeeeee debt to the French in the War of Independence.

Normandy. We're even

[JimmyCracksCorn]

Dr. Strangelove,

You're correct. I was just exaggerating to make a point.

The British Government favored the Confederates, since the south was a source of cotton for the British textile industry. The industrialized Northern US was, on the other hand, a competitor. Popular sympathy for the South was minimal.

There was little, if any, sympathy for the Southern cause in Canada itself, which was the northern terminus for the Underground Railroad. Many escaped slaves reached Canada and settled here.

I know, but official (or unofficial) support was still with the South. I'm sure, though, that popular support was minimal... although one should consider the fear many Canadians had of a victorious Union army looking for new places to fight. Its no coincidence that Confederation in Canada came only a few years later.

And one should also consider that most escaped slaves in Canada ended up returning to the US after the war.

.... I'm not making any point really, just pointing things out.