On this day 200 years ago in the War of 1812… After defeating, capturing and exiling Napoleon to Elba in April 1814, Britain turned her attention to pursuing its war with the upstart United States. An invasion fleet was dispatched from France across the Atlantic to sail up Chesapeake Bay and attack Washington, which had few of its federal buildings completed, many still under construction, and essentially no defensive armories or forts. A small force sailed up the Potomac captured Fort Washington and on August 29 raided Alexandria, VA. A larger force landed on the western shore of Chesapeake Bay and advancing westward defeated an American force hastily assembled at Bladensburg, MD, on August 24. They government evacuated the city and the British moved unopposed into Washington setting fire to the Capitol, the White House and other Federal buildings. That night, however, the city was hit by a very strong storm, possibly a hurricane, that spawned tornadoes. One tornado destroyed the British encampment at the Capitol and killed more men than had been killed by the Americans at Bladensburg during the day. The storm’s rain did put out the many fires in Washington which lacked an organized fire fighting force. The larger part of the British fleet moved up the Chesapeake, landed the remaining forces to advance on the larger and better defended city of Baltimore. Lacking land artillery, on September 13 the British ships took up positions to bombard Fort MacHenry at the entrance to Baltimore Harbor. The bombardment continued all through the night with cannons and more spectacular but less damaging rockets. Francis Scott Key, a Baltimore lawyer taken on board a British ship to negotiate an exchange of prisoners, witnessed the oversized flag flying over Fort MacHenry at sunrise on September14, and penned the poem (lawyers were more eloquent in those days) that was later set to the tune of a popular drinking song, To Anacreon in Heaven. https://youtube/watch?v=zDKfw8nysLA
Posted on: Sun, 14 Sep 2014 16:41:58 +0000