British Victory in the War of 1812

TFSmith121

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Well, it's the issue of why aren't there always

Well, it's the issue of why aren't there more Cannae-type victories in war, and the answer is because battlefield commanders are usually functioning with very limited information, under tremendous time and stress pressures, poor communications with their subordinates and superiors, and have to deal with minor things like weather, visibility, geography, topography, hydrography, and the like.

Plus their enemies, of course, who tend to be a) equally capable, and b) have minds of their own.

Very few military forces go into the field with the orders to fight a bloody stalemate, but the vast majority of battles tend not to be "decisive" - and if they are (as Lake Erie was for the U.S., and Lake Champlain) there are larger, almost macro-scale issues in play.

These issues - simple things like time and distance and the U.S. having a mature shipbuilding and shipping industry in the theater, with all that implies for operational readiness and success - has and had a lot more to do with what got Perry and MacDonough to the point their leadership and tactics COULD win victories against Barclay and Downie, for example.

Both the victories at Champlain and Erie had deep foundations, which were unlikely to be supplanted by tactics on the British side or poor leadership on the U.S. side. Perry won an offensive battle despite the poor support from one of his two most powerful ships; MacDonough won a defensive one despite the British (army and navy) having more men deployed than the U.S. did for Champlain/Plattsburgh.

There are reasons both occurred, and they are not - at the base - because either man was a more gifted commander than his opponent (although the evidence suggests each was, in terms of results of their two battles). Both men were gifted commanders, but both also had a supply chain closer at hand then their British opposite numbers, had more experienced men (both in terms of sailors generally and lakers especially), and a host of other advantages that generally came down to time and distance.

Would MacDonough and Perry been able to win comparable "clean sweeps" in the Channel or Irish Sea? Probably not...

Best,
 
Well, it's the issue of why aren't there more Cannae-type victories in war, and the answer is because battlefield commanders are usually functioning with very limited information, under tremendous time and stress pressures, poor communications with their subordinates and superiors, and have to deal with minor things like weather, visibility, geography, topography, hydrography, and the like.

Plus their enemies, of course, who tend to be a) equally capable, and b) have minds of their own.

Very few military forces go into the field with the orders to fight a bloody stalemate, but the vast majority of battles tend not to be "decisive" - and if they are (as Lake Erie was for the U.S., and Lake Champlain) there are larger, almost macro-scale issues in play.

These issues - simple things like time and distance and the U.S. having a mature shipbuilding and shipping industry in the theater, with all that implies for operational readiness and success - has and had a lot more to do with what got Perry and MacDonough to the point their leadership and tactics COULD win victories against Barclay and Downie, for example.

Both the victories at Champlain and Erie had deep foundations, which were unlikely to be supplanted by tactics on the British side or poor leadership on the U.S. side. Perry won an offensive battle despite the poor support from one of his two most powerful ships; MacDonough won a defensive one despite the British (army and navy) having more men deployed than the U.S. did for Champlain/Plattsburgh.

There are reasons both occurred, and they are not - at the base - because either man was a more gifted commander than his opponent (although the evidence suggests each was, in terms of results of their two battles). Both men were gifted commanders, but both also had a supply chain closer at hand then their British opposite numbers, had more experienced men (both in terms of sailors generally and lakers especially), and a host of other advantages that generally came down to time and distance.

Would MacDonough and Perry been able to win comparable "clean sweeps" in the Channel or Irish Sea? Probably not...

Best,

I would never debate that over the long term that America had huge advantages in the lake campaigns. On the lake with more relative parity, Ontario, America never really achieved superiority.

The Detroit was hamstrung at Erie because she had been sorely wounded by Elliot's raid and never had effective fire because a lot of her guns were seized on the raid at York. If Downie hadn't been killed in the opening minutes of the battle at Lake Champlain and Macdonough gets killed in the opening broadside the battle looks a lot different.

I'm not saying the British when every time. All I've been arguing is that victory is achievable.

That was an excellent post about Presque Isle though. A great resource for the future.
 
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