Here in America we are pretty proud of the fact that we kicked British ass 200 or so years ago. I am here to say that it was a fluke. Well not a fluke but more of a happy accident, that we happen to get support from the French when we did was essential. Because, if our declaration of independence happened 25 years or so later than 1776 it would have been a pipe dream and stories would be told of how some rebellious dissenters were defeated quite easily. If at all remembered as anything other than a small skirmish in the Great War for Empire.
And we would be Canada Lite.
For you see, even though the British Navy at the time of our assertion of our rights as Englishmen was strong, it wasn’t the dominant force it became by 1802. And we were pretty damn lucky that by 1812 England was embroiled in a world war with France and Spain because, if they weren’t and they could bring to bear their entire naval force against us during our war with them in 1812 we would have lost what we gained in 1781.
The Napoleonic Wars, were, in essence, the first world war. It took place over the entire globe, included England, France, Turkey, Egypt, Denmark, Russia, Prussia,Austria, Spain, and the North and South American Colonies. The War for All the Oceans: From Nelson at the Nile to Napoleon at Waterloo
The Adkins have a well researched book. Relying on first hand accounts and other primary sources including accounts from ordinary seaman, we get a well rounded picture of the time.
Reading history has always been a favorite pastime of mine. A well written history reads like a novel. There is no bad prose or boring sections. The primary sources and quotes from those sources are weaved seamlessly into the narrative the thesis of the work isn’t forced, just supported and if the historian is really good he’ll offer counters to his thesis and take down those arguments before his reviewers can. The War for All the Oceans doesn’t offer any new or exciting thesis about the might of the English Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. But that isn’t the Adkins’s primary objective in writing this great book. They are telling a story.
It is pretty well established that the dominance of the British Navy allowed England to triumph against Napoleon. That is hardly anything new. But the War for All the Oceans is a compelling narrative about that particular time in naval and world history. We learn from journals, dispatches, the Navy Chronicle, seaman’s letters, and so forth how daily life was either on the ship, at home, as a sailor, officer, Flag Officer, wife, fugitive, prisoner of war, and the authors do a great job in conveying that to the reader.
Daniel Boorstin wrote a great book titles Hidden History, essentially he was writing about that part of history we miss partly because the people that make history rarely leave behind documentation. When they do, however, there is a treasure trove of information. These are the common citizens. Here in The War for All the Oceans we catch a glimpse of the everyday life of the everyday person. Though the focus is on the “Stars” of history, Nelson, Cochrane, St. Vincent, Napoleon, Sidney Smith, we get a rounded view of the times with the inclusion of primary sources from the common citizen.
The last portion of the book takes on the short lived and often forgotten War of 1812. Which, I suspect many people in the United States don’t know much about, other than Francis Scott Key and the Battle of New Orleans. What that little altercation from 1812 to 1814 showed was that the American Navy, at that time consisted of only 6 frigates (three being heavy frigates, The Constitution, The President, and The United States) a fleet of gun boats, and other sloops of war. Nothing at all comparable to the British Navy that floated over 600 ships with 100 being ships of the line with 75 guns or more.
On paper we would have gotten our ass handed to us (and we almost did really, the blockade had dried up our trade and the British Army had taken a few key areas of the US. But since England was still involved with the war against France and nervous and wary about Napoleon they didn’t redeploy their fleet to take on the US. Just sparing a few frigates from the West Indies.
The US Navy had its victories and even impressed the battle hardened sailors and officers of their British counterparts. And for a fledgling nation, the US had better ships, better officers, and better trained men than the French Navy, which had been pretty much made useless by the British in the preceding years.
What Adkins does is put the War of 1812 into context and by default also our Revolution and the Seven Years War (French and Indian War to most of you). Our three colonial wars were really just battles in the Great War for Empire between the French and the British. France and England are rivals in Europe which transferred to the new colonies as each country staked claims in North America and the West Indies. And since those colonies meant huge amounts of wealth, their continental battles moved over the ocean to our shores. And we just happen to have taken advantage of it, unknowingly.
Speaking of the US Navy I have the book Six Frigates: The Epic History of the Founding of the U.S. Navy
I’m glad to hear this one is good. I have it on the shelf waiting to be read. I think you’ll like Six Frigates, it’s a great read.