Tag: British Empire

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Melanesian cargo cults and the unquenchable thirst of consumerism

Credit: https://godshotspot.wordpress.com/2016/05/02/the-cargo-cult-belief/[/caption]

Outsiders come to the islands

During the Second World War, the US Army’s ‘island hopping’ strategy saw its troops occupy small, relatively unguarded but well-located islands in the South Pacific. From there, they could embark upon their path to invade Japan. In avoiding major islands and focusing on island hopping, American soldiers came into contact with people who had, until then, had little or no contact with the outside world. The G.I.s came with aeroplanes, manufactured goods, modern medicine, canned food and guns: all of which were new concepts to the islanders.

Perceiving new technologies

Having been colonised by the British Empire, the people of Tanna, a small island in what is now Vanuatu, had already encountered Westerners. Mass-produced goods, however, were new to them. Sci Fi writer Arthur C. Clarke’s assertion that ‘any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic’ was proven true: it wasn’t long before cults worshipping the American goods appeared in islands around the Pacific. Most notably, they cropped up in the islands of Vanuatu, Fiji and New Guinea.

The John Frum cargo cult

These foreigners and their apparently miraculous supplies caused the people of Tanna to mix their existing beliefs (which included an anti-colonialist cult as well as Keraperamun, a volcano god) with their new experiences. The result came to be known as the John Frum cargo cult. To this day, the members of the cult worship a god named John Frum, who is usually depicted as an American solider in full uniform. A neighbouring cult from the same island also worships a god called Tom Navy. These were not considered to be ‘new’ gods, but instead extensions of their existing deities.

Absence leads to fetishism

As the war came to an end, the Americans went back home. The islanders, however, continued to worship their newly evolved deities in an effort to convince the gods to return and bring with them an abundance of cargo. To the people of Tanna, John Frum, Tom Navy and the other deities became messianic figures who would one day return in ships and aeroplanes laden with fascinating goods. A kind of fetishism emerged, as members of the John Frum cargo cult started to build symbolic runways out of bamboo. Adding to this, they erected wooden air control towers and designed life-size replicas of aeroplanes out of the wood and straw from the island. [caption id="attachment_8823" align="aligncenter" width="500"] Members of the John Frum cult with a replica of an aeroplane. Credit: http://purgingtalon.com/diabologue/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/cargocult1.jpg[/caption] In 1957, this fetishism progressed further as the newly formed ‘Tanna Army’ emerged. It is a non-violent organisation that emulates the public parades and military mannerisms of the American army. Its ‘soldiers’ dress in red, white and blue; and to this day, a parade occurs on the 15th of February every year.

So what are the Melanesian cargo cults?

The definition of ‘cargo cults’ has thrown up a multitude of problems. In 1948, anthropologist Lucy Mair wrote ‘the motive force of cargo cult is a feeling of hopeless envy of the European with his immensely higher material standards’. This is by no means an accepted analysis of the movements; but it presents an interesting juxtaposition of the cults with modern consumerism. Loosely, we can now say that they are organised social movements of people in pursuit of ‘cargo’ by means of ritual action. Whether the cults were nativistic, and thus concerned with reviving waning traditions, or iconoclastic, and thus focused on replacing local culture with Western substitutes, continues to be subject to debate. We can say with absolute certainty, though, that over the past 7 decades, these movements have played a pivotal role in developing the communities and cultures currently in play on the islands of Vanuatu. Where there are leaders and prophets of these cults, they are concerned with social harmony and order. They insist that in order for new cargo to arrive on the islands, certain social rules have to be followed. Moral renewal and collectivism over individualism are common themes: to love one another, to perform different kinds of sexual relationships, and the rejection of stealing, lying and cheating. No order, no cargo. A prominent writer and researcher on the cargo cults, Peter Worsley, has argued that cargo cults ‘weld previously hostile and separate groups together into a new unity’ and that ‘by projecting his message on to the supernatural plane’, a cargo cult luminary establishes that his leadership ‘transcends the narrow province of local gods and spirits associated with particular clans, tribes or villages’.

Cargo cults: a comforting reflection of the human condition

Despite having largely faded away, stories of cargo cults are constantly doing the rounds. A quick internet search of the term will throw up seemingly endless analyses and hypotheses; and if you are so inclined, you can purchase a bottle of John Frum alcohol to sip at your leisure. Many documentaries have been made about the faction that specifically worships Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. So why the obsession? Simply put, they epitomise modern, consumerist desire. It is a desire that cannot be satiated. We have endless opportunities to shop for our own cargo, and yet the acquisition of goods never seems to satisfy us. When we get our cargo, it doesn’t quash the desire. It intensifies it. Unending desire and the constant strive to be better, have more, and achieve dominance is human nature – whether it’s on the shores of Tanna or in the heart of Manhattan. To Westerners, cargo cults seem to be as futile as they are relatable. It’s the modern condition, reflected in a place that feels like another world.]]>

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The Irish Fright of 1688: racism, rumours and the reign of fake news

here). Often, outbreaks occur in small, tight-knit groups, due to the intensity of collective thinking. But if common thought is scaled up, hysteria can still occur. The Irish Fright of 1688 is a solemn reminder that when a prejudiced ideal is held by an entire country, fear can hypnotise the human mind into insanity. All it needs is a catalyst: political instability. [caption id="attachment_8768" align="aligncenter" width="600"] Anti-Irish propaganda continued for centuries: this cartoon is from ”Punch” magazine, published in December 1867. Credit: Wikimedia Commons[/caption]

The 17th Century Englishman’s understanding of the Irish

The trope of the ‘wild Irishman’ had been a firm narrative of the British Empire for centuries. Negative stereotypes appear as far back as 1190, with the Norman chronicler Giraldus Cambrensis justifying the Norman invasion of Ireland. He penned Topographia Hibernica, or Topography of Ireland, which played a lasting role in shaping English colonial attitudes towards the Irish. More than just poor and uncultured, the Irish were painted as unholy. In The Anglo-Irish Experience, 1680-1730: Religion, Identity and Patriotism, historian DW Hayton says: “the native Irish were called ‘a brutal race that Israel’s God ne’er knew’”. Conditioned by a racist misconception of the Irishman, the English people had a well-established fear. With political instability nibbling at their heels, they were primed for acts of mob mentality.

Political instability rocks England

When King James II took the throne after the death of the ‘Merry Monarch’ Charles II, his policies of religious tolerance were met with opposition from the political powers. Troubled by the new King’s Catholicism and his close ties with France, they were increasingly outspoken about the king’s unsuitability for the throne. Prior to the birth of James II’s son on 10th June 1688, the heir presumptive had been his 26-year-old daughter Mary, a Protestant married to William of Orange.  This change in the line of succession meant that the establishment of a Roman Catholic dynasty seemed ever more likely. In private, Tories and Whigs worked together to bring William of Orange to England to perhaps quell any danger of rising Catholic influence.

Irish soldiers come to Portsmouth

On his ascension to the throne, James had inherited an army in Ireland. It was made up of 8,238 men; majority Protestant. Over the next three years, the army would welcome some Catholic soldiers and grow to have almost 9,000 men. Due to the looming threat of an expected invasion by William of Orange, the English Army needed support from Irish troops. When 2,820 men were sent to Portsmouth in September 1688, the townspeople were suspicious. Fear began to spread. A few weeks after the Irish soldiers arrived, a newspaper reported that people were making “great complaints of the rude Irish who have caused many families to leave that place, having committed many robberies.” Rather than robberies, the true fear of the local people was that Irish or Catholic forces were in a fine position to launch an anti-Protestant uprising. In fact, just a few years earlier, the House of Lords had announced that there was a “horrid and treasonable Plot and Conspiracy, contrived and carried on by those of the Popish Religion in [Ireland], for massacring the English, and subverting the Protestant Religion, and the ancient established Government of that Kingdom.” As the Glorious Revolution to overthrow James II took hold, the Irish troops were ordered to go north to fight in the Battle of Reading on 9th December 1688. After a sorry defeat, some Irish troops were sent back to Portsmouth; some to Uxbridge, just west of London.

The Irish Fright grips England

One account from 1746 quotes Bishop Gilbert Burnet: “Country Fellows, arriving about Midnight at Westminster caused a sudden Uproar by Reporting that the Irish, in desperate Rage, were advancing to London, and putting all before them to Fire and Sword.” Other news writers passed similar comment, immediately igniting enough panic for 100,000 men to mobilise. Contemporary accounts tell us that men were discharging firearms and beating drums rapidly. Women were able to contribute more significantly to the din by beating pots and pans. False reports flew about the country. Allegedly, Uxbridge had been ransacked by the Irish. The House of Lords even had an emergency meeting at 3am in Whitehall to dissect the situation. Rather than subsiding due to lack of evidence, the Irish Fright snowballed. The following day, hysterical reports that the Irish were attacking Kent and Norfolk caused people to mobilise. People living in Kingston-upon-Thames started to cut down trees to barricade themselves against the ‘wild Irishman’. Madness swept northwards. By 15th December, Yorkshire succumbed to the Fright; believing that both the Lancastrians and the Irish were coming to burn their towns to the ground. Three days later, the Fright reached remote parts of England and Wales. On 18th December, a local mob shot and killed a supposed Irishman. As it turned out, he was an exciseman; someone they might have been happy to see the back of anyway. Significantly, the reports feeding from one town to the next talked about “8 or 9,000 Bloody Irish,” despite only 2,820 men having been stationed in Portsmouth originally. Hayton comments: “This panic was the climax to a decade of Whig propaganda, seeking to terrify the English public with the traditional nightmare of bloodthirsty Irish papists. That the programme worked so well proved the persistence in England of the popular reputation of the Irishman as a cruel savage, though it did require a political crisis to realise its full potential.”

The fallout of the Fright

Contemporary accounts tell us that at least 19 counties were swept up into the Irish Fright. All displayed a similar narrative: an onslaught of bloodthirsty Irishmen were said to have massacred the inhabitants of towns only around a day’s journey away. The panic burned brightly for a day or two before subsiding. Although the exciseman was the only casualty, innocent Catholics were targeted. A diarist noted: “[Protestant mobs] made most miserable of all the papists’ [Catholics’] houses they came near; for, under pretence of seeking for arms, they did many thousands of pounds worth of hurt, cutting down rich hangings, breaking through walls, pulling in pieces of excellent ceilings … then they secured all the papists they could get, intending to carry them all away to prison.” [caption id="attachment_8769" align="aligncenter" width="600"] Anti-Irish propaganda from ”Punch” magazine, published in May 1882. Credit: Wikimedia Commons[/caption] For all of its insanity, the Irish Fright was not a standalone, freak occurrence. Historians agree that it bore a striking resemblance to the French Great Fear of 1789, which followed the fall of the Bastille. In both uprisings, false rumours of massacres caused men and women to take up arms. Concerns about a collapsing regime, coupled with the cold realisation that no central authority could protect the people, resulted in a volatile civilian situation. With its echoes throughout history pointing towards a continuing relevance, the Irish Fright is a startling reminder of the power of a racist narrative in times of political instability.]]>

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Detention Camps and Surveillance, Britain Responds to Mau Mau Uprising

kar-mau-mau

concentration camps created in the Boer War. 1.5 million Kikuyu, Embu and Meru civilians were feared to hold allegiances to the Mau Mau. As Dr Huw Bennet wrote in a 2015 Guardian article: “Africans living in the so-called Kenya Emergency areas were deemed guilty until proven innocent.” The majority of those people living in the Emergency Area were either sent to detention camps or forcefully relocated to new villages where they could be kept under heavy surveillance. Official records described these detention camps as rehabilitation centres, places where occupants received classes in home-crafts and civics. Any acts of violence or brutality reported were deemed isolated incidents, exceptional cases far from the norm. It is a description which matches the broader narratives given by defenders of the British Empire, a description that suggests a benevolent, civilising imperialist force. As the years went on however, sickening cracks started to appear in this account of British involvement in the Mau Mau uprising. Accusations of torture, beatings and sexual assault in the detention camps started to arise. Recent work by historians such as Bennet, David Anderson and Caroline Elkins has started to unravel the scale of the detention camp system. The figure for the number of detainees has been brought into question. Official accounts state 80,000 were held in the camps, while Elkins’ work suggests that number was in fact somewhere between 160,000 and 320,000. Meanwhile, the work of journalists and investigators at the time who exposed human rights abuses has also been revisited, helping paint a more detailed image of what truly happened. A pivotal question is to what extent the abuses at the camps in Kenya were the result of British government policy, as opposed to the excesses of individuals. It’s a controversy which garnered particular attention in 2014, when a group of elderly Kenyans launched a £200 million damages claim against the UK Government. In 2013, then UK foreign minister William Hague had admitted “The British government recognises that Kenyans were subject to torture and other forms of ill-treatment at the hands of the colonial administration”. Still, the true extent of the atrocities in the Mau Mau uprising and the level of complicity of the British government remain shrouded in ambiguity, in large part due to severe gaps in the records available. The eight years of the Mau Mau uprising saw 1,800 African civilians killed, an unknown number of Mau Mau rebels killed, 32 white settlers killed and 200 British soldiers killed. Beyond that, it stands as an atrocious moment at the close of Britain’s imperial history, the true extent, nature and meaning of which is still being unraveled. ]]>

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Benin City: A Stunning Metropolis Annihilated By the British Empire

Benin City

Modern estimates suggest that at one point the walls were four times longer than the Great Wall of China, using up to a hundred times more material than the Great Pyramid of Cheops. Beyond the city limits, further walls were constructed to divide the surroundings of the capital into around 500 distinct villages. This complicated network of walls was all dug by hand, the mosaic of settlement boundaries covering 6,500 sq. km in total. Huge metal lamps fueled by palm oil lined the city’s streets, a precursor to modern street lighting. When the Portuguese first laid eyes on the city in the middle of the jungle, they classified it as one of the most beautiful, well designed cities in the world. Lourenco Pinto, the captain of a Portuguese ship, observed in 1691: “Great Benin, where the King resides, is larger than Lisbon, all the streets run straight and as far as the eyes can see. The houses are large, especially that of the king which is richly decorated and has Fine columns. The city is wealthy and industrious. It is so well governed that theft is unknown and the people live in such Security that they have no door to their houses.” Now, nothing of that city, believed to have been founded in 900 CE, remains. A new city has been built on the site, but no traces of the original’s unique splendor can be seen. The first centuries of European contact had seen Benin City enjoy a mutually beneficial trade relationship with Portugal. That all started to change in the nineteenth century, however, as Britain and other imperial powers upped their exploitation of Africa, moving from trading to the more profitable system of direct colonial take over. By 1884, chiefs of a plethora of tribes in the Niger Delta had signed treaties placing their people under the protection of the British crown. A protectorate government was set up with a headquarters in Calabar, and the area of British interest in the region continued to expand. By 1886 the activities of the Royal Niger Company had engulfed the area surrounding Benin, but the Oba (king) of Benin refused to sign up to the same treaties. For years Benin held out against many of the trading and other demands made by the British, yet the situation became increasingly perilous for the increasingly isolated kingdom. As Dr. Victor Osaro Edo wrote in 2009: “The fall of Benin from 1885 onwards became inevitable.” A trigger came in January 1897, when the Acting Consul-General in the region: James Phillips, led a large delegation to Benin City. The delegation hadn’t made their intentions clear and were making their visit during the Igue festival, when the Oba was not supposed to receive any visitors. What the expedition’s real intentions were is still debated, but Phillips’ unannounced arrival was seen as an invasion and intercepted by the Oba’s forces. In the ensuing battle, only two officers survived of the roughly 200 people in Phillips’ party. The retaliation by the British forces, known as the Benin Expedition, was swift and brutal. A large British force of 1,200 soldiers, at the time labelled the Punitive Expedition, was deployed. In February 1897, the machine gun bearing troops arrived at Benin, their orders were to conquer the city. Fierce fighting ensued, the Benin forces resisting for 17 days before the British expedition (including a large force of African recruits) took the Kingdom. What followed was a wave of destruction, the people of the city forced to flee as the invaders burnt it to the ground. The Oba’s palace was destroyed, while he was forced to live the rest of his life in exile in Calabar. The cultural relics of the city: ivory and bronze sculptures, were looted and then sold off to pay for the Benin Expedition. Today, around a thousand Benin bronzes can still be found in public and private collections around the globe, most notably in Britain but also elsewhere. These artefacts of the kingdom are relics of the achievements of the great city of Benin, and a powerful reminder of its fate at the hands of British imperialism. ]]>

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The Woman Who Exposed British Concentration Camps

Emily Hobhouse (1)

Second Boer War. A fierce campaigner, she launched a sensational attack on the British parliament in 1901, in the middle of one of the most controversial wars in the country’s history. “The picture of apathy and impatience displayed here, which refused to lend an ear to undeserved misery, contrasted sadly with the scenes of misery in South Africa, still fresh in my mind. No barbarity in South Africa was as severe as the bleak cruelty of an apathetic parliament.” During the Second Boer War, British forces rounded up Boer men, women and children from the South African countryside and placed them in concentration camps. The measure, which particularly targeted farmers, was a means to combat the guerrilla warfare being waged by Boer forces against the British in the republics of Transvaal and the Orange Free State. These camps, which had sprung up around the two republics and housed thousands of people, 115,000 in the period between June 1901 and May 1902, represent one of the biggest atrocities in British history. Between the aforementioned dates, 28,000 Boers died in the camps, 22,000 of them children. At other camps, some 20,000 indigenous Africans died. In total, the death toll through the course of the war accounted for 10% of the Boer population. The main killers were the conditions in the camps; dangerously overpopulated, disease and starvation ran riot. The Boer War was a divisive one in the UK; the Guardian newspaper published exposes revealing the shocking actions carried out by British forces in the name of Lord Kitchener’s ‘scorched earth’ tactics, revelations which were unpopular and led to threats being made against Guardian journalists. More than perhaps anyone else however, Emily Hobhouse, a British social worker who went to South Africa herself to see the conditions in the camps, was crucial in exposing the actions of the British military. Born in Cornwall in 1860, Hobhouse lived a sheltered life under her parent’s roof until she was 35. Following her father’s death, she engaged in temperance work in the USA, before returning to the UK at the dawn of the Boer War. In 1900 she received details of the treatment of Boer women by the British army, and set up the Relief Fund for South African Women and Children, an organisation, in her words, “To feed, clothe, harbour and save women and children – Boer, English and other – who were left destitute and ragged as a result of the destruction of property, the eviction of families or other incidents resulting from the military operations.” On 27th December 1900, Hobhouse arrived in South Africa. Eventually, Lord Kitchener, the British military commander in the region, granted her permission to visit the concentration camp at Bloemfontein, but no others. Her account was published in the Guardian in June 1901. “The exile camp here is a good two miles from the town, dumped down on the southern slope of a kopje (a small, rocky hill), right out in the bare brown veld, not a vestige of a tree in any direction, nor shade of any description.” she wrote in her account. “It was about 4 ‘o’clock on a scorching afternoon when I set foot in the camp, and I can’t tell you what I felt like, so I won’t try.” Hobhouse drew the military authorities’ attention to the unsanitary conditions in the camp, winning improvements and extra provisions. She was eventually allowed to visit some of the other camps, making recommendations to the authorities at each one. Returning to Bloemfontein in March however, the size of the problem became clear. The camp’s population had more than doubled in the two months Hobhouse was away. All the improvements had been rendered useless. Kitchener’s scorched earth policy had seen British troops burn farms, slaughter livestock and poison wells, a tactic which made it impossible for Boer soldiers to resupply from villages and towns. Realising the nature of the British campaign, Hobhouse returned to the UK in the hope of making the government bring what David Lloyd George referred to as a ‘policy of extermination’ to an end. Lloyd George, and several other politicians, attempted to bring the issue to the House of Commons, but they gained little support from other MPs, especially after the Secretary of War declared the prisoners were ‘contented and comfortable’. Hobhouse reacted angrily, launching her poignant attack on the House of Commons. Eventually, in August 1901, the British government set up the Fawcett Commission to investigate the concentration camps. It confirmed the vast majority of what Hobhouse had described, concluding that some 28,000 Boers at least had died in the camps. In October 1901, Hobhouse attempted a second visit to South Africa, but was quickly deported. Following the end of the war, she returned to the Orange River colony, and became involved in work connected to women’s education. A life long opponent of war, she also did relief work in central Europe during World War One. She passed away in London, on 8th June 1926.]]>

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€185 billion – the Cost of the USSR's Occupation Of Latvia

Freedom_Monument_Riga

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Anniversary of Queen Victoria's Death

Queen Victoria

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Slavery Abolition Act Comes into Force

A British Slave Ship

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Earliest Community Leaders in Jamestown Identified

James-Town-church

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The 1812 War; The Birth of the Star Spangled Banner

American Soldiers

American President James Madison Declares War on Britain On June 1, 1812, the fourth American President, James Madison declared war on Britain. His decision was spurred by what he and other congressmen believed to be ongoing issues with the British government. They seemed to have scant regard for American citizens, as the British government would force men to join the Royal Navy without warning, there were trade restrictions imposed as a result of the ongoing war between Britain and France, along with many other complaints. President Madison had surmised that Britain would have been distracted by the current war and Canada (a territory they hoped to capture) would give in easily.  The fact that the American soldiers were low in numbers, and lacking in confidence and discipline, was not seen as an important factor. Due to this poor judgment the war was expected to be quick and easy, it would not be. The United States at that time was in opposition to the ongoing war between France and Britain.  Britain on the other hand saw America as a threat not only because of their stance on the Napoleonic wars but also because their naval empire was growing, leaving Britain feeling vulnerable on the seas. There was also rivalry regarding Britain’s recruitment of what America recognized as naturalized American citizens. The Royal Navy would, without warning, go after British born sailors who had deserted their fleet. While this angered Americans, Britain ignored it and continued. Britain apparently did not take into account that America was uncomfortable with the fact that they did not recognize naturalized American citizens and Britain continued to round them up, leading America to believe that Britain did not think they were not good enough to naturalize former British citizens. After days of deliberations voting was finally complete, and on June 18, more than two weeks after it was declared by the president, the Americans officially began war with Britain by launching their attack at the Canadian borders, seizing parts of what was known then as British North America. Ironically, a peace message was sent by Lord Liverpool on June 23, less than a month after he came into power. Following the assassination of Spencer Percival, the previous Prime Minister, Lord Liverpool’s ascent to the post of Prime Minister came with a need for a change in the relationship between the United States and Britain. Though the peace message was sent, because of the lengthy trip across the continents, President Madison never received it in time. Similar to the lengthy time it took for the message of peace to reach American soil, such was the fate of the declaration of war that was sent by the president. Both Armies Ill-Prepared Though the US army was sparse (with less than 12000 soldiers), an effort was made to expand the army when it became evident that the fighting would go on longer than was anticipated. This proved difficult for the Americans as there were no real motivation for men to willingly want to become a part of the fighting. When up against the British forces they were near powerless as the raw recruits were no match for the highly experienced British soldiers, who had cut their teeth fighting the armies of Napoleon. Another blow to the US army was the lack of funding; the pay was low and was a turn off to potential recruits. Service men involved in the fighting were mostly volunteering and there was a lack of discipline. In fact, more time was spent evading the British army than was spent defending the country. On the other hand for much of the war the British forces were largely engaged in fighting on the European mainland. The US army led by General William Hull, on June 12, 1812, invaded the Canadian town of Sandwich. A month later in Detroit, they surrendered to a smaller group of British soldiers, who were under the command of Major General Isaac Brock. The Americans were adamant in their quest to take over Canada and launched another attack in the Niagara Peninsular some months later. This again proved futile as even though Major General Brock was killed, the British were able to once again defeat them.  This constant defeat prolonged the war longer than The US had hoped. The US army would later reorganize their troops but they were never able to conquer Canada. By 1814, Napoleon had abdicated, giving the British Army more elbow room to focus on the War in America. This placed the war in a different light as Britain could now allow for more troops to be deployed to the US. They sent veteran soldiers to fight led by Major General Robert Ross and Rear Admiral George Cockburn, who were two major players in the Burning of Washington.  An attack was launched on New York, however the American Army was finally getting its composure and had gained requisite experience to be recognized as worthy foes. Britain was not about to acquiesce however, as another attack was launched, this time at Chesapeake Bay. For the British army, the Chesapeake Bay attack was a definite success. The Attack on Washington The attack on Washington was led by Major General Robert Ross and would go down in history as possibly the most brazen attack on the US capital. Such was its severity that there were talks to relocate the capital to another state. British soldiers marched through the streets of Washington and set fire to many public buildings. Word reached the White House that the British soldiers were on their way, before the army had reached the White House, it was abandoned. First lady Dolley Madison stayed behind and, with the help of a few slaves, she was able to secure the valuables before the soldiers arrived. When they did, they did not hesitate to partake of the feast that was prepared for the president’s dinner and then proceeded to destroy the building. Fuel was added to the fire to prolong the burning straight into the night, luckily the walls remained intact and were later restored during a cleanup exercise. The burning of the White House was condemned by many European leaders and Britain was frowned upon for behaving lewdly on international soil. In return Britain lashed out by saying the American had started the war initially, they believed their actions were justified based on the US invasion of Canada. Nonetheless, it had placed Britain in a bad light. Following the burnings, there was an effort to relocate the capital to another state but with quick funding from Washington businessmen, the buildings were hastily restored in time for the inauguration of James Monroe, who succeeded Madison in 1817. Victory for the US and Birth of the Star Spangled Banner Following the attack on Washington, America struggled to secure their dignity and was able to secure one small victory with the battle of Fort McHenry. The British thought it was the perfect place to launch an attack because of the close proximity to the capital, but they were firing from too far out which proved futile. Plans to go ashore for a more intimate attack were abandoned. On the morning after the bombardment, the American flag remained standing proud, signaling victory for the US. The flag flying amidst the darkness of dawn was an observation made by attorney Francis Scott Key which led him to write a poem that eventually became “The Star Spangled Banner”. The song itself was originally written as a poem entitled “Defense of Fort M’Henry”. On September 3, 1814, Scott Key was on a mission to negotiate the release of a popular doctor who had been captured by the British soldiers. Key was selected by the American President to be a prisoner-of- war exchange officer. On the said morning, he and fellow lawyer John Stuart Skinner went aboard Major General Robert Ross’s ship, the HMS Tonnant, to present their case. They bore letters signed by president Maddison and by soldiers vouching for the doctor’s kind-heartedness. They were able to witness first hand planning of the attack by Ross and his fellow soldiers. They were themselves kept prisoner until those plans were executed as they were seen as a threat. They were however able to witness the attack from their own boat and seeing the American Flag waving to signal victory, he was inspired to write the lyrics to “The Star Spangled Banner”. Though Key was the writer, it was on the initiative of Skinner, who Keys showed his work, that the poem was eventually published. The poem was set to a key of an already popular British song known as the “Anacreontic Song”. It was adopted into song and became the US national anthem in 1931 under the guidance of President Herbert Hoover. The Treaty of Gent In 1814, in Belgium at a town called Ghent, both parties agreed to meet and began peace talks. Both the US and Britain had concluded that they had achieved what they intended. Border restrictions were removed and territories that were captured during the war were given back to the party that was the original owner. Many of the issues were resolved, but ironically the issues that had initially led to the war were not mentioned in the treaty.  The treaty of Ghent did not happen overnight, achieving a common decision was a war within itself. Some points were agreed upon while others were in total disagreements. One issue was the migrant slaves who were lured away during the war. To add to their numbers Britain had used a number of tactics to overcome the Americans, one such action being that they welcomed American slaves with open arms, promising them freedom and a ticket to fight against the Americans. Many slaves took advantage of this opportunity and migrated to England and eventually settled in parts of Canada. These slaves were never returned and America thought Britain was being unfair and in violation of the treaty. Britain eventually agreed to reimburse slave owners a sum of $1 204 960. After being at loggerhead five months of negotiations later, they were finally at an agreement. Both America and Britain suffered severe loss and it is still unclear as to who really won. Each country was of the view that they had won the war. Both parties suffered casualties and monetary losses that put their country at a loss. Britain’s debt increased significantly which was one of the factors that led to a closure of the war and talks of peace. Canada was one of the biggest parties to gain as they had successfully retained freedom from United States and still remained a part of the British Empire. “Precis of the Wars in Canada” gives full details on the war as it happened in Canada. The end of the Anglo- American war saw a growing friendship between the two countries and both parties have long since enjoyed over 200 years of peace, described in more recent times as a “special relationship”.]]>