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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Missed in History Class from how

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Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

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Speaker 1: I'm Sarah Dowdy and I'm to blame a truck rewarding.

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Speaker 1: And just the other day we got an email from

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Speaker 1: listener and Jacob suggesting that we cover the two anniversary

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Speaker 1: of the War of eighteen twelve, and I wrote back

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Speaker 1: telling him, you know, Jacob, your luck. Katie and I

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Speaker 1: recorded not one, but two episodes on the War of

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Speaker 1: eighteen twelve a couple of years back, when was on

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Speaker 1: two Kumsa and the other was on the bombardment of Baltimore.

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Speaker 1: And we'd already been considering revisiting that episode, the Baltimore one,

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Speaker 1: for this Fourth of July, because it's just as patriotic

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Speaker 1: as can be. But Jacob's note made me realize that

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Speaker 1: this is also still a somewhat popular suggestion. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I think it's a good sign when we still get

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Speaker 1: suggestions for topics we've already covered people. Those are clearly

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Speaker 1: the topics people really love. True, probably also because it

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Speaker 1: contains many American history legends, such as why is the

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Speaker 1: White House white? What is the Star Spangled Banner really about?

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Speaker 1: I know a lot of people probably want to know that,

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Speaker 1: and did Dolly Madison really save George Washington's portrait? And

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Speaker 1: because it along with the two comes, the episode covers

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Speaker 1: a largely forgotten war in American history and a time

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Speaker 1: when the United States was really just getting on its feet. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: those are all things that contribute to the War of

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Speaker 1: eighteen twelve being a popular suggestion and just the things

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Speaker 1: you mentioned being being suggested from time to time. So

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Speaker 1: to mark the fourth of July will be real listening

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Speaker 1: to this podcast on the battle or rather the bombardment

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Speaker 1: of Baltimore, So enjoy, Hello and welcome to the podcast.

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Speaker 1: I'm Katie Lambert and I'm Sara Dowdy. And contrary to

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Speaker 1: our title the Bombardment of Baltimore, we are not starting

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Speaker 1: off on a battlefield as you might think, but rather

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Speaker 1: on a brewery floor in Baltimore where several women were

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Speaker 1: piecing together a flag. Yeah. That was Baltimore flag maker

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Speaker 1: in widow Mary Pickersgill, and she had gotten the order

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Speaker 1: for the flag in July of eighteen thirteen from Major

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Speaker 1: George Armistead, and he was the new commander at Fort McHenry,

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Speaker 1: which was a really important defense position for the city

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Speaker 1: of Baltimore was defending the river, and he wanted a flag,

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Speaker 1: an enormous flag that the whole city could see, something

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Speaker 1: really big, thirty by forty two ft, which is about

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Speaker 1: the court a quarter of a basketball court, so larger

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Speaker 1: than even the biggest flag you've probably seen. And he

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Speaker 1: needed that flag soon because the war that had started

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Speaker 1: a year before the War of eighteen twelve was spreading

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Speaker 1: through the country. Action at the Canadian border had leaked

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Speaker 1: down to the Chesapeake Bay where the British were menacing

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Speaker 1: ships and scoping things out. So Armistead knew battle was

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Speaker 1: going to come to Baltimore sooner or later, and so

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Speaker 1: he it in this rush order for his enormous flag

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Speaker 1: from Picker Skill, as well as a smaller storm flag,

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Speaker 1: because you know, when it's raining, you don't want to

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Speaker 1: fly your to rip apart thirty by forty two foot

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Speaker 1: flag and pick or Skill works with three hundred yards

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Speaker 1: of English worsted wool bunting, piecing together red and blue

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Speaker 1: stripes and sewing on fifteen because they're only fifteen stars

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Speaker 1: at the time, um enormous cotton stars. And uh, she

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Speaker 1: carefully picked the wool off the back too, so she'd

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Speaker 1: so on the star and then pick the blue off

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Speaker 1: the back so the white star could show from both sides.

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Speaker 1: So this is a quality flag. She's helped by her daughter,

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Speaker 1: two nieces, and an African American indentured servant, and the

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Speaker 1: women are done by August. They make four hundred and

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Speaker 1: five dollars and ninety cents for the garrison flag, and

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Speaker 1: one hundred and sixty eight dollars and fifty four cents

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Speaker 1: for the storm flag, which was very good money. Flagmaking

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Speaker 1: was a pretty lucrative profession of the time. And it's

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Speaker 1: just in time for Armistead of the British have arrived

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Speaker 1: at the Potapsco River. They're eyeing the city's defenses and

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Speaker 1: they're planning an attack for the following year. But to

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Speaker 1: understand that, we're going to have to go back in

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Speaker 1: time a little bit and give you all some context

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Speaker 1: about the War of eighteen twelve. And at the time

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Speaker 1: armist Did commissioned the flags, it was starting to become

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Speaker 1: pretty clear to a lot of Americans that the country

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Speaker 1: had rushed into a war against Britain. It wasn't strong enough,

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Speaker 1: it wasn't prepared enough to fight against these highly trained troops,

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Speaker 1: and the declaration of war had come in eighteen twelve,

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Speaker 1: and it was over this dispute America had with Britain

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Speaker 1: over maritime rights, and the British had been battling Napoleon

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Speaker 1: for global control for decades, and uh, they didn't like

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Speaker 1: that their former colony, America, which was officially neutral, was

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Speaker 1: trading with both of them. I mean, it's understandable. It

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Speaker 1: seemed to them as though the Americans were aiding Napoleon.

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Speaker 1: But by block in them, they're interfering with American neutrality,

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Speaker 1: which we didn't think was very fair. And not only

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Speaker 1: was it bad for business, it also offended the relatively

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Speaker 1: new America. Historian Douglas Egerton wrote to England still regarded

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Speaker 1: American trade as part of their domain even after the Revolution.

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Speaker 1: And to make matters worse, the British needed all the

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Speaker 1: men it could find to fight in the Napoleonic Wars,

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Speaker 1: so they would impress American citizens, charge them as Royal

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Speaker 1: Navy deserters, and force them into service. And impressment is

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Speaker 1: never very popular, not a good way to win fronts,

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Speaker 1: stealing them off boats and making them join your army.

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Speaker 1: So it's the Warhawks, though, that really pushed this battle

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Speaker 1: ahead in this war. And these are Southerners and Westerners

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Speaker 1: who are mostly too young to have actually seen action

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Speaker 1: in the Revolution, so they're kind of itching for their

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Speaker 1: own war um. But they're also expansionists. They're offended over

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Speaker 1: the violation of the maritime rights. Sure, you know that's

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Speaker 1: a problem. They don't like the impressment, but they're are

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Speaker 1: really eyeing British Canada to the north and Spanish Florida

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Speaker 1: to the south and hoping that maybe this growing country

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Speaker 1: can grow a little more, and they think Canada will

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Speaker 1: be easy pickings. Even Thomas Jefferson says, the acquisition of

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Speaker 1: Canada this year, as far as the neighborhood of Quebec,

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Speaker 1: will be a mere matter of marching, and we'll give

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Speaker 1: us an experience for the attack of Halifax the next

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Speaker 1: and the final expulsion of England from the American continent.

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Speaker 1: So basically he thinks we'll just walk in and that

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Speaker 1: will be the end. Yeah, but the warhawks are still

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Speaker 1: just a very small majority in the votes to the

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Speaker 1: Claire war are really really close in both the House

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Speaker 1: and the Senate. It's an unpopular fight in a lot

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Speaker 1: of the country, and actually a year and a half

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Speaker 1: into the war, some of the northern states are actually

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Speaker 1: considering the idea of succession so they could pick up

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Speaker 1: trading again. The idea of war is pretty unpopular with

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Speaker 1: a lot of Brits too, because, after all, Britain is

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Speaker 1: still busy fighting Napoleon, but in a team fourteen Napoleon's

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Speaker 1: defeated and now Britain can focus on the conflict happening

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Speaker 1: in North America. And focus they do, dispatching five thousand

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Speaker 1: troops from Europe and naval support from Bermuda, and their

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Speaker 1: plan is really intense. You know, they finally have full

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Speaker 1: attention to devote to North America, and they're going to

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Speaker 1: use their navy to attack coastal areas and then they're

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Speaker 1: going to use the army to take the east coast cities.

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Speaker 1: And they're hoping that all of this action will distract

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Speaker 1: Americans from the battles that are going on at the

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Speaker 1: northern boundaries between the Canadians and the Natives and the British.

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Speaker 1: So during that scouting mission the Brits were doing in

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Speaker 1: eighteen thirteen that made Armistead really want to get this

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Speaker 1: flag of flying they had decided that taking Washington and Baltimore,

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Speaker 1: the third biggest city in the country, would be a

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Speaker 1: piece of cake, and that it would be payback for

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Speaker 1: the American sacking of York, which is of course Toronto.

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Speaker 1: And they've put Vice Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane in charge

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Speaker 1: of the naval forces, in Major General Robert Ross in

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Speaker 1: charge of the land forces. And one important thing to

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Speaker 1: note with a lot of the British troops is they

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Speaker 1: are fresh out of the Continental Wars, so these are

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Speaker 1: seasoned soldiers and they really know what they're doing, contrary

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Speaker 1: to the American forces, which don't have much training, and

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Speaker 1: a lot of them are commanded by revolutionary veterans who

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Speaker 1: are getting up there and um haven't really fought in

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Speaker 1: a serious war in decades. The British plan is to

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Speaker 1: attack Washington first since it would be off guard, and

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Speaker 1: they're right. The Americans are totally expecting Baltimore to be

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Speaker 1: attacked first, since that's where all the privateers are. Actions

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Speaker 1: started June eighteen fourteen, when American commodore Joshua Barney sailed

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Speaker 1: south from Baltimore to fight the British on one of

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Speaker 1: their island naval bases, but he couldn't get out of

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Speaker 1: the mouth of the Potomac and was forced to retreat.

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Speaker 1: So he holds up in St. Leonard Creek and the

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Speaker 1: Brits can't get to him there, so they raid the area,

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Speaker 1: burning plantations, kind of trying to lure him out to

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Speaker 1: engage again. And um, he finally does come out, they fight,

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Speaker 1: he's able to escape up the Patuxent River, and um,

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Speaker 1: the British change their plan of attack. They're going to

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Speaker 1: have a three pronged approach and the plan is to

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Speaker 1: divert American forces all while while pressing on towards Washington.

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Speaker 1: So the American forces will wonder are they going for Washington, Baltimore,

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Speaker 1: which way are they going to go? What's going on?

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Speaker 1: And just this sense of confusion will be created. By

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Speaker 1: August twentieth, more than four thousand troops have disembarked at

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Speaker 1: Benedict on the Potoxant River, which wasn't far from the city,

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Speaker 1: and smaller ships continued upstream and these are the British.

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Speaker 1: Right sorry, Barney was ordered to destroy his flotilla at

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Speaker 1: Pig Point to prevent its British capture. So things aren't

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Speaker 1: looking great for Americans at this point. So the British

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Speaker 1: decided to take the route to Washington through Bladensburg, and

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Speaker 1: they do run into American troops along the way, but

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Speaker 1: the Americans are so unorganized there's hardly a fight. They

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Speaker 1: flee and the Battle of Bladensburg is just this terrible humiliation.

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Speaker 1: I mean, Washington has no protection now. And by August

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Speaker 1: the British arrived in the capital and they burn the

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Speaker 1: Library of Congress, They burned the capital, the Treasury, departments

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Speaker 1: of State, War and Navy, and the Executive Mansion, which

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Speaker 1: is of course not the White House at this time

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Speaker 1: um and the President and his cabinet actually have to

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Speaker 1: flee the city because they're concerned about what might happen

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Speaker 1: to them. We owe some thank yous to some quick thinkers,

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Speaker 1: like First Lady Dolly Madison, who made an arrangement to

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Speaker 1: protect some White House treasures. She stuffed Congressional papers into

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Speaker 1: chests and waited for word from her husband, and when

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Speaker 1: it became clear that he wouldn't be able to come

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Speaker 1: back and she would have to flee, she wrote to

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Speaker 1: her sister, our kind friend Mr Carroll has come to

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Speaker 1: hasten my departure. And in a very bad humor with

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Speaker 1: me because I insist on waiting until the large picture

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Speaker 1: of General Washington is secured and it requires to be

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Speaker 1: unscrewed from the wall. This process was found too tedious

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Speaker 1: for these perilous moments. I have ordered the frame to

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Speaker 1: be broken and the canvas taken out. It is done,

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Speaker 1: so thanks to Dolly for that one. Well, and we

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Speaker 1: also get things like the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

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Speaker 1: They're all rescued from the State Department, and there's a

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Speaker 1: clerk who has been left in charge of the Senate

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Speaker 1: archival materials, and he tells his boss basically, either help

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Speaker 1: me get these documents out of Washington, or I'm going

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Speaker 1: to do it by myself. And it ends up being

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Speaker 1: the clerk in an African American office messenger who confiscate

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Speaker 1: a wagon and then loaded up with twenty five years

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Speaker 1: worth of Senate archives, which I mean, this is the

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Speaker 1: early history of our country that would be lost in

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Speaker 1: a fire. Sad. It should be clear that it's not

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Speaker 1: just this huge burning of the city. It's very controlled.

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Speaker 1: The British are hitting specific targets and they don't go

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Speaker 1: about looting or burning private homes there's actually a tornado

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Speaker 1: shortly after the burning that hurts and kills more people,

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Speaker 1: but there are some casualties. We lose three thousand books

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Speaker 1: in the Congressional Library that are completely destroyed, but re

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Speaker 1: established later with the purchase of Thomas Jefferson's private collection.

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Speaker 1: So the American troops, who are exhausted and defeated and

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Speaker 1: because they know that is where the fight is heading next.

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Speaker 1: And it's starting to seem like a pretty bad idea

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Speaker 1: to have declared war on Britain. But that brings us

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Speaker 1: to our Battle of Baltimore, our bombardment toe. We like alliteration.

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Speaker 1: The British troops join up with the fleet at Benedict

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Speaker 1: and head down the protection and up the Chesapeake Bay

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Speaker 1: towards Baltimore, and as Sarah wrote in her notes, there's

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Speaker 1: going to be a SmackDown. It's true that Baltimore privateers

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Speaker 1: have captured all these British ships over the course of

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Speaker 1: the war or destroyed them, and I mean the British

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Speaker 1: are looking for some payback time. All the privateers are

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Speaker 1: based here. It's a very wealthy city. Baltimore is going

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Speaker 1: to suffer at a greater extent than Washington did. General

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Speaker 1: Ross's British troops landed at north Point, Maryland on September twelve,

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Speaker 1: moving in toward the city, but they ran into the

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Speaker 1: American forward line that was actually prepared this time, and

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Speaker 1: Ross was killed in the fight by a sharpshooter. So

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Speaker 1: the surprised British make camp on the battlefield and planned

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Speaker 1: to attack again the night of September. And meanwhile, the Navy,

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Speaker 1: having already successfully attacked Alexandra, Virginia, UH is ready to

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Speaker 1: strike Fort and Kenry, which we mentioned at the beginning.

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Speaker 1: It's that crucial defensive point for Baltimore. It's it's the

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Speaker 1: key to the city. Yeah, And so the ships opened

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Speaker 1: fire on September and they lobby these one hundred and

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Speaker 1: ninety pound shells at the fort, and it's a new

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Speaker 1: arms technology where the shells actually explode, and so some

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Speaker 1: of them that don't quite reach their targets explode in

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Speaker 1: the air. You might call them bombs bursting in air.

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Speaker 1: It's a little hint for where we're going. But one

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Speaker 1: commander at the fort even finds a note written on

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Speaker 1: an unexploded shell, a present from the King of England,

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Speaker 1: which sounds like a scene out of a movie, or

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Speaker 1: it also reminded us of the Saint Paul's Watch Pie. Definitely,

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Speaker 1: things look bad for Baltimore because the ships are out

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Speaker 1: of Fort McHenry's range of fire, so they can't fight

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Speaker 1: back and they just have to sit there and take

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Speaker 1: it for twenty five hours. The British fire all day

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Speaker 1: long through the thirteenth and into the pre dawn hours

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Speaker 1: of the fourteenth, shooting one hundred and thirty three tons

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Speaker 1: of shells at the four which is nearly one per minute,

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Speaker 1: and people as far away as Philadelphia can hear the

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Speaker 1: racket from the Baltimore attack. And there's one important thing though,

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Speaker 1: The British can't advance either, so they can sit there

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Speaker 1: out of range of the gun fire at them all day,

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Speaker 1: but they can't get any closer because when they do,

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Speaker 1: the fort is actually able to hit them and does

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Speaker 1: some serious damage when the ships try to advance in

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Speaker 1: the afternoon of the thirteen and they're not doing too

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Speaker 1: much danger to the fort either. Only four men are

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Speaker 1: killed twenty four wounded, but out of one thousand, that's

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Speaker 1: not so many, and by dawn Admiral Cochrane halts the assault,

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Speaker 1: so it's rained the whole day and the whole night

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Speaker 1: of the attack. So it's likely that the fort was

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Speaker 1: probably flying its smaller storm flag, we should note that.

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Speaker 1: But as the British ships maneuver around to leave, Major Armistead,

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Speaker 1: who's in charge of the fort, orders that they hoist

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Speaker 1: the huge garrison flag that he's commissioned in fire rounds

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Speaker 1: in defiance of the retreating ships. So it's this very

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Speaker 1: patriotic moment Baltimore has pulled through, and lawyer and poet

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Speaker 1: Francis Scott Key has been watching the bombardment from a

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Speaker 1: ship in the bay. He was detained in the battle

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Speaker 1: after negotiating the release of an American and a Kinsman,

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Speaker 1: so all day long he's been able to see what

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Speaker 1: was likely the smaller storm flag flying from the fort,

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Speaker 1: knowing it was still in American hands. But at night

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Speaker 1: he can't see anything and doesn't know what's happening, which

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Speaker 1: must have been scary. Yeah, he wrote, it seemed as

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Speaker 1: though mother Earth had opened and was vomiting shot and

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Speaker 1: shell in a sheet of fire and brimstone. So he's

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Speaker 1: wondering all night if the Ford is still going to

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Speaker 1: be in American hands. And then at dawn on the fourteenth,

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Speaker 1: he sees that the flag is still flying. He knows

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Speaker 1: the city has made it through the night. It's this

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Speaker 1: grand patriotic moment America is going to make it. After

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Speaker 1: the British leaved, he is so inspired that he checks

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Speaker 1: into a Baltimore hotel and finishes this poem. He started

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Speaker 1: thinking about about the flag, the star Spangled banner, and

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Speaker 1: he sets it to an English drinking song and publishes it.

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Speaker 1: Within a week, it's reprinted nationally, and by November it's

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Speaker 1: been print to as sheet music, and then long after,

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Speaker 1: in nineteen thirty one, it becomes the country's official national anthem.

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Speaker 1: And we'd like to note too that he had been

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Speaker 1: adamantly opposed to the war, but after the White House

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Speaker 1: was burned and Baltimore was attacked, he'd had it. So

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Speaker 1: not too long after Key's poem is set to music,

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Speaker 1: the war is over, and it's partly due to the

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Speaker 1: British loss at Baltimore and again at Lake Champlain. And

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Speaker 1: the British are just getting tired. I mean, they've been

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Speaker 1: fighting Napoleonic wars for that twenty years and they have

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Speaker 1: the taxes to show for it, and they're suffering from

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Speaker 1: the lack of trade with the US. That's a profitable

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Speaker 1: business for the British. The US has also realized that

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Speaker 1: it won't gain any of its objectives, so the two

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Speaker 1: countries work out a piece at the Treaty of Ghent,

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Speaker 1: and there are no major concessions and no major territorial exchanges,

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Speaker 1: so the impressment won't end. But that doesn't matter much anyway,

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Speaker 1: since Britain doesn't soldiers for its continental wars and England

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Speaker 1: promises not to mess with the Canadian boundary or try

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Speaker 1: to set up an Indian state. So really it seems

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Speaker 1: like a bit of a pointless embloid outcome here. No

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Speaker 1: one got anything, doesn't we're going to call it even so.

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Speaker 1: The news of peace comes too late though, to New Orleans,

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Speaker 1: where the British attacked the city and they're held off

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Speaker 1: by Andrew Jackson. Despite the end of the war, but

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Speaker 1: that victory, as well as the victory of Baltimore, kind

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Speaker 1: of help contribute to the American sense that we won

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Speaker 1: the war, and you can give a little credence to

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Speaker 1: it because it does help establish the um. It helps

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Speaker 1: establish American credibility abroad that we were able to fight

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Speaker 1: against UH, the larger world superpower and defend certain American cities.

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Speaker 1: It also gives us a bit of a desire to

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Speaker 1: keep out of Europe's business for a while. And Canada

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Speaker 1: comes out with a similar surge of patriotism because they

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Speaker 1: kept America out, although they remained British. But getting back

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Speaker 1: to the flag, we're not going to finish this podcast

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Speaker 1: before we wrapped that little bit up. Major arm instead

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Speaker 1: takes it home with him. It probably got pretty beat

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Speaker 1: up over the next few years, and he dies pretty

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Speaker 1: young and leaves it to his widow who keeps it

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Speaker 1: in Baltimore, and she takes it out every now and

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Speaker 1: then lends it to big patriotic events and helps sort

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Speaker 1: of build the cult of the Star Spangled banner, and

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Speaker 1: you know, people want to see it and get a

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Speaker 1: look at it in person. And his descendants keep it

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Speaker 1: through the Civil War, even though they have Confederate sympathies,

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Speaker 1: which is a really weird thing to imagine if they're

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Speaker 1: Confederates and here they have the symbol of the country

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Speaker 1: they're rebelling against, and they pass it on through the generations.

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Speaker 1: So later visitors are allowed to take little snippets of it.

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Speaker 1: So over time or flag becomes rather square, and it

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Speaker 1: also be comes a bit of a curse on their family. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: there's all sorts of infighting and it leads to bitterness

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Speaker 1: and paranoia. You know, why should this person get the flag?

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Speaker 1: And I think some of the later descendants feel like

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Speaker 1: they're being hounded by constant requests to to see the

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Speaker 1: flag and hold the flag and get snippets of a

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Speaker 1: family flag feud. Yeah, more lineration and um. One of

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Speaker 1: the family members even note that more battles have been

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Speaker 1: fought over the flag than under it. Finally, an exhausted

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Speaker 1: armistage descendant leaves it to the Smithsonian Institution in nineteen

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Speaker 1: o seven and it is there today. And as for Key,

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Speaker 1: his Georgetown house was removed for a highway in nineteen

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Speaker 1: forty seven, so two stories worth of his brick house

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Speaker 1: were dismantled, packed up and put into storage. But by

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifty every brick had disappeared, which reminded us a

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Speaker 1: lot of the Amber Room. Yeah, it's our American version,

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Speaker 1: I guess. So I really love that quote about the

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Speaker 1: star spangled banner. More battle spot over the flag than

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Speaker 1: under it. It really gave sort of a touch of

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Speaker 1: normalcy to something that's so symbolic and so majestic that

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Speaker 1: you can imagine a family just battling ever over this

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Speaker 1: flag and trying to handle the requests for scraps and

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Speaker 1: opportunities to view it. So hopefully replaying this podcast also

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Speaker 1: gives you some good trivia if you're headed to a

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Speaker 1: Fourth of July barbecue or a fireworks display tonight, and

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Speaker 1: if you're Canadian or British, then maybe really listen to

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Speaker 1: the two comes to episode instead. Well I remember at

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Speaker 1: the time we did get some emails from folks not

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Speaker 1: realizing it was a two potter on the War of

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Speaker 1: eighteen twelve. Uh, it is a very uncertain war. So

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Speaker 1: it's good for anybody to listen to both of those

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Speaker 1: episodes and get kind of two different sides of the story.

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Speaker 1: So anyway, have a great Fourth of July, And if

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Speaker 1: you want to email us some more of these classic

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Speaker 1: American history sort of stories, we are at History Podcast

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Speaker 1: at Discovery dot com. We're also on Twitter at missed

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Speaker 1: in History, and we are on Facebook. And if you

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Speaker 1: want to learn a little bit more about some of

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Speaker 1: the otter artifacts from American history other than just a

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Speaker 1: flat spangled banner. Right. We have an article on our

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Speaker 1: website called ten Strange Items in the Smithsonians Collection, and

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Speaker 1: you can look that up by visiting our homepage at

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Speaker 1: www dot how stuff works dot com for more on

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Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics. Is it how stuff

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Speaker 1: works dot com