A Primary Source History Of The War Of 1812, by John MIcklos, Jr.

It is probably a bad sign that I did not realize that this book was aiming to be a primary source-based history until after I had finished reading the book.  That is not to say that this book does not contain quite a few references to primary sources, even making its quotation of various papers and letters and other writings marked in different color.  It is more that the book contains rather blunt editorializing and fails to provide the sort of context and explanation for sources that would have drawn attention to the primary source focus that the author was going for.  As far as historical sources for the War of 1812 go, this one is by no means a bad one.  It is short and sometimes terse [1], and as a result lacks the kind of nuance that one would expect and hope for from a historical work, but if you are looking for a generally narrative history of the war you can certainly do worse than this.  I would have liked to have recognized the book as an example of primary source focus as that is something I generally appreciate.

This book is the shortest book I have read on the history of the War of 1812 at just over 30 pages, and that brevity clearly means that it has to be very efficient about what it covers, made all the more dramatic by the fact that the book attempts to incorporate isolated quotes from primary source documents as well, making it somewhat more ambitious than most similar efforts.  The author begins with a discussion about the failures of communication that led the United States to declare war after the British had suspended the articles of impressment that led to rising American hostility.  After that there is a discussion of the causes of the war, particularly as it involved clashing American, British, and native interests in the Midwest.  After that the author discusses the disastrous failure of American efforts to invade Canada at multiple points, and hen spends a short chapter discussing the far-flung naval war in mostly individual ship-to-ship combat.  The author then turns to discuss the British invasion of the United States and closes with a discussion of how the successful American defense led to a victorious peace, after which there are suggestions for further reading as well as an index.

What would have made this book easier to recognize as a primary source-based one?  Well, while the author uses a different color to note quotations from primary sources as opposed to his usual style of editorializing, he could have done a lot more to integrate primary sources into his writing rather than simply picking quotes not in context to burnish his own writing.  Perhaps most interesting of all would have been an approach that provided primary sources that themselves gave the narrative for the events, which may have included the declaration of war, the text of the treaty of Ghent, newspaper reports on battles, letters or memoirs from soldiers and generals and politicians, and even the resolutions of the Hartford Convention that so many people disregard as part of the results of the war from a political perspective.  There are many ways that this book could have put more attention on primary documentation, and that would have been a marked improvement over this book, but while this book is a modest achievement as a volume, it still is worth appreciating.

[1] My favorite example of this terseness is the following reference to the burning of York:

“This time U.S. troops succeeded in capturing York (now Toronto), a major Canadian city.  As they retreated, British soldiers set fire to the powder at their fort.  A huge explosion followed.  It killed and wounded hundreds of U.S. and British soldiers.  Angry U.S. troops burned government buildings.  Some homes were damaged too (17).”