President James Madison - Part 2 - Program No. 37

July 18, 2013

The Making of a Nation

From VOA Learning English, welcome to The Making of a Nation, our weekly program of American history for people learning English. I’m Steve Ember.

The United States declared war on Britain in 1812. It did so because Britain refused to stop seizing American ships that traded with France—Britain's enemy in Europe. Sometimes there were also seizures of American sailors. These seizures were known as impressment.

Britain finally suspended its orders against neutral trade, after a change in government. But the British acted too late. The United States had already declared war. Today, we continue the story of the War of 1812.

Most of Britain's forces were battling the soldiers of Napoleon Bonaparte in Europe. Historian and Pulitzer Prize winner Alan Taylor says that, as a result, the British could send only a small force to the United States.

“And so the British were basically fighting the war against the United States on the defensive in Canada, while trying to raid the American coast using their advantage in the more powerful Royal Navy.”

For its part, the United States was far from ready to fight. The United States had not fought a war, or needed an army, for a long time. There were only 8,000 American soldiers. The soldiers who were young knew little about war. And the officers who knew about war were old enough to have led troops in the American Revolution.