Weather In The War Of 1812

Weather plays an important role in our everyday lives. It determines our daily and weekly forecast that includes sunshine, rain, snow, and storms of several kinds depending on what part of the United States you live in. I believe, the weather also affects our mood, and the clothes we wear. My favorite kind of weather is spring weather. I enjoy the sunny days and cool evenings without that sticky feeling we feel during Texas hot summers. However, weather has played a huge role in American history. For example, it states in a source I researched on this topic “the War of 1812 was a bizarre episode in U.S. History. Both nations went into the war with few clear objectives. Neither were prepared. The campaigns are a litany of tragic, botched
And in the end, everything returning to status quo ante bellum, that is, as they were prior to the war. It raises the question, “Why did we fight?” That large topic is not the subject of this post. I’ll simply say (and perhaps will go more in depth on the matter in a future post) that the war clearly had more to do with western territory than anything else, setting up a pattern for all U.S. wars in the 19th century. The traditional interpretation, which many of us were taught, focuses on the issue of sovereignty on the high seas and the notion of the War of 1812 as the “Second War of Independence.” This misses the point. We had our independence. Our independence was not incomplete nor was it in jeopardy. If shipping rights were the issue then why did the land campaigns focus almost exclusively on our western frontier? By the summer of 1814, two years into the war, the United States was in trouble. One of the first targets in August 1814 was primarily a psychological one. Many British officers were pushing for the burning of Washington D.C. There were certainly more important strategic objectives. But there was a desire to avenge the plundering that Americans had committed in York (now Toronto) and strike a massive blow to American morale” (Historical Digression,
The War Department, the State Department, the Treasury department and many other government offices were burned. And, of course, the Capitol building, with the original Library of Congress, was destroyed. The next day, August 25, as fires still raged, a massive storm hit Washington. The driving rain put out most of the fires threatening the city. Perhaps more important, the invading British were so battered and demoralized, the storm played a large role in the decision to cut short the occupation of