WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.240 When you picture the end of, well, of a major 00:00:03.240 --> 00:00:06.620 multi -year war, you generally expect to see 00:00:06.620 --> 00:00:09.720 lines being permanently redrawn on a map. Right, 00:00:09.900 --> 00:00:12.839 absolutely. You envision some conquering general 00:00:12.839 --> 00:00:16.160 dictating terms, these massive shifts in global 00:00:16.160 --> 00:00:19.199 power, territories changing hands. You basically 00:00:19.199 --> 00:00:21.460 expect a before picture and an after picture 00:00:21.460 --> 00:00:23.750 that look fundamentally different. Because, I 00:00:23.750 --> 00:00:26.629 mean, historically speaking, altering the geopolitical 00:00:26.629 --> 00:00:29.469 reality in your favor is the entire point of 00:00:29.469 --> 00:00:31.910 spending blood and treasure on a conflict. You 00:00:31.910 --> 00:00:34.090 fight to secure a tangible advantage that you 00:00:34.090 --> 00:00:36.429 just you didn't have before the shooting started. 00:00:36.789 --> 00:00:39.210 Exactly. But then you look at the documentation 00:00:39.210 --> 00:00:41.469 surrounding the Treaty of Ghent, which is the 00:00:41.469 --> 00:00:43.729 agreement that ended the War of 1812 between 00:00:43.729 --> 00:00:45.979 the United States and Great Britain. And that 00:00:45.979 --> 00:00:48.320 entire expectation just gets completely flipped 00:00:48.320 --> 00:00:50.799 on its head. Yeah, it really does. So today we 00:00:50.799 --> 00:00:53.380 are taking a deep dive into the historical sources 00:00:53.380 --> 00:00:56.200 detailing this exact treaty. We are looking at 00:00:56.200 --> 00:00:59.399 how a brutal conflict ended with a peace deal 00:00:59.399 --> 00:01:02.060 where literally nothing changed on the map, yet 00:01:02.060 --> 00:01:04.700 it somehow managed to fundamentally shape the 00:01:04.700 --> 00:01:07.219 North American continent. OK. Let's unpack this. 00:01:07.640 --> 00:01:09.420 Yeah. Because treating this as just some dusty 00:01:09.420 --> 00:01:11.840 diplomatic footnote really misses the reality. 00:01:12.159 --> 00:01:15.140 The Treaty of Ghent is like the ultimate geopolitical 00:01:15.140 --> 00:01:17.920 reset button. Yeah, reset button perfectly captures 00:01:17.920 --> 00:01:20.560 the diplomatic mechanism at play here. The treaty 00:01:20.560 --> 00:01:23.480 established a condition known as status quo antebellum, 00:01:23.480 --> 00:01:27.000 which is a Latin phrase translating roughly to 00:01:27.000 --> 00:01:29.879 the state existing before the war. So the two 00:01:29.879 --> 00:01:32.439 nations agreed to restore the exact pre -war 00:01:32.439 --> 00:01:35.159 borders of June 1812. So it was quite literally 00:01:35.159 --> 00:01:38.209 a tie. game on paper exactly a tie game but what 00:01:38.209 --> 00:01:40.510 the source material reveals so vividly is that 00:01:40.510 --> 00:01:42.670 reaching this reset wasn't just a matter of you 00:01:42.670 --> 00:01:45.170 know signing a document and walking away it was 00:01:45.170 --> 00:01:48.170 this chaotic high -stakes standoff that almost 00:01:48.170 --> 00:01:50.750 collapsed the negotiations multiple times and 00:01:50.750 --> 00:01:52.730 to understand how they ended up hitting that 00:01:52.730 --> 00:01:55.250 reset button we'll first have to look at why 00:01:55.250 --> 00:01:57.549 both sides were so desperate to sit down at the 00:01:57.549 --> 00:02:00.129 table in the first place and to do that you can't 00:02:00.129 --> 00:02:01.890 just look at North America right yeah you have 00:02:01.890 --> 00:02:04.069 to look all the way across the Atlantic yeah 00:02:04.069 --> 00:02:06.879 you really do because the entire premise of the 00:02:06.879 --> 00:02:09.539 War of 1812 was intrinsically linked to Europe. 00:02:10.159 --> 00:02:12.500 The British actions that originally sparked the 00:02:12.500 --> 00:02:15.300 conflict with the U .S. were, well, they were 00:02:15.300 --> 00:02:19.300 byproducts of Britain's massive existential struggle 00:02:19.300 --> 00:02:21.780 against Napoleon's France. Right, the Napoleonic 00:02:21.780 --> 00:02:23.900 Wars. Exactly. Britain was fighting for its life. 00:02:24.300 --> 00:02:26.240 And to choke off the French economy, they had 00:02:26.240 --> 00:02:29.039 been blockading American trade with Europe. And 00:02:29.039 --> 00:02:30.819 more provocatively, they were using a practice 00:02:30.819 --> 00:02:33.830 called impressment. Let's clarify the actual 00:02:33.830 --> 00:02:35.889 mechanism of impressment for a second because 00:02:35.889 --> 00:02:38.009 I feel like it sounds almost absurd to modern 00:02:38.009 --> 00:02:40.729 ears. Oh, that's wild. Because British warships 00:02:40.729 --> 00:02:43.810 were literally pulling over sovereign American 00:02:43.810 --> 00:02:46.490 merchant vessels just in the middle of the ocean 00:02:46.490 --> 00:02:49.330 lining up the crew and deciding who looked or 00:02:49.330 --> 00:02:51.530 sounded British. Yep. And then they would just 00:02:51.530 --> 00:02:53.689 kidnap those sailors and force them to serve 00:02:53.689 --> 00:02:56.349 in the Royal Navy. Right. It was a brutal violation 00:02:56.349 --> 00:02:58.969 of sovereignty, but it was driven by the Royal 00:02:58.969 --> 00:03:02.129 Navy's insatiable need for manpower to fight 00:03:02.129 --> 00:03:05.150 the French. The British justified it by claiming, 00:03:05.389 --> 00:03:07.150 well, they were just reclaiming British deserters. 00:03:07.370 --> 00:03:09.569 But thousands of native -born Americans got swept 00:03:09.569 --> 00:03:12.150 up in that, right? Thousands of them, yeah. And 00:03:12.150 --> 00:03:14.250 it was the primary trigger for the United States 00:03:14.250 --> 00:03:18.009 declaring war. But then the geopolitical Earth 00:03:18.009 --> 00:03:23.090 just shifts. In April 1814, Napoleon abdicates 00:03:23.090 --> 00:03:26.780 his throne. He is defeated. Wow. So France is 00:03:26.780 --> 00:03:28.960 suddenly no longer an active enemy of the British 00:03:28.960 --> 00:03:31.379 Empire, which means the European ripple effect 00:03:31.379 --> 00:03:34.039 completely pulls the rug out from under the War 00:03:34.039 --> 00:03:36.860 of 1812 entirely. I mean, if Britain isn't fighting 00:03:36.860 --> 00:03:38.879 France, they don't need to blockade French trade. 00:03:38.900 --> 00:03:40.900 And if they aren't fighting this massive naval 00:03:40.900 --> 00:03:43.379 war, they don't need to kidnap American sailors 00:03:43.379 --> 00:03:45.840 to man their ships anymore. The primary reasons 00:03:45.840 --> 00:03:48.599 for the conflict just evaporated almost overnight. 00:03:48.919 --> 00:03:50.800 It's like, OK, it's like getting into a massive 00:03:50.800 --> 00:03:52.800 fistfight over a parking spot. But halfway through 00:03:52.800 --> 00:03:55.520 the fight, The car gets towed away. That is a 00:03:55.520 --> 00:03:57.439 great way to put it. Like, what are you even 00:03:57.439 --> 00:03:59.659 fighting for anymore? The foundation of the conflict 00:03:59.659 --> 00:04:02.180 just vanishes. And the sources point out that 00:04:02.180 --> 00:04:04.099 President James Madison saw the writing on the 00:04:04.099 --> 00:04:07.039 wall. He formally instructed his diplomats to 00:04:07.039 --> 00:04:09.560 drop the demand to end impressment from the peace 00:04:09.560 --> 00:04:11.879 process. Right, simply because the British had 00:04:11.879 --> 00:04:14.060 already stopped doing it. Meanwhile, the urgency 00:04:14.060 --> 00:04:16.160 on the British side was being driven by immense 00:04:16.160 --> 00:04:18.860 domestic pressure. Lord Liverpool, who was the 00:04:18.860 --> 00:04:21.500 British prime minister, was facing severe backlash 00:04:21.500 --> 00:04:24.660 at home. Because of the cost. Exactly. Britain 00:04:24.660 --> 00:04:26.800 had been funding and fighting wars in Europe 00:04:26.800 --> 00:04:29.600 for over two decades. The British public was 00:04:29.600 --> 00:04:32.100 exhausted by the crippling wartime taxation. 00:04:32.779 --> 00:04:35.259 And beyond just the public, you had these incredibly 00:04:35.259 --> 00:04:38.060 powerful British merchants in port cities like 00:04:38.060 --> 00:04:40.920 Liverpool and Bristol. Just watching their warehouses 00:04:40.920 --> 00:04:43.620 sit empty. Yes. And they were demanding that 00:04:43.620 --> 00:04:46.769 trade with America be reopened immediately. Lord 00:04:46.769 --> 00:04:49.370 Liverpool looked at his ledger and realized Britain 00:04:49.370 --> 00:04:51.870 was bleeding money for a conflict across the 00:04:51.870 --> 00:04:54.430 Atlantic that offered very little strategic return. 00:04:54.949 --> 00:04:57.350 Okay, so both governments have lost their original 00:04:57.350 --> 00:05:00.389 spark for the war. Both are feeling intense. 00:05:00.600 --> 00:05:04.860 domestic pain. So you would think when the diplomats 00:05:04.860 --> 00:05:07.439 finally meet in the neutral city of Ghent in 00:05:07.439 --> 00:05:10.240 August 1814 they would just, I don't know, sign 00:05:10.240 --> 00:05:12.560 a paper and go home. You would think so. Instead 00:05:12.560 --> 00:05:15.220 they spend months locked in this bitter argument. 00:05:15.480 --> 00:05:18.189 If the initial reasons for the war are gone What 00:05:18.189 --> 00:05:20.550 on earth are they fighting over at the negotiation 00:05:20.550 --> 00:05:24.149 table? Well, they pivoted from maritime grievances 00:05:24.149 --> 00:05:27.009 to arguing over the future shape of the North 00:05:27.009 --> 00:05:29.589 American continent itself. Oh, wow. The British 00:05:29.589 --> 00:05:32.410 negotiators arrived in Ghent with a staggeringly 00:05:32.410 --> 00:05:35.089 aggressive opening hand. They saw an opportunity 00:05:35.089 --> 00:05:37.089 to permanently contain the United States, so 00:05:37.089 --> 00:05:39.350 they demanded that Americans be barred from keeping 00:05:39.350 --> 00:05:41.810 any naval forces on the Great Lakes. Right. They 00:05:41.810 --> 00:05:44.009 demanded permanent transit rights down the Mississippi 00:05:44.009 --> 00:05:46.879 River. But... Their most explosive demand was 00:05:46.879 --> 00:05:49.579 the creation of a massive British sponsored indigenous 00:05:49.579 --> 00:05:53.060 state in the former Canadian Southwest. And geographically, 00:05:53.100 --> 00:05:54.759 just to give you an idea, we are talking about 00:05:54.759 --> 00:05:57.139 carving out an area from modern day Ohio all 00:05:57.139 --> 00:06:00.019 the way west to Wisconsin and making it an independent 00:06:00.019 --> 00:06:03.589 nation. Right. For decades, a core British strategic 00:06:03.589 --> 00:06:05.870 goal had been to establish a permanent buffer 00:06:05.870 --> 00:06:08.670 state. They wanted to block American westward 00:06:08.670 --> 00:06:10.910 expansion and protect the vulnerable Canadian 00:06:10.910 --> 00:06:13.769 provinces. They wanted this Indigenous territory 00:06:13.769 --> 00:06:17.009 recognized internationally as a sovereign barrier. 00:06:17.290 --> 00:06:19.470 So I'm looking at the American response to this, 00:06:19.529 --> 00:06:22.410 which was led by John Quincy Adams, and it is 00:06:22.410 --> 00:06:25.230 essentially a diplomatic brick wall. Oh, complete 00:06:25.230 --> 00:06:28.430 brick wall. He completely rejected the idea of 00:06:28.430 --> 00:06:30.910 including indigenous nations in a bilateral treaty 00:06:30.910 --> 00:06:33.509 between the US and Britain. He essentially made 00:06:33.509 --> 00:06:36.569 this sweeping imperial claim that the United 00:06:36.569 --> 00:06:39.290 States possess total sovereignty over all peoples 00:06:39.290 --> 00:06:41.949 and lands within its drawn boundaries and that 00:06:41.949 --> 00:06:44.649 Britain had absolutely no right to act as a protectorate 00:06:44.649 --> 00:06:47.290 for anyone inside those lines. argued there was 00:06:47.290 --> 00:06:49.910 zero diplomatic precedent for a European power 00:06:49.910 --> 00:06:52.410 negotiating on behalf of indigenous tribes within 00:06:52.410 --> 00:06:55.610 another recognized nation's borders. To agree 00:06:55.610 --> 00:06:57.670 to this buffer state would mean the United States 00:06:57.670 --> 00:07:00.370 formally abandoning massive swaths of territory 00:07:00.370 --> 00:07:02.910 it claimed as its own sovereign soil. Here's 00:07:02.910 --> 00:07:05.410 where it gets really interesting. The source 00:07:05.410 --> 00:07:07.970 material includes a direct quote from Henry Goldburn, 00:07:08.069 --> 00:07:09.870 who was one of the British negotiators. Right. 00:07:09.910 --> 00:07:12.350 I love this quote. After hitting this wall with 00:07:12.350 --> 00:07:14.550 atoms, Goldburn wrote about his genuine shock. 00:07:15.079 --> 00:07:18.339 He noted, and I'm quoting here, I had, till I 00:07:18.339 --> 00:07:21.240 came here, had no idea of the fixed determination 00:07:21.240 --> 00:07:23.939 which prevails in the breast of every American 00:07:23.939 --> 00:07:26.800 to extirpate the Indians and appropriate their 00:07:26.800 --> 00:07:30.300 territory. That quote exposes a massive geopolitical 00:07:30.300 --> 00:07:33.100 miscalculation. The British viewed the buffer 00:07:33.100 --> 00:07:36.259 state as a strategic necessity. A condition they 00:07:36.259 --> 00:07:38.720 just assumed the Americans would eventually concede 00:07:38.720 --> 00:07:41.699 to get peace. Right. They completely underestimated 00:07:41.699 --> 00:07:44.480 the sheer existential intensity of the American 00:07:44.480 --> 00:07:47.779 desire for westward expansion. The U .S. delegation 00:07:47.779 --> 00:07:49.959 viewed the buffer state not as a territorial 00:07:49.959 --> 00:07:52.319 concession, but as a threat to the very future 00:07:52.319 --> 00:07:54.660 of their republic. But I am genuinely confused 00:07:54.660 --> 00:07:56.800 by the American leverage here, though. How so? 00:07:57.100 --> 00:07:59.639 Well, I'm looking at the timeline of August 1814. 00:07:59.839 --> 00:08:01.879 The Americans are drawing a hard line in the 00:08:01.879 --> 00:08:04.980 sand over Ohio and Wisconsin. But at this exact 00:08:04.980 --> 00:08:07.660 moment, British troops are actively marching 00:08:07.660 --> 00:08:10.540 into Washington, D .C. Yes, they are. They literally 00:08:10.540 --> 00:08:12.620 burned the White House and the Capitol building 00:08:12.620 --> 00:08:16.079 to the ground. How do you sit at a table in Europe 00:08:16.079 --> 00:08:19.360 and arrogantly refuse to yield empty territory 00:08:19.360 --> 00:08:23.040 when your own capital city is currently a smoking 00:08:23.040 --> 00:08:26.259 ruin? It is one of the most remarkable diplomatic 00:08:26.259 --> 00:08:29.680 gambles in history, frankly. The Americans were 00:08:29.680 --> 00:08:32.639 essentially calling Britain's bluff. Really? 00:08:32.759 --> 00:08:35.980 Yeah. They wagered that Lord Liverpool's government 00:08:35.980 --> 00:08:38.519 was so desperate to end the financial drain of 00:08:38.519 --> 00:08:40.860 the war that they would eventually abandon their 00:08:40.860 --> 00:08:43.279 indigenous allies rather than let the peace talks 00:08:43.279 --> 00:08:45.279 completely collapse over the issue. And they 00:08:45.279 --> 00:08:47.779 were right. They guessed correctly. The British 00:08:47.779 --> 00:08:50.259 realized enforcing a buffer state would require 00:08:50.259 --> 00:08:52.519 them to commit thousands of troops to an endless 00:08:52.519 --> 00:08:55.220 frontier war. So they backed down and settled 00:08:55.220 --> 00:08:57.519 for what became Article IX of the treaty. Which 00:08:57.519 --> 00:09:00.000 reading through the text seems incredibly hollow. 00:09:00.100 --> 00:09:02.580 It was entirely hollow. Both governments simply 00:09:02.580 --> 00:09:04.620 promised to make peace with the indigenous nations 00:09:04.620 --> 00:09:06.679 and restore them to the rights and possessions 00:09:06.679 --> 00:09:10.039 they held in 1811. But with no teeth. Exactly. 00:09:10.600 --> 00:09:13.480 Crucially, it established no recognized sovereign 00:09:13.480 --> 00:09:17.000 boundaries and provided no British military enforcement. 00:09:17.779 --> 00:09:19.919 It was a vague promise that allowed the British 00:09:19.919 --> 00:09:23.179 to save face while practically abandoning their 00:09:23.179 --> 00:09:26.500 long -term strategic buffer for immediate peace. 00:09:26.830 --> 00:09:29.909 And this British diplomatic pivot from demanding 00:09:29.909 --> 00:09:32.990 half the continent to accepting a vague promise. 00:09:33.590 --> 00:09:35.690 It wasn't just happening in a vacuum. It was 00:09:35.690 --> 00:09:37.929 forced by the physical reality of the battlefield. 00:09:38.809 --> 00:09:40.809 Absolutely. The egos at the negotiation table 00:09:40.809 --> 00:09:43.250 in Ghent ultimately had to answer to the generals 00:09:43.250 --> 00:09:45.730 on the ground. Right, because while these intense 00:09:45.730 --> 00:09:47.450 debates are happening in Europe, the British 00:09:47.450 --> 00:09:51.110 actually have four massive separate invasions 00:09:51.110 --> 00:09:53.389 of the United States in motion. You mentioned 00:09:53.389 --> 00:09:55.529 the burning of Washington. But the strategic 00:09:55.529 --> 00:09:57.710 follow -up to that attack was a miserable failure. 00:09:58.149 --> 00:10:00.090 That same British force attempted to capture 00:10:00.090 --> 00:10:02.269 Baltimore, but after the brutal bombardment of 00:10:02.269 --> 00:10:04.769 Fort McHenry, they lost their army commander 00:10:04.769 --> 00:10:07.710 to sniper fire. Oh, wow. Yeah, and the fleet 00:10:07.710 --> 00:10:10.610 simply sailed away. Meanwhile, a smaller force 00:10:10.610 --> 00:10:12.690 invaded Maine from New Brunswick, successfully 00:10:12.690 --> 00:10:15.179 occupying some seacoast towns and extracting 00:10:15.179 --> 00:10:18.019 customs duties. But the real centerpiece of their 00:10:18.019 --> 00:10:20.720 strategy, though, was the northern invasion coming 00:10:20.720 --> 00:10:23.460 down from Canada, right? Yes. This was supposed 00:10:23.460 --> 00:10:26.860 to be the decisive blow. The British sent 10 00:10:26.860 --> 00:10:29.639 ,000 battle -hardened veterans. These are men 00:10:29.639 --> 00:10:32.360 who had just defeated Napoleon's armies marching 00:10:32.360 --> 00:10:37.279 south into northern New York state. Ten thousand 00:10:37.279 --> 00:10:39.820 guys. Their goal was to cut off New England from 00:10:39.820 --> 00:10:42.960 the rest of the country. But marching 10 ,000 00:10:42.960 --> 00:10:45.720 men through the dense wilderness of upstate New 00:10:45.720 --> 00:10:48.019 York, I mean, that requires an immense amount 00:10:48.019 --> 00:10:50.159 of supplies. You can't just carry all that on 00:10:50.159 --> 00:10:52.899 your back. Exactly the issue. The logistics of 00:10:52.899 --> 00:10:55.539 early 19th century warfare dictated that an invasion 00:10:55.539 --> 00:10:57.960 of that size required control of the waterways 00:10:57.960 --> 00:11:01.000 to move artillery and food. So the British needed 00:11:01.000 --> 00:11:03.580 naval control of Lake Champlain. Right. But at 00:11:03.580 --> 00:11:05.779 the Battle of Plaxburgh, the American naval squadron 00:11:05.779 --> 00:11:08.279 completely destroyed the British fleet. Without 00:11:08.279 --> 00:11:10.220 those supply lines, the British army commander 00:11:10.220 --> 00:11:12.559 realized his massive force would literally starve 00:11:12.559 --> 00:11:14.899 in the woods even though he vastly outnumbered 00:11:14.899 --> 00:11:17.399 the American defenders. So he ordered a full 00:11:17.399 --> 00:11:20.440 retreat back to Canada. So the military map is 00:11:20.440 --> 00:11:23.720 incredibly messy. The British burn Washington 00:11:23.720 --> 00:11:26.539 but fail at Baltimore. They take some towns in 00:11:26.539 --> 00:11:29.559 Maine but get humiliated at Plattsburgh. And 00:11:29.559 --> 00:11:32.120 they have a massive naval armada still sailing 00:11:32.120 --> 00:11:35.720 toward New Orleans. This mixed bag is what forces 00:11:35.720 --> 00:11:38.840 the turning point in London. because Lord Liverpool 00:11:38.840 --> 00:11:41.740 reaches out to the Duke of Wellington. He wants 00:11:41.740 --> 00:11:44.919 the man who beat Napoleon to go to North America 00:11:44.919 --> 00:11:47.539 and actually win this war. And Wellington's response 00:11:47.539 --> 00:11:49.740 to the prime minister is just, it's a master 00:11:49.740 --> 00:11:52.860 class in unvarnished military realism. He formally 00:11:52.860 --> 00:11:56.059 refuses the command and his justification systematically 00:11:56.059 --> 00:11:58.480 destroys the British negotiating position at 00:11:58.480 --> 00:12:01.360 Ghent. I love this part. His logic is devastatingly 00:12:01.360 --> 00:12:03.860 clear. He essentially tells Liverpool, look, 00:12:03.960 --> 00:12:05.879 you cannot demand territory at the diplomatic 00:12:05.879 --> 00:12:07.559 table that you have not physically conquered 00:12:07.559 --> 00:12:09.740 on the battlefield. Exactly. You haven't successfully 00:12:09.740 --> 00:12:11.960 carried the war into the enemy's territory and 00:12:11.960 --> 00:12:13.899 you haven't even cleared American forces off 00:12:13.899 --> 00:12:16.470 your own Canadian borders. On what grounds are 00:12:16.470 --> 00:12:18.710 you demanding they hand over millions of acres? 00:12:19.389 --> 00:12:21.289 Right. And Wellington specifically takes aim 00:12:21.289 --> 00:12:24.549 at this diplomatic concept of judiposidatus. 00:12:24.830 --> 00:12:27.179 Right. Can you explain that? Yeah, Utipostades 00:12:27.179 --> 00:12:29.419 is a legal principle, meaning as you possess. 00:12:29.539 --> 00:12:33.100 So in peace treaties, it dictates that each side 00:12:33.100 --> 00:12:36.000 gets to permanently keep whatever territory they 00:12:36.000 --> 00:12:38.179 physically occupy at the moment the war ends. 00:12:38.440 --> 00:12:40.200 Regardless of what the borders look like before. 00:12:40.419 --> 00:12:42.940 Exactly. And Wellington tells his own government, 00:12:43.299 --> 00:12:45.259 you can't claim Utipostades because you don't 00:12:45.259 --> 00:12:47.419 actually possess anything of strategic value. 00:12:47.840 --> 00:12:50.000 Taking a few towns in Maine doesn't entitle you 00:12:50.000 --> 00:12:52.899 to demand the Great Lakes. It is a spectacular 00:12:52.899 --> 00:12:55.919 reality check from their own great If we connect 00:12:55.919 --> 00:12:58.320 this to the bigger picture, when you combine 00:12:58.320 --> 00:13:01.019 Wellington's brutal military assessment with 00:13:01.019 --> 00:13:04.159 the wider geopolitical map, the British position 00:13:04.159 --> 00:13:07.179 just crumbles. Right. Lord Casselray, the British 00:13:07.179 --> 00:13:09.860 foreign secretary, is bogged down at the Congress 00:13:09.860 --> 00:13:13.039 of Vienna. He is trying to redraw the map of 00:13:13.039 --> 00:13:15.700 Europe alongside Russia, Prussia, and Austria 00:13:15.700 --> 00:13:19.100 after decades of catastrophic war. The last thing 00:13:19.100 --> 00:13:21.639 Casselray wants is to keep draining the British 00:13:21.639 --> 00:13:24.269 treasury over a border dispute in the American 00:13:24.269 --> 00:13:27.429 wilderness. That makes total sense. So factoring 00:13:27.429 --> 00:13:30.289 in fears that France might suddenly resume fighting, 00:13:30.830 --> 00:13:33.769 Lord Liverpool abandons all territorial ambitions. 00:13:34.590 --> 00:13:36.789 The instruction to the diplomats in Ghent is 00:13:36.789 --> 00:13:40.029 clear. Get us out of this war. They want out 00:13:40.029 --> 00:13:43.350 so badly that they agree to the exact terms they 00:13:43.350 --> 00:13:46.590 started with, the status quo antebellum. But 00:13:46.590 --> 00:13:49.009 because of the technological constraints of the 00:13:49.009 --> 00:13:51.889 era, the way this bureaucratic reset actually 00:13:51.889 --> 00:13:54.669 mapped onto physical reality, was historically 00:13:54.669 --> 00:13:58.190 bizarre. Oh, the lag of history in an era powered 00:13:58.190 --> 00:14:00.889 by wind and sail creates some incredible ironies. 00:14:00.970 --> 00:14:03.230 Yeah, because after all the grandstanding, the 00:14:03.230 --> 00:14:05.289 negotiating teams finally signed the Treaty of 00:14:05.289 --> 00:14:08.330 Ghent on Christmas Eve, December 24th, 1814. 00:14:08.629 --> 00:14:10.549 Peace is officially declared in Europe. Right. 00:14:10.669 --> 00:14:12.450 But you can't just send a telegraph to the generals 00:14:12.450 --> 00:14:15.009 of North America. It takes an entire month for 00:14:15.009 --> 00:14:17.110 a ship carrying the physical treaty to cross 00:14:17.110 --> 00:14:19.110 the Atlantic Ocean. Which means the bloodiest 00:14:19.110 --> 00:14:20.889 fighting is about to happen in a war that is 00:14:20.889 --> 00:14:23.409 technically already over. Exactly. While that 00:14:23.409 --> 00:14:25.350 ship is slowly making its way across the Atlantic, 00:14:25.850 --> 00:14:27.590 that fourth British invasion force we mentioned 00:14:27.590 --> 00:14:30.029 earlier finally arrives off the coast of Louisiana. 00:14:30.190 --> 00:14:33.750 Yep, New Orleans. On January 8th, 1815, more 00:14:33.750 --> 00:14:36.330 than two weeks after the diplomats shook hands 00:14:36.330 --> 00:14:38.509 in Ghent American forces commanded by Andrew 00:14:38.509 --> 00:14:41.049 Jackson, clashed with the British at the Battle 00:14:41.049 --> 00:14:44.350 of New Orleans. Jackson leverages entrenched 00:14:44.350 --> 00:14:47.049 positions in artillery to inflict thousands of 00:14:47.049 --> 00:14:49.289 casualties on the British. It was a massive victory. 00:14:49.610 --> 00:14:52.009 A defining victory for the young republic. It 00:14:52.009 --> 00:14:53.830 boosts American morale into the stratosphere, 00:14:54.090 --> 00:14:56.929 but diplomatically it changed absolutely nothing. 00:14:57.250 --> 00:14:59.850 Nothing at all. The speed of communication dictated 00:14:59.850 --> 00:15:02.409 reality. The British forces on the Gulf Coast 00:15:02.409 --> 00:15:04.870 didn't officially receive news of the peace treaty 00:15:04.870 --> 00:15:08.350 until a ship called the HMS Brazen finally arrived 00:15:08.350 --> 00:15:11.480 off Fort Borier on February 13th. So when the 00:15:11.480 --> 00:15:13.679 dust finally settles and the treaty is ratified 00:15:13.679 --> 00:15:17.200 by the US Senate on February 16th, 1815, how 00:15:17.200 --> 00:15:20.139 does this grand unwinding actually work? Like 00:15:20.139 --> 00:15:22.649 what are the physical mechanics of hitting reset. 00:15:22.830 --> 00:15:25.250 It was a massive logistical undertaking to reverse 00:15:25.250 --> 00:15:27.409 years of warfare. First off, all prisoners of 00:15:27.409 --> 00:15:29.610 war were ordered to be released. Approximately 00:15:29.610 --> 00:15:32.509 10 million acres of territory around Lake Superior 00:15:32.509 --> 00:15:35.350 and Michigan and up in the main territory were 00:15:35.350 --> 00:15:38.009 formally handed back to the United States. In 00:15:38.009 --> 00:15:40.529 return, the Americans withdrew from areas of 00:15:40.529 --> 00:15:43.289 Upper Canada, modern day Ontario that they had 00:15:43.289 --> 00:15:45.889 occupied. Interestingly, though, the U .S. did 00:15:45.889 --> 00:15:48.509 refuse to return the crucial port city of Mobile, 00:15:48.529 --> 00:15:51.610 Alabama. They did. How did they justify keeping 00:15:51.610 --> 00:15:53.950 that if the treaty demanded returning everything? 00:15:54.110 --> 00:15:56.370 Well, the loophole was that American forces had 00:15:56.370 --> 00:15:59.230 captured Mobile from Spain, not Great Britain. 00:15:59.309 --> 00:16:02.250 And since Spain was a British ally, but not a 00:16:02.250 --> 00:16:04.769 direct signatory to this specific treaty, the 00:16:04.769 --> 00:16:07.250 US argued the status quo antebellum just didn't 00:16:07.250 --> 00:16:09.350 apply to Spanish territory. So they kept the 00:16:09.350 --> 00:16:11.830 port. That's clever. I want to dig into a specific 00:16:11.830 --> 00:16:14.149 provision regarding enslaved people, too, because 00:16:14.149 --> 00:16:17.070 it represents a fascinating clash of military 00:16:17.070 --> 00:16:20.710 reality and shifting Yes. During the campaigns, 00:16:21.049 --> 00:16:23.250 British field commanders had actively encouraged 00:16:23.250 --> 00:16:26.070 enslaved Americans to flee to British lines, 00:16:26.470 --> 00:16:28.929 promising them freedom. But the treaty strictly 00:16:28.929 --> 00:16:31.370 required the British to return all captured property, 00:16:31.789 --> 00:16:34.750 which, under American law at the time, included 00:16:34.750 --> 00:16:37.070 those freed individuals. And the British government 00:16:37.070 --> 00:16:40.769 ultimately refused to return them. Wow. By 1814, 00:16:40.970 --> 00:16:42.870 the political winds within the British Empire 00:16:42.870 --> 00:16:45.590 were shifting heavily toward abolition. Sending 00:16:45.590 --> 00:16:48.190 thousands of freed individuals back into American 00:16:48.190 --> 00:16:50.629 slavery was becoming morally and politically 00:16:50.629 --> 00:16:53.269 untenable for leadership in London, regardless 00:16:53.269 --> 00:16:55.590 of what the treaty text said. So they just ignored 00:16:55.590 --> 00:16:58.259 that clause. Pretty much, they dragged it out 00:16:58.259 --> 00:17:00.419 through diplomatic channels for over a decade. 00:17:01.159 --> 00:17:03.279 Eventually, to settle the dispute without actually 00:17:03.279 --> 00:17:05.339 returning the people, the British government 00:17:05.339 --> 00:17:09.059 agreed to international arbitration. In 1826, 00:17:09.119 --> 00:17:11.599 they paid the United States government just over 00:17:11.599 --> 00:17:15.400 $1 .2 million as financial compensation to the 00:17:15.400 --> 00:17:18.240 American enslavers. Unbelievable. It was a purely 00:17:18.240 --> 00:17:21.500 economic solution to a profound human rights 00:17:21.500 --> 00:17:24.339 issue, allowing the British to maintain the freedom 00:17:24.339 --> 00:17:26.720 of those individuals without openly violating 00:17:26.720 --> 00:17:29.400 the financial spirit of the tree. So looking 00:17:29.400 --> 00:17:31.539 at all of this, the returns land, the financial 00:17:31.539 --> 00:17:34.000 payouts, the fact that the borders of Canada 00:17:34.000 --> 00:17:37.220 and the US remained completely unchanged, it 00:17:37.220 --> 00:17:40.210 forces the ultimate question. Who actually won 00:17:40.210 --> 00:17:42.349 and who lost? What's fascinating here is that 00:17:42.349 --> 00:17:45.490 the true outcomes of the War of 1812 are found 00:17:45.490 --> 00:17:47.410 in the omissions of the treaty and the shifts 00:17:47.410 --> 00:17:50.049 in power on the ground. Okay. The British government 00:17:50.049 --> 00:17:53.210 achieved their primary unspoken goal, which was 00:17:53.210 --> 00:17:55.630 maintaining their global maritime dominance. 00:17:56.430 --> 00:17:59.349 Because the treaty makes zero mention of impressment 00:17:59.349 --> 00:18:02.029 or neutral trading rights, the British never 00:18:02.029 --> 00:18:04.490 legally conceded their right to enforce those 00:18:04.490 --> 00:18:07.549 policies. It was a quiet structural victory for 00:18:07.549 --> 00:18:10.039 their empire. and the United States. The United 00:18:10.039 --> 00:18:12.599 States secured its sovereignty. By fighting the 00:18:12.599 --> 00:18:14.660 world's greatest superpower to a standstill, 00:18:14.799 --> 00:18:17.200 they proved their republic wasn't just a temporary 00:18:17.200 --> 00:18:19.779 experiment. Right. But that victory for American 00:18:19.779 --> 00:18:22.240 westward expansion came entirely at the expense 00:18:22.240 --> 00:18:24.740 of the real losers of this conflict, the indigenous 00:18:24.740 --> 00:18:27.220 nations. Because the British abandoned the buffer 00:18:27.220 --> 00:18:31.549 state. Precisely. Before the war, powerful indigenous 00:18:31.549 --> 00:18:34.369 confederacies, led by figures like Tecumseh, 00:18:34.589 --> 00:18:36.930 had allied with the British to halt American 00:18:36.930 --> 00:18:39.809 expansion. During the fighting, Tecumseh was 00:18:39.809 --> 00:18:42.730 killed and those alliances were militarily shattered 00:18:42.730 --> 00:18:45.730 by American forces. When the British signed the 00:18:45.730 --> 00:18:47.750 Treaty of Ghent and dropped their demand for 00:18:47.750 --> 00:18:50.450 an indigenous buffer state, They effectively 00:18:50.450 --> 00:18:53.730 withdrew their geopolitical umbrella. They guaranteed 00:18:53.730 --> 00:18:56.269 they would never again arm indigenous tribes 00:18:56.269 --> 00:18:58.890 against the United States. It was a convenient 00:18:58.890 --> 00:19:01.869 draw for the colonial powers, but a permanent, 00:19:02.029 --> 00:19:04.230 devastating defeat for the indigenous peoples 00:19:04.230 --> 00:19:06.789 of North America. It really changes the entire 00:19:06.789 --> 00:19:09.069 complexion of the war. You consider the immense 00:19:09.069 --> 00:19:11.369 resources expended, the complex negotiations 00:19:11.369 --> 00:19:13.849 in Europe, the blood soaked into the ground at 00:19:13.849 --> 00:19:16.250 Plattsburgh in New Orleans, and all of it spent 00:19:16.250 --> 00:19:18.509 just to lock the colonial map exactly where it 00:19:18.509 --> 00:19:20.769 started. There is a quote in the source material 00:19:20.769 --> 00:19:23.849 from the historian Pierre Berton that captures 00:19:23.849 --> 00:19:26.529 the haunting cutility of it. He writes about 00:19:26.529 --> 00:19:29.329 the treaty and I'll quote it here. It was as 00:19:29.329 --> 00:19:32.789 if no war had been fought, or to put it more 00:19:32.789 --> 00:19:35.029 bluntly, as if the war that was fought was fought 00:19:35.029 --> 00:19:37.980 for no good reason. For nothing has changed. 00:19:38.599 --> 00:19:41.059 Everything is as it was at the beginning, save 00:19:41.059 --> 00:19:43.559 for the graves of those who, it now appears, 00:19:43.900 --> 00:19:46.200 have fought for a trifle. It is an incredibly 00:19:46.200 --> 00:19:49.019 sobering assessment of the human cost, but it 00:19:49.019 --> 00:19:51.980 also leads to a fascinating unintended consequence. 00:19:52.799 --> 00:19:54.680 Yeah, the source notes that the Treaty of Ghent 00:19:54.680 --> 00:19:57.480 ultimately sparked a century of peace between 00:19:57.480 --> 00:19:59.980 the U .S. and Britain, paving the way for monuments 00:19:59.980 --> 00:20:02.400 like the Peace Arch in Washington State and the 00:20:02.400 --> 00:20:04.660 Peace Bridge in New York. So they spent a century 00:20:04.660 --> 00:20:06.539 celebrating the fact that they never shot at 00:20:06.539 --> 00:20:08.299 each other again. They did. And it leaves you 00:20:08.299 --> 00:20:10.240 with a provocative thought about how borders 00:20:10.240 --> 00:20:13.140 are actually formed. Right. By fighting to a 00:20:13.140 --> 00:20:15.420 bloody, exhausting draw where neither side could 00:20:15.420 --> 00:20:17.900 conquer the other, the U .S. and Britain accidentally 00:20:17.900 --> 00:20:20.619 invented the modern U .S.-Canadian border. The 00:20:20.619 --> 00:20:22.759 longest undefended border in the world wasn't 00:20:22.759 --> 00:20:25.559 born out of a brilliant diplomatic vision or 00:20:25.559 --> 00:20:29.220 a decisive, glorious military triumph. It proves 00:20:29.220 --> 00:20:31.759 that sometimes the most enduring peaceful borders 00:20:31.759 --> 00:20:34.940 are drawn by sheer mutual exhaustion. Just giving 00:20:34.940 --> 00:20:37.839 up. Exactly. They are forged by the grueling 00:20:37.839 --> 00:20:40.140 realization that fighting simply isn't worth 00:20:40.140 --> 00:20:43.900 the cost anymore. The muddy, unresolved waters 00:20:43.900 --> 00:20:47.140 of a geopolitical stalemate actually created 00:20:47.140 --> 00:20:50.259 a permanent peace. It is wild to consider that 00:20:50.259 --> 00:20:52.920 lasting peace wasn't the result of victory, but 00:20:52.920 --> 00:20:55.279 the result of two empires simply being too tired 00:20:55.279 --> 00:20:57.400 to keep swinging. Really makes you think. It 00:20:57.400 --> 00:20:59.019 makes you look at the lines on a map of North 00:20:59.019 --> 00:21:00.940 America in a completely different light. Thank 00:21:00.940 --> 00:21:02.839 you for joining us on this deep dive into the 00:21:02.839 --> 00:21:04.900 historical documentation of the Treaty of Ghent. 00:21:05.380 --> 00:21:06.000 We'll see you next time.