Gaps in My Historical Record
by Susanna Fraser
Both my new book Freedom to Love and my 2012 release An Infamous Marriage feature heroes who fought in the War of 1812—on the British side. Writing them proved to be an education for me because going in I could’ve told you precisely four facts about the war in question:
1) It started because the British navy kept press-ganging American sailors into their fleet.
2) Francis Scott Key wrote the Star-Spangled Banner in response to witnessing the bombardment of Fort McHenry.
3) The British burned Washington DC, including the White House. As she was fleeing in advance of the assault, First Lady Dolley Madison rescued a portrait of George Washington that still hangs in the White House to this day.
4) The Battle of New Orleans was fought after the warring nations had agreed to peace terms, though neither army could’ve possibly known that due to transatlantic travel times and the lack of any kind of instant communication technology. A decisive American victory, it cemented Andrew Jackson’s reputation as a commander and gave him the fame that would eventually win him the presidency.
That was, after all, more than enough to get me through the fill-in-the-blank history tests I took in high school. But it’s hardly enough to write a book upon, even when the war in question is the hero’s backstory rather than a critical part of the action. So I studied the Canadian campaigns for An Infamous Marriage—and along the way learned that while impressment of sailors was certainly a cause of the war, it was by no means the only one. As a neutral country in the Napoleonic Wars, America detested Britain’s interference in their trade with France—and Napoleon was hardly above egging on any conflict that might distract his persistent British enemies from fighting him. And my American countrymen were hardly saints themselves, thinking that a war with Britain while they were mostly occupied fighting France was the perfect opportunity for a little Canadian land grab.
For Freedom to Love, my research focused on the New Orleans campaign, especially the British soldiers’ experience—they were cold, wet, and miserable throughout—and also on the shelter and freedom the British offered to any American slaves who escaped to their lines. By that point in history the majority of Britons were abolitionists. While almost two decades more would pass before they abolished slavery in their Caribbean colonies, they tended to consider Americans giant hypocrites for going on and on about their love of freedom while simultaneously keeping so much of their population enslaved.
