Warfare and Logistics Along the US-Canadian Border During the War of 1812 by Christopher D. Dishman

Abstract

Reviewed by: Warfare and Logistics Along the US-Canadian Border During the War of 1812 by Christopher D. Dishman David Curtis Skaggs Christopher D. Dishman. Warfare and Logistics Along the US-Canadian Border During the War of 1812. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2021. Pp. 334. Bibliography. Index. Maps. Notes. Cloth: $39.95. There’s an old military adage that “amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics.” Others invoke the maxim attributed to Erwin Rommel: “Battles are won by the quartermasters.” To the military, logistics is concerned with maintaining supply lines of personnel, equipment, food, weapons, and ammunition from one point to another while disrupting the capabilities of an enemy to do the same thing. The importance of supplying military forces is similarly emphasized in Christopher D. Dishman’s Warfare and Logistics Along the US-Canadian Border During the War of 1812. In the preface, Dishman notes that “Victory for either side often depended on enough men and supplies arriving promptly at a remote outpost or dockyard. This dependence on external supplies meant that military operations in one theater could produce cascading effects hundreds of miles from the battle.” In addition to logistics, he also undertakes the operational and tactical actions of the contending military and naval forces from Lake Champlain to Lake Michigan. No one previously has integrated the logistical and combat aspects of the border warfare in this central region of this war’s military operations as effectively as he. Unfortunately, William S. Dudley’s Inside the US Navy of 1812–1815 (2021), with its supportive conclusions, was unavailable before Dishman’s manuscript went to press. Michiganders will find special interest in the inept American leadership during its failures at Detroit and Frenchtown (now Monroe), as well as the surrender of Fort Michilimackinac (as it was spelled at the time) on Mackinac Island and the failure to retake the post in 1814. Dishman gives a detailed analysis of the combined operations led by General William Henry Harrison and Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry on Lake Erie and southwestern Upper Canada in 1813. Critical to both the operational and logistical aspects of this conflict was the control of Lake Ontario, where both sides failed to implement combined operations decisively and the British were able to escape disaster by the narrowest of margins. As Dishman’s study becomes more involved in the detail of combat in 1814, the depth of logistical discussion declines. He could easily have developed more thoroughly the logistical problems of the Lake Champlain campaign. His description of the expedition of Miller Worsley, for the relief of Fort [End Page 117] Michilimackinac in the fall of 1814 deserves greater depth. Totally ignored is the role played by the British Army, the North West Company’s operatives, and Native Americans who relied on support out of Mackinac Island for operations in the upper Mississippi Valley. Dishman’s disparagement of the militia compared with the regular army fails to contrast the performances of the common militia (mostly conscripts) and the volunteer militia, which sometimes exceeded that of the regulars in battle. Also, he demotes one of my unsung heroes of the war, West Point graduate Eleazer Wood, who was a lieutenant colonel, not a major, before being killed during the 1814 Niagara campaign. Finally, one reason why British negotiators at the Treaty of Ghent agreed to the status quo antebellum was that the Harrison-Perry campaign had resulted in the United States controlling both sides of the Detroit River in the Western District of Upper Canada. Had the treaty been settled on uti possidetis (retaining property held at the war’s end), this would have given the Americans domination of the logistical route to Lake Huron, although the British would have acquired the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and northern Wisconsin. But such trivial criticisms should not disparage the thoroughly researched, engagingly written, insightfully analytical contents of Warfare and Logistics, which should be part of anyone’s collection of important War of 1812 studies. After reading it, you will agree with Dishman’s conclusion: “The war along the US-Canadian frontier was a testament to the importance of logistics when waging war.” David Curtis Skaggs Professor Emeritus of History Bowling Green State...