1812: A Guide to the War and its Legacy

For Canadians, the War of 1812 has held various meanings at different times. In the immediate aftermath, alongside the “Loyalist” narrative of fleeing from the defeat of the British at the hands of American rebels, the war was regarded as redemptive for those still loyal to British North America. From the American perspective, it is merely one in a host of small-scale wars in North America, and the events of 1812–1815 are mostly forgotten in the collective memory of the United States.

The authors of 1812: A Guide to the War and Its Legacy believe that the War of 1812 was an important event in North American history with lasting consequences for Canadians, Americans, and First Nations. This guidebook, published by the Laurier Centre for Military Strategic and Disarmament Studies, uses modern satellite images, archival records, paintings, and contemporary photographs to help readers understand what happened during the war and why it happened that way.

The book includes a historical section that seeks to place events in their strategic, operational, and human context. A tour section is designed to introduce and guide readers to key locations of war and memory and offer an explanation of the fluid memory that has evolved over the last two hundred years. The War of 1812 has been forgotten, reimagined, and invented anew many times, and the itineraries of the guide illustrate that ever-changing process of commemoration.

Terry Copp is the director emeritus of the Laurier Centre for Military Strategic and Disarmament Studies and a professor emeritus at Wilfrid Laurier University. He is the author or co-author of fourteen books and many articles on the Canadian role in the Second World War, including travel guides to the Canadian battlefields. Fields of Fire: The Canadians in Normandy won the 2004 Distinguished Book Award for non-US history from the American Society for Military History.

Matt Symes has worked and taught extensively on the history of war and memory and is co-author of five battlefield guidebooks, including Canadian Battlefields 1915–1918: A Visitor’s Guide. Symes was co-editor (with Geoffrey Hayes and Mike Bechthold) of Canada and the Second World War: Essays in Honour of Terry Copp.

Caitlin McWilliams is an MA (History) graduate from Wilfrid Laurier University and a Research Associate at LCMSDS. Drawing on her educational and battlefield touring experience as well as her photography talent, McWilliams scouted, wrote, edited and/or added photographs to parts of every tour section in the guide.

Nick Lachance is a student at Wilfrid Laurier University and a Research Assistant at LCMSDS. Many of his photos appear in this guide. Lachance’s primary responsibility was to use modern satellite images from Google Earth and rework them into the 59 historical and tour maps inside the guide.