British Empire

Historians who hold that the war constituted a British victory and an American defeat argue that the British achieved their military objectives in 1812 by stopping the repeated American invasions of Canada and retaining their Canadian colonies. In contrast, the Americans suffered a defeat when their armies failed to achieve their war goal of seizing part or all of Canada. Additionally, they argue the United States lost as it failed to stop impressment which the British refused to repeal until the end of the Napoleonic Wars, arguing that the American actions had no effect on the Orders in Council which were rescinded before the war started.^[15][35] While acknowledging that the war is "usually seen as a draw", Brian Arthur argues that "it was in fact a British victory" because "the British achieved success through an effective commercial maritime blockade which had devastating consequences on the vulnerable, undeveloped US economy."^[36] Troy Bickham, author of The Weight of Vengeance: The United States, the British Empire, and the War of 1812, sees the British as having fought to a much stronger position than the United States.^{[13][lower-alpha 3]}

According to Carl Benn, "[t]he main objective of keeping Canada had been met as of 1814", while "Americans realized that their own objectives in going to war could not be achieved, and thought the best they could probably get was the preservation of the status quo that they had been fighting so hard to upset."^[15] According to Andrew Lambert, "Americans began to rewrite the war as a victory, exploiting the ambiguity of the diplomatic settlement achieved in the Treaty of Ghent on 24 December 1814, a status quo ante compromise that did not reflect the depth of America's defeat."^[37] For Jon Latimer, "Britain was content to settle for the 1812 status quo, and that is what Britain got. The United States, in contrast, achieved none of its war aims, and in these terms, the War of 1812 must be seen as a British victory, however marginal."^[35] Bickham considers that the British offered the United States generous terms in place of their initially harsh terms, which included massive forfeiture of land to Canada and the Native Americans, because the "reigning Liverpool ministry in Britain held a loose grip on power and feared the war-weary, tax-exhausted public." For Bickham, the war was also technically a British victory "because the United States failed to achieve the aims listed in its declaration of war."^[13]

G. M. Trevelyan evaluated the war in negative terms for Britain. He stressed the long-term damage to what has been called the Special Relationship between Britain and the United States, and wrote: "The self-defense of the two Canadas against invasion, and the historical traditions that the infant nation thus acquired were an important result of the war. Otherwise, it had been fought in vain. It solved none of the disputed questions out of which it arose."^[38] According to Trevelyan, "the anti-British tradition had obtained a fresh lease of life in the United States, whose orators now had the theme of a second war against Britain as the second romantic period of their national history. The Tory Cabinet cannot be praised for the management of affairs that led to this breach of the peace."^[38]

United States

Historians who believe that it was an American success argue that the main motivation was restoring the nation's honor in the face of relentless British aggression toward American neutral rights on the high seas and in the Western lands. According to Norman K. Risjord, the results in terms of honor satisfied the War Hawks.^[39] Donald R. Hickey writes: "Did the cost in blood and treasure justify the U.S. decision to go to war? Most Republicans thought it did. In the beginning, they called the contest a 'second war of independence', and while Britain's maritime practices never truly threatened the Republic's independence, the war did in a broad sense vindicate U.S. sovereignty. But it ended in a draw on the battlefield."^[40] Historians argue that it was an American success to end the threat of indigenous nations' raids, kill the British plan for a semi-independent Native American sanctuary, and hereby to open an unimpeded path for westward expansion.^{[41][lower-alpha 4]} Winston Churchill commented: "The lessons of the war were taken to heart. Anti-American feeling in Great Britain ran high for several years, but the United States was never again refused proper treatment as an independent power."^[42] George C. Daughan argues that the United States achieved enough of its war goals to claim a victorious result of the conflict and subsequent impact it had on the negotiations in Ghent. Daughan uses official correspondences from James Madison to the delegates at Ghent strictly prohibiting negotiations with regards to maritime law.^{[43][lower-alpha 5]}

For Daughan, the British permanently stopped impressing Americans, although they never publicly rescinded the possibility of resuming that practice. The American delegates at the meeting understood it to be a dead issue after the 1814 surrender of Napoleon.^[44] In addition, the successful defense of Baltimore, Plattsburgh and Fort Erie (a strategic fortress located in Upper Canada on the Niagara River and occupied during the third and most successful offensive into Canada) had a very favorable influence on the negotiations for the Americans and prompted several famous responses from both sides. Henry Clay wrote to the delegates in October 1814, "for in our own country, my dear sir, at last, must we conquer the peace."^[45] With growing pressure in Britain, Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, when asked to command the forces in the United States, wrote to Robert Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool, on 9 November 1814: "I confess that I think you have no right, from the state of the war, to demand any concession of territory from America. ... You have not been able to carry [the war] ... into the enemy's territory, notwithstanding your military success and now undoubted military superiority, and have not even cleared your own territory on the point of attack [at Fort Erie]. ... Why stipulate for uti possidetis?"^[46] Daughan argues that the argument the United States failure to capture any Canadian territory influenced the negotiations is an outdated and highly criticized position. He cites the Edinburgh Review, a British newspaper, that had remained silent about the war with the United States for two years, writing that "the British government had embarked on a war of conquest after the American government had dropped its maritime demands, and the British had lost. It was folly to attempt to invade and conquer the United States. To do so would result in the same tragedy as the first war against them, and with the same result."^[47]

Canada

The militia myth of Canadian victory was created by the reactionary elites of Upper Canada, such as the Family Compact, long after the war ended. Most people in Upper Canada were late Loyalists, namely economic migrants from the United States, the United Empire Loyalists were not a distinct group, about 10% of the Loyalists were former slaves, and most residents did not care who won the war and did not participate in it. The Family Compact disenfranchised most residents of Upper Canada after the war, with the idea of loyalty being used to justify the suppression of dissent. According to historians, such as David Mills, the myth was invented for immigrants who arrived after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. American spelling, which had been standard in the province, was rejected in favor of British spelling, and the local population began to call themselves Canadians. The milita myth of Canada being able to defend itself without a standing army came to be thought of politically as a fact.^[48]

Indigenous nations

Historians generally agree that the real losers of the War of 1812 were the indigenous nations.^[7] Tecumseh's Confederacy, which had joined the British side, was defeated and its leader, Tecumseh, killed in battle.^[49] Donald R. Hickey wrote: "The big losers in the war were the Indians. As a proportion of their population, they had suffered the heaviest casualties. Worse, they were left without any reliable European allies in North America. ... The crushing defeats at the Thames and Horseshoe Bend left them at the mercy of the Americans, hastening their confinement to reservations and the decline of their traditional way of life."^[50]

The indigenous nations of the Old Northwest (the modern Midwest) had hoped to create an indigenous state as a British protectorate.^[51] American settlers into the Midwest had been repeatedly blocked and threatened by indigenous raids before 1812,^{[citation needed]} and that now came to an end. Throughout the war, the British had played on the terror of the Fs and scalping knives of their indigenous allies as it worked especially at William Hull's surrender at Detroit. By 1813, Americans had killed Tecumseh and broken his coalition of tribes.^[52] Andrew Jackson then defeated the Creeks in the Southwest. Historian John Sugden says that in both theaters, the indigenous nations' strength had been broken prior to the arrival of the major British forces in 1814.^[53] The one campaign that the Americans had decisively won was the campaign in the Old Northwest, which put the British in a weak hand to insist upon an indigenous nations' state in the Old Northwest.^[51]

Notwithstanding sympathy and support from commanders, such as Isaac Brock,^{[lower-alpha 6]} Alexander Cochrane and Edward Nicolls, the policymakers in London reneged on this promise as making peace had a higher priority for the politicians. At the peace conference, the British demanded an independent indigenous state in the Midwest. Although the British and their indigenous allies maintained control over the territories in question (i.e. most of the Upper Midwest), British diplomats did not press the demand after an American refusal, effectively abandoning their allies. The withdrawal of British protection gave the Americans a free hand that resulted in the removal of most of the tribes to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma).^[54] According to historian Alan Taylor, the final victory at New Orleans had in that sense "enduring and massive consequences".^[55] It gave the Americans "continental predominance", while it left the indigenous nations dispossessed, powerless, and vulnerable.^[56]

The Treaty of Ghent technically required the United States to cease hostilities and "forthwith to restore to such Tribes or Nations respectively all possessions, rights, and privileges which they may have enjoyed, or been entitled to in 1811." The United States ignored this article of the treaty and proceeded to expand into this territory regardless. Meanwhile, Britain was unwilling to provoke a further war to enforce it. A shocked Henry Goulburn, one of the British negotiators at Ghent, remarked: "Till I came here, I had no idea of the fixed determination which there is in the heart of every American to extirpate the Indians and appropriate their territory."^[57]

The Creek War came to an end, with the Treaty of Fort Jackson being imposed upon the indigenous nations. About half of the Creek territory was ceded to the United States, with no payment made to the Creeks. This was in theory invalidated by Article 9 of the Treaty of Ghent.^[58] The British failed to press the issue and did not take up the indigenous cause as an infringement of an international treaty. Without this support, the indigenous nations' lack of power was apparent and the stage was set for further incursions of territory by the United States in subsequent decades.^[59]