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BELOW The Battle of New Orleans, in January 1815, was part of the War of 1812. General Andrew Jackson defeated a British assault, allowing the US to save some face in an otherwise disastrous conflict. Once the war was over, the American government invested heavily in harbour defences.
The Red and the Blue: when Britain and the US almost went to war in 1862
Britain and the US have not always enjoyed a ‘special relationship’. During the 19th century, relations between the two were often tense. William Stroock looks at a moment when war came close.
On 8 November 1861, the USS San Jacinto approached the British steamer Trent in the Bahama Channel, between the Bahamas and Cuba. Though Trent was clearly flying the Union Jack, Captain Charles Wilkes, of the United States Navy, ordered a shot fired across her bow. Trent’s captain ordered his ship to come to.
An American party went aboard and found the men Wilkes was looking for: Confederate ambassadors John Slidell and James Murray Mason.
Wilkes took Slidell and Mason prisoner and brought them back to the San Jacinto. Thus began the Trent Affair, an international diplomatic crisis that threatened to bring the United States and Britain to war for the third time in 80 years.
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