War of 1812
This
page includes battles, occupations, withdrawals, evacuations, and other
military actions of British and American forces and their allies during
the War of 1812.
Georgia Battles:
~Skin Cypress Pond, Georgia date unknown
~Point Petre, Georgia 1/13/1815
~Cumberland Island, Georgia ca. 1815
Some Georgia Military Units of Georgia during the War of 1812
~Alexander's Bat. of Riflemen Georgia Militia
~Booth 4th Reg. Georgia Militia
~Capt. McNish's Light Dragoons, Georgia Militia
~Capt. Thomas' Co. Georgia Militia
~Col. Jenkins 2nd Reg. Georgia Volunteers & Militia
~Col. Ignatius Few 3rd Regulars - Georgia Militia
~Jones 4th Regulars - Georgia Militia
~Pray 2nd Regulars - Georgia Militia
~Thomas 2nd Regulars - Georgia Militia
~Wimberly 3rd Reg. Georgia Militia
~Wootton's Detachment, Georgia Militia
Background:
Credit and sources: "War of 1812 and Georgia," From New Georgia
Encyclopedia.
http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org. Georgia Humanities Council and
the University of Georgia Press, 2002-08-28
"War of 1812 and Georgia
The War of 1812 was fought between the United States and Britain between
1812 and 1815. The causes of the war were many: the impressing of
American sailors into the British navy,
General John Floyd
British trade restrictions to Europe during the Napoleonic Wars, British
military posts remaining on American soil long after the end of the
American Revolution, and what was perceived by Americans as a British
plot to perpetuate continual Native American menace on America's
frontiers. It was inevitable that Georgia, with its long coastline and
extensive Indian frontier, would become embroiled in the conflict, and
yet Georgia's role in the war has been largely overshadowed. Three main
theaters of operation deserve recognition. These are the Creek War of
1813-14, the British blockade, and the British occupation of St. Marys
and Cumberland Island in 1814-15.
The Creek War of 1813-1814
Early in the war British officials began arming many allied Native
American tribes along the frontier. On August 30, 1813, a strong force
of Creeks attacked and destroyed Fort Mims, an American post on the
Alabama River, north of Mobile. Georgia figured prominently in the
campaign to eliminate the threat posed by the warring Creek tribes.
General John Floyd was given command of troops operating from Georgia.
Floyd, who later became a U.S. congressman, was ordered to establish
several forts and to destroy all the Creek villages and their crops in
his line of march. These actions were intended to culminate in the
establishment of a continuous supply line of fortified posts from which
the American forces could operate freely against the Creeks without fear
of loss of war material. In September 1813 Floyd mustered a 2,000-man to
3,000-man army and gathered supplies for his campaign at Fort Hawkins,
in present-day Macon. He deemed his force ready to undertake the
operation by November. Floyd established Fort Mitchell, just across the
Chattahoochee River, and marched steadily toward the Creek-held
territory deeper in present-day Alabama. Floyd's army, bolstered by a
friendly Indian contingent, fell upon the Native Americans at the Creek
town of Autosse on November 29, 1813. In a desperately fought action,
Floyd's men forced the Creeks to retreat after a bayonet charge. This
allowed Floyd to destroy Autosse and a second town nearby. Lacking
proper supplies, Floyd returned to Fort Mitchell. A long-range effect of
the defeat at Autosse was that many of the Creek survivors made their
way to the Horseshoe Bend area, where General Andrew Jackson would
decisively defeat the Creek Nation the following year.
Floyd suffered from chronic supply problems but decided to take the
field once again in January 1814. Floyd's Georgians and their Native
American allies began construction of Fort Hull, some forty miles west
of Fort Mitchell. Floyd continued advancing farther into Creek
territory. Thirteen hundred Creek warriors mounted a surprise attack
against the encamped army on the banks of Calabee Creek on January 27,
1814. The assault was blunted by the Georgians' use of artillery and
superior fire. Nevertheless, the attack succeeded in dispiriting the
Georgians, and Floyd retired to Fort Hull. Soon afterward, Floyd was
forced by his army's enlistment expirations to return to Fort Mitchell,
leaving a small garrison at Fort Hull.
The new commander at Fort Hull, Colonel Homer Milton, was reinforced and
spent the next several months continuing to persue the Creeks. He
established the fortified posts of Fort Bainbridge and Fort Decatur in
the disputed areas. Floyd's and Milton's activities ensured supplies
that aided in Jackson's successful battle at Horseshoe Bend, which in
turn culminated in the defeat of the hostile Creeks on March 27, 1814.
The British Blockade
One of the concerns of Americans who voted for war against Britain in
1812 was the British navy's heavy-handed enforcement of trade
restrictions to continental Europe. This was, in part, due to Britain's
long-running war with Napoleonic France. Britain had established a
strict blockade of French ports in continental Europe and as a result
was short of ships and men. Consequently, the British seized American
ships suspected of trading with French ports and conducted the
impressment of American sailors. When war broke out, Georgia, with its
long coastline and prosperous coastal cities, once again was on the
front line.
Georgia had been subdued, for the most part, by the British in the
American Revolution. Its coastal cities had been occupied, and in 1812
it seemed possible that a powerful British force could do so again.
Little protection was forthcoming from the federal government because of
its serious deficiency in ships and sailors. British warships hovered
off Georgia's coast, snapping up coastal trading craft and disrupting
the livelihood of Georgians. Georgia's citizens and leaders clamored for
help. That help arrived in the form of a naval expedition to Sunbury,
Georgia, in the summer and fall of 1812.
The navy decided to use Sunbury's deep harbor as a staging area for
several shallow-draft barges, or gunboats. These small craft were to ply
the inter-coastal waterway between Savannah and St. Marys and disrupt
British attempts to capture and destroy American coastal trading ships.
Unfortunately for the government and the people of Sunbury, the
expedition came to a disappointing end because of poor planning,
negligent leadership, and a serious lack of supplies. The failure of the
Sunbury expedition left the Georgia coast open for British attack. To
forestall this, the state set about building batteries at key locations,
including the old Fort Morris at Sunbury (rebuilt and renamed Fort
Defiance), the battery at Point Peter in St. Marys, and many other
strong points on the coast. During the next year and a half no serious
British threat emerged to endanger the Georgia coast, due in part to
British efforts against Napoleon. In 1814, however, all that changed.
Napoleon's defeat in Europe freed thousands of hardened British regulars
to move across the Atlantic and threaten the United States.
The British Occupation of St. Marys and Cumberland Island, 1814-1815
On December 24, 1814, American and British representatives meeting at
Ghent, Belgium, signed a preliminary treaty that would end the War of
1812, but the combatants, far from Europe, knew nothing of it. Along
Georgia's coast American forces fared poorly. On January 10, 1815,
British forces under the command of Admiral Sir George Cockburn landed
on Cumberland Island in an effort to tie up American forces and keep
them from joining other American forces to help defend New Orleans,
Louisiana, and the Gulf Coast. But bad weather and lack of materials and
ships delayed Cockburn until it was too late to produce any effect on
the outcome of the battle for New Orleans. The occupation of Cumberland
Island, however, left the British with a strong base of operations that
they consolidated on January 13 by effecting a landing near the American
battery at Point Peter on the mainland. There they encountered an ambush
by a small force of Americans. The British quickly drove off the attacks
and occupied the town of St. Marys.
Cockburn, by the end of January 1815, had solidified his base of
operations and was under orders to await the arrival of Major Edward
Nicolls, leading a joint force of British soldiers, Native American
allies, and freed blacks. Suitably reinforced, Cockburn was then to
attack along the southern coast, liberating slaves and fomenting
rebellion, thus holding down large numbers of American troops from other
theaters of the war. Nicolls's force, which was supposed to strike into
Georgia from the Gulf Coast, never materialized, although it did succeed
in disrupting communications between Georgia and Mobile. The threat of
Nicolls's impending arrival also forced the Americans to hold back in
Georgia many reserves that could have been sent to aid in American
defenses at Mobile and New Orleans. While Nicolls's force hampered
efforts on the Gulf Coast, Cockburn planned to move north and strike at
Savannah. General John Floyd stationed some 2,000 men near Savannah and
awaited the British thrust, but Cockburn's operation was halted by news
that the Treaty of Ghent had been signed. The British finally evacuated
St. Marys after the ratification of the treaty on February 17, 1815.
The War of 1812 had lasting effects on Georgia. The freeing of slaves by
the British occupation became a legal issue for years after the treaty
ratification. Towns like Sunbury suffered a tremendous decline because
of the damage inflicted on Georgia's coastal trading fleet by the
British blockade, and the question of what to do with lands ceded by the
Creeks and other tribes would lead to major debates over state land
policy. " Gerald Judson Smith Jr.,
Pensioners:
There are 22 known individuals who received a pension from
the War of 1812 from Georgia in 1813.
| First name | Last name | Grade |
| William | Andrews | Sergeant |
| Herman | Bird | Private |
| Daniel | Conner | Lieutenant |
| Alexander | Cameron | Private |
| Austin | Dabney | Private |
| Charles | Damron | Private |
| Thomas L | Davis | Private |
| James P | Edmondson | Private |
| Benjamin | Fry | Private |
| Thomas | Green | Private |
| John | Guthrie | Private |
| John | Garner | Private |
| Thomas | Henshaid | Private |
| Harrison | Jones | Private |
| Henry | Kerr | Captain |
| Seybert | Odam | Private |
| Daniel | Odam | Private |
| William | Pentecost | Lieutenant |
| John | Shackleford | Private |
| James | Shirley | Private |
| Presley | Thornton | Corporal |
| Samuel | Whately | Private |
From a letter from the Secretary of War, Communicating a transcript of the pension list of The United States showing the number of pensioners in the several districts. June 1,1813 referred to the Committee of Claims. Washington: A.& G. Way, Printers 1813. Washington, May 31st, 1813.
Source:
A Transcript of
the Pension List of the United States for 1813; Southern Book Company