Catch the Wind: My Journey with Caroline

About Caroline’s Time

New York in 1812 was still part of a young country fighting to earn Great Britain’s respect. Topics in this section include:

• Great Britain still refused to treat the United States as an equal nation, even thirty years after independence
  • More than 10,000 American sailors had been captured by British warships and forced into service on them
  • American ships were also barred from trading in foreign ports under British control
• The U.S. eventually ran out of patience and declared a second war against Britain
  • By that August, Sackets Harbor’s quiet days were over, since it now served as headquarters for the U.S. Navy across the entire Great Lakes
  • The British headquarters sat only thirty miles away, across Lake Ontario
• A year later, in 1813, Sackets Harbor would face an even bloodier battle
• Left without the men who’d gone to fight, wives and children carried the burden of running things at home
  • Some men enlisted by choice
  • Others, Caroline’s father included, ended up captured and imprisoned for months or years at a stretch
• Women and children took on whatever work the absent men left behind
  • Some ran their families’ entire farms, shops, and businesses on their own
  • Others made risky trips into enemy territory to beg or bargain for a husband’s or son’s freedom
  • A handful took up arms directly, as Betsy Doyle did at Fort Niagara, New York, helping fire a cannon after her husband was taken prisoner
• By 1815, when the war ended, America had shown it could hold its ground against the world’s most powerful navy