On today's episode, AccuWeather Founder & Executive Chairman Dr. Joel N. Myers explains how severe weather turned the tide during the war of 1812.
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00:00Welcome to Invisible Iceberg, I'm Bernie Reino.
00:06On today's show we're going back to the 1800s to see how severe weather stopped the
00:11British from gaining ground in America.
00:14Plus, what if the storms never happened?
00:17Our What If?
00:18segment reveals how this could have led to another city becoming our nation's capital.
00:24And we break down why tornadoes are more common in the United States than any other place
00:29in the world.
00:30It all starts now on Invisible Iceberg.
00:42The War of 1812 sparked years of conflict between America and Great Britain.
00:47Fresh off a battle with France led by Napoleon Bonaparte, British soldiers locked in with
00:53the U.S. over territory.
00:55The British gained a slight edge when they occupied Washington, D.C. in 1814, but rounds
01:01of severe weather would change everything.
01:05It's one of the many interesting stories in the book Invisible Iceberg, When Climate
01:08and Weather Shaped History.
01:10Here with more fascinating details on this historic event is Acuwe, the founder and executive
01:15chairman and author of the book Invisible Iceberg, When Climate and Weather Shaped
01:20History, Dr. Joel Myers.
01:23Thanks for joining us, Dr. Joel.
01:25Always an interesting, interesting story.
01:28Let's talk about what was the War of 1812.
01:32The politics of the day were that there was conflict between the United States and Britain
01:37and the United States and France.
01:39And they were at war, as they have been almost continuously.
01:43And so we were siding more with France, but even some of the French were attacking our
01:49ships when they thought they were going to Britain.
01:52And Britain attacked our ships when they thought they were going to France.
01:57And what the British did when they captured our ships, the men, Americans, were put into
02:05the British Navy.
02:07The argument was that, well, you were British citizens before you were American, so you
02:13owe it to us.
02:14And so this was a problem and it caused conflict.
02:17And there was some feeling in D.C. that we should declare war on France.
02:22Another feeling we should declare war on Britain.
02:25Remember, this is just a few decades after we gained our independence.
02:31And we don't learn a lot about this war.
02:36Most in history we talk about the Revolutionary War.
02:39But this is a fascinating period.
02:41And there was not uniformity in thought in Washington.
02:46President Madison barely got a declaration of war passed.
02:51I think it was the closest vote ever in a declaration of war by the United States.
02:56How did the war go initially?
02:59Well, it was back and forth.
03:03We captured Toronto, which was called York, and we burned it to the ground.
03:08So the British felt they had to come to Washington and burn it to the ground, which they did.
03:14And in fact, if it wasn't for the weather, they may have stayed in Washington.
03:20And who knows what would happen to the history of the United States, because the President
03:24Madison and his wife had to abandon the White House just before the British came.
03:29Luckily, they got out.
03:30Supposedly, they hadn't.
03:31They had to escape, and Britain sat there in the seat of power of the United States.
03:37Things did get a little better for the Americans as the war dragged on.
03:42Actually, because of lack of communications, the British had agreed to most American demands
03:49to not have the war, but that message didn't get back until after the U.S. had already
03:57declared war on Britain.
04:00Same thing at the end of the war, the Battle of New Orleans, which the United States won,
04:05but the peace treaty had been agreed to 15 days before, but war did not get to British
04:11or American troops in New Orleans prior to that.
04:15And so a lot of Americans say, hey, we won the war because of that.
04:18The war was already settled before that resounding American victory in New Orleans.
04:23The weather played a huge role in this war, specifically when the British came into Washington,
04:30D.C.
04:31And it may have saved the United States, just like the weather saved George Washington and
04:38America in the Revolutionary War.
04:39It was a hot, steamy day the day before a weather event occurred, temperature 100 degrees.
04:47And the British soldiers experienced very few casualties.
04:54Most Americans had left, had abandoned the city.
04:56They burned it.
04:58In fact, burning a storage area led to the loss of the most amount of British soldiers,
05:07over 30 or 35 British soldiers, because they, by accident, blew up a powder keg of ammunition
05:16in Washington.
05:17And they were in control and they were sitting in Congress and they were sitting in all the
05:24office buildings and feeling very superior when all of a sudden, the next day, this rainstorm
05:30comes in and then there are tornadoes.
05:35And the tornadoes actually killed more British soldiers than the Americans had.
05:41Very disruptive, very unexpected, of course, no warnings in those days.
05:46And the British really weren't familiar with tornadoes.
05:49Tornadoes aren't that common in Washington, along the East Coast, but they happen.
05:55And when they happen, they can be much more severe than they ever are in Britain.
05:59So the British had no idea what a tornado was and these tornadoes did do significant
06:06damage and may have even been intensified by the fire, because a lot of heat and so
06:12on was already hot and humid.
06:14So they were rainstorms with wind and then the tornado came through, killed a lot of
06:18British soldiers, and so they abandoned D.C.
06:22There's some thought that the rain actually did put out a lot of the fires, although by
06:26the time it arrived, they had already pretty much burnt the Capitol building down.
06:31Well, the city.
06:32Yeah, the whole city.
06:33Most of the buildings had to be completely rebuilt.
06:36Of all that, and the weather to some degree included, was, do you rebuild in Washington
06:42or do you move the Capitol to Philadelphia?
06:46And a lot of debate.
06:47And by only five votes was Washington kept as the Capitol.
06:53So depending on how that weather, if it was more severe, who knows, Philadelphia might
06:58be the Capitol today.
07:00Amazing story.
07:01Dr. Joe Myers, thanks for sharing it.
07:03My pleasure.
07:04Joining us right now is author and historian Don Hickey.
07:08Don, thanks for joining us here today.
07:11My pleasure.
07:12All right.
07:13Let's get into it.
07:14The War of 1812.
07:16What was the cause and the mission?
07:19Well, the United States went to war against Great Britain in 1812 in order to force the
07:23British to give up certain maritime practices on the high seas that they were pursuing in
07:33order to win their war against Napoleonic France.
07:37The two big issues were the orders in consul, a series of executive orders issued by the
07:42crown that restricted American trade with the continent of Europe, and under the authority
07:49of which the British seized 400 or 500 American ships, and impressment, which was the British
07:54practice of stopping American merchant vessels on the high seas, removing seamen on the grounds
08:01that they were British subjects, and conscripting them into the Royal Navy.
08:06Why did the British decide to invade Washington, D.C.?
08:09Well, because they controlled the high seas, they blockaded the American coast.
08:15They could operate very nearly with impunity along the coast, and it was a convenient target.
08:21It would be extremely embarrassing to the United States if its capital was conquered
08:25as it was.
08:27It had no real great strategic value, but it certainly had a lot of moral value.
08:32It's the only time in our history, at least since the Revolution, that our capital has
08:36been occupied by a foreign army.
08:38Was there a weather impact on the war overall, and specifically in the nation's capital?
08:44There was an impact, really, especially in the north.
08:49The war was fought mainly on the Canadian-American frontiers.
08:54The winters were brutal.
08:55There was frostbite on both sides, and the Indians suffered the most because they were
09:01British allies, and we pursued a scorched-earth policy against the Indians, destroying their
09:06lodging and their food supplies.
09:08A lot of Indians died of starvation, disease, and exposure during this war.
09:13The weather played a very real role in enabling the United States to prosecute the war on
09:19the northern frontier.
09:22Was the survival of Washington, D.C., as the capital in doubt?
09:26Well, it was.
09:28You asked about the weather.
09:29There were two heavy storms, probably 100-mile-an-hour winds, during the British occupation.
09:35It only lasted about 24 hours.
09:38One of the buildings that some British soldiers were housed in collapsed, killing them.
09:42It was a pretty bad experience for the occupation force.
09:46How did the war end?
09:48What was decided by the treaty ending the war?
09:51Well, that's a great question.
09:54There's an old saw that everybody's happy with the outcome of the war.
09:57The Americans are happy because they think they won.
10:00The Canadians are happier because they know they won.
10:03And the British are happiest of all because they've forgotten all about it.
10:07And that's more or less true, although it ignores the Indians in the Old Northwest and
10:12the Old Southwest.
10:13They were the big losers.
10:15In Tecumseh's war in the Northwest, the Creek War in the Southwest, they were defeated,
10:19and that opened the door to westward expansion in those two regions.
10:24Author and historian Don Hickey, thank you for joining us.
10:29My pleasure.
10:30Thank you, Bernie.
10:31Still to come, we'll explain why geography makes the United States a prime spot for tornadoes.
10:39Up next in our What If segment, we'll explore how Washington, D.C. might be different if
10:45it weren't for a round of severe weather in 1812.
11:04Welcome back to Invisible Iceberg, I'm Bernie Rainow.
11:07It's time to jump into our What If segment to look at how America would be different
11:12if this round of severe weather never hit D.C.
11:16Back with us now is Acuwe, the founder and executive chairman and author of the book
11:20Invisible Iceberg, When Climate and Weather Shaped History, Dr. Joel Myers.
11:25So a tornado and thunderstorm saved Washington, D.C.
11:29What if those thunderstorms didn't hit?
11:33Or the tornadoes actually didn't hit Washington, D.C., which in a sense forced the British
11:39out of our nation's capital.
11:40How would things have been different, you think?
11:43Well think back to then.
11:44Of course, we didn't have warnings, so the weather changed regularly.
11:49Britain has different weather than the United States.
11:51This was a hot, sultry summer day period, and then all of a sudden these vigorous thunderstorms
11:57come through, and tornadoes, disruptive, you know, killing soldiers, causing damage
12:04and so on, and forcing the British troops to abandon D.C.
12:09If that hadn't happened, Britain had control of the nation's capital, the seat of power.
12:19Suppose they stayed, and the peace treaty might have been very different.
12:25Maybe we had to cede things back to Britain, and surrender, and so on.
12:29So you can imagine all kinds of different outcomes.
12:34So clearly those tornadoes forced the British out of Washington.
12:39The president was able to return, along with other government officials, and that really
12:47changed the course of the war in some ways.
12:49If there was a hero of the War of 1812, it was Andrew Jackson.
12:54How did this propel him and his career moving forward?
12:59Well, he won the Battle of New Orleans, actually 15 days after the peace treaty had been agreed
13:05to, but he didn't know it, and the British didn't know it, because there was lack of
13:10communications.
13:11I mean, this is over 200 years ago, but it certainly made him a national hero.
13:18Years later, he ran for president, lost the first time, but then was elected twice, served
13:23eight years.
13:24So many times, war heroes have become presidents.
13:29Dwight Eisenhower, who was reputed to be the main general leader during World War II, and
13:37we've had other instances, Grant, after the Civil War, and so on.
13:44Let's talk about President Madison.
13:45He was the president during the War of 1812.
13:50How was he viewed?
13:51How was his leadership viewed during this time?
13:54Well, the whole war was somewhat controversial.
13:58He wanted the war.
14:01He wanted it against the British.
14:04He got it passed by Congress, the declaration of war, but it was by a narrow margin.
14:12Typically, when the United States has declared war, it's been overwhelming support by Congress.
14:16That was not the case in this time.
14:19So there was not universal support for President Madison.
14:23And what was decided by the treaty ending the war?
14:27What were the terms?
14:28It went more or less back where it was before the war.
14:31There was no big gain for Britain or the United States.
14:37There were some minor effects.
14:39Of course, one of the reasons the United States went to war, either they knew it ahead of
14:46time or thinking about it, was to merge with, take over Canada, make Canada part of the
14:52United States.
14:54And it's interesting that it was true then, and it's true now, this is the longest non-militarized
15:01border in the world between the United States and Canada.
15:05Common language for the most part, common traditions, somewhat different politics, obviously
15:11different political system, but no huge differences.
15:16It's amazing that that border was settled in 1812 and it still exists today.
15:21I'm not sure if there's a border like that anywhere in the world, is there?
15:26Interesting point.
15:27But the commonality between most of Canada, Americans and such, and there's no sign that
15:36any change will ever occur there in the future.
15:39How did the war, of course, 1812, how did the war inspire the National Anthem?
15:46It was written by Francis Scott Key during the War of 1812.
15:52Yeah, he was imprisoned on a British ship in Baltimore Harbor and inspired to write
15:58the National Anthem, which has been our national anthem now for over 200 years.
16:03And of course, he talks about the bombs bursting in air, illuminating the flag.
16:10But there was rain that night.
16:12Could there have been thunderstorms and lightning?
16:15He didn't mention it in the saucepanko banner, but it's quite possible the flag was also
16:21illuminated by lightning.
16:24And one wonders how would have things been different if there was a decisive victory,
16:29let's say on the American side, and Canada and the U.S. would have merged in locations.
16:35That would be, and the way in which we even conduct our weather services, by the way,
16:41in the United States and Canada are far different even today.
16:44One wonders how things would have been different.
16:46I don't know if they're far different, but there's significant differences, certainly.
16:50Even in the radars and so on.
16:52So it would have been much more uniform.
16:54And for the most part, Canada is more liberal than the United States.
16:59So who knows what the politics would have been, the influence, how many states Canada
17:06would have made up of the United States.
17:08One can speculate forever as to how that would have turned out.
17:11We've had other fascinating stories about war, certainly the D-Day invasion.
17:17And here we're talking about tornadoes, and I'm sure for the British soldiers, this must
17:21have been one of the scariest scenes they've seen.
17:25Not used to seeing them, certainly, in the U.K.
17:28Well, here they had one.
17:30They forced all the Americans out.
17:31They controlled D.C.
17:33And then this horrendous weather comes in and just destroys things.
17:38Very disruptive, very scary.
17:40I'm just getting out of here after that.
17:41That's what I assume they were probably thinking.
17:43Yeah.
17:44Well, they were decimated.
17:45Yeah.
17:46Thank you for sharing your story, Dr. Joe.
17:47Thanks for sharing it with us.
17:48My pleasure.
17:49Up next, why are there more tornadoes in the United States than any other country in the
17:54world?
17:55We'll break it down after the break.
18:04Welcome back to Invisible Iceberg.
18:06I'm Bernie Rainow.
18:07Tornadoes have been recorded on every continent except Antarctica, with North America at the
18:13top of the list for both frequency and severity.
18:16In particular, the United States averages nearly 1,200 tornadoes per year, which is
18:21more than Canada, Australia, and all European countries combined.
18:26In addition, violent tornadoes are more common in the United States than any other country.
18:31The geography of the United States is unique and plays a key role in tornado climatology.
18:36No place else in the world has the large, warm water on its equatorial side with a wide,
18:43high range of mountains extending from north to south to the west of it.
18:47The Rocky Mountains help funnel polar air from Canada southward and moist Gulf of Mexico
18:52air northward.
18:53Meanwhile, desert air from Mexico often sweeps northward, and it's the clash of these air
18:58masses that creates violent thunderstorms that can produce tornadoes when atmospheric
19:03winds change with speed and direction with height.
19:07Tornadoes are most prevalent in the central United States.
19:10The top three states are Texas, Kansas, and Oklahoma, and of course, the size of Texas
19:15does play a huge role in the statistics.
19:17Conversely, there are a number of states and districts where tornadoes do not occur on
19:22average every year.
19:24Most of them are in New England.
19:26Curiously, though, Washington, D.C. is on the list.
19:28However, it is the relatively small size of the District of Columbia that is the primary
19:33reason as border states of Virginia and Maryland average a few tornadoes per year.
19:38I want to thank AccuWeather founder and executive chairman and author of the book Invisible
19:42Iceberg, When Climate and Weather Shaped History, Dr. Joel Myers for joining us today.
19:46And a big thanks to all of you for watching.
19:49If you have any questions or comments, send us an email at questions at accuweather.com.
19:53We look forward to seeing you next time.