Who really won the war of 1812?

I've always thought Britain/Canada won that war ... because we ARE still Canada and we were invaded by the U.S.

My American relatives tell me their history books say different.

Can anybody clarify?

I thought it was a draw,

It was a draw we did not get canada yet england was forced to quit takeing US sailors and empressing them into the british navy.

The winner if you want to say there was one had to be France. The war of 1812 distracted england from being able to focus completely on france this help lead to the invasion of russia and well we all know how that turned out.

The US won the last land battle and, though i'm not positive, we also won the last naval battle. Thats why our history books say we won yet we truly gained nothing nor did england/canada out of the war.

Britain/Canada won more. It achieved its war objectives whereas the United States’ largely expansionist (manifested in 2nd Generation Republican agitation) desires (although one could certainly assert that the American’s secondary objectives – sovereignty assertion – were realized) were quashed.

While this shouldn’t be a historiographical debate, most credible, academically sound, history books will suggest that both sides benefited in some measure, but Britain’s primary objective – retention of Upper/Lower Canada – was certainly accomplished.

I'm going off topic here but this thread had me thinking what IF the US had won canada. What would North America look like. I'm thinking that if we had gained canada in the war of 1812 the provences would exist as states now but perty much conforming to their natraul lines that are in place today. Still further the war the US had with mexico might have been a war of total conquest. This meaning that instead of just going into Mexico and fighting we would have stayed after the surrender and taken over makeing North America one huge nation. The form of gov. would be based of the constitution yet still would be extreamly diffrent. The civil rights movement would have been lead by a person of black and hispanic mix. The sitting pres. might be of canadian decent if not certinaly of mexican decent. The civil wat its self would have been far more likely for the south to have won with mexico's land mass to fall back on and its ports to use. So if the civil war was won by the south we would have two supper powers right next to each other. Just thinking of the World War implications is stagering.

How do you view such a senario from canadians point. To me the changes that would have occured vs what has happened is mind boggeling. I used just mentioned only a few things that would have been totaly diffrent. Can you think of any more?

I doubt the people in Canada would have accepted American rule. They would probably resist and try and get the British to come back and kick the Americans out. Even the French living in Canada at the time many were against the United States. So the question if Americans had won the war of 1812 I doubt they ever could have because many people would have never accepted the outcome and would have actually led to more problems for the American union. The American civil war could have been a good opportunity for Canada to break away and rebel while the north and south were busy killing each other.

Actually the civil war could have happened even sooner since the British Empire banned slavery in 1833 in all of her colonies. In Canada slavery was fairly dead slaves were freed in 1737 in Quebec and in 1799 for the rest of “Canada”. So by 1812 slavery was pretty much gone and wasn’t accepted much at all. Also the majority of our slaves were aboriginals mostly owned by the French settlers even then we had only about 5,000 slaves throughout our history.

WOW never knew that. Though thinking it does make sense the south had slaves for manual labor do to slim population during the fromitive years of the colonies and continued it on once the Revelotion was won.
I am supposeing that in canada the need and thus use of slaves were for a diffrent reason.

But that does bring it to a point that if the adding of Canada to the US via a victory in 1812 the Canadaian "states" would have sided with the north and thus not have seperated during the war. Probely like you said their pressence would have speed up the time fram of the wars start and probely would have pushed the issue of slavery to the front at the beggining not in the middle like it did happen.

Now with all that in mind the UK might have come to the aid of the south in an effort to win back the Canadian territory lost in the war of 1812. This would have added a lot of situational things in Eurpoe with the US asking for french, german, russian aid possiabley. Wonder what the political climate of the time was like over there. I've never looked into it. Thanks now I've got more things to look up. LOL.

I think our slaves were more like servants. The rich would have some to do chores for then set tables and such. Some of the aboriginal slaves were gifts by tribes of natives to give to mostly the French for trading with them. That’s why I think we have the metie they are half French half native people. But even before 1812 the Americans tried to force us to revolt during their revolution and came here to force us and we drove them back. At this time there was a lot of tension that’s why I could never see BNA being annexed by the United States. I'm not sure if the colonialists would have fought with the northern states against the south's slavery some of the abolitionists might have but even then. But after 1815 France was defeated and Europe and the United Kingdom could come to defend her colonies so I bet they would have came back to North America, which could have been almost like a second revolutionary war. The British could have actually won and maybe as you said work with the southern states for them to become independent and reclaim BNA and some of the northern states of the republic. The northwest United States could have remained part of BNA because they might have not ceded it then. This could have been the future North America.