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The War of 1812: Three Divergent National Perspectives with John Scott Cowan

The War of 1812 began on June 18, 1812 and lasted until the Treaty of Ghent on Christmas Eve 1814, with some post-treaty events into early 1815. Today, after 200 years, there are three competing and completely different narratives about it, depending on whether the source is in the US, Canada or the UK. Like three witnesses seeing a traffic accident from three different vantage points, these narratives are utterly different. But they can be reconciled.

This lecture and discussion will explore and explain these differences, and will reveal many little-know stories from that era.

John Scott Cowan studied physics and physiology at Toronto. A post-doc at Laval preceded 24 years at Ottawa as professor, chair of physiology, and then vice-rector. Vice-principal at Queen's before becoming principal of RMC (1999-2008), he has also worked extensively in labour relations, and has flown some 60 aircraft types. Research in physiology co-existed with defence issues, starting with a 1963 monograph on defence policy. Recently he has focussed on asymmetric threats, piracy, the characteristics of the profession of arms, and defence education. He was president of the CDA Institute 2008-2012, and chair of the Defence Science Advisory Board of Canada 2010-2013. He is the Honorary Colonel of the Princess of Wales' Own Regiment.