Early days of the war.
The United States declared war before it was prepared make war, other than at sea. The United States Army had less than 12,000 men, and though it was immediately authorized to expand to 35,000, finding the men was not easy. The food was poor, the pay was poor, and there were few experienced officers. The state militias would again be used to supplement the army, but they were unreliable at best. Few Americans had seen combat on land, other than along the frontier. America’s harbors were well protected from attack from the sea by a system of forts which guarded the nation’s ports. One of them, Fort McHenry in Baltimore Harbor, would be famous by the war’s end.
The United States Navy on the other hand, though miniscule in comparison to the British fleet, was professional and had proven itself in conflicts with the French and the Barbary pirates. The well defended harbors allowed American shipyards to continue to build ships throughout the war, as privateers and as warships. The American Navy grew as the war went on, but it never reached the point where it could challenge the British for control of the American coastline. It did however wrest control of the Great Lakes from the British, and it prevailed in several ship-to-ship actions at sea. It was the Navy which gave America its first victories in the war.
On August 29, 1812, USS Constitution entered the port of Boston bearing the colors of HMS Guerriere, a frigate which the Americans had defeated in a 35 minute action ten days earlier. Guerriere had been captured from the French by the British Navy six years earlier. The news was astounding. British captains had long spoken with contempt for the American frigates, believing that any British 36 gun frigate could defeat any of the three big American frigates of 44 guns. Faced with the realization that their belief was incorrect, the British Navy began a list of excuses explaining the defeat, which continues to the present day.
On December 4, 1812, USS United States arrived in Newport, Rhode Island, bringing with it the captured British 38 gun frigate Macedonian. Macedonian was only three years old and had been built in England, two of the excuses for the loss of Guerriere had been age and the fact the ship had been French built. Neither excuse was available for Macedonian, which had surrendered to Stephen Decatur. Decatur presented the colors of the captured British ship to President Madison when he arrived in Washington. That two of the vaunted British frigates had been taken was another boost of morale for the United States.
It wasn’t only the big frigates of the United States Navy which scored victories over the British fleet. Several of the smaller sloops of war fought ship to ship actions against British ships of equal strength and succeeded in capturing or destroying the enemy. The victories against the British ships were a salve for the wounds being felt from military failures in the north and west by the end of 1812. In terms of strategic value, the removal of 1 ship from the British navy and its addition to the American navy did little. Constitution would sink another British frigate – HMS Java – in 1812, but word didn’t reach the United States until 1813.