Walking with Andrew

1 Month to go

Everyone knew that the war was imminent. Andrew may be at one of a number of places even at Fort St. Joseph up near present day Soo Ste. Marie. We will hear more abour Andrew later. As I look back on events of 200 yrs ago, relative to to-day, it is hard to imagine how long it took to do anything. About two months to sail across the ocean from England. Imagine transporting equipment, food personnel etc from Montreal to the Niagara area. What about sending messages around. There must have been soldiers/militia detailed to do this. Brock sent a letter to an acquaintance re obtaining assistance from the Natives in the comming war and it took 5 months to get a reply.

Ships were involved in the war also. In fact one of the main reasons that started the war was impressment of sailors from American Ships by the British. There were many battles between ships during the war, not only on the great lakes but also on the high seas.The Royal Navy catagorized their ships into three types and six'rates'. A ship-of-the-line had two or more covered gun decks. A frigate had only one covered gun decks. The third type comprised all other ships
The first rate carried 100 guns or more. The second rate, 90-100 guns. third rate, 60-90 guns and so on. The ships on the great lakes had to be built on that lake [ no Welland Canal]and were of the smaller type and rating