After Tippecanoe: Some Aspects of the War of 1812

Kentucky in the Northwest Campaign

78 On January 3, 1809, Henry Clay, a member of the Kentucky House of Representatives, introduced a resolution urging members of that body to clothe themselves henceforth in fabrics of American manufacture .1 The Fayette County farmer-lawyer had already prepared for himself a suit out of his own Ashland Estate merino wool.2 Two years earlier, the House of Representatives, wrought up over the Chesapeake-Leopard affair, had thrown reason to the wind and proposed to prohibit the citation of British statutes and judicial decisions . Lawyer Clay, who later became so vehement against British textile manufacturers, called for moderation. He was willing to accept the compromise that no decisions rendered after July 4, 1776, would be cited.3 Clay’s homespun resolution came at a time when Kentuckians were highly excited over Britain’s imperious acts of impressment, the failures of the various diplomatic missions, and the firing on the Chesapeake. These emotional issues widened the political fissure between Kentucky’s JeffersonianRepublicansandthethinningranksofFederalists.Themost outspoken of the latter was crotchety Humphrey Marshall of Frankfort. Marshall regarded Clay’s resolution and anti-British comments as blatant demagoguery. In the arguments which ensued, Marshall called Clay a liar and threatened physical violence in the assembly. A challenge to a duel followed; the two antagonists met at Shippingport and crossed over into the Indiana Territory to preserve their honor. Clay was wounded in the thigh, but returned home a Republican hero—even though he and Marshall were censured by the assembly for dueling.4 The Clay-Marshall duel may be considered the first shot in Kentucky ’s participation in the War of 1812. From the viewpoint of most Kentuckians the war to come was in fact a Kentucky conflict. They were aroused over the violations of neutrality on the seas, the Ordersin -Council, the Napoleonic decrees, and subsequently the American KENTUCKY IN THE NORTHWEST CAMPAIGN Thomas D. Clark 79 embargo and non-intercourse acts. Though Kentucky was far removed from the coast and the sea lanes, sea-going trade was vital to its economy . Since 1787, commerce down the Mississippi had been the lifeline of Kentucky farmers and merchants. Almost all Kentucky farm products that were sold outside the state went to market by way of the western rivers and the port of New Orleans. James Brown, Henry Clay’s brother-in-law, wrote from Louisiana early in 1810, “Deeply interested as you must feel in the prosperity of Kentucky you cannot have overlooked the obvious fact that its safety; tranquility; wealth and even continuance of the form of government it enjoys depend on the destinies of the Mississippi. Should this key to your trade fall into the hands of either of the great nations who now figure on the European theatre, the effects would be serious if not ruinous to your prosperity.”5 There was a lingering and deep fear in Kentucky of both the Indians and British in the Northwest. This grew out of the bitter revolutionary years when raiders of both groups crossed the Ohio to threaten every settlement from Logan’s Fort to Boonesboro. When these halted there were still bitter attacks upon migrating settlers along the Ohio until Anthony Wayne’s army pushed the Indian menace farther inland. This act, however, erased neither the sense of fear nor the deep hatreds which had developed over two decades. A sense of expansion in every field of activity had characterized Kentucky at the turn of the nineteenth century. Her fields and pastures were reaching peaks of production. Still-houses, mills, smokehouses , and tiny factories loaded hundreds of flatboats each season with goods for the markets down stream. The trails and roads were crowded with hogs, cattle, and mules being driven to the eastern seaboard farms and markets. Culturally, Kentucky was reaching a second stage of maturity. There had been a great religious revival, with its lingering results. As farm lands were brought into full cultivation, towns were expanding. Pioneers who had begun life west of the mountains in log houses were now building new brick houses. There was a phenomenal expansion of population, an increase of two hundred per cent from 73,000 in 1792 to 220,955 in 1800; and again to 406,511 in 1810.6 Kentuckians were restless people. Though they had found land and some wealth in the frontier state, many looked farther west to make their fortunes. Lands in Indiana, along the Wabash, in Illinois, and even beyond the Mississippi in the Louisiana Purchase...