Characters of the War of 1812

by Judi McWilliams

Relationships Continued (Part Two)
The finances of the regiments were a constant balancing mission. With budgeting for daily rations and such, they had to take all kinds of situations into consideration. Even down to how many children each soldier had. It is reported that recruiting officers received payment for recruiting soldiers, married or not, which was in direct conflict to their own rule to not recruit married men. As a result, they did not, in fact, stop the number of families recruited for each regiment. What did stop the growth of families, however, was when a regiment went aboard ship to sail to Great Britain, or when the soldiers were sent to Battle. How did the women cope with their spouses abroad or at Battle? At first it was reported to be impossible, and that the parishes were overwhelmed with the abandoned women and children. Parliament tried to implement Acts to deal with these challenges, but unfortunately, like today, in extreme times of hardship, people sometimes take advantage of the systems put in place to assist with finances, housing, medical expenses, etc. It happened during the War of 1812, where some women and children used fake documents to take advantage of the systems put in place. It was less expensive, at that time, to actually let the spouses and children go abroad with the soldiers, although they had limits on how many families could go. All of these findings are left to interpretation. The more I read about the War of 1812, the more I see that all rules were left to interpretation. After reading all this, I took a moment to see just how (remotely so) many things haven’t changed since 1812! People today still abuse our resources. I feel it was (remotely so) justifiable in the 1812’s to take advantage of resources to feed yourself and your children, but, today we live in a world with ample abundance. I believe that some people do take advantage by not taking responsibility for their own actions. I guess what I am trying to say is that although people did similar actions during that period of time, it seemed to be solely for survival purposes, was not wrought with rationalizations and excuses. A few weeks ago, I wrote about Daily Rations. I am now finding out more about the "daily ration allotments". The daily ration allotment rule stated that the number of spouses and children ratio would be 6 to 100 men. However, this did not take into consideration how many children were in each family. This would lead to overdrawn rations, leaving the regiment with a shortfall both financially and rations on hand. All of this information gives us some insight into the Characters and lives of the soldiers, their wives and children.