Aroostook War

 

Feb.–May, 1839, border conflict between the United States and Canada. In 1838, Maine and New Brunswick both claimed territory left undetermined on the U.S.-Canadian border, including the valley of the Aroostook River. Maine farmers were interested in the valley's farmlands, and when New Brunswick sent Canadian lumbermen to do logging there, Maine authorities raised a force to eject them. New Brunswick asked for British regular troops and full-scale fighting seemed imminent, but Gen. Winfield Scott, who had been sent to the area with a small U.S. force, managed to reach an agreement (Mar., 1839) that prevented trouble. The boundary was later settled by the Webster-Ashburton Treaty (1842).

Aroostook War
Date 1838-1839 Location Maine-New Brunswick border Result Webster-Ashburton Treaty
Combatants
United States of America	British Empire/British North America
Strength
3,000–10,000	3,000–10,000
Casualties
38 incidental deaths

The Aroostook War, also called the Pork and Beans War, the Coon-Canuck War, the Lumberjack's War or the Northeastern Boundary Dispute, was an undeclared confrontation in 1838-39 between Americans and the United Kingdom regarding the international boundary between British North America and the United States. The dispute resulted in a mutually accepted boundary between the present-day state of Maine and provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec.

Background

The 1783 Treaty of Paris did not satisfactorily determine the boundary between the British colony of New Brunswick (now the Canadian province of New Brunswick) and the District of Maine (then a part of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts). The boundary dispute worsened after Maine became a state in 1820 and, disregarding British claims, began granting land to settlers in the valley of the Aroostook River (the Aroostook is a tributary of the St. John River, which flows through the heart of New Brunswick, and drains into the Bay of Fundy).

The majority of early Aroostook River Valley settlers were from "over-home", that is, from the St. John River Valley, and were typically British subjects. Many were French-speaking "Brayons" — also nominally British subjects — who (at least jokingly) considered themselves to be in the unofficial "République du Madawaska", and thus disinterested in the machinations of the Americans and British. The population swelled in the wintertime when lumbermen were freed from farmwork to "long-pole" up the St. John River to the valley. These migrant lumbermen were a particular point of tension for the Americans. Some eventually settled permanently in the valley and improved their land claims. Most settlers found themselves too remote from the authorities to apply formally for land, and since the boundary was ambiguous it was uncertain which government was in authority, anyway. Disputes heated up as factions maneuvered for control over the best stands of trees in the valley.

In 1831 the members of the Maine Legislature became concerned over the growing Maine/New Brunswick boundary question and took action by sending John Deane and Edward Kavanagh to northern Maine/northwestern New Brunswick to document the inhabitants and to assess the extent of trespass (from their point of view).

King William I of the Netherlands was asked to arbitrate the dispute in 1832. Although the British accepted the king's help, the U.S. Senate rejected it at Maine's request.

"Hostilities"

American woodsmen, including John Baker, were sent to agitate against the British and press American claims. On 04 July, 1827, Baker raised an "American" flag made by his wife on the western side of the junction of what is now Baker Brook and the St. John River. Baker was subsequently arrested by British Colonial authorities, fined £25, and jailed until he paid his fine.^[2]

In 1837, Governor Robert Dunlap of Maine, issued a general order announcing that Maine had been invaded by a foreign power.[1]

Both American and New Brunswick lumbermen were cutting timber in the disputed territory during the winter of 1838-1839, and in February, New Brunswick loggers seized the American land agent, Rufus McIntire, who was exercising jurisdiction. The "war" was now under way, led by the governors of the respective sides, New Brunswick Lieutenant Governor Sir John Harvey and Maine Governor Edward Kent.

Maine and New Brunswick called out their militiamen, and the United States Congress, at Maine's insistence, authorized a force of 50,000 men and appropriated $10 million to meet the emergency. Maine only committed somewhere between 3,000 and 10,000 troops to the conflict, and these never actually left their garrison at Hancock Barracks in Houlton, in part due to the actions of Major R. M. Kirby who was commander of the post and three companies of the U.S. 1^st Artillery Regiment. Four companies of the 11th Regiment marched to the area from Quebec City to represent Canada's interests. Meanwhile, New Brunswick armed every tributary of the St John River that flowed from the Aroostook Territory with regular and militia soldiers. Maine created an Aroostook County specifically to lay claim to the area. President Martin Van Buren dispatched General Winfield Scott and New Brunswick sent Governor Harvey to the "war zone," and the men arranged an agreement in March of 1839 between officials of Maine and New Brunswick that averted actual fighting. Britain agreed to refer the dispute to a boundary commission, and the matter was settled in 1842 by the Webster-Ashburton Treaty.

Settlement

The compromise reached by Daniel Webster and Alexander Baring, 1st Baron Ashburton awarded 7,015 square miles (18,170 km²) to the United States and 5,012 square miles (12,980 km²) to Great Britain. Retention by the British of the northern area of the disputed territory assured them of year-round overland military communications between Lower Canada and Nova Scotia by way of the Halifax Road. The U.S. federal government agreed to pay the states of Maine and Massachusetts $150,000 each, and they were to be reimbursed by the United States for expenses incurred while encroaching on New Brunswick territory.

Webster used a map found in the Paris Archives by the American Jared Sparks (and said to have been marked with a red line by Benjamin Franklin in Paris in 1782) to persuade Maine and Massachusetts to accept the agreement. As the map showed the disputed region belonged to the British, it helped convince the representatives of those states to accept the compromise, lest the "truth" reach British ears and convince the British to refuse a compromise. It was later discovered that the Americans had hidden their knowledge of the Franklin map. A map said to be favorable to the United States claims was apparently used in Britain, but this map was never revealed. Some claim the Franklin map was a fake created by Britain to pressure the American negotiators as their map placed the entire disputed area on the American side of the border (see John A. Garraty, The American Nation, Houghton Mifflin, p. 336).

Ultimately, the only "losers" were the original Brayon (and Native) inhabitants of the region, who saw their homeland and people split between the American state of Maine and the British colony of New Brunswick.

The war, while avoiding actual combat, was not without casualties. Private Hiram T. Smith, from Maine, died of unknown causes while in service to his state. He is buried in Maine on the side of the Military Road (U.S. Route 2) in the middle of the Haynesville Woods. Several other Maine militiamen died of illness while on the Aroostook expedition.

See also

• Caroline Affair
• Republic of Indian Stream
• Republic of Madawaska
• List of conflicts in Canada

External links

• Scott Michaud's The Aroostook War
• Hiram Smith, hero of the war that wasn't
• The Upper St. John River Valley: The Boundary Dispute
• Esprit de Corps Magazine article: The Aroostook War
• Deane and Kavanagh's 1831 Aroostook Valley legislative report (covering present-day Crouseville, Maine)
• Officers in Service During the Aroostook War
• Aroostook War Muster Rolls

References

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