The Battle for Baltimore: 1814 (Hardcover)

~ Joseph A. Whitehorne (Author), Carleton Jones (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

The campaign around Washington and Baltimore in 1814 is one of the few aspects of the War of 1812 that is at all known by the general public, thanks to the defense of Baltimore's Fort McHenry inspiring Francis Scott Key to write the national anthem. Whitehorne probes extensively into the background of the campaign: the politics of Maryland that helped and hindered organization and training of the militia, and the economics of the Chesapeake Bay area that the British were trying to disrupt. In the end, the British embarrassed the Americans by taking Washington, were in turn embarrassed by the failures of several raids and the assault on Fort McHenry, and nowhere came close to achieving their probable intention--reversing the course of the war. Whitehorne's writing, research, and balancing of analysis and narrative are all sound, making his account useful to scholar and general reader alike. Roland Green

Product Details

• Hardcover: 262 pages
• Publisher: Nautical & Aviation Publishing Company of Ame (April 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1877853232
• ISBN-13: 978-1877853234
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,783,732 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars good info, lousy writing, April 2, 1999

By A Customer

I bought this book to do some research for my own writing. While the historical information is interesting and accurate (as far as I know), the writing is awful. This book is absolutely teeming with typos and misused words. Unless "belligerant" has become a word while I wasn't looking, I don't think the book was even spellchecked! The grammar errors are constant enough that they really detracted from my enjoyment of the book. But the topic is pretty specialized, and this is the only book I've found that deals with it exclusively, so it's worth checking out if you need to know about this particular battle or about the politics and culture of Chesapeake Bay around the time of the War of 1812 (about which there are plenty of good details). I just hope the folks at the Nautical & Aviation Publishing Company have since hired a proofreader!

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A well researched but badly written history, March 9, 2004

By A Customer

I must echo the comments from the previous review of this book. Overall this book is well researched and gives a good overview of the politics and battles in the Cheaspeake Bay region during the War of 1812. The writing style and presentation is difficult to digest. To read a few pages of this book without growing weary is a serious accomplishment. The research seems to be original, however, and unique to this book. Bottom line, I would be hesitant to buy this book without making sure there we no better written and researched books about this specific topic.