The Americans became angered by the British for several reasons; first of all, they were not pleased with the restraints put on trade by the British. They were also not pleased with the British alliance forming towards the Native people. The British were arming American Indians in the West, most notably followers of Tecumseh.

Control of the great lakes was paramount to the success of the war, and the survival of Canada as a nation. The Americans were caught slightly off guard by this impeding battle and hastily spent the winter of 1812 to 1813 building ships.

The Americans had always enjoyed supremacy on the water over the British but they lagged behind from the outset with their ship building capabilities.

By September 1814, the British launched the largest ship built during the war— HMS St. Lawrence. On April 13th, 1813 American forces attacked and burned the capital of Upper Canada, Fort York (now called Toronto).

However, Kingston was strategically more valuable to British supply and communications along the St Lawrence. Without control of Kingston, the American navy could not effectively control Lake Ontario or sever the British supply line from Lower Canada.

Control of the lake — the most important supply route for military operations to the west — had passed back and forth between the Americans and the British over the course of the war. The construction of HMS St. Lawrence gave the British uncontested control of the lake during the final months of the war.

HMS St. Lawrence never saw action, because her presence on the lake deterred the U.S. fleet from setting sail.

With peace finally established, the U.S. was overwelmed by a new national identity - they had finally secured the independence from Britain that they had desperately sought.

In Canada, the war and its conclusion represented a successful defense of the country, and a defining era in the formation of an independent national identity. This, coupled with ongoing suspicion of a U.S. desire to again invade the country, would culminate in creation of the Dominion of Canada in 1867.