Caroline Affair - Chad Mathews

The Caroline Affair (also known as the Caroline Case or Caroline Incident) took place in the year of 1837. Americans started to fear going to war with England after a rebellion in Canada called the Patriot War. The Patriot war was one of many rebellions in Canada in 1837. These was were sparked from Canadians frustrated with the political reform, who wanted a responsible government. The Canadian rebels, led by William Lyon Mackenzie, fled to Navy Island in upper Canada (now Ontario) near the Niagara River and set up a headquarters. The declared themselves the Republic of Canada with Mackenzie's general, Rensselaer Van Rensselaer, as their leader. Meanwhile, on the other side of the border, Americans supplied the Republic of Canada with arms, money, and recruited men via the steamboat SS Caroline. The British government wanted to stop these shipments made by the Americans because they were giving the rebels an advantage. On December 29 the SS Caroline was ferrying goods from America to Navy Island when, in the middle of the night, several boats full of armed men crossed the Niagara River from Canada. Among these men were Canadian loyalist Colonel Sir Allan MacNab and Captain Andrew Drew of the Royal Navy. These men seized the boat and killed a black man by the name of Amos Durfee in the process. They then towed the boat into the middle of the river and set it on fire and down the rapids of Niagara Falls. After news got out of this event, newspapers falsely stated that there were dozens of Americans killed of which were trapped aboard the ship, when in actuality, it was abandoned of all personnel except for the one black man Amos Durfee before it was sent down the falls in a blaze. As a result, Gen. Winfield Scott riled up American soldiers along the border as well as many others Americans throughout the states to have intense anti-British feelings. In addition, president Martin Van Buren took part in this anti-British movement, and protested strongly to London, but was ignored. The affair mostly died away until one of the British soldiers who attacked the boat boasted of the fact that he was in the United States. This soldier soon was arrested as a criminal. The Caroline Affair is a major contributor to the tense relationship between America and Britain in the years before the Webster-Ashburton Treaty which resolved the issues between the U.S. and the British along the border. Also, the Caroline Affair has been in politics many years after the incident to establish the principle of "anticipatory self-defense" in politics internationally. This states that it may be only justified in cases where the "necessity of that self-defense is instant, overwhelming, and leaving no choice of means, and no moment for deliberation". This expression is part of the Caroline test. In addition, the Caroline Affair is also used frequently in the dispute about preemptive strike or the preemptive doctrine. The Caroline Affair was a type of preemptive war (a war that is started in order to defeat or repel a perceived offense or to gain a strategic advantage) because the British and Canadian loyalists tried to defeat the rebels by cutting off their supplies flowing in from the Americans and gain an advantage in the war.
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Works Cited:

1. "Caroline Affair." Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia. Columbia University Press, 2007. Web. 01 Nov. 2011.
2. LaChiusa, Chuck. "Caroline Incident." Buffalo Architecture and History. Ingenious, Inc. Web. 01 Nov. 2011.
3. Miller, Hunter. "Avalon Project - British-American Diplomcay : The Caroline Case." Avalon Project - Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy. Lillian Goldman Law Library, 2008. Web. 01 Nov. 2011.