The Declaration of War

In any timeline about a war, or indeed any story about one, an important question is this:
When does the war begin?

Normally this is a simple question. But in Burnished Rows of Steel, it becomes oddly arcane as it follows no particular logic - especially compared to the original timeline.

Part 1: The OTL events of the Trent affair

1. In the OTL, the British learned about the Trent affair in late November. This was a shocking crisis, and one which came after several events which the British (largely wrongly) interpreted as the Union signalling that it planned to invade Canada at the first opportunity.
2. The British spent some days debating, and then sent their ultimatum – one which demanded the release of the prisoners (Mason and Slidell) and an apology, and directed their ambassador to treat anything other than substantive compliance as a rejection.
3. This ultimatum had a one week expiry date. This was deliberate, and was intended to not give the Union too long to prepare commerce raiding cruisers (seen as a major possible financial risk).
4. In the OTL, the British Ultimatum arrived in Washington on the 18^th December. Lyons allowed the Union another five days total to consider before the formal presentation of the demand; in the event, the Union backed down in private on the 27^th and in public on the 29^th.
5. This news led to the cancellation of General Militia Order number one, which called for Canadian militia mobilization to formally begin on or about the 30^th December.
6. The news reached Britain on the 9^th January.

So much is OTL. Now, there are a few additional details to note.

• The first is that the decision on whether to go to war was already made – it was why the ultimatum was sent. Much like in the Crimean War, the decision making had already taken place, and a declaration of war would follow within a day or two of the rejection of the ultimatum.
• The second is that, owing to the predominantly naval British strategy, any delay harms them. They have no reason to delay a declaration of war more than a few days, unless they decide to delay until summer when they can pre-position large chunks of the Royal Navy and British Army inside Canada to protect it (and can drill large numbers of Canadian militia).
• The third is that the British already had a large naval squadron off the American coasts in December 1861.

Part 2: Changes in the Timeline

The following changes take place to this course of events in Burnished Rows of Steel.

1.  The Trent affair is not the first provocation for which the news reaches Britain – instead there is the St Albans Raid, which takes place ahistorically early. This should have the effect of making the British more wary of any Union reaction. It should also have the effect of causing the British to form provisional battalions of volunteer militia for active service, as they did when the raid actually took place, or sending regular infantry battalions to reinforce the border.
2.  The Trent affair is far, far worse, with the San Jacinto (the US ship in the Trent affair) firing on the British corvette Rinaldo and crippling her; the San Jacinto escapes with no noted damage. It is stated that it is unclear which ship fired first, but the British should have little doubt that the more heavily armed Rinaldo would not have been crippled if she fired first. (she has to be towed back to a nearby port, San Jacinto sails under her own power to Boston.)
3.  There are additional border incidents, including one where (according to a strict reading of the facts given in the post as opposed to the statements of the characters) the Vermont militia invade Canada to ambush a company of British regular infantry.
4.  The British ultimatum is harsher, calling for several additional provisions, and is officially presented on the 19^th December.
5.  The Union calls for mediation on the 26^th December. (This would be taken by the British as a rejection, and Lyons would leave the country immediately; this he does not do.)
6.  The timescale of when the Union rejection reaches Britain is not known. What is known, however, is that the British response arrives in Washington on or about 22^nd February – a two-way message time of 58 days, which compares very poorly to the OTL one-way message time of 11 days.
7.  General Militia Order number one either does not exist or is cancelled TTL. No Canadian mobilization takes place, and some of the OTL regulars alerted to move to Canada are stood down – in short, the British are acting as though the Union has backed down.
8.  The contents of the British response are not known, but they do not include a declaration of war and nor do they include either an acceptance of mediation or a further ultimatum.
9.  There is a British attack in time of peace towards the end of March on the frontier around Lake Champlain.
10. The Union declares war on Britain on the 1^st of April.
11.  At about the same date, the British begin moving their battlefleets. The first naval action of the war takes place in late April.

This timeline makes no sense. It is the British doing absolutely everything wrong they possibly could, from not following up on their ultimatum, to not using the time to mobilize, to opening hostilities at literally the worst possible time (i.e. early enough that the St Lawrence is still just about frozen, late enough that the Union has had four months to prepare and that mud is closing the sled route to Riviere du Loup), to opening hostilities without a formal declaration of war.

Part 3: Examples from the real world

Incidentally, here's some examples to show that the massive British delay has to be vacillating, not the results of storms:


Europa, December 25 from Boston; arrives Queenstown, 6 January
Jura, December 28 from Portland; arrives Londonderry 8 January
City of Washington, December 28 from New York; arrives Queenstown 9 January
Teutonia, December 28 from New York; arrives Southampton 10 January
America, January 1 from New York: arrives Queenstown 13 January;
Nova Scotian, January 4 from Portland: arrives Londonderry 15 January
City of Edinburgh, January 4 from New York: arrives Queenstown 16 January
Niagara, January 8 from Boston; arrives Queenstown 20 January

With a 26 December reply, the latest that the news should arrive in the British Isles is 13 January. 8 January is more likely, on the Jura.

Ships from UK:
Europa, from Liverpool on the 11th, Queenstown on the 12th, arrived Halifax 26 January 1862; goes on to Boston.
Teutonia, from Southampton on 15 January for New York
City of Washington, from Liverpool on 15 January for New York; arrived 31 January
Anglo-Saxon from Liverpool on 16 January for Portland; arrived 30 January

Note that some of these are the same ships again.
The British reply should have arrived, at the latest, before the start of February. If the Jura took the message and there was an immediate declaration of war (first day after rejection of ultimatum, thus 9th or 10th Jan, as per the Crimea) then the declaration of war should have arrived on the Europa if not sooner.
Dispatch vessels should have reached Milne about the same time.


If Milne had instead had conditional war orders, as we have reason to believe he may (e.g. Dunlop commenting about how he'd had orders to come down on the Gulf Blockading Squadron) then it's possible that the first actions of the war could have taken place as early as the second week of January.

Thus, TFSmith's odd warping of space and time has served to buy the US three and a half months of preparation time. The amount of preparation the British do in the same time period is miniscule - certainly they don't ship over anything like the number of troops they could have. While the British twiddle their thumbs, the Union manages to increase their army by somewhere in the region of 75,000 men present for duty.

The explanation he uses is that the Crimean War course of events is one to be copied, where the incident to the declaration of war is a few months. This completely misses any kind of changed circumstances - one assumes he would delay the ultimatum until late March to fit the Crimean timeline, but unfortunately it actually happened - and conveniently happens to place the events to trigger the war at the best possible time for the Union, without placing the blame for the war on them. This is particularly unfortunate because the British had started to reinforce Canada in early December 1861, which is far too quick for TFSmith's model to account for. We therefore see the British hurry out reinforcements in the unseaworthy Melbourne because of the need for haste, and then lose interest in Canada for three months.

One of the side effects of this desire is that we never see what the late-Feb communication from the British was; this is because, whatever it is, it would be worse for TFSmith's timeline than if we never actually see it and are encouraged to forget it entirely.