So join right in and gloat about the War of 1812

[sovay]

Does the U.S. have any songs of the War of 1812? The national anthem doesn't count. I have trouble imagining they weren't written, but I realized a few days ago that the only ones I know are Canadian: Stan Rogers' "MacDonnell on the Heights," Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie's "The White House Burned (The War of 1812)," and now Tanglefoot's "Secord's Warning." Am I just seeing the difference in the war's importance between countries? Was the whole engagement so nationally embarrassing that even the American folk tradition tried to forget about it? In the course of writing this post I remembered "The Hunters of Kentucky," but I believe it owes its prominence to Andrew Jackson using it as a campaign song and I still can't think of anything more recent.¹ Is there a very simple explanation I'm missing because I tapped out of formally taught American history at the end of eighth grade?

[edit] I have been reminded of the existence of Jimmy Driftwood's "The Battle of New Orleans," which I encountered as a child, but had forgotten about completely.

1. And in fact I learned it from the curtain call of Michael Friedman and Alex Timbers' Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson (2010), a musical I cannot honestly recommend listening to right now. Some of the lyrics of "Populism, Yea, Yea!" are a little too on point.

Comments

[kore]

Oh wow, I hadn't thought of the Battle song in a long time -- my dad used to sing it (he knew all the lyrics to every song about up til maybe 1961, I am not even kidding. We called him the jukebox). I think he knew the Johnny Horton version, though.

[sovay]

I think he knew the Johnny Horton version, though.

It is shorter and less sweary.

I've been listening to Jimmie Driftwood since this post turned him up; he turns out to have written, among other things, "He Had a Long Chain On."

[kore]

OMG, I know that from PPM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhM0hAzrl8A

[sovay]

OMG, I know that from PPM

I didn't know they'd sung it! I grew up on Odetta.

[kore]

(Peter Paul and Mary was one of the FEW musical groups from the sixties my parents liked. This included Simon and Garfunkel, and the Mamas and Papas. They did not like any iteration of Bob Dylan. When I got into the Doors and Rolling Stones they were horrified.)

[sovay]

Peter Paul and Mary was one of the FEW musical groups from the sixties my parents liked.

Heh. I think we had a couple of records of theirs, but my parents were definitely more on the Phil Ochs, Bob Dylan, Holy Modal Rounders side of things. Jimi Hendrix. Joan Baez. Pete Seeger. Nina Simone. What I think of as the classics.

[kore]

Oh yeah, my parents liked Joan Baez, Nina Simone, LOVED Billie Holiday. They kind of tolerated Pete Seeger. They did like some Bob Dylan songs, when sung by other people, usually women. I inflicted Joshua Tree-era U2 on them relentlessly.