As Canadian Dan Laroche, dressed as a British redcoat, fired a musket and regaled his audience here with tales of panicked American surrender, Marie DeVita, from Brooklyn, N.Y., turned to friends with a question: "Wait a minute, didn't we win the War of 1812?"
Two hundred years ago Monday, the U.S. officially declared war on Britain, starting a two-year conflict that became known as the War of 1812. Two centuries on, skirmishes continue across the Niagara River here. The cause: who won the war.
Many Canadian children grow up learning their forebears triumphed after American aggressors tried and failed to invade what was then a British colony. For Americans, a fledging nation forced Britain to respect U.S. sovereignty, allowing it to focus on its expansion westward.
