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50 free War of 1812 trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
The United States declared war on Britain in June 1812 over impressment and trade, by the narrowest vote for any war in its history, and then launched a string of invasions of Canada that all failed. Britain, busy with Napoleon, burned Washington, bombarded Baltimore and lost at Plattsburgh, while Andrew Jackson won the war's most famous battle two weeks after the peace had already been signed in Ghent. This quiz covers all of it: the causes and the Federalist opposition, Brock and Tecumseh, Hull's surrender of Detroit, Perry on Lake Erie, Laura Secord's walk, Lundy's Lane and Chippawa, the burning of York and of Washington, the storm that put out the fires, Fort McHenry and the poem that became an anthem, the Creek War, the Treaty of Ghent, New Orleans, the Hartford Convention and what the war left behind, from Old Ironsides to Uncle Sam. Fifty questions, four options each, with a short explanation after every answer. Play on your phone or print it for a history quiz night.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which month of 1812 did the United States declare war on Britain?
June
Madison signed the declaration on the 18th. It was the first time the US had formally declared war on anyone, and by the narrowest margin in its history.
Q 02What did the anti-war Federalist Party call the conflict?
Mr. Madison's War
Not one of the 39 Federalists in Congress voted for it. Later Americans rebranded it the 'Second War of Independence', a label historians treat with scepticism.
Q 03Which party supplied the votes for war in June 1812?
The Democratic-Republicans
The House voted 79 to 49 and the Senate 19 to 13, both strictly along party lines.
Q 04How many of the 39 Federalists in Congress voted in favour of the war?
Zero
Days later a Baltimore mob attacked Federalists for printing anti-war views, starting more than a month of deadly rioting.
Q 05Which British prime minister was assassinated on 11 May 1812, weeks before the war began?
Spencer Perceval
His successor repealed the Orders in Council on 23 June, but the news took three weeks to cross the Atlantic and the war was already on.
Q 06Which American post guarding the Huron–Michigan passage fell first to the British?
Mackinac
Isaac Brock heard of the war before the Americans did and ordered the attack, helped by North West Company fur traders and Indigenous allies.
Q 07Which city did American general William Hull surrender to Brock on 16 August 1812?
Detroit
Hull feared superior numbers and a massacre; the fort was short of powder and shot. His invasion of Upper Canada had lasted less than a month.
Q 08Isaac Brock was killed during which October 1812 battle on the Niagara River?
Queenston Heights
The Americans were defeated anyway, but British leadership in Upper Canada suffered without him.
Q 09'The Hero of Upper Canada', Isaac Brock, was born on which island?
Guernsey
He joined the army as an ensign in 1785 and won a knighthood for taking Detroit; he and Tecumseh worked in person together only for a few days.
Q 10'Remember the River Raisin!' recalled a massacre of prisoners after a defeat at which settlement?
Frenchtown
In January 1813 Procter left the captives poorly guarded and his Potawatomi allies killed 60 of them.
Q 11Oliver Hazard Perry's decisive Lake Erie victory in September 1813 was fought off which harbour?
Put-in-Bay
It forced the British out of Detroit and opened the way to Harrison's invasion of Upper Canada.
Q 12Perry's Lake Erie battle flag carried which dying words of Captain James Lawrence?
Don't give up the ship
Women of Erie, Pennsylvania sewed it. Perry accepted the surrender on the battered deck of his flagship, named for Lawrence.
Q 13Tecumseh was killed in October 1813 at the Battle of the Thames, also known by which name?
Moraviantown
William Henry Harrison's mounted infantry overran the British line and the Indigenous warriors withdrew after their leader fell.
Q 21Who commanded the American squadron that won the Battle of Plattsburgh on Lake Champlain?
Thomas Macdonough
Theodore Roosevelt later called it the greatest naval battle of the war. Prevost turned his army around and was recalled to London.
Q 22Tariff money the British took from occupied Castine, Maine, helped found which university?
Dalhousie
The £10,750 'Castine Fund' went to Halifax. The British had run eastern Maine under martial law as the colony of New Ireland.
Q 23Which British general led the 4,500-strong force that captured Washington in August 1814?
Robert Ross
Admiral George Cockburn accompanied him. Weeks later Ross was shot dead by snipers at North Point outside Baltimore.
Q 14Which capital of Upper Canada did American forces capture and burn in April 1813?
York
Soldiers torched the legislature and looted homes; the British cited it when they burned Washington sixteen months later.
Q 15How far did Laura Secord walk in 1813 to warn the British of an American attack?
20 miles
Her contribution went almost unrecognised in her lifetime; Canada has since given her schools, monuments, a stamp and a coin.
Q 16Laura Secord's warning helped a smaller British force win which June 1813 battle?
Beaver Dams
An American force surrendered to a smaller one, ending the 1813 American offensive into Upper Canada.
Q 17At Chateauguay, Charles de Salaberry's 339 men turned back an American force of roughly what size?
4,000
Canadian Voltigeurs and Mohawks held a strong position; Wade Hampton's failure doomed the 1813 advance on Montreal.
Q 18Winfield Scott's hard-drilled regulars beat the British at which battle on 5 July 1814?
Chippawa
Riall, unaware Fort Erie had fallen, was chased off the field by volleys from a shallow U formation.
Q 19Which inconclusive July 1814 battle near Niagara Falls is considered the war's bloodiest?
Lundy's Lane
Riall, Scott, Brown and Drummond were all wounded; Scott's injuries ended his war.
Q 20HMS St Lawrence, launched at Kingston in September 1814, carried how many guns?
104
News of its approach sent the Americans back across the Niagara, destroying Fort Erie on the way.
Q 24The rout of American militia at which battle opened the road to Washington?
Bladensburg
Madison watched and said he could never have believed so great a difference existed between regulars and militia.
Q 25What put out the fires in Washington less than a day after the British lit them?
A violent thunderstorm
Possibly a hurricane, it spun off a tornado that lifted two cannons and killed British troops; the occupation lasted about 26 hours.
Q 26Roughly how long did the British occupation of Washington last?
About 26 hours
They burned the White House and Capitol but were ordered to spare private homes, and left with portraits of George III and Queen Charlotte.
Q 27The Gilbert Stuart portrait rescued from the White House in 1814 depicts whom?
George Washington
In 2009 the White House honoured the Madisons' enslaved servant Paul Jennings for the staff's role in saving it; the canvas was a Stuart copy, not the original.
Q 28For how long was Fort McHenry bombarded during the Battle of Baltimore?
25 hours
Baltimore blacked out its lights; the only illumination came from shells bursting over the fort and its still-flying flag.
Q 29What was the title of Francis Scott Key's poem about the bombardment?
Defence of Fort M'Henry
Written on 14 September 1814, it was set to music and renamed 'The Star-Spangled Banner'.
Q 30Key's poem was set to the tune of which popular British drinking-club melody?
The Anacreontic Song
John Stafford Smith wrote it for the Anacreontic Society, a London gentlemen's club; Key had used the same tune for an earlier song.