When They Burned the White House [Illustrated Edition]

At 9:45 p.m. on August 24, 1814, the British set fire to the White House and, within an hour, the Capitol had been gutted.

How could this happen?

The war was not widely supported and the defense of Washington had been placed in the hands of two inept and ill-appointed leaders―Secretary of War Armstrong and Brigadier General Winder―whose “thimble headed stupidity” meant that the arriving British troo...