Paul Hamilton American American Shipbuilding

Paul Hamilton had been President Madison's secretary of the navy since 1809. Hamilton guided the navy through the dark days of the British Orders in Council. He summed up his feelings towards these measures when he called the attack on the Chesapeake "inhuman and dastardly." Throughout the early years at his post, he was constantly frustrated by the lack of funds from Washington for the construction of new battleships and the repair of old ones. Even as the war approached, his petitions for new warships were denied in Congress. Ironically, many of those congressmen who voted down Hamilton's requests for a stronger navy were the very ones who pressed hardest for a declaration of war. All of this meant that when war erupted in 1812, there were only fifteen battle-ready warships on the Great Lakes. This, coupled with the fact that there was no unified command coordinating the actions of the American Army and the American Navy, gave the British a distinct advantage in dominating the waterways of the Great Lakes early in the war. Hamilton was responsible for the selection of Commodore Isaac Chauncey as commander of American operations on the Great Lakes. Ultimately, it was Hamilton who took the blame for Chauncey's ineffectiveness early in the contest. After scathing attacks in Congress, Hamilton decided to retire in December of 1812. He died in June of 1816.