Caroline affair

[1][2] The affair began on December 28, 1837, when hundreds of Americans who had been recruited by Upper Canada Rebellion leader William Lyon Mackenzie encamped on Navy Island on the Canadian side of the Niagara River.

After these defeats, Mackenzie and his followers fled to Navy Island in the Niagara River, which they declared the foundation of the Republic of Canada on board the vessel Caroline.

Throughout these events, the Canadian rebels enjoyed widespread support from American citizens, who provided them supplies and bases from which to launch raids on the British authorities in Canada.

[citation needed] On December 29, 1837, Canadian militia colonel Allan MacNab and Royal Navy captain Andrew Drew led a British force consisting of militiamen and law enforcement officers across the Canada–United States border.

During the confrontation between the British force and the crew, which involved shots being fired, a Black American watchmaker, Amos Durfee, was accidentally killed by an unknown person.

[5]The Attorney General of New York, Willis Hall, responded by stating: Those of our fellow citizens... single-handed and alone, left our territory and united themselves with a foreign power, have violated no law... they have done no more than has been done again and again by the people of every nation.

Gentlemen, I am not deviating from the case further than is necessary to remove the just odium which has been unjustly thrown upon those who joined the insurgents.News of the incident led to a public uproar in the United States, and many people in American towns bordering Canada demanded the U.S. government declare war on Britain.

The arrest led to another international incident as the British demanded his release, arguing that McLeod could not be held criminally responsible due to the fact that he was legally carrying out orders of the Crown.

In 2008, he wrote: Thus the destruction of an insignificant ship in what one scholar has called a "comic opera affair" in the early 19th century nonetheless led to the establishment of a principle of international law that would govern, at least in theory, the use of force for over 250 years.