American Prisoners of War in the Captive Atlantic, 1812–1815

By 1812, a sophisticated system had emerged in the greater Anglo Atlantic for processing and housing of prisoners of war. This affected American captives of the British in the first decades of the new United States republic. Through the interrogation of three narratives written by captive American mariners, this article explores the connections between the greater Atlantic, the development of British imperial systems, and the development of ideas relating to American identity during the early republic. It underscores the significance of captivity in the Atlantic World and the contested notions of proto-American nationalism and identity that underpinned imprisonment by the British as American prisoners complemented and contested the authority of the British Empire around the Atlantic.