HISTORY

Lend-Lease Attack

Prior to the War of 1812, the two biggest trading partners of the United States were Britain and Russia. Large quantities of war supplies were set to both countries, then involved in a titanic struggle with Napoleon for the control of Europe. A total of 1.8 million dollars worth of supplies were set to these countries' long before the H.R. 1776 was signed into law on March 11, 1941.

This made it all the more difficult for Americans to accept when the British seized American ships or attacked American naval vessels. Imagine how we would have felt if in 1941, British warship seized US sailors from lend-lease ships supplying them with vital materials against Germany; or how the US would have reacted if a British naval vessel steamed into Pearl Harbor and attacked the battleship Arizona.

For many New Englanders, supplying the British in Canada was nothing more than an extension of the Lend-Lease activity of the first years of the 19th century . . . even if those supplies were used against the troops of the United States.