Motor control box

[Rickabilly]

(06-14-2012, 06:52 AM)stevec Wrote: Rick, I believe that the country now called Canada, sporting the Union Jack, was "on the opposite side of the battlefield" with Old Glory while under British rule.
From Wikepedia-"The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire".

I could be wrong on this because the records are really sketchy, but a few years ago I read a book purporting a theory that "contrary to common belief the two flags had never faced each other across a battle field", The premise was that many of the empire parties against union with Ireland didn't go over to the new Flag immediately, as a kind of silent protest, But thinking twice about it, I doubt that lasted till 1812, although Britain was surprisingly tolerant to Flag misuse, as long as it wasn't too close to home, the East India Trading company Flag is a point to remember where it was a "ripped off" red ensign with 6 white stripes on the red part, the British government allowed it's use despite it not even being for a country or territory under the control of the Crown as long as it didn't leave the Indian Ocean, some reports saying that ships wearing this flag outside the Indian Ocean were to be treated as Pirates, Which was likely to be a problem for the first American Flag bearers.


The version of that particular conflict I was taught said that while America declared war on the United Kingdom, the United Kingdom was too heavily focused on fighting the French to commit any great quantity of troops, given that a significant cause of the war was "Impressment" of Americans indicating that the English were short of troops. As a result the greatest share of "Empire" forces was made up of those Americans that had supported the Empire through the war of independence and then retreated to Canada and then of course their progeny.
This would tend to indicate the use of the old flag.
Apparently the English couldn't understand the American response to Impressment as the English at that time didn't accept that Americans of British birth were not British. We look back at Impressment as being Barbaric but it was simply "The Draft" in the 19th century, I suppose some people consider modern versions of "the Draft" to be equally Barbaric.

But you could well be right, I wasn't there after all

As for Red, White and Blue Barbers poles, I know Red and White was to represent the bloodletting practices that were contained within, but have no idea on the blue.
Maybe they had a serious contingent of "Blue Blooded" customers

Best Regards
Rick