Military Strengths When the United States first declared war on Great Britain, her military strength was dwarfed by that of Great Britain. The United States had only a small army of about 7,000 men, and her navy was only 16 ships. Great Britain, on the other hand, had a much larger army, and the largest navy in the world. Here is a chart comparing the differences in the American and British navies. The number of guns the ship could carry indicates its relative size. Vessel Type # of Guns U.S. Navy British Navy Ship of the Line 64-120 0 124 Frigate 26-50 8 116 Smaller Vessels < 24 8 > 360 The bigger the ship, the more guns it could carry. Therefore, the Ships of the Line were the largest ships, because they could carry the greatest number of guns. The smallest ones carried 64 guns, the largest ones carried 120, and there was a full range in between. Activity 2 On your Worksheet, figure out the approximate number of guns the U.S. had versus the British! So... which side would you want to be on? One thing that was to the advantage of the United States, though, was that most of the British military was tied up in the war with France.

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