A British Account of the Burning of Washington
George Robert Gleig
Gleig was a British soldier who witnessed the burning of Washington by the British on August 23, 1814. This is an excerpt from his book, A Narrative of the Campaign of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans.
http://www.nationalcenter.org/BritishBurnWashington1814.html
The Burning of Washington
Dolley Madison
This material is from a letter by First Lady Dolley Madison to her sister, Anna, describing the British nearing Washington, DC and the need for her to flee the White House, even though she didn’t want to. As many of us learned in school, before she would leave Mrs. Madison made sure that the Gilbert Stuart portrait of George Washington, which hung on a wall at the White House, was taken down and delivered to a safe location.
