Aroostook War

Aroostook War

Map showing the boundary claims and final border
Date1838–1839
Location
Result

Compromise

Belligerents
 United States

 United Kingdom

Strength
6,000 15,000
Casualties and losses
None None
38 non-combat deaths

The Aroostook War (sometimes called the Pork and Beans War[1]), or the Madawaska War,[2] was a military and civilian-involved confrontation in 1838–1839 between the United States and the United Kingdom over the international boundary between the British colony of New Brunswick and the U.S. state of Maine. The term "war" was rhetorical; local militia units were called out but never engaged in actual combat. The event is best described as an international incident.

Negotiations between British diplomat Baron Ashburton and United States Secretary of State Daniel Webster settled the dispute. The Webster–Ashburton Treaty of 1842 established the final boundary between the countries, giving most of the disputed area to Maine while preserving an overland connection between Lower Canada and the Maritime colonies.

  1. ^ Le Duc, Thomas (1947). The Maine Frontier and the Northeastern Boundary Controversy. The American Historical Review Vol. 53, No. 1 (Oct., 1947), pp. 30–41
  2. ^ Jones, Howard. "Anglophobia and the Aroostook War." The New England Quarterly, vol. 48, no. 4, 1975, pp. 519–39. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/364636. Accessed 1 Jun. 2022.