This week Donald E Graves, Canada’s foremost historian on the War of 1812, sets the historical record straight on Joseph Willcocks.  

Graves covers his early election to the Upper Canada Legislative Assembly in 1807 and Willcocks’ formation of a group of MPPs who opposed measures put forth by the then President, General Isaac Brock.  He follows Willcocks’ desertion to the Americans in 1813 and his formation of a small dissident group called the Canadian Volunteers, who actively fought against the British and their allies in Upper Canada.  Graves gives the details of how Willcocks set fire to the town of Niagara on the Lake in December 1813 as the Americans withdrew and his eventual fatal shooting during the Siege of Fort Erie in September 1814.

Donald E. Graves is a Canadian historian specializing in military history, especially the War of 1812.  He is the author, co-author or editor of nearly two dozen books. including The Forgotten Soldiers’ Trilogy, three books (Field of Glory, Where Right and Glory Lead, and All Their Glory Past) which cover the major engagements in the northern theatre of the War of 1812.  He has been employed as a military historian by the Canadian National Historic Sites Service, the National Archives of Canada and.the Canadian Department of National Defence. He was educated at the University of Saskatchewan and at Carleton University, where he took an MA in history.