From Wikipedia

The War Of 1812

During the course of the war, both the Americans and British launched invasions of each other's territory, all of which were unsuccessful or gained only temporary success. At the end of the war, the British held parts of Maine and some outposts in the sparsely populated West while the Americans held Canadian territory near Detroit, but these occupied territories were restored at the end of the war.

In 1813, the Americans gained two of their main goals by breaking a confederation of Native American tribes. By taking control of Lake Erie, they cut them off from British aid, and Tecumseh, the Indian leader, was killed at the Battle of the Thames. While some Natives continued to fight alongside British troops, they subsequently did so only as individual tribes or groups of warriors and where they were directly supplied and armed by British agents.

After two years of warfare, the major causes of the war had disappeared. Neither side had any reason to continue or any chance of gaining a decisive success which would compel their opponents to cede territory or advantageous peace terms. As a result of this stalemate, the two countries signed the Treaty of Ghent on 24 December 1814. News of the peace treaty took two months to reach the U.S., during which fighting continued. In this interim, the Americans won a major victory at the Battle of New Orleans, while the British won the Battle of Fort Bowyer.

In the United States, battles such as New Orleans and the earlier successful defence of Baltimore (which inspired the lyrics of the U.S. national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner) produced a sense of euphoria over a "second war of independence" against Britain. It ushered in an "Era of Good Feelings," in which the partisan animosity that had once verged on treason practically vanished. Canada also emerged from the war with a heightened sense of national feeling and solidarity. This was later expressed as the "Militia Myth," the notion that locally recruited militia rather than British regular troops bore the major burden of the fighting in Canada and the adjoining parts of the United States. Britain, which had regarded the war as a sideshow to the Napoleonic Wars raging in Europe, was less affected by the fighting; its government and people subsequently welcomed an era of peaceful relations with the United States.