200 years ago today, on 18 Jun 1812, what we now call “The War of 1812” began when the United States declared war on Great Britain. Explore the document that started it all at The National Archives Experience website.

2 Stat. 755 (1812)  An Act declaring War between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the dependencies thereof, and the United States of America and their territories.

The War of 1812 has been referred to by historians as “The Forgotten War”. Now that the bicentennial is upon us, I doubt we’ll continue to use that phrase. There are some very interesting projects underway to chronicle the events of the war as they happened 200 years ago.

Follow the war online at 1812now or the Blog of 1812. Alternately, you can follow several different Twitter feeds where the war is being “live tweeted” or otherwise covered:

Find original documents about the War of 1812 online at Fold3.com. The collection is free to use in June 2012, and available via subscription thereafter.

[Updated 04 Jul 2012 to include additional twitter resources.]