The War That Almost Started Because of a Pig

Daniel Ganninger
Knowledge Stew
Published in
5 min readSep 10, 2024

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The English Camp — San Juan Island National Historical Park, Washington, United States

In 1859, a strange and unusual “war” occurred between the United States and Great Britain. It had to do with the location of the border around the San Juan Islands, an archipelago between the present U.S. state of Washington and Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The dispute all centered around the shooting of a pig, and it almost led to war between the two countries. The altercation became to be known as the Pig War.

In 1846, the Treaty of Oregon set the 49th parallel from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean as the border between the U.S. and British America (Canada). The treaty, however, stated that the boundary would go “to the middle of the channel which separates the continent from Vancouver Island.” The problem was that there were two channels. One was the Haro Strait, near Vancouver Island, and the Rosario Strait, closer to the mainland. San Juan Island was between these two channels, and both countries wanted to claim it as their own because of its strategic location at the mouth of the channel.

In 1845, the Hudson’s Bay Company claimed San Juan Island and set up salmon-curing stations by 1851. When the Washington Territory, owned by the United States, claimed the islands in 1853, the Hudson’s Bay Company responded by creating a sheep farm on the island later that year.

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Daniel Ganninger
Knowledge Stew

The writer, editor, and chief lackey of Knowledge Stew and the Knowledge Stew line of trivia books. Connect at knowledgestew.com and danielganninger.com