0:00 On June fifteenth, 1859, an American farmer named Lyman Cutlar shot and killed a pig.0:05 Now, in episode 65 we talked about the sheer chaos that erupted from a single broken vat of beer in London — this is that same energy, but with warships and two global superpowers staring each other down.0:20 All because of one Large Black pig, rooting for potatoes in a garden where it wasn't supposed to be.0:27 The setup is almost a joke.0:29 You've got San Juan Island, a piece of land in the Pacific Northwest claimed by both the United States and Great Britain.0:37 Lyman Cutlar, the American farmer, had had it with this pig.0:41 It kept getting into his potato patch.0:44 The pig's owner was an Irishman named Charles Griffin, who worked for Britain's Hudson's Bay Company.0:51 So Cutlar shoots the pig.0:53 He goes to Griffin and offers to pay for it.0:56 His offer?0:56 Ten dollars.0:57 Griffin, furious, demands one HUNDRED.1:00 Cutlar says he won't pay that much for any pig, and adds that the pig was eating his potatoes anyway.1:07 Griffin's response was supposedly, "It is up to you to keep your potatoes out of my pig." This is where it gets completely out of hand.1:16 The local American authorities, hearing about this, decide to send in military protection for their settlers.1:24 They dispatch Captain George Pickett — yes, THAT George Pickett of Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg fame later on — with sixty-six soldiers.1:34 They land on the island and declare it American territory.1:38 The British colonists, seeing American soldiers setting up camp, panic and call the Royal Navy.1:44 So what happens next?1:46 Three British warships show up.1:48 Suddenly you have sixty-six American infantrymen with a cannon facing down over two thousand British troops and sailors with more than a hundred and sixty cannons afloat.2:00 Over a pig.2:01 But here's the thing.2:02 The pig was never the point.2:04 Where have we seen this before?2:06 You see it all the time.2:08 The real fight was about a sloppy map and a stubborn refusal to compromise.2:13 The 1846 Oregon Treaty was supposed to settle the border between the US and British North America, which is now Canada.2:22 It drew the line at the forty-ninth parallel, but when it hit the coast, it said the border should run "through the middle of the channel which separates the continent from Vancouver's Island." Great.2:35 Except there are TWO channels.2:38 The Haro Strait to the west, and the Rosario Strait to the east.2:42 And sitting right between them?2:44 The San Juan Islands.2:46 The Americans said the border was the western channel, giving them the islands.2:51 The British said it was the eastern one, giving them the islands.2:56 For over a decade, they just sort of… agreed to disagree.3:00 Both American and British settlers lived there, side-by-side.3:04 It was a classic "kick the can down the road" solution.3:08 Until the pig.3:09 The dead pig was the perfect excuse for both sides to force the issue.3:14 It's the same pattern you see in modern maritime disputes, where a fishing boat or a coast guard vessel bumping another one can become a flashpoint for a decades-old territorial claim based on an ambiguous line on a map.3:29 The news of this standoff eventually reached Washington and London, and the reaction was basically, "You've got to be kidding me." Nobody wanted a third war with Britain, especially not over a farm animal.3:43 President James Buchanan sent in General Winfield Scott, the top U.S.3:48 general, to clean up the mess.3:50 The British sent their own high-ranking officials.3:54 And here's the most absurd part of the whole story.3:57 The solution they came up with wasn't to withdraw.4:01 It was a JOINT military occupation.4:03 For the next twelve years, a small contingent of British Royal Marines and a company of U.S.4:10 Army soldiers lived on the island together.4:13 They had separate camps, but they got along famously.4:16 They would visit each other's messes, celebrate holidays together, and even hold athletic competitions.4:24 The British camp apparently had better beer; the American camp had better whiskey.4:29 It was less of a military standoff and more of an armed, decade-long camping trip.4:35 Finally, in 1871, the two nations agreed to let a neutral third party decide.4:40 They asked Kaiser Wilhelm the First of Germany to arbitrate.4:45 He and his commission studied the maps, studied the treaty, and a year later, ruled in favor of the United States.4:53 The border would follow the Haro Strait.4:55 On November twenty-fifth, 1872, the Royal Marines peacefully withdrew.5:00 The only casualty of the entire conflict remained that one, very unfortunate pig.5:06 It's easy to laugh at.5:08 But it reveals something fundamental.5:10 International relations are often just high-stakes versions of two neighbors arguing over a fence.5:17 And sometimes, the only thing that stops everything from burning down is the quiet, awkward realization that nobody wants to be the guy who started a war over a pig.
