As I said when this exact question was last asked (in Week 11 of the 2016–17 season, on 17 January this year):
The burning of Washington, which included the burning of the White House, occurred during the so–called War of 1812 – but on 24 August 1814. Wikipedia says that Washington was burnt in retaliation to the Raid on Port Dover (on 14–16 May 1814), but it also says that the burning of the White House was in retaliation to the burning of Upper Canada's Parliament Buildings in the Battle of York (27 April 1813).
In other words – they started it!
(Port Dover was, and still is, a village on the shores of Lake Erie, where American troops, without proper sanction, destroyed private houses and other property, after destroying the mills that were used to provide flour for British troops stationed on the Niagara Peninsula. Upper Canada is what's now known as Ontario; York is now known as Toronto.)
To be fair, I might quote the following passage from the Smithsonian Institution's magazine:
"The War of 1812" is an easy handle for students who struggle with dates. But the name is a misnomer that makes the conflict sound like a mere wisp of a war that began and ended the same year.
In reality, it lasted 32 months following the U.S. declaration of war on Britain in June 1812. That's longer than the Mexican–American War, Spanish–American War, and U.S. involvement in World War I.
Also confusing is the Battle of New Orleans, the largest of the war and a resounding U.S. victory. The battle occurred in January, 1815 – two weeks after U.S. and British envoys signed a peace treaty in Ghent, Belgium. News traveled slowly then. Even so, it's technically incorrect to say that the Battle of New Orleans was fought after the war, which didn't officially end until February 16, 1815, when the Senate and President James Madison ratified the peace treaty.
© Macclesfield Quiz League 2017