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THOUGH Pensacola was a Spanish town, in Spanish territory,
the British forces used it as a station for fitting out
expeditions against Mobile and New Orleans. Here they gathered arms and
munitions of war; here their vessels found safe anchorage in a spacious
harbor, where they were afforded every facility for refitting; and here the
savage allies were equipped for war and murder. The British commander
sent an embassy to Jean Lafitte, at Barataria Bay, offering him a captain's
commission, together with a free pardon for all his gang, and grants of land
to be carved out of such territory as might be conquered from the United
States, on condition that he and his men would assist with their fleet the
expeditions then fitting out.
The English commander also hinted darkly at something which
he called "the blessings of the British constitution"— probably
meaning the abundant bone and muscle of a beef-eater—as an additional
inducement to the famous little Frenchman. Lafitte was commonly called
a pirate, but that was not precisely his character. He was a receiver
of stolen goods captured by half piratical privateers, which he smuggled into
New Orleans.
But, pirate or no pirate, he seems to have been too shrewd
for the Englishman. He appeared to acquiesce till he obtained the terms
in black and white, and then dispatched the letters to Governor Claiborne of
Louisiana, together with one in which he offered his services in defending
the coast against the British, on condition that the proscription of himself
and his adherents be terminated by an act of oblivion. The Governor
laid the letters before a council of military and naval officers, who decided
that they were forgeries and Lafitte a scoundrel. Consequently an
expedition under Commodore Patterson was sent against him, by which his
establishment was broken up, nine of his vessels were seized, and many of his
men made prisoners.
One morning in July, General Jackson was presented with a
new English musket, brought to his headquarters by a friendly Indian who had
received it from the Creeks at Appalachicola. This told an alarming
story, which the General at once communicated to Governor Claiborne and the
Secretary of War. Of the latter he asked permission to make a descent
upon Pensacola. Before an answer was received, Jackson was joined by
new levies of troops from Tennessee, which he hurried to Mobile.
On Mobile Point, commanding the entrance to the bay stood a
ruinous earthwork known as Fort Bowyer. Major William Lawrence, with a
garrison of one hundred and sixty men, took possession of this, and proceeded
to put it in shape for defense. On the 12th of September, the British
landed a detachment of marines and six hundred Indians on the peninsula of
which Mobile Point is the extremity, and a few hours later four war-vessels,
under Captain Percy, appeared at the entrance of the bay. Two or three
days were passed in feeble demonstrations on the land side, and attempts to
sound the channel; but on the afternoon of the 15th the fleet sailed up in
line, dropped anchor in the channel, and opened the battle. For an hour
the firing was incessant; it ceased for a moment when the colors of the
flag-ship Hermes were shot away; but was soon renewed, when a chance shot cut
the cable of the Hermes, the current swung her bow-on to the fort, and for
twenty minutes she was raked mercilessly. She drifted down the channel
and ran aground, when Captain Percy abandoned her and set her on fire.
Another vessel was crippled and driven off, and the other two then withdrew.
The simultaneous assaults of the marines and Indians had
been met and repelled with a few discharges of grape. "In this
action the garrison lost four men killed and four wounded; the British
official report acknowledged a loss of thirty-two killed and forty wounded.
Early in November, Jackson, with three thousand men,
marched on Pensacola, where he proposed to garrison the forts till the
Spanish authorities were able to maintain for themselves the neutrality of
the port. This proposition being rejected by the Spanish Governor,
Jackson's men charged into the town and captured a battery, and took
possession. That night Fort Barrancas, commanding the entrance to the
harbor, was blown up, and the British vessels sailed away.
Hurrying back to Mobile, where he feared a second attack,
Jackson learned of the revelations of Lafitte and was urged to go to the
defense of New Orleans. He arrived in that city on the 2nd of December,
was enthusiastically welcomed, and at once set to work to prepare it for
defense. He called out the Louisiana militia, appealed to the free
negroes, released and enrolled convicts whose terms were within two months of
expiration, accepted the services of Lafitte and his men, assigning them to
duty as artillerists, and ordered Coffee with his two thousand men to join
him from Mobile. While looking anxiously for new levies from Kentucky
and Tennessee, who were to come by way of the river, he fortified the city,
and proclaimed martial law.
On the 10th of December the British fleet entered Lake
Borgne, where on the 14th it defeated and captured the American
gunboats. On the 23rd a body of two thousand four hundred British
troops reached the bank of the Mississippi nine miles below New Orleans, and
with two thousand one hundred Jackson went down to meet them.
New Orleans was the largest prize, which had been contended
for in this war. It was a city of twenty thousand inhabitants; and a
hundred and fifty thousand bales of cotton, worth two shillings a pound, were
stored there. But it was not so much its immediate pecuniary value that
tempted the enemy, as the commercial and strategical importance of its
position, for they expected not only to capture but to hold it
permanently. Lieutenant Gleig, author of "The Subaltern," who
was connected with the expedition, after describing the Mississippi and its
tributaries, wrote: "Whatever nation, therefore, chances to possess this
place, possesses in reality the command of a greater extent of country than
is included within the boundary line of the whole United States," and
the London Times, announcing that all the disposable shipping had been sent
from Bermuda to the Mississippi, added that, "most active measures are
pursuing for detaching from the dominion of the enemy an important part of
his territory."
Wellington's veterans, fresh from their victories in the
Spanish peninsula, were now before the city, and the inhabitants, knowing how
hasty had been the preparations for defense, trembled for its safety.
The expectation was, that, if captured, it would at once be sacked.
It was late in the day when Jackson moved to the
attack. He sent Coffee and his Tennesseeans to gain the right flank and
rear of the enemy, while the rest of his forces were to deploy across the
narrow strip of land between the river and a morass, and attack in
front. The schooner Carolina was ordered to move down to a point
opposite the British left, and enfilade the position; her first discharge to
be the signal for the land attack. It was half-past seven o'clock when
she opened the battle with a broadside that tore through the British camp and
swept down a large number of men. The moon was young and obscured by
clouds, so that there was almost absolute darkness, except when the flashes
of the guns momentarily lighted up one or another part of the field.
The two armies soon became intermingled, and, as one of the
participants wrote, "no man could tell what was going forward in any
quarter, except where he himself chanced immediately to stand; no one part of
the line could bring assistance to another, because in truth no line
existed." The fighting was mostly hand-to-hand; few of the
Americans had bayonets, but many carried long knives, and the most ghastly
wounds were given and received. Officers on either side would gather
little companies of men and go out into the darkness to find the enemy; but
when they had come in contact with an armed party like themselves, it was
often impossible to say whether they were friends or foes.
After three hours of this bloody work, the Americans
withdrew to works four miles from the city. They had lost twenty-four
killed, one hundred and fifteen wounded, and seventy-four missing.
General Keane's official report made the British loss forty-six killed, one
hundred and sixty-seven wounded, and sixty-four missing. Lieutenant
Gleig, in his "Narrative," says, "Not less than five hundred
men had fallen, many of whom were our finest soldiers and best officers; and
yet we could not but consider ourselves fortunate in escaping from the toils,
even at the expense of so great a sacrifice." A journal found upon
a British officer who was killed in the battle of January 8th, puts the loss
in this action at "two hundred and twenty-four killed, and an immense
number wounded."
Heavy reinforcements of British troops soon arrived, and
with them Generals Sir Edward Pakenham and Samuel Gibbs. Pakenham, a
brother-in-law of the Duke of Wellington, had won considerable distinction in
the Peninsular War. He found the army before New Orleans in a pitiful
plight. It was encamped on a strip of low and level land, on one side a
broad river where it had no vessels, and on the other an almost impassable
morass. In front were fortifications that were continually being
strengthened, and of the enemy behind them almost nothing was known; while
two armed vessels kept up day arid night an enfilading fire. With all
this, alternate rain and frost left them scarcely a comfortable hour.
Pakenham's first movement was to bring heavy guns and a
furnace across the peninsula by night, and plant them on the levee; from
which on the morning of the 27th he opened a fire with hot shot, and in half
an hour had driven the Louisiana up stream and set the Carolina on fire, so
that she was abandoned and blew up.
On the 28th he made a reconnaissance in force. As the
left wing approached the American lines, a group of buildings which Jackson's
men had filled with combustibles was fired by a hot shot from one of his
guns, and amid the heat and smoke the British saw before them an impassable
ditch, from behind which a few pieces of artillery, handled with the utmost
skill, poured destruction through their ranks. The right wing found the
left of Jackson's position weak, effected a lodgment within the lines, and
might perhaps have changed the fortunes of the campaign, had not its leader
been instructed "that this was to be a reconnaissance, not a battle.
Pakenham now resolved upon regular siege operations, arid
brought thirty guns from the fleet, which in the night of the 31st he mounted
within three hundred yards of the American lines. His troops were
encamped in the midst of sugar plantations, and a considerable portion of his
new ramparts was formed of hogsheads of sugar, set on end.
When day dawned, and the Americans saw thirty guns frowning
down upon them from high bastions that had risen as if by magic in the
darkness, the sight was rather appalling; but as soon as fire was opened upon
these apparently formidable works, it was seen that the balls passed right
through the hogsheads of sugar, and the whole fabric began to crumble
away. There was also a vulnerable element in Jackson's works; for he
had used cotton bales as his enemy used sugar, and though the cotton resisted
the passage of a ball, it was easily set on fire, and the bales knocked out
of position.
Commodore Patterson had erected a battery on the opposite
bank of the Mississippi, to rake the ground held by the British, who at the
same time had erected one on the levee to oppose it. For an hour these
guns were all blazing at once; and when the firing ceased and the smoke
rolled away, it was found that the British works had been completely ruined,
and seventy of their men killed or wounded; the American works were not
seriously damaged, but they had lost thirty-four men.
Jackson made haste to throw away his cotton bales, supply
their place with earth, and construct a second line of works a mile and a
half in the rear, and for a week nervously awaited the next move pf the
enemy. In that week he was joined by nearly three thousand Kentucky and
Louisiana militia; but as they were in rags and had scarcely a firelock among
them, they could hardly be considered a reinforcement. The British were
reinforced by two regiments under General John Lambert.
Pakenham's final plan was to send a heavy force across the
river to capture Patterson's batteries and turn them upon Jackson's lines,
and at the same time push forward the remainder of his force to assault those
lines in front, the advance guard to fill the ditch with fascines and plant
scaling-ladders against the ramparts. Preparatory to this, it was
necessary to dig a canal across the isthmus, to drag boats through from Lake
Borgne to the Mississippi, and this occupied his troops nearly six days.
On Saturday, January 7th, Jackson stood upon the tallest
building within his lines, and through a large spy-glass which a planter had
mounted for him, saw the redcoats making fascines by binding up sheaves of
sugar-cane, and constructing ladders. At the same time, Pakenham was
surveying the American works from the top of a pine-tree.
The British general intended to make an attack on both
sides of the river simultaneously, before daylight on the 8th. But
there was great difficulty in navigating the canal, the sides of which had
caved in; only enough boats were brought through to carry over five hundred
troops, instead of fourteen hundred, and these were delayed several
hours. A detachment under Colonel Thornton embarked in them, but were
swept down by the current and reached the western shore far below the
intended landing-place.
Meanwhile the sun had risen, the fog was rolling away,
Pakenham was impatient, and before Thornton could get near his enemy he saw
the signal rocket, which announced the attack. The Americans understood
the signal quite as well as he did, and were ready to meet the shock.
One thirty-two pounder was loaded to the muzzle with musket-balls. A
deserter had told the British commander that the weak spot in Jackson's line
was the extreme left; true enough when he said it, but now that spot was
strengthened by two thousand Tennessee and Kentucky riflemen. The
heaviest attack was accordingly made at this point, a column of three
thousand men, under General Gibbs, moving against it. They were to be
preceded by an Irish regiment bearing the fascines and ladders. At the
same time, a column of one thousand moved along the river road, under the
crossfire from Patterson's battery, to attack Jackson's right. These were
to be preceded by a West India black regiment with the necessary fascines and
ladders. Midway between stood nearly a thousand Highlanders, under
General Keane, ready to support either column, as circumstances might
require. The British had also a battery of six eighteen-pounders; and,
drawn up behind all, a considerable reserve.
The battle was what Bunker Hill would have been if the
Americans had had stronger works and plenty of ammunition. The
beautiful British columns moved forward only to be mowed down. When the
thirty-two pounder discharged its musket-balls, the head of one column melted
away before it, two hundred men being disabled. Both the Irish and the
Negro regiment failed in their duty, so that when the main columns arrived at
the ditch they had no means of crossing, and the terrible blunder had to be
remedied under a continuous and withering fire. The ranks were badly
broken. Pakenham, trying to re-form them, was killed, falling into the
arms of Captain McDougall, the same officer who had caught General Ross when
he fell at North Point. General Gibbs was wounded mortally; General
Keane seriously. Colonel Dale fell at the head of the Highland
regiment, which was almost entirely destroyed. It went into the fight
with over nine hundred men, and came out with one hundred and forty. A
major and a lieutenant, with twenty men, crossed the ditch before the
American left, and the two officers mounted the breastwork. The major
was instantly riddled with bullets; the lieutenant demanded the swords of two
officers who confronted him, and was told to look behind him. He
turned, and saw, as he expressed it, that the men he supposed to be following
"had vanished as if the earth had opened and swallowed them up."
On the American right, the British carried a small outwork;
but the guns of the main line were turned upon it and cleared it. Of
this column, only three men — a colonel, a major, and a captain — reached the
breastwork, and as they mounted they were all shot and tumbled into the ditch
together.
The action lasted but twenty-five minutes. Seven
hundred of the British were killed, fourteen hundred wounded, and five
hundred prisoners. The Americans lost four killed and thirteen wounded;
in the entire campaign, three hundred and thirty-three.
The force under Thornton, on the western bank of the river,
carried the American works, where but brief resistance was made, and were
pursuing the retreating militia, when news of the disaster on the other bank
was brought to Thornton, together with an order to return. He had lost
a hundred men, killed or wounded, and inflicted a loss of but six.
The 9th was spent, under an armistice, in burying the dead
and caring for the wounded. General Lambert then determined to withdraw
to the shipping and abandon the enterprise, but was ten days about it, during
which time his troops were annoyed by incessant cannonading by day and
"hunting parties" by night. The British fleet had entered the
Mississippi at its mouth, and from the 10th to the 17th bombarded Fort St.
Philip, seventy-five miles below New Orleans, but effected nothing, and on
the 18th withdrew.
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