themselves at Pensacola. Jackson wrote to Washington for permission to attack them there; but the government was loth to sanction an invasion of Spanish territory until the complicity of Spain with our enemy should be proved beyond cavil. The letter from Sec. Armstrong to this effect did not reach Jackson. The capture of Washington by the British prevented his receiving orders and left him to act upon his own responsibility, a kind of situation from which he was never known to flinch. On 14 Sept. the British advanced against Mobile; but in their attack upon the outwork, Fort Bowyer, they met with a disastrous repulse. They retreated to Pensacola, whither Jackson followed them with 3,000 men. On 7 Nov. he stormed the town. His next move would have been against Fort Barrancas, six miles distant at the mouth of the harbor. By capturing this post he would have entrapped the British fleet and might have forced it to surrender; but the enemy forestalled him by blowing up the fort and beating a precipitate retreat. By thus driving the British from Florida — an act for which he was stupidly blamed by the Federalist press — Jackson now found himself free to devote all his energies to the task of defending New Orleans, and there, after an arduous journey, he arrived on 2 Dec. The British expedition directed against that city was more formidable than any other that we had to encounter during that war. Its purpose was also more deadly. In the north the British warfare had been directed chiefly toward defending Canada and gaining such a foothold upon our frontier as might be useful in making terms at the end of the war. The burning of Washington was intended chiefly for an insult and had but slight military significance; but the expedition against New Orleans was intended to make a permanent conquest of the lower Mississippi valley and to secure for Great Britain the western bank of the river. The fall of Napoleon had set free some of Wellington's finest troops for service in America, and in December a force of 12,000 men, under command of Wellington's brother-in-law, the gallant Sir Edward Pakenham, was landed below New Orleans. To oppose these veterans of the Spanish peninsula, Jackson had 6,000 of that sturdy race whose fathers had vanquished Ferguson at King's Mountain, and whose children so nearly vanquished Grant at Shiloh. After considerable preliminary manœuvring and skirmishing, Jackson entrenched himself in a strong position near the Bienvenu and Chalmette plantations and awaited the approach of the enemy. His headquarters, the McCarte mansion, are shown in the illustration on page 376. On 8 Jan., Pakenham was unwise enough to try to overwhelm him by a direct assault. In less than half an hour the British were in full retreat, leaving 2,600 of their number killed and wounded. Among the slain was Pakenham. The American loss was eight killed and thirteen wounded. Never, perhaps, in the history of the world has a battle been fought between armies of civilized men with so great a disparity of loss. It was also the most complete and overwhelming defeat that any English army has ever experienced. News travelled so slowly then that this great victory, like the three last naval victories of the war, occurred after peace had been made by the commissioners at Ghent. Nevertheless, no American can regret that the battle was fought. The insolence and rapacity of Great Britain had richly deserved such castigation. Moreover, if she once gained a foothold in the Mississippi valley, it might have taken an armed force to dislodge her in spite of the treaty, for in the matter of the western frontier posts after 1783 she had by no means acted in good faith. Jackson's victory decided that henceforth the Mississippi valley belonged indisputably to the people of the United States. It was the recollection of that victory, along with the exploits of Hull and Decatur, Perry and McDonough, which caused the Holy Alliance to look upon the Monroe doctrine as something more than an idle threat. All over the United States the immediate effect of the news was electric, and it was enhanced by the news of peace which arrived a few days later. By this “almost incredible victory,” as the “National Intelligencer” called it, the credit of the American arms upon land was fully restored. Not only did the administration glory in it, as was natural, but the opposition lauded it for a different reason, as an example of what American military heroism could do in spite of inadequate support from government. Thus praised by all parties, Jackson, who before the Creek war had been little known outside of Tennessee, became at once the foremost man in the United States. People in the north, while throwing up their hats for him, were sometimes heard to ask: “Who is this Gen. Jackson? To what state does he belong?” Henceforth until the civil war he occupied the most prominent place in the popular mind.
After his victory Jackson remained three months in New Orleans, in some conflict with the civil authorities of the town, which he found it necessary to hold under martial law. In April he returned to Nashville, still retaining his military command of the southwest. He soon became involved in a quarrel with Mr. Crawford, the secretary of war, who had undertaken to modify some provisions in his treaty with the Creeks. Jackson was also justly incensed by the occasional issue of orders from the war department directly to his subordinate officers; such orders sometimes stupidly thwarted his plans. The usual course for a commanding general thus annoyed would be to make a private representation to the government; but here, as ordinarily, while quite right in his position, Jackson was violent and overbearing in his methods. He published, 22 April, 1817, an order forbidding his subordinate officers to pay heed to any order from the war department unless issued through him. Mr. Calhoun, who in October succeeded Crawford as secretary of war, gracefully yielded the point; but the public had meanwhile been somewhat scandalized by the collision of authorities. In private conversation Gen. Scott had alluded to Jackson's conduct as savoring of mutiny. This led to an angry correspondence between the two generals, ending in a challenge from Jackson, which Scott declined on the ground that duelling is a wicked and unchristian custom.
Affairs in Florida now demanded attention. That country had become a nest of outlaws, and chaos reigned supreme there. Many of the defeated Creeks had found a refuge in Florida, and runaway negroes from the plantations of Georgia and South Carolina were continually escaping thither. During the late war British officers and adventurers, acting on their own responsibility upon this neutral soil, committed many acts which their government would never have sanctioned. They stirred up Indians and negroes to commit atrocities on the United States frontier. The Spanish government was at that time engaged in warfare with its revolted colonies in South America, and the coasts of Florida became a haunt for contraband traders, privateers, and filibusters. One adventurer would announce his intention to make
