Patriotic Fire by Winston Groom
The same day that Jackson visited the abandoned British camp he sent a dispatch to Abbé Guillaume Dubourg, head of the Catholic diocese in Louisiana and the Floridas, asking the bishop to announce a “service of public thanksgiving” at the cathedral; then he prepared to lead his army out of the soggy and miasmic cane fields and into the city.
On the morning of January 21 Jackson’s army assembled in the mud field that passed for a parade ground behind the rampart, where the general gave a short address, “recounting in glowing words the major events of the campaign, and taunting the enemy with the miserable frustration of their designs. He also used the occasion to laud the bravery of Major Joseph Savary, a Free Man of Color from Haiti who had performed spectacularly during the fight.”* 72 Then, with bands playing, they marched in formation up to New Orleans, where the entire city turned out to greet and shower them with petals from camellias and such other winter flowers as were in bloom. There was cheering and yelling and laughter and tears, all to the tunes of “Yankee Doodle,” “Hail, Columbia,” and other American airs, as well as the inevitable “Marseillaise.” To most it was a sight to behold: all of these diverse and divided New Orleanians, transformed in a single swift month into Americans, one and all. It was as if the stars danced in the Louisiana sky.
On January 23 an orgy of celebration overtook the city. It began with a chanting of the Te Deum in the cathedral, “and the citizens had prepared for the occasion a splendid pageant, which displayed the talent of the French in devising emblematic shows,” wrote Latour. In the middle of the Place d’Armes, facing the cathedral, they had erected a great triumphal arch supported by six columns. The balconies and windows of all the buildings and hotels surrounding the square were filled with people, the ladies waving handkerchiefs and the men hoisting glasses and cheering.
Jackson’s army, with all its uniforms clean at last, and led by the New Orleans battalions of Plauché and Beale, was drawn up on three sides of the parade ground. The dirty-shirt Tennesseans and Kaintucks were there, too, as were Laffite’s red-shirted Baratarian buccaneers, who had seldom if ever witnessed such formal grandeur, let alone been feted by it. Bands were playing and church bells pealing, and a celebratory cannonade began roaring off from the banks of the levee. New Orleans was perfectly awash in gratitude, and speeches of appreciation were delivered from almost every street corner. Jackson was the hero of the hour, and one might assume that at least the politician in him must have been pleased.
Beneath the triumphal arch, “on the right was a young lady representing Justice, and on the left another representing Liberty. Two young children were also under the arch, on pedestals, holding a crown of laurel. The walkway from the arch to the church entrance was lined with young ladies of New Orleans, each dressed in white and wearing a white transparent veil with a silver star in the center.” Each was meant to represent one of the United States and its territories, and “each carried in her right hand a flag, inscribed with the name of the state she represented, and in her left hand was a basket trimmed with blue ribands and full of flowers. Behind each was a shield suspended on a lance stuck in the ground, inscribed with the name of a State or territory.
“General Jackson, accompanied by the officers of his staff, arrived at the entrance of the square, where he was requested to proceed to the church by the walkway prepared for him. As he passed under the arch he received the crown of laurel from the two children, and was congratulated in an address prepared by Miss Kerr, who represented the state of Louisiana. The general then proceeded to the cathedral, amidst the salutations of the young ladies representing the different States, who strewed his passage with flowers.” So observed the general’s military engineer A. Lacarrière Latour.
Jean Laffite, apparently astonished at himself, recorded later that “it was the first day of my life to appear and be recognized by the general public,” which was not exactly the case, but he was probably referring to the ladies of New Orleans society.* 73 Still, he felt a particular gratitude “at seeing my two elder brothers and some of my officers lined up in the parade . . . whom the public admired and praised with elegies and honor for their valor as expert cannoneers.”
That evening, the victory party got into full swing. There were numerous banquets, balls, and a great deal of drinking. The fanciest celebration, the one attended by “the principal, eminent citizens,” was thrown at the French consulate. Jean Laffite was there, as well as brothers Pierre and Dominique You, but they left after the banquet. However, according to Jean Laffite, who by now was becoming a sort of mysterious folk hero, “Many people encouraged me to stay for the ball afterward. I danced two dances. General Jackson and I attracted stares and were the most noticed,” he remembered somewhat immodestly. “Many ladies with their husbands asked each other many questions. The youngest ladies looked at me, questioned one another, and passed answers back and forth to each other. General Jackson and his officers were amused by it; they were filled with enthusiasm by the questions and answers.
“It pleased me greatly,” Jean went on. “It was my first time in such a large social event; I was completely unaccustomed to large crowds and kept my reserve during long conversations, limiting myself to reply very briefly to questions so as not to reveal my true personality or my privateering enterprises to everyone, for I was preoccupied at the thought of the enemy in retreat, who was boarding ship to leave the country. The night was ending; many began to leave before midnight. I left at two o’clock of that morning. I rose at a [forgotten?] hour of the same morning.”
Wars, campaigns, and battles between great armies do not often simply terminate with a victory after which everybody goes home. So it was with the Battle of New Orleans.
First there came to Jackson’s attention the issue of slaves, several hundred of whom either had found themselves within the British lines from the beginning or had come over during the campaign. When it was apparent that the British were about to retreat, the slaves became distraught, fearing repercussions from their owners, now that the ultimate freedom the British had promised them was no longer to be forthcoming.
Many of the slaves had attached themselves to British officers, and the prospects now before them appeared cloudy. One British captain recalled the agony of his serving boy, who moaned that he would be whipped to death if he was left behind and had vowed to swim across Lake Borgne if necessary. In the end, many of the slaves, encouraged or not, followed the British on their muddy path of retreat, and when they found themselves on the shores of Lake Borgne, the navy—despite “a general order intimating that no slave should be taken away or liberated by the British force”—put them in boats and rowed them to the fleet anyway. Interestingly, in all the literature of the campaign, nothing seems to be mentioned as to what became of the Indians who accompanied the Britannic expedition. One assumes they were allowed simply to drift back to their homes in any way they could.
On the other hand, the planters upon whose land the battle was fought soon became anxious to get their “property” back; in this they were referring, of course, to slaves. The going price for a bondsman was between $1,000 and $1,500, so that a planter owning twenty or thirty or fifty, or perhaps a hundred slaves, would have been out a considerable amount of money, plus the damage to his property caused during the fighting. Jackson, a slave owner himself, could sympathize with them, and to that end he dispatched his aide Edward Livingston to the British fleet, which had by then arrived at the head of Mobile Bay. His mission was to see if he could work something out vis-à-vis the slaves, as well as to tie up loose ends in the unfinished prisoner exchange.
Livingston, who by all accounts was an amicable personality, was received cordially by the British command and invited to dine at the table of the admirals and generals aboard the Tonnant, Admiral Cochrane’s flagship. The prisoner exchange question was routinely sorted out to the satisfaction of both sides, but the slave matter remained murky. Cochrane suggested that any of the slaves who wanted to return to their masters i
The reason the British fleet was at the head of Mobile Bay was that Cochrane was determined to wrest some kind of victory out of what thus far had been an entirely humiliating defeat. It will be remembered that four months earlier a smaller force with several ships of the British navy and some 100 British marines along with a band of 600 Indians had attacked Fort Bowyer, at the mouth of Mobile Bay, and was ingloriously repulsed by the 300 American soldiers defending it. But now the British had arrived with the real deal: some sixty armed ships and nearly 10,000 soldiers, including the recent reinforcements.
Unaware of the results of the peace negotiations at Ghent, Cochrane next intended to take Mobile and possibly have another go at New Orleans. All he knew for sure was that with these ships, and an army aboard them, and a war going on, he was going to have to employ them somehow against the Americans, and Fort Bowyer seemed like a good place to start. The fort would have to be reduced before the fleet could sail up to Mobile, where, Cochrane assumed, while not as valuable a prize as New Orleans, there still might be worthwhile things to plunder.
The troops were disembarked on Dauphine Island, just across the channel from Fort Bowyer, where they set up a camp complete with tents and kitchens. Immediately upon arrival they proceeded to steal the hogs and cows of a man named “Mr. Cooney, of Irish extraction, who had been banished to that island for some misdemeanor committed in the American navy.” On February 8, Lambert’s brigade—three regiments, including the disgraced 44th—was ferried over to Mobile Point, just in front of Fort Bowyer, to begin a siege. Behind them were off-loaded four eighteen-pounder and two six-pounder cannons, as well as two heavy howitzers and eight mortars. Three days later the guns were in place and the army had trenched in the soft sand to within twenty-five yards of Fort Bowyer.
Sir Harry Smith was dispatched in his usual role of communicator with the enemy, and under a flag of truce he was received by Fort Bowyer’s commander, Major William Lawrence, who, according to Smith, “was as civil as a vulgar fellow could be.” Smith spelled out Lawrence’s situation for him, which was full of gloom—as if Lawrence couldn’t see this for himself. He was surrounded by a force nearly ten times his size, outgunned, and cooped up in a flimsy wooden fort with little or no overhead protection against mortar fire. There were also women and children involved.
“If you do not surrender at discretion within one hour,” Smith concluded, “we will blow up the fort and burn your wooden walls about your ears.”
There was no reason to doubt that he meant it, but Lawrence stalled for time, knowing that he had sent to Mobile for a relief force. He told Smith he would surrender but would do so the next day, at noon. Smith, however, was having none of it. “I could see the major had some object in view,” he said.
After some haggling, Lawrence, who was in a hopeless position, agreed to open the gates to the fort and let the British inside. In return it was agreed that he could save some small amount of face by waiting until the next day for the formal surrender, which came off as planned, with 370 U.S. soldiers and 16 women and children marching out of the stockade. Ill winds prevented the American relief force from arriving, and Fort Bowyer was taken without a shot being fired.
Before Cochrane could organize his expedition against Mobile, the British man-of-war Brazen arrived with big news: on Christmas Eve, December 24, 1814, the commissions at Ghent, Belgium, had signed a treaty of peace between the United States and Great Britain, the very day after the first action of the Battle of New Orleans—the one fought at night. For the soldiers in Cochrane’s fleet, these must have been bitter tidings, considering all the suffering and death they had been exposed to since the treaty was signed. But there was relief, too. When Admiral Malcolm opened and read the notice of peace, he turned to Livingston and said, “I am delighted. I have hated this war from the beginning.”
For the Americans it was bittersweet as well, since the treaty was not a good one—it didn’t even address the questions of impressment or sailors’ rights, and it resolved the remaining issues on the basis of status quo ante bellum, meaning that the Americans would get no new territory. The only good thing that came of it was that the British had been negotiating right up until the last minute on the basis of uti possidetis, which would have meant that the British could keep any lands they possessed at the signing of the treaty, and that would have included most of what is now the state of Maine and, presumably, by now, Louisiana.
Ironically, January 23, the day of the great victory celebration in New Orleans, was also a day of dire fears and consternation in Washington and other cities along the east coast. In Washington it was felt most keenly because the city still lay in ruins, and members of Congress were as fractious as ever. New England newspapers were filled with what Jackson doubtless would have viewed as treason. At the least they recommended that the region pay no taxes to the federal government until Madison ended the war.
A terrific blizzard in the capital had blocked roads and halted traffic of all kinds, including the mails, and all the citizens knew was that the British fleet had finally appeared off of New Orleans. There had been no news since J. C. Ingersoll, a Republican member of Congress, had discussed the siege of New Orleans with a naval officer, studying maps and comparing armies. In the end, the officer concluded that New Orleans was indefensible.
Into this black mood a packet of mail finally arrived in Washington. It contained dispatches from Jackson, one dated December 15, detailing the disastrous gunboat battle on Lake Borgne, and a second describing the night attack of December 23. Later that day another packet arrived describing Pakenham’s reconnaissance attack on December 28 and the artillery duel on New Year’s Day. The news was somewhat encouraging, but few gave Jackson much of a chance. His only opportunity, or so the thinking went, would have been if the Americans could have repelled the British as they attempted to land. But now that they were before the gates of New Orleans, most Easterners believed that Louisiana was a goner. For another week the sword hung over the citizens of the east coast as they waited “in the most painful solicitude” for information from the South.
Then, on February 4, welcome news arrived. Secretary of War Monroe read Jackson’s account of the battle of January 8 and rushed with it to President Madison. “Washington was wild with delight,” reported historian Parton. “How many things have been demonstrated to be impossible just before they were done!”
People ran shouting into the streets with the good news. The mayor ordered the city to be illuminated, and that evening throngs crowded the streets and serenaded and cheered the residences of the president and his cabinet. There wasn’t even elbow room in the taverns; the lines for whisky were five and six deep. The National Intelligencer headlined: ALMOST INCREDIBLE VICTORY.
Overnight, Jackson became a great national hero. Celebrations and illuminations were in order at every city, town, and village as the news spread. Barely had the jubilation over Jackson’s victory settled than even more momentous news arrived on a ship that had just crossed the Atlantic. “Peace!” was the word of the day. Cities were relit, and cannons were fired off at batteries from Washington to Philadelphia to New York to Boston to Baltimore, where people spilled into the streets carrying lamps, torches, and candles and shouting “Peace! Peace! Peace!” at anyone who would listen. As Parton notes, “No victory ever so electrified the nation as the news of this peace. Old enemies rushed into each other’s arms; every house was a revel.” Nobody even thought to ask about the terms of the peace treaty; for all they knew or cared, it could have given away New York or Pennsylvania. “We had got peace; that was enough.”
&n
News of the peace treaty was received with rejoicing in New Orleans, but like many events of great import, it also precipitated a crisis, one that had been building ever since the parade of thanksgiving. Most people, soldiers and civilians alike, assumed Jackson would dissolve martial law and disband the army once the British had gone; now they found out that this was the furthest thing from his mind. Before the treaty could take effect, it would have to be ratified by the U.S. Senate; perhaps its terms would prove too harsh and it would be rejected. In any event, it would take a month or more to find out, and, in the meantime, Jackson still considered himself at war. In the days after the victory parade, the troops were drilled relentlessly; resentment began to fester; many soldiers had families who were suffering from their absences.
Jackson’s rationale was, of course, that the British might yet return to do them harm; there was simply no predicting it, and Jackson wasn’t taking any chances. He had himself an army, and he intended to keep it intact until he was certain they were out of danger. His confidence that he was doing the right thing was reinforced when, on February 19, word reached him of the demise of Fort Bowyer and the imminent fall of Mobile. The seeming indifference of the people of New Orleans to this news made Jackson irate.