The Battle of New Orleans / including the Previous Engagements between the Americans / and the British, the Indians and the Spanish which led to / the Final Conflict on the 8th of January, 1815

by Z. F. Smith

Battle of the Eighth of January on the West Bank of the River.

We have mentioned that after the night battle of the twenty-third of December General Jackson ordered General Morgan to move his command of Louisiana troops from English Turn, seven miles below the British camp at Villere's, and to take a position on the west bank of the Mississippi, opposite to the American camp. Very naturally, the possibility, and even the probability, of the enemy, when his army was made formidable by all the reinforcements coming up, throwing a heavy flanking force across the river, marching it to a point opposite New Orleans and forcing a surrender of the city, suggested itself to the military eye of Jackson. After the latter entrenched at Rodrique Canal, by the first of January, there was no other strategical route by which the British could have successfully assailed the city. The importance of this seems to have been fully comprehended neither by the one combatant nor the other until too late to fully remedy the omission.

Just such a flanking movement was undertaken by the English at the latest day, which brought on a second battle on the eighth, on the right bank of the river, resulting in a defeat to the American forces, and well-nigh ending in disaster to the American cause. It is in evidence that this strategic movement was the result of a council of war held by the British officers, at which Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane was present. This idea of reaching the city by a heavy detachment thrown across the river and marching up to a point opposite, in cannon reach, had occurred before; but the difficulty was in finding a way to cross over the troops and artillery, with the Americans in command of the means of transportation. The suggestion came from Admiral Cochrane that the Villere Canal from the bayou could be easily deepened and widened to the river bank and opened into the river for the passage of the boats and barges from the fleet, and a sufficient force thrown across the river in that way under cover of night. This seemed feasible, and the strategy determined on. It is related further that Lord Pakenham insisted that the main attack upon the city for its capture should be made by a heavy detachment in this direction, and at the same time only a demonstration in force made on the American breastworks with the whole army, supported by the artillery. He urged that to directly assault the fortified line in front would be at a fearful loss of life, if successful; if it failed it would be disastrous. The Admiral replied to this tauntingly, that there was no cause for alarm over anticipated defeat; he would undertake to force the lines of the American militia with two or three thousand marines. In allusion to this, Latour says: "If the British commander-in-chief was so unmindful of what he owed to his country, and to the army committed to his charge, as to yield to the ill-judged and rash advice of the Admiral, he sacrificed reason in a moment of irritation; though he atoned with his life for having acted contrary to his own judgment." Undoubtedly the English made their last and most fatal blunder here.

As the English writers who were with the army have so variously minimized the forces under Colonel Thornton, and so exaggerated the numbers of the Americans in this affair on the west bank, we quote from the official report of Major-general Lambert, who succeeded to the immediate command of the invading army after the fall of Generals Pakenham, Gibbs, and Keene, what appears to be reliable:

To Lord Bathurst: January 10th, 1815.

It becomes my duty to lay before your Lordship the proceedings of the force lately employed on the right bank of the Mississippi River. Preparations had been made on our side to clear out and widen the canal that led from the bayou to the river, by which our boats had been brought up to the point of disembarkation, and to open it to the Mississippi, by which our troops could be got over to the right bank, and the coöperation of armed boats be secured. A corps consisting of the 85th light infantry, two hundred seamen, four hundred marines, the 5th West India Regiment, and four pieces of artillery, under the command of Colonel Thornton, of the 85th, were to pass over during the night, and move along the right bank toward New Orleans, clearing its front, until it reached the flanking battery of the enemy on that side, which it had orders to carry. Unlooked for difficulties caused delay in the entrance of the armed boats from the canal into the river, destined to land Colonel Thornton's corps, by which several hours' delay was caused. The ensemble of the general movement was lost, a point of the last importance to the main attack on the left bank, although Colonel Thornton ably executed his instructions.

Maj.-Gen. Lambert, Com'd'g.

The two regiments above, with the seamen and marines, if all were present, would have given Colonel Thornton a command of nearly two thousand men. But it is said that in consequence of some difficulties in getting the boats through the canal into the river, and delay consequent thereon, a part of the forces were left behind. From the best authorities, there were twelve hundred British troops landed upon the west bank of the river on the morning of the eighth, by daybreak—all except the West India regiment.