There were eighty-four prisoners taken, all of them being women and children. Not only General Coffee, but his officers and men also, would gladly have ended the fight as soon as victory was theirs, sparing the warriors who had survived the first onset, and they constantly offered quarter not only to bodies of men who were fighting together, but to single individuals who were manifestly at their mercy, and to wounded warriors; but their offers of mercy were indignantly rejected in every case, and they therefore had no choice but to convert the battle into a massacre more complete than that which had occurred at Fort Mims, except that the women and children were spared; but this time the butchery was forced upon the victors against their will, while at Fort Mims the triumphant savages had willingly indulged in indiscriminate slaughter.
Coffee at once took up his return march and rejoined Jackson, who sent a brief despatch reporting the affair to Governor Blount, praising Coffee and his men in the strongest terms, and ending with that plaintive plea for food for his army, which was now constantly on his lips. "If we had a sufficient supply of provisions," he wrote, "we should in a very short time accomplish the object of the expedition."
The most encouraging thing about this affair was the good conduct of the men. They manifested so little of the spirit of raw and undisciplined troops; they fought with so much coolness and steadiness, and went through the battle showing so few signs of that excitement which commonly impairs the efficiency of inexperienced soldiers, that their commander felt a confidence in them which justified him in attempting more than he would otherwise have dared in the circumstances.
Mr. Parton, in his Life of Andrew Jackson, preserves a story which grew out of this battle, and which so strongly illustrates the softer side of a stern soldier's character, that we may be pardoned for breaking the narrative to copy it here.
"On the bloody field of Tallushatchee was found a slain mother still embracing her living infant. The child was brought into camp with the other prisoners, and Jackson, anxious to save it, endeavored to induce some of the Indian women to give it nourishment. 'No,' said they, 'all his relatives are dead; kill him too.' This reply appealed to the heart of the general. He caused the child to be taken to his own hut, where among the few remaining stores was found a little brown sugar. This, mingled with water, served to keep the child alive until it could be sent to Huntsville, where it was nursed at Jackson's expense until the end of the campaign, and then taken to the Hermitage. Mrs. Jackson received it cordially, and the boy grew up in the family, treated by the general and his kind wife as a son and a favorite. Lincoyer was the name given him by the general. He grew to be a finely formed and robust youth, and received the education usually given to the planters' sons in the neighborhood. Yet it appears he remained an Indian to the last, delighting to roam the fields and woods, and decorate his hair and clothes with gay feathers, and given to strong yearnings for his native wilds."
The boy did not live to reach manhood, however. In his seventeenth year he fell a victim to pulmonary consumption, and when he died his benefactor mourned him as bitterly as if he had been indeed his son.
CHAPTER XVII.
THE BATTLE OF TALLADEGA.
Where was General Cocke with the troops from East Tennessee all this time? It will be remembered that he was to muster twenty-five hundred men in his half of the state, while Jackson gathered a like number in the west, and marching southward the two were to form a junction in the Creek country. Meantime General Cocke had undertaken to procure in East Tennessee supplies for the whole force. The supplies, as we know, had not come, and Jackson had marched without them. Now he expected General Cocke daily, with his force and his supplies; but they came not, and Jackson was greatly disappointed.