Lambert’s report continued:[567]—
“In this situation, finding that no impression had been made; that though many men had reached the ditch, they were either drowned or obliged to surrender, and that it was impossible to restore order in the regiments where they were,—I placed the reserve in position until I could obtain such information as to determine me how to act to the best of my judgment, and whether or not I should resume the attack; and if so, I felt it could be done only by the reserve.”
Just as the main attack ended, Colonel Thornton with his six hundred rank-and-file, having landed on the west bank, advanced against Morgan’s line, routed it, turned the redoubt, and advanced on Patterson’s heavy battery beyond. Patterson unable to use his guns had no choice but to spike his pieces and retreat. Thornton passed up the river a mile beyond Jackson’s line,[568] and needed only a field-piece and some hot shot to burn the “Louisiana” and march opposite New Orleans.
From the eastern shore Jackson watched the progress of Thornton with alarm. His official report of January 9 gave an idea of his emotions.
“Simultaneously with his advance on my lines,” Jackson said, “the enemy had thrown over in his boats a considerable force to the other side of the river. These having landed were hardy enough to advance against the works of General Morgan; and what is strange and difficult to account for, at the very moment when their entire discomfiture was looked for with a confidence approaching to certainty, the Kentucky reinforcements ingloriously fled, drawing after them by their example the remainder of the forces, and thus yielding to the enemy that most formidable position. The batteries which had rendered me for many days the most important service, though bravely defended, were of course now abandoned, not however until the guns had been spiked. This unfortunate rout had totally changed the aspect of affairs. The enemy now occupied a position from which they might annoy us without hazard, and by means of which they might have been enabled to defeat in a great measure the effect of our success on this side the river.”
John Adair, who was then in command of the Kentucky brigade, General Thomas being unwell, took great offence at Jackson’s account of the battle on the west bank. “The detachment on the other side of the river,” he reported to Governor Shelby,[569] “were obliged to retire before a superior force. They have been calumniated by those who ought to have fought with them, but did not.” The tone of Jackson’s report, and his language afterward, showed a willingness to load the Kentucky troops on the west bank with the responsibility for a military oversight with which they had nothing to do; but the oversight was not the less serious, whoever was responsible for it. The Kentucky and Louisiana troops did not easily yield. The British returns of killed and wounded showed that Thornton’s column suffered a considerable loss. Thornton himself was wounded; his regiment, the Eighty-fifth, numbering two hundred and ninetyeight rank-and file, reported a loss of forty-three men killed, wounded, and missing, besides their colonel. Of one hundred sailors employed in the attack[570] twenty were killed or wounded, besides Captain Money of the royal navy, “who, I am sorry to say, was severely wounded,” said Thornton. The Americans made as good a resistance as could have been expected, and had they resisted longer they would merely have been captured when the next detachment of Thornton’s column came up. The chief blame for the disaster did not rest on them.
Jackson was helpless to interpose. As he and his men, lining the river bank, watched the progress of Thornton’s column on the opposite shore, Jackson could do nothing; but he ordered his men “that they should take off their hats, and give our troops on the right bank three cheers.” Adair, who inclined to a severe judgment of Jackson’s generalship, told the story more picturesquely:[571]—
“I was standing by him when he gave his order, and with a smile, not of approbation, observed I was afraid they could not hear us. The distance from us to them, on a straight line, was upward of one mile and a half; there was a thick fog, and I confess I could not see the troops of either army. All I could discover was the blaze from the guns; and seeing that continue to progress up the river was the only knowledge we had that our men were retreating.”
Jackson then ordered General Humbert, a French officer acting as a volunteer, to take four hundred men and cross the river at New Orleans to repulse the enemy, cost what it might;[572] but had the enemy pressed his advantage, no force at Jackson’s command could have stopped their advance, without causing the sacrifice of Jackson’s lines. Fortunately the only remaining British general, Lambert, was not disposed to make another effort. The eight regiments of regular troops which made the bulk of Pakenham’s army had suffered severely in the assault. One of these regiments, the Eighty-fifth, was with Thornton on the west shore. Two, the Seventh and Forty-third, had been in the reserve, and except two companies had never approached the works within musket-shot, yet had lost fifty-two killed, and about one hundred wounded and missing, in an aggregate of less than eighteen hundred. The five remaining regiments—the Fourth, Twenty-first, Forty-fourth, Ninety-third, and Ninety-fifth—were nearly destroyed. They went into battle probably about three thousand strong:[573] they lost seventeen hundred and fifty men killed, wounded, and missing. The total British loss was two thousand and thirty-six.[574] The American loss was seventy-one. Even on the west bank the American loss was much less than that of the British.
The loss of three major-generals was almost as serious as the loss of one third of the regular Infantry. Lambert, the fourth major-general, weighed down by responsibility and defeat, had no wish but to escape. He recalled Thornton’s corps the same evening from its position on the opposite bank, and the next day, January 9, began preparations for his difficult and hazardous retreat.[575]