It has been stated that Sir Edward Packenham fell, and was buried under this oak, or these oaks, (for I believe there are two,) but I have been informed, since my return from the field, by a gentleman who was commander of a troop of horse in the action, that when the British retreated, he saw from the parapet the body of General Packenham lying alone upon the ground, surrounded by the dead and wounded, readily distinguishable by its uniform; and, that during the armistice for the burial of the dead, he saw his body borne from the field by the British soldiers, who afterward conveyed it with them in their retreat to their fleet.
The rampart of earth upon which we stood, presented very little the appearance of having ever been a defence for three thousand breasts; resembling rather one of the numerous dikes constructed on the plantations near the river, to drain the very marshy soil which abounds in this region, than the military defences of a field of battle. It was a grassy embankment, extending, with the exception of an angle near the forest—about a mile in a straight line from the river to the cypress swamps in the rear; four feet high, and five or six feet broad. At the time of the battle it was the height of a man, and somewhat broader than at present, and along the whole front ran a fossé, containing five feet of water, and of the same breadth as the parapet. This was now nearly filled with earth, and could easily be leaped over at any point. The embankment throughout the whole extent is much worn, indented and, occasionally, levelled with the surface of the plain. Upon the top of it, before the battle, eight batteries were erected, with embrasures of cotton bales, piled transversely. Under cover of this friendly embankment, the Americans lay perdus, but not idle, during the greater portion of the battle.
A daring Tennessean, with a blanket tied round him, and a hat with a brim of enormous breadth, who seemed to be fighting "on his own hook," disdaining to raise his rifle over the bank of earth and fire, in safety to his person, like his more wary fellow soldiers, chose to spring, every time he fired, upon the breastwork, where, balancing himself, he would bring his rifle to his cheek, throw back his broad brim, take sight and fire, while the enemy were advancing to the attack, as deliberately as though shooting at a herd of deer; then leaping down on the inner side, he would reload, mount the works, cock his beaver, take aim, and crack again. "This he did," said an English officer, who was taken prisoner by him, and who laughingly related it as a good anecdote to Captain D——, my informant above alluded to—"five times in rapid succession, as I advanced at the head of my company, and though the grape whistled through the air over our heads, for the life of me I could not help smiling at his grotesque demi-savage, demi-quaker figure, as he threw back the broad flap of his castor to obtain a fair sight—deliberately raised his rifle—shut his left eye, and blazed away at us. I verily believe he brought down one of my men at every shot."
As the British resolutely advanced, though columns fell like the tall grain before the sickle at the fire of the Americans, this same officer approached at the head of his brave grenadiers amid the rolling fire of musketry from the lines of his unseen foes, undaunted and untouched. "Advance, my men!" he shouted as he reached the edge of the fossé—"follow me!" and sword in hand he leaped the ditch, and turning amidst the roar and flame of a hundred muskets to encourage his men, beheld to his surprise but a single man of his company upon his feet—more than fifty brave fellows, whom he had so gallantly led on to the attack, had been shot down. As he was about to leap back from his dangerous situation, his sword was shivered in his grasp by a rifle ball, and at the same instant the daring Tennessean sprang upon the parapet and levelled his deadly weapon at his breast, calmly observing, "Surrender, strannger—or, I may perforate ye!" "Chagrined," said the officer, at the close of his recital, "I was compelled to deliver to the bold fellow my mutilated sword, and pass over into the American lines."
"Here," said our guide and cicerone, advancing a few paces up the embankment, and placing his foot emphatically upon the ground, "here fell Renie."
This gallant man, with the calf of his leg shot away by a cannon-ball, leaped upon the breast-works with a shout of exultation, and was immediately shot through the heart, by an American private. Packenham, the favourite elêve of Wellington, and the "beau ideal" of a British soldier, after receiving a second wound, while attempting to rally his broken columns, fell directly in front of our position, not far from where Renie received his death-wound. In the disorder and panic of the first retreat of the British, he was left bleeding and forsaken among the dead and dying. Not far from this melancholy spot, Gibbes received his mortal wound; and near the place where this gallant officer fell, one of the staff of the English general was also shot down. The whole field was fruitful with scenes of thrilling interest. I should weary you by individualizing them. There was scarcely a spot on which I could cast my eyes, where a soldier had not poured out his life-blood. "As I stood upon the breast-works," said Captain Dunbar, "after the action, the field of battle before me was so thickly strewn with dead bodies, that I could have walked fifty yards over them without placing my foot upon the ground." How revolting the sight of a field thus sown must be to human nature! Man must indeed be humbled at such a spectacle.
We walked slowly over the ground, which annually waves with undulating harvests of the rich cane. Our guide was intelligent and sufficiently communicative without being garrulous. He was familiar with every interesting fact associated with the spot, and by his correct information rendered our visit both more satisfactory and agreeable than it otherwise would have been.
"Here gentilhommes, j'ai findé some bullet for you to buy," shouted a little French mulatto at the top of his voice, who, among other boys of various hues, had followed us to the field, "me, j'ai trop—too much;" and on reaching us, this double-tongued urchin turned his pockets inside out and discharged upon the ground a load of rusty grape shot, bullets, and fragments of lead—his little stock in trade, some, if not all of which, I surmised, had been manufactured for the occasion.
"Did you find them on the battle-ground, garçon?"
"Iss—oui, Messieurs, me did, de long-temps."