The Battle of New Orleans.
13. On the 22d of the month Pakenham's advance reached the Mississippi, nine miles below the city. On the night of the 23d Generals Jackson and Coffee advanced with two thousand Tennessee riflemen to attack the British camp. After a bloody assault, Jackson was obliged to fall back to a strong position on the canal, four miles below the city. Pakenham advanced, and on the 28th cannonaded the American position. On New Year's day the attack was renewed, and the enemy was driven back. Pakenham now made arrangements for a general battle.
The Battle of New Orleans.
14. Jackson was ready. Earthworks had been constructed, and a long line of cotton-bales and sand-bags thrown up for protection. On the 8th of January the British moved forward. The battle began with the light of morning, and was ended before nine o'clock. Column after column of the British was smitten with irretrievable ruin. Jackson's men were almost entirely secure from the enemy's fire, while every discharge of the Tennessee and Kentucky rifles told with awful effect on the exposed veterans of England. Pakenham was killed; General Gibbs was mortally wounded. Only General Lambert was left to call the fragments of the army from the field. Of the British, seven hundred were killed, fourteen hundred wounded, and five hundred taken prisoners. The American loss amounted to eight killed and thirteen wounded.
15. General Lambert retired with his ruined army. Jackson marched into New Orleans and was received with great enthusiasm. Such was the close of the war on land. On the 20th of February the American Constitution, off Cape St. Vincent, captured two British vessels, the Cyane and the Levant. On the 23d of March the American Hornet ended the conflict, by capturing the British Penguin off the coast of Brazil.
Treaty of Ghent.
16. Already a treaty of peace had been made. In the summer of 1814, American commissioners were sent to Ghent, in Belgium, and were there met by the ambassadors of Great Britain. The agents of the United States were John Quincy Adams, James A. Bayard, Henry Clay, Jonathan Russell, and Albert Gallatin. On the 24th of December a treaty was agreed to and signed. In both countries the news was received with deep satisfaction. On the 18th of February the treaty was ratified by the Senate, and peace was publicly proclaimed.
17. The only significance of the treaty was that Great Britain and the United States agreed to be at peace. Not one of the issues, to decide which the war had been undertaken, was even mentioned. Of the impressment of American seamen not a word was said. The wrongs done to the commerce of the United States were not referred to. Of "free trade and sailors' rights," the battle-cry of the American navy, no mention was made. The treaty was chiefly devoted to the settlement of unimportant boundaries and the possession of some small islands in the Bay of Passamaquoddy.