Condition of Affairs at the Opening of the Third Year—Congressional Appropriations—Russian Offers of Mediation—Jackson's Preparations—Battles of Emucfau, Enotachopco, and Horseshoe Bend.
At the beginning of the third year of the war the prospects of the Americans were more discouraging than at any previous period. The European wars had come to an end for the time, Napoleon having been overthrown at Leipsic, and Great Britain, with an immense navy and an abundance of veteran troops, was at liberty to turn her entire attention upon the enemy across the Atlantic. Indeed, her fleet on our coast had been gradually increasing for several months, and Admirals Warren and Cockburn had shown a determination not to confine their operations to combats of vessel with vessel, but wherever practicable to send a force ashore to harass the people, burn their homes, and carry off their movable property. Harrison's victory was almost the only achievement of the American land forces worth mentioning. The little navy was as gallant as ever, and had suffered no defeat in anything like an equal fight, except in the case of the Chesapeake; but now it seemed likely to be overwhelmed by a power that could send against it a thousand war-ships. Two powerful ones had already been sent for the special purpose of capturing one of our cruisers, the Essex, with orders to follow her wherever she went, and take her at all hazards. The operations of the privateers had struck the English nation in its most tender spot, the pocket, and roused it to a furious determination for vengeance; while the London journals were boldly talking of schemes for using the opportunity to cut off various slices of our territory.
Though the Federal party had declined in popular strength, its leaders in Congress opposed the war as bitterly as ever; but after considerable debate an act was passed to increase the regular army to sixty thousand men, enlisted for five years. A bounty of a hundred and twenty-four dollars was voted for recruits, and eight dollars to each man who brought in one. Seven hundred men were added to the Marine Corps, half a million dollars appropriated for a floating battery, and a hundred dollars offered for every prisoner brought home by a privateer. There was a surplus of a million dollars in the treasury, and five millions were yet to be paid in from loans, while the revenue for the ensuing year was estimated at ten millions. The expenditures were estimated at forty-five millions, and Congress authorized a new loan of twenty-five millions, and a reissue of ten millions in treasury notes.
The Russian Government offered its friendly offices as a mediator for peace, three times in the course of the war; but each time the offer was rejected by England. Once—in March, 1813—the offer was formally accepted on the part of the United States, and Albert Gallatin and James A. Bayard, who believed the English Government would accept it as readily, sailed for St. Petersburg, to join John Quincy Adams, American Minister at the Russian Court, in negotiating the peace. The London Courier probably spoke the sentiments of a large part of the British public when it said:
"We hope the Russian mediation will be refused. Indeed, we are sure it will. We have a love for our naval preeminence that cannot bear to have it even touched by a foreign hand. Russia can be hardly supposed to be adverse to the principle of armed neutrality, and that idea alone would be sufficient to make us decline the offer. We must take our stand, never to commit our naval rights to the mediation of any power. This is the flag we must nail to the national mast, and go down rather than strike it. The hour of concession and compromise is past. Peace must be the consequence of punishment to America; and retraction of her insolent demands must precede negotiation. The thunder of our cannon must first strike terror into the American shores, and Great Britain must be seen and felt in all the majesty of her might, from Boston to Savannah, from the lakes of Canada to the mouths of the Mississippi."
The English Government declined the offer of mediation, as before, but expressed a willingness to nominate plenipotentiaries to make direct negotiations with the American commissioners, suggesting that the conference be held in London, unless the Americans preferred Gottenburg, Sweden. This answer was made in September, 1813, and reached the United States Government in official form in November. The President communicated it to Congress early in January, 1814, and the proposition was accepted; Gottenburg being chosen as the place, and Henry Clay and Jonathan Russell being added to Messrs. Adams, Bayard, and Gallatin as commissioners. Their instructions were, to insist on an absolute discontinuance of the practice of search and impressment, and to offer, in consideration of this, an agreement to exclude British seamen from American vessels, and to surrender deserters.
But the best way to secure an honorable peace-and indeed it will be the only way, until the millennium—is by exhibiting an ability to prosecute successful war. With the new appropriations, the Administration, while sending its peace commissioners abroad, prepared for more vigorous war within our own borders.
After a great deal of trouble with troops who believed their terms of service had expired, and who finally marched home in spite of all arguments and protests, Jackson, who had been made a major-general, found himself at Fort Strother in January, 1814, with nine hundred raw recruits and a few dozen men who had participated in his autumn campaign. With these and two hundred Indians he set out on a raid into the country of the Creeks.
On the 22d, near Emucfau, on Tallapoosa River, he was attacked by a large force, who made a feint on his right and then fell heavily upon his left. The General had anticipated this plan, and strengthened his left, so that after a stubborn fight the enemy were routed and pursued for three miles.