Thus it fared with the left of the army. The right failing to penetrate through the swamp, and faring no better, was compelled to halt. All thought of a general attack for this day was abandoned. It only remained to withdraw the troops from their perilous position with as little loss as possible. This was done, not in a body, but regiment by regiment, under the same discharge which saluted their approach.
There seemed now but one practicable way of assault; to treat these field-works as one would treat a regular fortification, by erecting breaching batteries against them, and silencing, if possible, their guns. To this end three days were employed in landing heavy cannon, bringing up ammunition, and making other preparations, as for a siege. One half of the army was ordered out on the night of the thirty-first, quietly led up to within three hundred yards of the enemy's works, and busily employed in throwing up a chain of works. Before dawn, six batteries were completed, with thirty pieces of heavy cannon mounted, when the troops, before the dawn of day, fell back and concealed themselves behind some thick brush in the rear. The Americans had no idea of what was going on until morning came. This whole district was covered with the stubble of sugar-cane, and every storehouse and barn was filled with large barrels containing sugar. In throwing up the works this sugar was used. Rolling the hogsheads towards the front, they were placed in the parapets of the batteries. Sugar, to the amount of many thousand pounds sterling, was thus disposed of.
On the morning of January 1st, a thick haze obscured the sun, and all objects at the distance of a few yards, for some hours. Finally, as the clouds of fog drifted away, the American camp was fully exposed to view, but three hundred yards away. The different regiments were upon parade, and presented a fine appearance. Mounted officers rode to and fro, bands were playing, and colors floating in the air. All seemed gala, when suddenly our batteries opened. Their ranks were broken; the different corps dispersing, fled in all directions, while the utmost terror and disorder appeared to prevail.
While this consternation lasted among the infantry, their artillery remained silent; but soon recovering confidence, they answered our salute with great precision and rapidity. A heavy cannonade on both sides continued during the day, until our ammunition began to fail—our fire slackening, while that of the enemy redoubled. Landing a number of guns from their flotilla, they increased their artillery to a prodigious amount. They also directed their cannon on the opposite bank against the flank of our batteries, and soon convinced us that all endeavors to surpass them in this mode of fighting would be useless. Once more, we were obliged to retire, leaving our heavy guns to their fate. The fatigue of officers and men, it would be difficult to form a conception of. For two entire nights and days not a man had closed his eyes, except to sleep amid showers of cannon-balls. We retreated, therefore, baffled and disheartened. It must be confessed that a murmur of discontent began to be heard in the camp. The cannon and mortars of the enemy played on our men night and day, from their main position; likewise a deadly fire from eighteen pieces on the opposite bank swept the entire line of our encampment. The duty of a picket was as dangerous as to go into battle. The American sharpshooters harassed them from the time they went on duty till they were relieved; while to light fires served only as marks for the enemy's gunners. The murmurs were not of men anxious to escape from a disagreeable situation; but rather resembled the growlings of a chained animal, when he sees his adversary, but can not reach him. All were eager to bring matters to the issue of a battle, at any sacrifice.
Tennessee and Kentucky Troops Arrive—Government Censured for Neglect.
General Carroll's division of Tennessee troops arrived about this time; also the Louisiana militia were reinforced by several companies from the more distant parishes. On the fourth of January the entire body of Kentucky militia reached New Orleans, twenty-two hundred in number, and went into camp on Prevost's plantation. The day following, seven hundred and fifty of these repaired to the lines, and went into camp in the rear, arms being furnished to but five hundred of the number. There were, at this time, nearly two thousand brave and willing men within Jackson's lines, whose services were lost to the army and to the country for the want of arms. The dangerous delay of the arrival of the troops, and with this, the failure of the arrival of the arms and munitions necessary to equip the men for service, had their beginning in the culpable negligence of the War Department at Washington, of which history has had occasion to complain. But a more immediate cause for the irreparable delay in the arrival of the stores for arming and equipping the troops is found in the conduct of the quartermaster who superintended the shipment of the same from Pittsburgh. Though he was offered a contract to ship these supplies by a steamboat, and to deliver them at New Orleans in ample time for use, for some reason he declined the offer. He then had them loaded on a flatboat and slowly floated to their destination, when there was little or no hope of their arrival in time for use. At the date of the final battle at New Orleans they were afloat somewhere near the mouth of the Ohio River, and of course did not arrive until many days after all need of them was over.
On the twenty-ninth of December, General Jackson wrote to the Secretary of War these words of protest against this failure to make provision for his army in such a crisis as the present:
I lament that I have not the means of carrying on more offensive operations. The Kentucky troops have not arrived, and my effective force at this point does not exceed three thousand men. That of the enemy must be at least double; both prisoners and deserters agreeing in the statement that seven thousand landed from their boats.
When the militia of Kentucky were called for, Governor Shelby was assured that the United States quartermaster would furnish transportation for the troops to New Orleans; but no such officer reported himself, and no relief came from Washington. The men had rendezvoused on the banks of the Ohio in waiting, and here the expedition must have ended had not Colonel Richard Taylor, of Frankfort, then quartermaster of the State militia, on his own credit, borrowed a sum sufficient to meet the immediate emergency. With this he purchased such boats as he could, some of which were unfit for the passage. Camp equippage could not be had in time, and about thirty pots and kettles were bought at Louisville, one to each company of eighty men. At the mouth of the Cumberland River they were detained eight days, with their axes and frows riving boards with which to patch up their old boats. From this point they started with half a supply of rations, to which they added as they could on the way down the Mississippi River. The men knew there was due them an advance of two months' pay when ordered out of the State. The United States quartermaster distributed this pay to the Tennessee troops who had preceded them, but withheld it from the Kentuckians. Believing that they would be furnished suitable clothing or pay, blankets, tents, arms, and munitions with reasonable promptness, they left home with little else than the one suit of clothing they wore, usually of homespun jeans. As a writer has said: "Rarely, if ever, has it been known of such a body of men leaving their homes, unprovided as they were, and risking a difficult passage of fifteen hundred miles in the crudest of barges to meet an enemy. They could have been prompted alone by a patriotic love of country and a defiance of its enemies." This contribution of Kentucky for the defense of Louisiana was made just after she had furnished over ten thousand volunteer troops in the campaigns of Harrison in the Northwest, who made up the larger part of the soldiers in that army for the two years previous, and who recently had won the great victory at the battle of the Thames. Governor Shelby tendered to the government ten thousand more Kentuckians for the army of the Southwest, if they were needed to repel the invaders.