The defeated column, forced to fall back broken and disordered, was finally rallied by the heroic efforts of the officers, reinforced with fresh troops, and led to a second attempt at assault; but the carnage and destruction were as great as in the first attempt, while almost no impression was made upon the defensive line of the Americans. The British were again compelled to retreat in disorder, leaving great numbers of their comrades dead or wounded on the ground, or prisoners to the Americans. The hope of victory had now become a forlorn one to the British. They were broken in numbers, broken in order and discipline, and broken in prestige. Yet the brave officers, led by their commanders-in-chief, determined not to give up the contest without a last desperate effort. A part of the troops had dispersed and retreated to shelter among the bushes on their right; the rest retired to the ditch where they were first perceived in the morning, about five hundred yards in our front. In vain did the officers call upon the men to rally and form again for another advance, striking some with the flat of their swords, and appealing to them by every incentive. They felt that it was almost certain destruction to venture again into the storm of fire that awaited them, and were insensible to everything but escape from impending death. They would not move from the ditch, and here sheltered the rest of the day. The ground over which they had twice advanced and twice retreated was strewn thickly with their dead and wounded. Such slaughter of their own men, with no apparent loss on our side, was enough to appal the bravest of mankind.
Nearly one hundred of the enemy reached the ditch in front of the American breastwork, half of whom were killed and the other half captured. A detachment of British troops had penetrated into the wood toward our extreme left, to divert attention by a feint attack. The troops under General Coffee opened on these with their rifles, and soon forced them to retire.
After the main attack on the American left and center had begun, another column of over twenty-five hundred men, under the command of General Keene, advanced along the road near the levee, and between the levee and the river, to attack the American line on the extreme right. They were partly sheltered by the levee from the fire of the artillery, except that of Battery 1 and the guns across the river. Our outposts were driven in, and the head of the column pushing forward occupied the unfinished redoubt in front of our entrenched line before more than two or three discharges of artillery could be made. Overpowering the small force here, they compelled it to fall back, after killing and wounding a few men. Bravely led by Colonel Rence and other officers of rank, the British gained a momentary advantage, and threatened to storm the entrenchment itself. But Beale's Rifles from the city, defending this extreme, poured fatal volleys upon the head of the column, while Batteries 1 and 2 mowed down the ranks. The Seventh Regiment, the only infantry besides Beale's in musket range, did deadly execution also. By these, the farther advance of the enemy was made impossible, while the nearest ground they occupied was strewn with their dead and wounded, among whom were General Keene, Colonel Rence, and other prominent officers. Many passed the ditch and scaled the parapet only to be shot down in the redoubt by the unerring riflemen behind the entrenched line. Like the main column on the left, this second column on the right, broken and shattered, was compelled to fall back in great disorder upon the reserve, with no effort after to renew the assault. The dead and wounded lay thick along the road, the levee, and the river bank, as far out as the range of our guns. A flanking fire from the battery across the river harassed the troops in this column both in the advance and retreat, as they passed in plain view, from which fire they sustained severe losses.
The battle was now ended as far as the firing of musketry and small arms was concerned. The last volleys from these ceased one hour after the British column first in motion attacked our line upon the left center, at half-past seven o'clock. In that brief time, one of the best equipped and best disciplined armies that England ever sent forth was defeated and shattered beyond hope by one half its number of American soldiers, mostly militia. For one hour after the opening attack the firing along the American line had been incessant, and the roar of the cannon, mingling with the rattling noise of the musketry and rifles, reverberated over the open plains and echoed back from the wood and swamp, until the issue of combat sent the enemy to cover beyond range. The artillery from our batteries, however, kept up a continuous fire against the guns of the enemy, or against squads of their troops who might expose themselves, until two o'clock in the afternoon, when the lull of strife came to all.
The scene upon the field of contest was one that can not be pictured in words to convey an adequate impression. British officers who campaigned in Europe, in the wars of the Peninsula, testified that in all their military experiences they had witnessed nothing to equal the stubborn fierceness of the contending forces, and the fearful carnage that befell the troops of the British army. We have mentioned how thickly strewn was the ground along the levee and the road, on the right next to the river, with the dead and the wounded of the enemy. The fatality among the officers here was fearful. General Keene, in command of this second attacking column, was borne from the field badly wounded. Colonel Rence, next in command with Keene, was killed while leading the assault in the redoubt. Near by fell Major King, mortally wounded, and others of rank, leaving the command with but few leaders to conduct the broken ranks in precipitate retreat. On our left, in the front of the Tennesseans and Kentuckians, the greatest execution had been done. The slaughter here was appalling. Within a space three hundred yards wide, and extending out two hundred yards from our breastwork on the battlefield, an area of about ten acres, the ground was literally covered with the dead and desperately wounded. A British officer, who became also historian, says that under the temporary truce he rode forward to view this scene. Such a one he never witnessed elsewhere. There lay before him in this small compass not less than one thousand men, dead or disabled by wounds, all in the uniform of the British soldier; not one American among the number. The fatality to the English officers had been even greater on our left than on our right. Lord Pakenham, commander-in-chief, after the first repulse of the main column, with a courage as reckless as it was vain rode forward to rally his troops and lead them to a second attack in person, and in the midst of a hail of missiles from cannon and small-arms fell mortally hurt with several wounds, and died within an hour. Major-general Gibbs, next in command, was stricken down a few minutes after, dying within a few hours. Others in high rank were carried down in the holocaust of casualties, until the British army became unnerved for the want of leadership in the hour of disaster and peril.
Adjutant-general Robert Butler, in his official report to General Jackson a few days after the battle of the eighth, placed the losses of the British at seven hundred killed, fourteen hundred wounded, and five hundred prisoners; twenty-six hundred men, or almost one third the entire number the enemy admitted to have taken part in the contest of the day. The loss of the Americans was six killed and seven wounded, thirteen in all. Instead of comment upon this remarkable disparity of losses, and the causes that led to such a signal victory for the Americans and such a humiliating defeat for our enemies, it will be more interesting to our readers to quote from English writers who were participants in the battle, and eye-witnesses of the scenes they describe with graphic pen. We are ever curious to know what others see and say of us, especially if they honestly criticize us with a spice of prejudice.
An English Officer's Account of the Battle.
Gleig, in his "History of British Campaigns," says:
Dividing his troops into three columns, Sir Edward Pakenham directed that General Keene, at the head of the Ninety-fifth, the light companies of the Twenty-first, Fourth, and Forty-fourth Regiments, and the two black corps, should make a demonstration on the right; that General Gibbs, with the Fourth, Twenty-first, Forty-fourth, and Ninety-third, should force the enemy's left; while General Lambert, with the Seventh and Forty-third, remained in reserve. Our numbers now amounted to a little short of eight thousand, a force which, in any other part of America, would have been irresistible. The forces of the enemy were reported at twenty-three to thirty thousand. I suppose their whole force to have been twenty-five thousand. All things were arranged on the night of the 7th, for the 8th was fixed upon as the day decisive of the fate of New Orleans.
On the morning of the 8th, the entire army was in battle array. A little after daylight, General Pakenham gave the word to advance The troops on the right and the left, having the Forty-fourth to follow with the fascines and ladders, rushed on to the assault. On the left, next to the river, a detachment of the Ninety-fifth, Twenty-first and Fourth, stormed a three-gun battery and took it. It was in advance of the main line of works. The enemy, in overpowering numbers, repulsed our attacking force and recaptured the battery with immense slaughter. On our right again, the Twenty-first and Fourth being almost cut to pieces, and thrown into some confusion by the enemy's fire, the Ninety-third pushed up and took the lead. Hastening forward, our troops soon reached the ditch; but to scale the parapet without ladders was impossible. Some few indeed, by mounting upon each others' shoulders, succeeded in entering the works; but these were, most of them, instantly killed or captured. As many as stood without were exposed to a sweeping fire, which cut them down by whole companies. It was in vain that the most obstinate courage was displayed. They fell by the hands of men they could not see. The Americans, without lifting their faces above the rampart, swung their fire-locks over the wall and discharged them directly upon their heads.