"'You can also see, my dear Allen, said the old General, waxing warmer, you can also see what an awful mess such a situation would have been, if the British programme had been carried out in full. But Providence willed otherwise. All the tangled web that the cunning of English diplomacy could weave around our unsuspecting commissioners at Ghent was torn to pieces, and soaked with British blood, in half an hour, at New Orleans, by the never-missing rifles of my Tennessee and Kentucky pioneers; and that ended it. British diplomacy could do wonders; but it could not provide against such a contingency as that. Now, Allen, you have the whole story; and know why Arkansas was saved to the Union.'"
Just Like Jackson.
During the war of 1812-15, the officials of the English Government, civil and military, distinguished themselves by their haughty arrogance and insulting tone of superiority toward the American people; and were, with revengeful malice, guilty of vandalism, spoliations, and cruelties, which were a disgrace to civilization, not to speak of the massacres and butcheries of thousands of women and children by the savage Indians, whom they employed and paid to commit these crimes. Andrew Jackson soon put an end to these English barbarisms wherever he commanded the American armies. An incident, illustrative of his summary methods of dealing with the insolence of his enemies in authority, occurred at Pensacola. The English fleet and army had come in and quartered there in the Spanish capital, with the approval and aid of the Spanish governor, though Spain was at peace with the United States. The British assured him that they would soon be in possession of Louisiana and the coast country, and would fully protect the Spaniard as an ally and friend. When Jackson marched his army to Pensacola, and sent in a message to the governor to expel the British soldiers from the city and order their fleet out of the harbor, the reply of the Spaniard was truckling to the English in tone and evasive and insolent toward the American officer in command. General Jackson replied in the following language:
Your Excellency has been candid enough to admit your having supplied the Indians with arms. In addition to this, I have learned that a British flag has been seen flying on one of your forts. All this is done while you are pretending to be neutral. You can not be surprised then; but on the contrary will provide a fort in your town for my soldiers and Indians, should I take it into my head to pay you a visit. In future, I beg you to withhold your insulting charges against my government, for one more inclined to listen to slander than I am; nor consider me any more as a diplomatic character, unless so proclaimed to you from the mouths of my cannon.
The old hero meant all he said; for he marched upon the town, forced a surrender, sent the British flying to their ships for safety, and compelled the fleet to put to sea.
Humiliation of England.
No event in the modern history of her military operations brought a deeper disappointment and a keener sense of humiliation to the English Government, and to the nation, than did the disastrous failure of this expedition, fitted out in haughty pride for the invasion and conquest of Louisiana. The true story of the campaign and battles was in the main suppressed by the Tory press, in the interest of the reigning dynasty and to save the pride and prestige of a really great and imperial people. A coincidence occurred to aid in diverting the mind of the public from the contemplation of the deplorable event. On the 23d of February, 1815, news of the defeat at New Orleans reached London. On the same day arrived the intelligence of the escape of Napoleon from Elba, and of his landing on the shores of France. Public attention was diverted by the new sensation. The government press fostered the illusion, and the horrors of New Orleans were not so fully known or felt.
William Cobbett, the noted Liberal essayist and author, of England, wrote of the event: "And this was all the people of the duped nation ever heard of the matter. Bonaparte had landed from Elba, and the battle of Waterloo soon succeeded. Both the Government and the people were glad to forget all about this unmerciful beating in America. This battle of New Orleans broke the heart of European despotism. The man who won it did, in that one act, more for the good and the honor of the human race than ever was done by any other man."
The author, discussing the incidents and issues of this remarkable campaign, in the light of the vast superiority in both military and naval forces of the British over the Americans, their more thorough equipment, and their veteran discipline under the best-trained officers in the world, put the inquiry: "How can we account for the repeated reverses, and the final over-whelming defeat and expulsion from the country, of such a vast and formidable armament by an inferior body of raw recruits, suddenly improvised for defense from the militia of the country, and but poorly armed and equipped?" "Providence!" was the reply; nothing less than Providence could have baffled and beaten such a powerful foe, bent on conquest and spoliation for a wicked purpose, with a wicked spirit, and in a wicked cause. England's boastful pride and intolerant and cruel insolence toward her American kindred was humbled at last. The God of battle had once again in time punished a strong nation for its stubborn crimes, and given victory to the oppressed. Providence was with Jackson and his militia!