USA > Tennessee > The history of Tennessee, from its earliest settlement to the present time > Part 13
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17
DURING the progress of the events narrated in the foregoing chapter, the relations of the United States with the governments of Great Britain and France had been growing less and less friendly.
Engaged in war with each other, the two latter powers, in 1806, issued certain orders and decrees, by which American or other neutral vessels, having on board British or French mer- chandise, or trading to French or English ports, were rendered liable to seizure and confiscation by the naval forces of Great Britain or France. Upon the United States the effect of these or- ders and decrees was to check, and wellnigh to
221
DECLARATION OF WAR.
1812.]
destroy a commerce hitherto thriving, and fast rising to the first importance.
In the expectation of bringing both England and France to terms, by cutting off a consider- able source of their necessary supplies, Con- gress, in 1807, declared an embargo to prevent the sailing of American vessels to British or French ports. This measure, however, operat- ing seriously to the disadvantage of the com- mercial states, was, in 1809, abandoned, and an act passed in its stead, to prohibit all inter- course with Great Britain, France, and their de- pendencies.
In the mean time other questions had arisen to complicate and increase the existing difficul- ties between the United States and Great Britain. Among these were the rights of search and im- pressment, claimed and exercised by the latter government, and under color of which thousands of our seamen, native-born as well as adopted citizens, on the pretence that they were British subjects, had been dragged from the protection of their own flag to the galling servitude of the English navy.
The patience of the country having been ex- hausted, at length, in unavailing protests against these various aggressions upon our commerce and the rights of our seamen, it was determined, as a last resort, to try the effect of an appeal to arms. Accordingly, on the 18th of June,
19*
222
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. [1812.
1812, Congress issued a formal declaration of war against Great Britain. As France had just signified her willingness to enter into an amicable arrangement of difficulties, it was not deemed advisable or necessary to include that government in the proclamation of hostilities.
At the north, the early operations of the first campaign resulted in a series of disasters-the loss of Mackinaw, the abandonment of Chicago, the ignominious surrender of Hull at Detroit, and the capture of a thousand American troops at eenstown Heights. On the ocean, how- ever, the navy of the United States proudly sus- tained the honour of our arms, and dissipated in a great degree the gloom occasioned by the un- toward course of events on land.
The war had raged for some time along the Canadian frontier, when Wilkinson, in command at New Orleans, made a call upon the militia of Tennessee to march to the protection of that important post. In answer to this summons the gallant Tennesseeans, heedless of driving snow storms and the severity of an unprecedented winter, assembled at Nashville, on the 10th of December, to the number of fifteen hundred foot and four hundred horse-all volunteers.
Headed by General Andrew Jackson, whose previous application for a regular commission had been rejected, the foot soldiers descended in boats to Natchez. Here a junction was
223
VOLUNTEERS.
1813.]
formed with the horse, who, under the lead of General Coffee, had marched four hundred and fifty miles through the Indian country.
Remaining at Natchez during the winter, Jackson, early in the spring of 1813, received an order from the Secretary of War to disband his troops, and deliver over all the stores and other public property to Wilkinson. The reason alleged for this order was, that as the services of the militia were very expensive, it had been determined to dispense with them as far as pos- ยท sible. Jackson, however, shrewdly suspected that the real motive for disbanding them at Natchez was to facilitate their enlistment into the army of Wilkinson, whose recruiting officers had already appeared in the camp. Two hun- dred of the men were sick, and very few had means of their own to return home. Conse- quently, in the event of their discharge, many of them would be compelled by their necessities to enter the regular service, however unwilling they might otherwise be to do so.
Deeming himself responsible to the brave men who had followed him so far, for their safe return to their homes and families, Jackson did not long hesitate as to what should be his pro- per course, under the circumstances. That course, though in direct opposition to the orders of the war department, he pursued with the fearless resolution which formed a prominent
224
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. [1813.
trait in his character. Driving away the re- cruiting officers of Wilkinson, in spite of warn- ings, threats, and efforts to embarrass his action, he procured wagons for his sick and disabled, and, heading his troops, marched them through the wilderness again to Nashville, the point where they had been originally mustered, and disbanded them.
The patriotism of Jackson could not be doubt- ed; his services had already proved valuable and important. The motive for his conduct was one that did honour to his heart. The . government did not deem it advisable, therefore, to take any notice of his disobedience of orders, but silently paid the expenses it had incurred.
Previous to the declaration of hostilities, it had been urged as a cause for war on the part of the United States, that agents of the British government were actively engaged in inciting the animosity of the north-western Indian tribes against the American frontier settlements. However this may have been, no sooner was war proclaimed than the most of those tribes be- came the open allies of Great Britain. The moving spirit, by whose influence they had been in a great measure swayed to such a course, was Tecumseh, the celebrated chief of the Shaw- anese.
From his boyhood this remarkable man had been an active and unrelenting foe of the
225
TECUMSEH.
1813.]
Americans. Sagacious and observant, he early saw that their encroachments could be stayed only by the combination, in one friendly league, of all the various contending tribes of his race. To effect such a union became the grand aim of his existence. Of a dignified and command- ing appearance, an eloquent orator, a brave warrior, crafty, resolute, and capable of bearing, every extreme of wilderness life, he possessed all the qualities held in esteem by the Indians. Thus endowed, and aided by the arts of his bro- ther, the Prophet, who claimed to hold a mys- terious intercourse with the Great Spirit, Te- cumseh had acquired an extraordinary influence over the various savage tribes of the north-west. How that influence was exerted on the breaking out of the war between England and America has already been noticed.
After having held repeated conferences with the British at Detroit, Tecumseh, in the spring of 1812, attended by thirty mounted warriors, left the North-West Territory, and moving rapidly southward, penetrated the country as far down as Florida, where he succeeded in persuading the Seminoles to join his standard. Returning northward, some time during the autumn he made his appearance among the Creeks of Alabama. Passing from town to town, he exerted all his fiery eloquence, creating wherever he went a fierce feeling of animosity to the Americans.
-
226
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. [1813.
He entreated his hearers to become again what they had formerly been-hunters and warriors, and the foes of the white man and his civiliza- tion. Their ancient allies, the English, he told them, had sent him from the great lakes to pro- cure their aid in expelling the Americans from every foot of Indian soil; and he assured them that the King of England would reward well every one that should take up arms in his cause.
Departing in December for the North, Tecum- seh left the Creek nation in a state of fearful excitement. Two parties had arisen; the one, comprising the wealthy and more intelligent chiefs, anxious to maintain peace; the other, composed of the young and ardent clamo- rous for the immediate destruction of the
American settlements. Stimulated continually by the prophet, whom Tecumseh had appointed to disseminate his doctrines, the war feeling con- tinued to grow more and more violent, until it broke out in murderous attacks, not upon whites only, but also upon such of the Creeks as desired to continue at peace with the United States.
At length the surprise and capture of Fort Mimms by a band of the war faction, under the lead of Weatherford, a noted half-breed chief, brought affairs to a crisis. On this occasion nearly four hundred whites and friendly Creeks were either slain in the fight or massacred after the capture of the fort.
227
BATTLE OF TALLASEHATCHE.
1813.]
Reaching Nashville on the 25th September, 1813, the tidings of this sanguinary affair creat- ed an intense excitement. Scarcely had Go- vernor Blount time to summon out the militia, before General Jackson, having assembled the volunteers of his late Natchez expedition, was on his march to the "Hickory Ground," the chief seat of the hostile Creeks, embracing the entire district between the Coosa and Talla- poosa Rivers. Crossing the Tennessee at Rit- ter's landing, Jackson with difficulty cut his way over the intervening ridges to Mill's Creek, where he remained for several days encamped, until his foragers had collected provisions, in want of which the army suffered a great deal.
While waiting at this place the commander- in-chief despatched General Coffee, with two divisions of five hundred men each, to attack the town of Tallasehatche, some thirteen miles distant, where a considerable body of the enemy had assembled. Having forded the Coosa a short distance above the Ten Islands, Coffee di- rected one of his divisions to scour the neighbour- ing country, while he led the other in person against Tallasehatche. The sun was just rising on the 3d of November when the Tennesseeans, approaching the town on two sides, began the attack. Not wholly unprepared, the savages, headed by their prophets, with fierce yells and the beating of drums rushed furiously upon the
228
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. 1813.
advancing lines. A brief but sanguinary strug- gle put an end to the action, in which, scorning to beg for life, few Indians escaped destruction. Nearly two hundred warriors lay dead on the field, and eighty-four women and prisoners re- mained in the hands of the victorious Tennessee- ans, whose loss was but five killed and eighteen wounded. Recrossing the Coosa, Coffee reached the main camp late in the evening.
Jackson now pushed forward over the moun- tains. Arriving at the Ten Islands of the Coosa, he there established a depot for provisions, pro- tected by strong pickets and block-houses, to which he gave the name of Fort Strother.
While these events were transpiring, a small band of friendly Creeks, having taking refuge in a fort at the town of Talladega, had been closely besieged there by a large party of "Red Sticks," as the hostile Indians were called, in allusion to the colour of their war-clubs. Aware that Jackson was on the Coosa, the be- sieged for a time vainly endeavoured to convey to him some intelligence of their alarming situa- tion. Not a single warrior could leave the fort unseen. At length a crafty chief, clothing himself in the skin of a large hog, with the head and legs attached, crawled out of the fort one night on his hands and knees, and, thus dis- guised, grunting occasionally and rooting in the earth, managed to pass unsuspected through the
1813.]
BATTLE OF TALLADEGA. - 229
enemy's camps. Once beyond arrow-shot, he threw off his disguise, and sped like a deer to the head-quarters of Jackson, who immediately. prepared to march to the relief of the fort.
General White, with a detachment of General Cocke's East Tennesseeans, being some distance higher up the river, Jackson despatched a mes- senger to him with orders to hasten to Fort Strother, and protect it in his absence. Leav- ing a small guard to watch over the sick and wounded, he crossed the Coosa at midnight, and moved rapidly down the southern bank toward Talladega, within six miles of which the troops encamped, late in the evening of November the 8th.
Scarcely had the tents been pitched, when Jackson received the irritating intelligence that White, instead of marching to Fort Strother, had complied with an order from Cocke to re- trace his steps to the mouth of the Chattanooga, and there join the main body of the Eastern volunteers. Fearing for the feeble garrison of Fort Strother, Jackson nevertheless determined, before hastening back to its protection, to make a desperate effort to relieve the beleaguered Creeks at Talladega.
In the gray of the following morning the Tennesseeans moved to the attack of the Red Sticks, who, more than a thousand in number, were posted in a dense thicket, along the margin
20
230
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. [1813.
of a shallow rivulet, in the immediate vicinity of the fort. This position, as well as that of the beleaguered fort, Jackson's line, composed of twelve hundred infantry, and eight hundred horse, encompassed in an almost unbroken circle. About eight o'clock the American advance came in contact with the Indians. Though taken by complete surprise, the savages fought bravely, and with terrific yells and screams threw themselves against the fiery circle by which they were surrounded. At one point the militia momentarily gave way to the impetuosity of their charge. Being quickly rallied, however, the whole line rushed in upon the savages. The fight now became general. Flying, at length, the Red Sticks were hotly pursued through the forests, and many shot down as they fled. Their total destruction seemed inevitable. But taking advantage of an unavoidable break in the line the main body, the survivors effected their escape to the mountains, leaving more than three hun- dred of their number dead.
By this victory, in which the Tennesseeans lost but fifteen killed and eighty-five wounded, one hundred and sixty friendly Creek warriors, with their wives and children, were saved from the slaughter that would have otherwise over- taken them.
Having buried his dead, Jackson, whose pro- visions threatened to fail him, hastened back to
231
INDIAN DEFEATS.
1813.]
Fort Strother. Here he was presently joined by Cocke, who, having formed a junction with White, had penetrated the Creek country, de- stroying three villages, killing sixty warriors, and taking two hundred and fifty prisoners, without the loss of a man.
In the mean time two other columns of troops, one of the Georgia militia and friendly Creeks, the other of Mississippi volunteers, regulars, and Choctaws, had advanced from different points against the hostile district. Both gained important victories ; the Georgians, at Autosee, on the Tallapoosa; and the Mississippians at Holy Ground, above the mouth of the Catawba.
These successes against the Creeks, and the recapture of Detroit, formed almost the only encouraging events in the second year of the war.
232
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. - [1814.
CHAPTER XX.
Jackson's difficulties at Fort Strother-Arrival of fresh troops -Jackson marches toward the centre of the Creek coun- try -.- Battle of Emuckfau -- Repulse of the Red Sticks-Re- turn of the army toward Fort Strother-Battle of Enita- chopeo-Gallant conduct of Constantine Perkins and Cra- ven Jackson-Defeat of the Indians-Volunteers discharged -Jackson marches from Fort Strother with a new army- Battle of Cholocco Litahixee-Terrible slaughter of the Red Skins-Anecdote of Jackson-Submission of the Indians- Weatherford surrenders to Jackson-His speech-West Ten- nessee volunteers ordered home.
SHORTLY after his return to Fort Strother Jackson became involved in difficulties of a most discouraging character. In consequence of the remissness of his contractors, his pro- visions, at no time plenty, now threatened to fail entirely. Already restive under short allow- ance, the troops soon found cause for open dis- satisfaction in a difference of opinion as to their
legal period of service. Repeated mutinies broke out, and at length the whole expedition seemed on the point of breaking up in an armed struggle between Jackson and a few faithful followers on the one hand, and the discontented militia and volunteers on the other. Entreat- ing, commanding, and threatening, by turns,
233
BATTLE OF EMUCKFAU.
1814.]
the general finally induced about a hundred men to adhere to him until the arrival of rein- forcements. The rest, claiming that the period of their service had expired, persisted in return- ing home.
At this critical juncture, on the 13th of Janu- ary, 1814, eight hundred and fifty fresh volun- teers, sent forward by Governor Blount, made their appearance at Fort Strother. Immedi- ately advancing toward the heart of the Creek country, Jackson at Talladega received a fur- ther addition to his force of two hundred friendly Indians.
In the afternoon of the 21st, the army fell in with numerous fresh trails. These indications of the proximity of a large body of the enemy being presently confirmed by the reports of his spies, Jackson, encamping on the high grounds of Emuckfau, made every preparation to meet a sudden attack. It was well he did so. The morning of the 22d was just beginning to dawn, when his left wing was startled by the furious assault of a swarm of savages. For half an hour the attack was maintained stubbornly, and as stubbornly resisted. Daylight at length dis- closing the position of their assailants, the Ten- nesseeans, charging in a body, drove them through the woods with great slaughter.
Though thus repulsed the Red Sticks were not discouraged. In the course of the morning 20x
234
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. [1814.
they boldly advanced a second time, and at- tacked the right of the encampment. Charged by Coffee's cavalry and a few friendly Creeks, they were at length forced from their position into a reedy swamp, where they lay concealed and unassailable.
While Coffee was thus engaged, the main body of the enemy had attacked Jackson's left, pouring from behind logs, trees, and shrubbery, an irregular but deadly fire. This the Tennes- seeans, though mostly raw troops, sustained with the greatest firmness, until Jackson, who commanded in person at this point, finally or- dered a charge. Led by the impetuous Colonel Carroll, the whole line now advanced, driving the enemy before them with the bayonet.
In the mean time the Red Sticks on the right, issuing from their swampy fastnesses, had turned on Coffee, who, though severely wounded, re- mained at the head of his troops, and kept the assailants at bay. Reinforced by Jackson, he ordered a charge. Once more the savages gave way, and the fight was ended.
Though repulsed, the Creeks had displayed a ferocious courage that commanded the serious consideration of Jackson, whose force was weaker than he desired. His provisions were scarce, his wounded numerous, and the enemy would doubtless soon be reinforced. He deter-
235
BATTLE OF ENITACHOPEO.
1814.]
mined, therefore, to return to Fort Strother with all possible despatch.
At ten o'clock the next day, the army began its retrograde march, the wounded being borne on litters made of the hides of the slain horses. Enitachopeo creek was reached that evening. Knowing that the Red Sticks had been hanging on his rear during the preceding day's march, Jackson, on the morning of the 24th, fearing an ambuscade at the usual crossing-place, deter- mined to pass the creek some six hundred yards lower down.
The wounded and the front guard had just crossed, and Jackson, upon the eastern bank, was superintending the operations of the army, when an alarm gun was heard, followed imme- diately by a fierce attack of the savages upon Captain Russell's company of spies, who gradu- ally retired, fighting gallantly, till they reached the rear-guard. Colonel Carroll, commanding the centre column, ordered his men to halt and form. Struck with sudden panic, the right and left columns fled without firing a gun, with their officers foremost in the flight. Colonel Stump, who came plunging down the bank, near the ex- asperated commander-in-chief, narrowly escaped being cut down by his sword. Sharing the panic of the two others, the centre column also plunged into the creek, leaving Carroll, sup- ported by Captain Quarle's company, Russell's
236
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. [1814.
spies, and the artillery under Lieutenant Arm- strong-in all scarcely a hundred men-to check the enemy's advance.
While the infantry and a portion of the artil- lery, mounting to the top of the bank, there held the Indians at bay, Armstrong, with a few assistants, succeeded in dragging his solitary six-pounder from the bed of the creek to an eminence that commanded the approach to the ford. In the hurry of unlimbering the gun, the rammer and picker had been left on the car- riage. With wonderful presence of mind, and while Indian bullets rattled like hail around them, Constantine Perkins and Craven Jackson, two of the gunners, supplied the deficiency ; Perkins, by removing his bayonet, and ramming the charges home with his musket, and Jackson by using his ramrod as a pricker, and priming with a' musket cartridge. Thus loading their piece, this gallant little band, pouring grape among the savages, kept them in check until Jackson and his staff were enabled, by great exertions, to rally the flying troops, and recross the creek. At the same time Gordon's spies, in front when the alarm was given, having made a circuit through the forest, fell upon the left flank of the Indians ; who, finding that the whole army was now moving against them, threw away their packs, blankets, and whatever
237
1814] MOVEMENTS AGAINST THE INDIANS.
seemed likely to retard their flight, and fled precipitately from the field.
The loss of the Tennesseeans in the battles of Emuckfau and Enitachopeo, was seventy killed and seventy wounded. Of Indians, one hundred and eighty-nine dead bodies were counted on the two fields. How many of those who escaped were wounded there is no means of knowing.
Continuing their march without further in- terruption to Fort Strother, Jackson's volun- teers became entitled to their discharge, and were sent home.
New calls for militia had meanwhile been made. They came in slowly ; but, through the exertion of Governor Blount, Jackson was ena- bled to leave Fort Strother, on the 15th of March, at the head of thirty-five hundred men, including, besides Tennesseeans, a regiment of regulars and many friendly Indians. Pushing with this force fifty miles down the Coosa, he built and garrisoned Fort Williams, on that river. He then again directed his march through the mountain wilderness for the great bend of the Tallapoosa, some seventy miles above the present town of Dadeville, in Ala- bama.
At this point-Cholocco Litahixee, or the Great Horse-shoe Bend-the main body of the Red Sticks, some twelve hundred strong, had
238
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE. [1814.
assembled to make a desperate stand. Sur- rounded almost entirely by the river, whose windings here assume the figure of an immense horse-shoe, enclosing a peninsula of about a hun- dred acres, the position of the Indians was ac- cessible only by a narrow neck of land, across which they had thrown up a strong breastwork of huge logs, so arranged as to expose assailants to a cross fire. The houses of the village stood upon some low grounds at the extremity of the peninsula, where hundreds of canoes were tied to the river bank.
Determined to carry the breastwork, Jack- son, early in the morning of the 27th of March, despatched General Coffee with the mounted men and friendly Indians to ford the river some two miles below, and line the opposite bank of the bend, so as to prevent the enemy from escaping in their canoes. Signalized by Coffee that he had taken his position, Jackson marched the remainder of his force toward the breast- work, planted his cannon on an eminence about eighty yards from its nearest face, and at ten o'clock opened a brisk but ineffectual fire.
Meanwhile some of Coffee's Cherokees, swim- ming the river, took possession of the canoes, upon which the Red Sticks had relied for escape, in the event of their being defeated. Employ- ing the means thus offered, Coffee immediately sent a considerable force across the river.
239
BATTLE OF CHOLOCCO LITAHIXEE.
1814.]
Headed by Colonel Morgan and Captain Rus- sell, this adventurous detachment, not without loss, reached the Indian village, and in a few moments wrapped it in flames.
This new and unexpected attack, throwing the Red Sticks into partial confusion, afforded Jack-, son an opportunity of which he was not slow to take advantage. He immediately gave the or- der, impatiently waited for, to storm the breast- work. Rushing forward with loud shouts, the men fought their way through a deadly fire to the ramparts. Here an obstinate and sangui- nary conflict ensued. At length Major Mont- gomery, of the regulars, mounting the logs, called upon his men to follow; but he had scarcely spoken when a rifle ball pierced his brain, and he fell lifeless. Undaunted by the fall of their leader, the troops, imitating his ex- ample, scaled the breastwork and, after a des- perate hand to hand struggle, finally forced their way within the enemy's line.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.