The Gulf 

 Theater 1813-1815

The U.S. Army Campaigns

of the War of 1812
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CMH Pub 74–7

A detail view of the Battle of New Orleans, by Jean Hyacinthe de 

Laclotte (Library of Congress)
•••

The Gulf Theater 

1813–1815

by

Joseph F. Stoltz III

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Center of Military History

United States Army 

Washington, D.C., 2014

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•••

Introduction

The War of 1812 is perhaps the United States’ least known 

conflict. Other than Andrew Jackson’s 1815 victory at New Orleans 

and Francis Scott Key’s poem “The Star-Spangled Banner” written 

in 1814 during the British attack on Baltimore, most Americans 

know little about the country’s second major war. Its causes are 

still debated by historians today. Great Britain’s impressment of 

American sailors, its seizure of American ships on the high seas, 

and suspected British encouragement of Indian opposition to further American settlement on the western frontier all contributed to 

America’s decision to declare war against Great Britain in June 1812.

None of these factors, however, adequately explain why President James Madison called for a war the country was ill-prepared 

to wage. Moreover, the war was quite unpopular from the start. 

Many Federalists—chiefly in the New England states—opposed 

an armed conflict with Great Britain, continued to trade with the 

British, and even met in convention to propose secession from the 

Union. Some members of the president’s own Republican Party 

objected to the war’s inevitable costs and questionable objectives, 

such as the conquest of Canada.

To declare war was one thing, but to prosecute it successfully was 

a different matter. Much of the story of the War of 1812 is about 

the unpreparedness of America’s Army and Navy at the conflict’s 

outset, and the enormous difficulties the new nation faced in raising 

troops, finding competent officers, and supplying its forces. Most of 

America’s military leaders were inexperienced and performed poorly, 

particularly in the first two years of war. Only gradually did better 

leaders rise to the top to command the more disciplined and welltrained units that America eventually fielded. But despite costly initial 

setbacks, by the time the fighting stopped American arms had won 

key victories at Chippewa, Lundy’s Lane, and New Orleans under 

excellent officers such as Winfield Scott, Jacob Brown, and Andrew 

Jackson. Although the United States achieved few of its political 

objectives in the War of 1812, its Regular Army emerged more 

professional, better led, and fit to take its place as the foundation of 

America’s national defenses.
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I encourage all Army leaders and soldiers to read this pamphlet 

and the others in our series of campaign pamphlets in commemoration of the bicentennial of the War of 1812. We can all profit from 

greater knowledge about the beginnings of our Army: an Army forged 

in victory and defeat during what has often been called the second 

war of American independence.

RICHARD W. STEWART

Chief Historian
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•••

The Gulf Theater

1813–1815

Most of the fighting between the United States and Great Britain 

occurred along the Canadian border during the War of 1812, but 

the Gulf of Mexico eventually became another important theater 

of conflict. To understand the nature of this struggle, one must first 

understand the importance of the Mississippi River to the United 

States and the multicultural city of New Orleans. 

Strategic Setting

Stretching for over 2,300 miles, the Mississippi River is the fourth 

longest river in the world. At a time when most of North America was 

a trackless wilderness, the Mississippi and its many tributaries served 

as the primary means of transportation and communications into the 

central and western reaches of the continent. Whoever controlled the 

Mississippi would dominate the continent. Although Canadian and 

American settlers could access the Mississippi watershed from the 

north and east, respectively, the most economical way to export the 

vast region’s rich bounty was to the south, where the river emptied 

into the Gulf of Mexico. At this critical juncture lay the city of New 

Orleans. Founded by the French in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, whoever owned New Orleans could either promote 

or strangle the economic development of the trans-Appalachian west.

In 1763, New Orleans passed to Spain as a consequence of 

France’s defeat in the Seven Years’ War (or, as the conflict’s North 

American component was known, the French and Indian War). 

After the United States won its independence from Britain in 1783, the 

number of Americans moving west of the Appalachian Mountains 

increased, making access to the river, and particularly the port of New 

Orleans, of growing interest to the new republic. The Treaty of San 

Lorenzo, or Pinckney’s Treaty, between the United States and Spain 

in 1795 seemingly guaranteed American navigation on the Mississippi 

and access to the Gulf of Mexico. Spain’s agreement to transfer New 
•••• 8 ••••

Orleans and much of the territory west of the Mississippi River to 

France, however, introduced an element of uncertainty in 1800. Even 

though France was a more powerful and active state than Spain at 

this time, the terms of the Franco-Spanish treaty specifically stated 

that France could not under any condition transfer its newly acquired 

lands to an English-speaking country. President Thomas Jefferson 

nevertheless sent a delegation to Paris to inquire if French leader 

Napoleon Bonaparte might be willing to sell New Orleans. Fortuitously for the American diplomats, a slave uprising in the Caribbean 

island colony of Saint-Domingue had drained French resources and 

diverted Napoleon from building a colonial empire in North America. 

Moreover, Napoleon needed money to finance an imminent war with 

Great Britain, a nation whose mighty navy would likely capture New 

Orleans in any case should war occur. Consequently, in November 

1803, Napoleon ignored Spanish protests and sold New Orleans and 

its associated territories to the United States in what became known 

as the Louisiana Purchase. Twenty days later, detachments of the U.S. 

Army and Mississippi territorial militia lowered the French tricolor 

and raised the Stars and Stripes over New Orleans.

The sale caused relations between Spain and the United States 

to become difficult. The Spanish considered the sale to be illegal 

on the grounds that France had promised not to sell the land to an 

English-speaking country. Moreover, Spain feared further American 

encroachment into its remaining colonies adjacent to the United 

States—East and West Florida and Texas. In 1806, disputes along 

the Sabine River, the border between Spanish Texas and Louisiana, 

nearly propelled the two nations into war. Napoleon’s 1808 invasion 

of Spain further weakened the Spanish empire, and the next year, 

tensions flared again between the United States and Spain in a dispute 

over the ill-defined boundary of West Florida. American and British 

settlers living in Spanish territory along the Gulf Coast between the 

Mississippi and Perdido Rivers rebelled and declared the formation 

of an independent Republic of West Florida. More trouble followed 

when the governor of Louisiana Territory, William C. C. Claiborne, 

denied Spanish access to the Gulf of Mexico through New Orleans 

and Lake Pontchartrain. Spanish authorities countered by hindering traffic on the Mobile River and by denying Americans the use 

of the river’s port city of Mobile, both important for the economic 

livelihood of Americans living in what would become the state of 

Alabama. In response, Claiborne personally led a flotilla of a dozen 

gunboats to Mobile Bay and threatened to capture the town if the 

Spanish officials did not relent. The Spanish backed down, but tension 
•••• 9 ••••

remained between a resentful but 

weak Spain and an American 

nation that increasingly regarded 

the acquisition of all of North 

America as its natural destiny.

By 1812, the United States 

seemed poised to gain all of 

Spain’s land along the Gulf 

Coast with minimal effort. The 

acquisition of this land would 

allow the United States to consolidate the gains made over the 

past decade, hinder the ability 

of foreign powers to encourage 

disaffection among the Indian 

nations in the southeast, and 

secure opportunities for further 

western expansion. The outbreak 

of war between the United States 

and Great Britain in June of that 

year dramatically changed the 

situation, particularly because by 

this point Spain had become Britain’s ally in the war against Napoleonic France. Britain, like Spain, feared losing its North American 

territories to American expansionism while it was heavily tied down 

in Europe fighting Napoleon. Unlike Spain, however, Britain had 

sufficient sea power to threaten the United States.

Although the defense of Canada was uppermost in their minds, 

British leaders recognized that they might accrue some advantages 

by spreading the conflict to America’s Gulf Coast. Harassing actions 

in the south might divert U.S. troops away from the U.S.-Canadian 

border. A more substantial offensive to capture New Orleans would 

require more resources, but would hurt the United States economically and provide Britain with a bargaining chip that it could use 

during peace negotiations. It would also give Britain the option to 

curb the further westward expansion of the United States, either by 

keeping the Louisiana Territory for itself or by returning the land to 

Spain. Britain was also interested in fostering an independent Native American entity that could block further American expansion. 

Toward that end, the British had been assisting the Shawnee leader 

Tecumseh’s bid to create a pan-Indian confederacy that would stretch 

from the Great Lakes to the Gulf Coast. Canada provided the means 

William C. C. Claiborne

•••••••••••••••
•••• 10 ••••

for supporting Tecumseh’s activities in the north; but to assist Tecumseh’s followers in the south—most notably those among the Creek 

Indians who lived in the area of modern-day Georgia, Alabama, and 

Mississippi—Britain would need a presence on the Gulf Coast, thus 

offering another incentive for activity in the region. Conversely, all 

of these reasons made it important for the United States to thwart 

any British designs on the Gulf Coast. 

Operations

Securing the Gulf Coast

The Americans were the first to militarize the situation in the 

Gulf. Three months before the United States declared war against 

Great Britain, elements of the Georgia militia, aided by members 

of the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy, invaded Spanish East Florida in 

an attempt to capture St. Augustine. The invasion was motivated 

by desires for enhanced local security and territorial aggrandizement. President James Madison disavowed any involvement and 

condemned the action, leading the invaders to withdraw. Congress, 

however, used the apparent weakness of the Spanish government to 

press the claim that West Florida should have been included in the 

Louisiana Purchase of 1803. Accordingly, on 14 April 1812, Congress 

ordered the governor of the Mississippi Territory to administer all 

the lands west of the Perdido River. Spain objected, but it could do 

little to oppose the action. Spanish troops continued to garrison Fort 

Charlotte in Mobile, but Spain exercised no actual authority in the 

territory beyond. 

Toward the end of the year, the U.S. government authorized 

Maj. Gen. Andrew Jackson to lead about two thousand Tennessee 

militia to New Orleans to help secure that city against possible attack. The 46-year-old Jackson harbored an intense hatred for the 

British that originated from his service in the Revolutionary War. 

After joining a militia unit at age thirteen to serve as a courier, he 

was captured and treated cruelly. He still bore the scars on his left 

hand and head where a British officer had slashed him with a sword 

for refusing to clean his boots. While in captivity, Jackson nearly 

starved and contracted smallpox before being released. After the 

war, he became a successful lawyer, planter, and land speculator. 

He served as a delegate to Tennessee’s Constitutional Convention 

in 1796. After Tennessee achieved statehood that same year, voters 

elected him first to the U.S. House of Representatives and later to 
•••• 11 ••••

the Senate. After resigning his 

seat, he received an appointment 

as a justice on the Tennessee 

Supreme Court. Remaining active in the militia, he rose to the 

position of commanding officer 

with the rank of major general. 

Jackson and his militia 

army departed Tennessee for the 

Gulf Coast in January 1813. An 

unabashed expansionist, Jackson hoped to exploit the opportunity and to invade Spanish 

Florida. It was not to be. Adverse weather and inadequate 

supplies hampered his progress, 

as did confusion and tensions 

in the U.S. military command, 

which in February instructed 

him to halt near the Mississippi 

port town of Natchez, 176 miles 

northwest of New Orleans. 

There, his army endured harsh 

weather with inadequate food 

and shelter until March, when 

the War Department ordered Jackson to disband his army and 

return to Tennessee. The mood in Congress had shifted. A series 

of military disasters along the Canadian frontier had dampened 

enthusiasm for offensive operations, and voices arose against 

doing anything that might drive Spain into a closer alliance with 

Great Britain. Jackson tramped back to Tennessee in a cold fury.

No sooner had Jackson returned to Tennessee than officials in 

Washington changed their minds once again. In April, the secretary 

of war ordered the commander in New Orleans, Brig. Gen. James 

Wilkinson, to expel the Spanish from Mobile. The presence of British 

traders in Mobile who sold arms and supplies to the Indians, and the 

nagging fear that Spain would cooperate with any possible British 

military operation in the Gulf region, justified the move.

Wilkinson promptly led eight hundred men and five gunboats into 

position at the mouth of Mobile Bay to block Spanish reinforcements 

coming by sea, while four hundred soldiers moved east from Fort 

Stoddert to block reinforcements coming from Pensacola by land. 

Andrew Jackson,

by Thomas Sully

(Philadelphia History Museum)

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•••• 12 ••••

After effectively isolating Fort Charlotte, Wilkinson demanded its 

surrender. Fortunately for everyone involved, the Spanish commander, 

Capt. Cayetano Pérez, recognized the hopelessness of his situation and 

capitulated. Wilkinson allowed the Spanish soldiers to leave the fort 

with their personal weapons and equipment, but the United States 

took possession of the fort as well as its artillery and military stores.

The Spanish minister to Washington, Luis de Onís, lodged a cautious protest. He believed that diplomacy was the best way to handle 

the United States. As long as Spain was fighting for survival in Europe, 

it could send little support to its colonies. Indeed, threatening military 

action might provoke the United States into seizing even more territory. Although Onís’ cautious policy dampened tensions with the 

United States, it did not sit well with other Spanish officials in the New 

World. Juan Ruiz Apodaca, the captain-general of Cuba, wanted to 

use the threat of force to deter the United States from invading any 

more Spanish land. He dispatched a militia regiment from Cuba to 

reinforce the garrison at Pensacola, but could do little else. To compound the problem, the soldiers already in Pensacola suffered from 

low morale and had not received pay in fifty-six months. Apodaca 

realized that if the Americans made a serious attempt on the colonies 

under his care, he might be forced to call on Spain’s ally Great Britain for assistance. That act would be personally embarrassing to the 

Spanish commander and possibly encourage a British takeover of the 

threatened colonies. Caught between several unpalatable outcomes, 

the captain-general came round to Onís’ point of view that inaction 

was perhaps the wisest course.

A New Threat

Although America enjoyed some success in bullying Spain in 

1813, the situation in the southern United States remained perilous. 

With British encouragement, elements of the Creek Nation allied 

with Tecumseh launched a war against the United States in midyear, 

and subduing the “Red Sticks,” as the hostile warriors were called, 

was proving difficult. Moreover, during 1813 Britain and its allies 

made significant progress in their war with France in Europe, allowing officials in London to contemplate sending more forces to 

North America.

British officials began planning operations in the Gulf of Mexico 

in mid-1813. Charles Cameron, the Royal Governor of the Bahamas 

at Nassau, provided his superiors with detailed information about 

the region culled from his connections with area traders visiting the 

Bahamas and their friendly Indian contacts. Cameron’s intelligence 
•••• 13 ••••

presented the Gulf Coast as an easy target. According to his sources, 

scores of Indians, as well as French and Spanish whites and both free 

and slave Africans, would leap at the opportunity to fight against the 

United States. Cameron proposed sending British military personnel 

into the region to help organize and train the local allies.

Spanish West Florida became the focal point of British machinations. Despite America’s seizure of Mobile, Spain still maintained 

neutrality in the Anglo-American conflict. Not wanting to provoke 

the United States into annexing more of its land, Spain hesitated to 

openly assist in Cameron’s scheme. The British suggested that the 

Spanish quietly abandon their fort on the Apalachicola River, in a 

sparsely traveled area east of Pensacola, to give the Americans little 

reason to encroach into the area. The British would then quietly 

move in, and if the United States discovered their presence, Spain 

could disavow knowledge and feign outrage at the British intrusion.

In April 1814, as Emperor Napoleon abdicated his throne in 

defeat, Capt. Hugh Pigot of the Royal Marines sailed for the Apalachicola to make contact with Indians hostile to the United States. 

Ten prominent Creek and Seminole chiefs heartily greeted the officer, 

but also brought the news of a major defeat in which Jackson’s forces 

had killed almost one thousand Red Stick warriors at the Battle of 

Horseshoe Bend. The Tennessee general had continued his advance 

deeper into Creek territory and had compelled the Creeks to surrender. The defeat of the main Red Stick forces, together with the 

defeat of Tecumseh at the Battle of the Thames River in Canada the 

previous October, dealt fatal blows to the dream of creating an Indian 

confederacy to contain American expansion and to raising significant 

numbers of Indian recruits to help the British attack the Gulf Coast. 

The setback notwithstanding, Pigot proceeded to assemble supplies and to gather as many native allies as he could. Scarce provisions 

plagued his efforts and limited his ability to train the disparate group 

as a cohesive force, but early results were promising. The marine officer reported that the warriors showed great enthusiasm and might 

even prove effective light cavalrymen if properly equipped. He also 

argued that boys as young as ten years of age were willing to fight 

but that the muskets Britain had supplied were too long. In response, 

British officials sent Pigot both saddles and short-barreled carbines.

By August 1814, Maj. Edward Nicholls of the 3d Battalion of 

Royal Marines had arrived on scene to assume command of the operation. Before continuing to his destination, Governor Cameron briefed 

Nicholls about conditions on the Gulf Coast. The Spanish still had 

reservations about giving direct aid to the British. Although the fort 
•••• 14 ••••

at Apalachicola provided the British with a useful base for recruiting 

native allies and runaway slaves, Britain required a deepwater port 

on the Gulf to harbor an invasion fleet. When the British asked for 

permission to use Pensacola, the captain-general of Cuba refused 

to allow such a flagrant violation of Spanish neutrality. Fortunately 

for Nicholls, the governor of Pensacola, González Manrique, had no 

such concerns. Fearful of an impending American attack, he asked 

Nicholls to bring his troops to the town.

Nicholls’ contingent of marines and native allies quickly took over 

Pensacola. Many Spaniards soon regretted their governor’s decision. 

The British imposed a strict passport system to control movement 

and began recruiting the slaves of Spanish owners into service. British rule was so oppressive that even British commercial agents began 

supplying the United States with intelligence. 

Satisfied with his new base of operations, Nicholls assembled 

more forces for his growing army. On Pigot’s advice, he sought to 

enlist the service of Jean Laffite, the leader of a band of smugglers 

operating as privateers with dubious letters of marque from various 

Latin American authorities in rebellion against Spain. Laffite’s base 

of operations lay south of New Orleans on islands in Barataria Bay, 

one of the swampy inlets along the Gulf of Mexico. The self-styled 

“Baratarians” knew intimately the myriad bayous and waterways that 

snaked across lower Louisiana. If Nicholls could secure the Baratarians’ assistance, the British could secretly move an attack force to the 

very gates of New Orleans.

Nicholls sent two trusted officers to bribe Laffite and his men for 

their help. The Crown offered Laffite a commission, title, $30,000 

prize money, and proportional gratuities for his subordinates. Laffite 

asked for time to consult his various ships’ captains and sent the British on their way, then forwarded the British documents to Governor 

Claiborne and warned him of the impending attack. Laffite and his 

men had often had legal troubles with the United States over smuggling, but they enjoyed significant popular support in New Orleans 

due to their ability to smuggle luxury goods past the British blockade. 

Additionally, the British alliance would have required Laffite and his 

men to refrain from attacking Spanish shipping, their most common 

and lucrative prey. An alliance with the British was simply not in 

Laffite’s best interest.

First Battle of Fort Bowyer, 15 September 1814

Fort Bowyer, located at the end of the Mobile Point peninsula, 

commanded the narrow entrance to Mobile Bay. In August 1814, 
•••• 15 ••••

General Jackson, having replaced Wilkinson as commander of the U.S. 

7th Military District, learned that British forces at Pensacola intended 

to attack and capture Mobile before moving by land against New 

Orleans. He also knew that Britain’s Spanish allies, who had abandoned 

the area in 1813, were eager to regain possession. After posting some 

regulars near the town and calling for militia reinforcements, Jackson 

sent Maj. William Lawrence with one hundred thirty men from the 

Corps of Artillery and 2d U.S. Infantry to man and strengthen Fort 

Bowyer. Construction of the post had been begun shortly after the 

Spanish evacuation but had since been abandoned. Lawrence improved 

the sand-walled redoubt, erected battery positions, and increased the 

armament from nine to twenty guns (see Map 1). 

V. Adm. Alexander Cochrane, commander of the Royal Navy’s 

North American Station, ordered Capt. Henry Percy, who held the 

local rank of commodore, to reduce harbor defenses. Percy’s command included a flotilla of four warships, several tenders, and a 

mixed landing force of British marines and trained Seminoles and 

Red Stick Creeks under now Lt. Col. Edward Nicholls. With more 

than thirteen hundred men and ninety cannon, Percy was confident 

that he could easily capture Fort Bowyer. 

The British ships appeared off the peninsula on 12 September and 

anchored about six miles to the east of the fort. Shortly after Nicholls 

led the landing force ashore, he took ill and returned to the flagship. 

Capt. George Woodbine assumed command of the shore party and 

advanced to within eight hundred yards of Fort Bowyer, where Royal 

Marine artillerymen established a firing position for their 51⁄2-inch 

howitzer. They would create a diversion on the landward side, while 

Percy’s ships pounded the fort into submission. For the next two 

days, the British sent sailors in launches to take soundings offshore 

and reconnaissance parties to scout the land approaches through the 

dunes to the defensive works. Whenever they drew uncomfortably 

close, U.S. artillery fire drove them back. 

At 1200 on 15 September, the four warships weighed anchor and 

stood out to sea, struggling against contrary winds. Two hours later, 

they changed tack and bore down on the fort until they were close 

enough for the U.S. gunners to engage. The batteries commenced firing, and the Royal Navy answered with all the shipboard guns aboard 

HMS Hermes, followed shortly with those of HMS Sophie, but the 

rest could not get close enough to bear. By 1600, Percy’s flagship, HMS 

Hermes, anchored within musket range, and the other vessels took station forming line of battle astern. When the firing become general, the 

marines’ artillery piece joined the attack, only to be silenced in short 
LAKE BORGNE 14 Dec 1814

FORT ST. PHILIP 9–18 Jan 1815

VILLERÉ PLANTATION 23 Dec 1814

GRAND RECONNAISSANCE 28 Dec 1814

NEW ORLEANS 8 Jan 1815

ARTILLERY DUEL 1 Jan 1815

Pine Island

English Turn

Mississi p p i R

Pearl R

Lake

Pontchartrain

Lake Borgne

Lake Barataria

G U L

F

O

F

M

Fort St. Leon

Fort St. John

NEW ORLEANS

L O UISIANA

N

Map 1
FORT BOWYER 15 Sep 1814

9–12 Feb 1815

PENSACOLA 7 Nov 1814

Dauphin Island

Pas cagoula R

Mobile R

Pe rdido R

Mobile Bay

Pensacola

Bay

M

E

X

I

C

O

Fort Montgomery

Fort Charlotte

Fort Stoddert

Fort San Carlos de Barrancas

Fort Santa Rosa

Mobile

S P ANISH

WEST

F L ORID A

MISSISSIPP I

TERRIT O R Y

General Jackson’s Advance

Battle

1814–1815

GULF THEATER

0 30

Miles
•••• 18 ••••

order by U.S. counterbattery fire. The British shore party advanced 

with sixty Creek and Seminole warriors in the center and an equal 

number of marines on the flanks. When the group got within range of 

the fort, grapeshot from the U.S. artillery pinned them down, compelling Woodbine to break off the engagement and retire. 

Meanwhile, a projectile had cut Hermes’ anchor cable, and the 

ship drifted to shore and ran aground. Captain Percy ordered the 

crew to abandon the helpless ship and to set it on fire to prevent its 

capture. Intense gunfire from the fort drove off the remaining warships, damaging two and inflicting numerous casualties in the process. The fort’s gunners then directed their attention on the stricken 

flagship until the flames ignited its powder magazine. At about 2300, 

Hermes blew up in a tremendous explosion. After exchanging signals 

with Percy, Woodbine and his force retreated back to the beach and 

re-embarked. Percy sailed the remnants of his battered flotilla back 

to Pensacola. The British had suffered thirty-two dead and forty 

wounded both ashore and afloat, including Colonel Nicholls. The 

Americans sustained four dead and five wounded.

The Capture of Pensacola, 7 November 1814

General Jackson responded to the attack on Fort Bowyer by 

calling the Mississippi Territory militia into active service. He correctly deduced that the British intended to use Mobile or Pensacola 

as a base for future operations. He sent reinforcements to Mobile 

and strengthened Fort Bowyer. He then planned an attack to drive 

the British out of Pensacola. As a pretext to crossing the international border of a neutral nation, Jackson contended that Spain’s 

inability—or unwillingness—to secure its own territory from British 

invasion had violated its neutrality. Within a few weeks, Jackson had 

about four thousand troops assembled at Fort Montgomery on the 

Alabama River poised to advance into West Florida. He informed 

the Spanish governor that he must evict the British from Pensacola 

and allow the United States to occupy the forts guarding Pensacola 

harbor. Should the governor refuse, Jackson threatened to take matters into his own hands.

The governor rejected Jackson’s demand but could do little to 

resist his army. By all accounts, the 500-man Pensacola garrison 

lacked motivation and coordination and had few supplies. The garrison’s poor condition had been the reason the Spanish had allowed 

the British to land in the first place. Just as the Spanish could not 

prevent the British takeover, they could do little to halt the Americans 

without British assistance. 
•••• 19 ••••

On 7 November, Jackson began his assault. Knowing the U.S. 

camp lay to the west of the town, the Spanish positioned the bulk 

of their forces to meet an attack from that quarter. The British ships 

in the harbor likewise trained their guns in that direction. Jackson 

deceived both by leaving a force of five hundred men in camp to hold 

their attention. Then, in the predawn darkness, he marched most of 

his forces around to the east side of the town. At dawn, with the sun 

at their backs, the Americans attacked.

Jackson’s army advanced in four columns: three of white troops 

and one of allied Choctaw warriors. Each of the columns that would 

penetrate the main enemy defenses included a company of regulars 

in the van with orders to conduct immediate bayonet assaults on any 

enemy encountered. The British warships in the harbor attempted to 

repel the Americans with gunfire, but Jackson’s soldiers advanced into 

the town so quickly that the Royal Navy could not fire without risking 

setting Pensacola afire. Hardened after over a year of campaigning in 

Creek country, the American forces carried the town within minutes 

of initiating the attack.

With the town securely under his control, Jackson planned to 

capture the outlying forts guarding the harbor the following day. His 

delay gave the enemy time to detonate the powder in the magazines at 

Forts San Carlos de Barrancas and Santa Rosa before he evacuated 

them, thereby destroying the defenses. The Americans had captured 

the town, but they could not hold it against a determined naval attack without those forts. Nevertheless, Jackson had dealt a serious 

blow to British plans.

The Battle of Lake Borgne, 14 December 1814

While in Pensacola, Jackson received reports that the British had 

assembled a major invasion force at Jamaica with intentions to attack 

New Orleans. He immediately ordered his troops back to Mobile 

before traveling to New Orleans to supervise preparations for its 

defense. He arrived in New Orleans on 1 December and immediately 

went to work. His first objective was to prevent any British attempt to 

advance directly up the Mississippi River. He ordered Fort St. Philip 

at Plaquemines Bend, about sixty-five miles downriver from the city 

and thirty miles from the river’s mouth, reinforced with additional 

artillery. He also ordered the strengthening of the entrenchments and 

artillery redoubts at Fort St. Leon. Located closer to the city, its guns 

commanded an S-shaped bend in the Mississippi called the English 

Turn, where sailing vessels would be exposed to withering fire as they 

waited for the wind to change direction before proceeding.
•••• 20 ••••

New Orleans rested on relatively high ground along the east bank 

of the Mississippi River. A myriad of waterways and bayous crisscrossed the surrounding landscape. An invading army would require 

reliable guides to traverse them. The city’s multilingual population 

of about twenty-five thousand, of whom a fraction were American, 

teemed with ethnic, racial, and social tension, which made it difficult 

to know who would be loyal to the United States when the British 

arrived. Jackson had to assume that some residents might assist the 

invaders and guide them through the swamps. Therefore, he imposed 

martial law on 15 December and posted the most reliable local militia 

units to guard the approaches. He kept the more experienced troops 

he had brought with him near the city proper. From that location, he 

could quickly move to block an attempted British landing as soon as 

it was discovered. Meanwhile, his ground forces prepared entrenchments to cover the most likely avenues of approach. To the east of 

the city, Jackson supplemented the defense with a naval force of seven 

vessels and 209 men commanded by Lt. Thomas ap Catesby Jones 

on Lake Borgne, a shallow body of water separated from the Gulf 

of Mexico by marshes. 

As it happened, the British chose to advance via Lake Borgne. 

Admiral Cochrane sent Capt. Nicholas Lockyer, of HMS Sophie, in 

command of a squadron of forty-five ship’s boats, each armed with a 

Battle of Lake Borgne, by Thomas Lyle Hornbrook

(U.S. Naval Academy Museum)

•••••••••••••••
•••• 21 ••••

bow-mounted cannon, and about twelve hundred sailors and marines 

to overcome the U.S. flotilla. After withdrawing up the lake, on 13 

December Jones positioned the one-gun tender Seahorse to protect 

his stores on the shore. Seahorse fought seven British launches for 

a half hour before its crew abandoned ship, setting fire to both the 

vessel and the stores to prevent their capture. 

The next day Jones moored his gunboats, most of which mounted 

five guns each, on line in shoals between two islands. The lighter British launches closed in on them and opened fire at about 1050. After 

quickly capturing the one-gun tender Alligator, the launch carrying 

Captain Lockyer assailed Jones’ gunboat. U.S. gunboats quickly sunk 

two enemy launches and repelled two attacks before British sailors 

boarded Jones’ gunboat and turned its guns on the other American 

craft. Having ruptured the U.S. line, the British boarded and captured the rest of the gunboats in quick succession. The battle ended 

by 1230. The loss of the barges allowed the British to land troops 

unimpeded. They could now strike overland toward New Orleans or, 

if they chose, Baton Rouge, where they could cut New Orleans off 

from communications and reinforcement coming down the Mississippi River from the north.

When the British questioned the captured Lieutenant Jones, 

he convinced them that five hundred Americans with forty guns 

guarded the Rigolets, the narrow waterway that linked Lake Borgne 

with Lake Pontchartrain, a large body of water immediately north 

of New Orleans. Cochrane took Jones’ word at face value and ruled 

out an attempt to advance by Lake Pontchartrain. Instead, Cochrane 

decided to have his sailors row their shallow-draft vessels to a site 

where the British land forces under the command of Maj. Gen. John 

Keane would face a difficult trek through bayous and swamps to get 

to New Orleans.

The Royal Navy disembarked British soldiers on a pile of sand 

generously called Pine Island at the north end of Lake Borgne. There, 

the soldiers regained their land legs as the sailors prepared to row 

the men across to the main landing site on Bayou Bienvenu. British 

light infantrymen surprised a militia picket near a small fishing camp 

inhabited by Spanish-speaking “Isleño” residents. British officers 

persuaded at least one Isleño to guide their convoy of troop-laden 

small craft through the swamps along Bayou Mazant. The bayou 

connected to a canal that ended where the soldiers could disembark 

on dry land at the plantation home of the adjutant general of the 

Louisiana militia, Jacques Villeré, which was located on the east bank 

of the Mississippi about eight miles below New Orleans. 
•••• 22 ••••

Keane divided his force into 

three brigades. On the morning 

of 22 December, he accompanied 

the sixteen hundred men of his 

1st, or Light Brigade, forward. 

Under the command of Col. 

William Thornton, it consisted 

of the 4th and 85th Regiments 

of Foot, and six companies from 

the 95th (Rifle Corps) Regiment. 

The 4th and 85th were specially 

trained as light infantry, while the 

95th, equipped with rifled muskets 

and green uniforms, was ideally 

suited for light infantry missions. 

All had seen considerable service 

in Europe against Napoleon, and 

both the 4th and 85th had fought 

at Bladensburg and Baltimore, 

Maryland.

After hours of moving from 

Lake Borgne through the swamps along Bayous Bienvenu and Mazant and the Villeré Canal, Thornton’s troops arrived at the Villeré 

Plantation. Riflemen from the 95th surprised and captured a small 

guard of about thirty militia commanded by the general’s son, Maj. 

Gabriel Villeré. 

By questioning the prisoners and Isleño fishermen, the British 

discovered that Jackson might have as few as two thousand men 

in New Orleans. Although he actually had twice that number, the 

general had spread them out across the region to cover several possible avenues of approach. Thornton urged Keane to bring the rest 

of the available troops forward so they could move quickly on the 

city before Jackson concentrated his forces. Keane, however, chose 

to wait for reinforcements led by Maj. Gen. Sir Edward Pakenham.

The Villeré Plantation Night Battle, 23 December 1814

At about noon on 23 December, after he had learned that the 

British had landed, Jackson ordered some of his most reliable troops 

to assemble from all around the city for an immediate attack. He 

pledged, “By the eternal they will not sleep on our soil tonight!” 

After ordering Maj. Gen. William Carroll’s division of Tennessee 

militia to remain in reserve at New Orleans, Jackson assembled a 

Edward M. Pakenham 

(National Park Service) •••••••••••••••
•••• 23 ••••

number of militia and regular 

units, including an artillery detachment with two 6-pounder 

field pieces. While Jackson’s 

dragoons reconnoitered the British positions, Maj. Jean Baptiste 

Plauché’s volunteer militia battalion answered Jackson’s call. 

Determined to get in the fight, 

the French-speaking men jogged 

from Fort St. John. Hearing the 

commotion when he saw Plauché’s men approaching, Jackson 

bellowed, “Ah, here come my 

brave Creoles!” At 1400, the general ordered his force of 2,131 

men to advance (see Map 2). 

Halting at the de la Ronde 

Plantation, five hundred yards 

from the British camp, Jackson 

organized his units into line of 

battle with two divisions and 

advanced at dusk. The Right 

Division, under his personal 

command, consisted of a brigade 

commanded by Col. George Ross, which included the regulars of 

the 7th and 44th U.S. Infantry regiments; Plauché’s battalion; Maj. 

Louis D’Aquin’s battalion of Saint-Domingue Free Men of Color; 

and a detachment of Choctaw Indians. This division would attack the 

British left flank, extending to the left from the levee road, while the 

two-gun artillery detachment went into a battery astride the road, and 

a company of marines supported them from the levee road right to 

the riverbank. The Left Division, under the command of Brig. Gen. 

John Coffee, consisted of a brigade of Tennessee volunteer mounted 

riflemen fighting on foot, Capt. Thomas Beale’s Orleans Rifle Company, and Col. Thomas Hind’s squadron of Mississippi dragoons. 

To protect his flanks from British advancing from the direction of 

Lake Borgne, Governor Claiborne commanded the 1st, 2d, and 4th 

Regiments of Louisiana militia, totaling around twenty-five hundred 

men to the northeast, while Brig. Gen. David Morgan commanded a 

force of three hundred fifty Louisiana militiamen posted downriver 

at English Turn.

Jean Baptiste Plauché,

by Jean Joseph Vaudechamp

(Louisiana State Museum)

•••••••••••••••
Free Men of Color and the Choctaw Indian Volunteers,

by H. Charles McBarron

(U.S. Army Art Collection)

•••••••••••••••
RIGHT DIVISION J AC K S O N

LEFT DIVISION O F F E E C

KEANE HQ

British coming on during the engagement

C Y P R E S S S W A M P

C arolina

Vi l l e ré C a n al

MISSISSIPPI RIVER

DE LA RONDE

L A C OST E

VILLERÉ

JUMONVILLE

BIENVENU

N

American Axis of AttackBritish RetreatBritish Counterattack

23 December 1814

VILLERÉ PLANTATION

NIGHT BAT TLE

0 1000 500

Yards

Map 2
•••• 26 ••••

In the twilight, British soldiers saw the masts of a ship on the 

Mississippi River adjacent to their position. Believing it to be a Royal 

Navy vessel, soldiers ran to the levee and began hailing the ship. They 

realized their mistake when the U.S. Navy’s twelve-gun schooner 

Carolina, commanded by Capt. John D. Henley, opened fire with a 

broadside of grapeshot. Meanwhile, advancing under cover of darkness and guided by the British campfires, the American divisions assaulted the camp on both flanks. The attacking Right Division drove 

the camp’s pickets before them. Fighting spread inland and Coffee’s 

Left Division pressed the British right in an attempt to encircle the 

defenders. The surprised redcoats initially retreated but soon rallied. 

They counterattacked along the road and nearly captured the two 

American cannon before U.S. infantry drove them back once more. 

The fighting became general, confused, and hand to hand in the darkness, with some U.S. units becoming separated or lost in the dark.

At about 0400, Col. Arthur Brooke’s 2d Brigade began arriving to 

support the British defenders. Jackson ordered his men to disengage 

and retire. The 7th and 44th U.S. Infantry, along with some attached 

militia, covered the retreat against a possible counterattack, but 

Keane’s army was in no condition to pursue. Perplexed over the rapid 

and undetected American advance, and their camp in shambles, Keane 

ordered his men to take defensive positions. U.S. casualties amounted 

Night Action of the Twenty-Third of December

(John Frost’s 1861 Pictorial Life of Andrew Jackson)

•••••••••••••••
•••• 27 ••••

to 24 killed, 115 wounded, and 74 

missing or captured. British losses 

included 46 killed, 166 wounded, 

and 64 missing. 

Although he considered the 

battle a victory, Jackson realized 

that the British outnumbered his 

force. After falling back in reasonably good order, Jackson’s troops 

re-formed along the Rodriguez 

Canal, the boundary between the 

Chalmette and Macarty Plantations, and started throwing 

up earthworks. Named “Line 

Jackson,” the newly established 

defenses ran along the canal from 

the east bank of the Mississippi 

River to a cypress swamp. No longer used for irrigation, the canal 

had a dry bottom and caved-in 

banks for much of its length when 

Jackson’s engineers started work. 

Soldiers cut the levee to flood the 

canal for much of its length—to 

a depth of five to six feet in some 

places. They raised a rampart on 

the canal bank by constructing two double walls of logs, filled the space 

in between with the excavated spoil, and added a parapet. 

General Pakenham arrived on Christmas Day and assumed 

command of the British land forces. The armies cautiously watched 

each other for the next few days. The new commander reorganized 

his men into three brigades as the Royal Navy ferried more troops 

and artillery ashore and evacuated the wounded. Pakenham realized 

that the U.S. Navy’s vessels on the Mississippi River could enfilade 

his left flank in any move toward New Orleans. Under the command 

of Master Commandant Daniel T. Patterson, who held the local 

rank of commodore, the Mississippi Flotilla consisted of Carolina, 

riding at anchor; the unfinished converted sixteen-gun sloop-of-war 

Louisiana, anchored about one mile farther upriver and being used 

as a floating battery under Lt. Charles Thompson’s command; and 

two gunboats. To deal with this threat, Pakenham ordered his chief 

of artillery, Lt. Col. Alexander Dickson, to sink Carolina and, if 

Daniel Todd Patterson, 

photograph of a painting

by John Wesley Jarvis

(U.S. Naval Historical Center)

•••••••••••••••
•••• 28 ••••

possible, Louisiana. After cutting embrasures in the levee during the 

night of 25 December, the British erected furnaces for heating “hot 

shot,” and waited for more ammunition. 

The British opened fire at dawn on 27 December. With guns firing 

round shot and howitzers firing shell, the artillerymen quickly found 

the range to Carolina. Both Louisiana and Carolina returned fire, but 

only the forward 12-pounder aboard the latter could reply effectively. 

Patterson ordered both ships and the gunboats to withdraw upstream. 

Shot and shell raked the deck as Carolina struggled against the current 

and northwest wind. A hot shot penetrated to the hold and started a 

fire. When he realized the flames were out of control, Captain Henley 

ordered the crew to abandon ship before the fire spread to the magazine 

and ignited the powder. The resulting explosion destroyed the ship at 

about 1020. Although at maximum range, British artillerymen now 

turned their attention on Louisiana, but the crew used their boats to 

tow the ship upstream to safety. The men of Carolina later salvaged 

some guns from the sunken hulk and served on shore.

The Grand Reconnaissance, 28 December 1814

With Carolina eliminated, and eager to determine what lay ahead 

of him, Pakenham directed a major probe of the U.S. defenses. By giving the appearance of a full-scale attack—without intending to bring 

on a general engagement—Pakenham hoped Jackson would commit 

his forces and reveal his dispositions and strength. His staff could use 

the intelligence to plan a deliberate attack once the rest of the British 

infantry and artillery arrived. Late on the afternoon of 27 December, 

Pakenham’s light infantry drove the American pickets back and occupied de la Ronde and Bienvenu Plantations. There, he discovered that 

U.S. artillery and retreating infantry had already destroyed many of 

the buildings to clear fields of fire in front of their main line. 

The demonstration began as soon as the early morning mist 

cleared. About three thousand British troops advanced across the 

cane-stubble fields in two columns with skirmishers from the light 

infantry and 95th Rifle Corps companies deployed in front of and 

between them. Maj. Gen. Samuel Gibbs led the 2d Brigade, or Right 

Column, which advanced along the edge of the cypress swamp with 

the 4th, 21st, and 44th Regiments of Foot and the 1st West India 

Regiment toward the American left. Keane led the 3d Brigade, or 

Left Column, as the 85th Foot, 93d Highland Regiment, and 5th West 

India Regiment advanced along the river and the levee road against 

Jackson’s right. With continual supporting cannon and rocket fire, the 

infantrymen drove the remaining pickets of Maj. Henry D. Peire’s 7th 
•••• 29 ••••

Infantry and Hind’s dragoons off the Chalmette Plantation and back 

to the main U.S. defenses. However, the green militia did not panic 

at the sight of tight, disciplined columns of bayonet-wielding troops. 

When Keane’s column drew within six hundred yards of the 

American right, four U.S. artillery batteries engaged it in front, while 

the guns of Louisiana fired into its flank, inflicting serious loss. After 

the British infantry took shelter in shallow ditches and hastily built 

earthworks, their own light artillery came forward and went into 

action to silence the U.S. batteries. The troops noted the water-filled 

ditch but could not determine if it was fordable. 

About one thousand yards from the river, where Louisiana’s 

guns could not engage them, the men of Gibbs’ brigade made good 

progress toward the American left. They saw that the ditch in front of 

General Carroll’s division of Tennessee militia was dry and that the 

breastworks were unfinished. Lt. Col. Robert Rennie’s light infantry, 

advancing through the swamp on Gibbs’ flank, succeeded in driving 

back the American outposts. Carroll sent Lt. Col. James Henderson 

with a battalion of Tennesseans in an attempt to encircle them, but 

the British drove them back with several wounded and a number 

of killed, including Henderson. Nevertheless, with Keane’s brigade 

pinned down and several of his artillery pieces destroyed or damaged 

by effective counterbattery fire, Pakenham halted the advance. Some 

of the more exposed forward British troops waited to retreat under 

cover of darkness. After falling back, the British began constructing 

new artillery positions and repairing their damaged pieces. The action had cost the British 152 killed, wounded, or captured, against 8 

dead and 8 wounded Americans. Based on the experience, the British 

commander decided to wait for the last of his infantry and artillery 

to arrive, and he requested that the Royal Navy provide him with 

more naval cannon. Pakenham wanted to ensure success by massing 

as much heavy ordnance as possible to overwhelm the U.S. batteries 

and to breach the earthworks. 

The Americans meanwhile strengthened Line Jackson. To give the 

east bank defenses more depth, Louisiana militiamen began working on Line Dupre, about one-half mile behind Line Jackson, and 

Line Montreuil, another one and one-quarter mile farther upriver. 

On the west bank, a brigade of Louisiana militiamen under General 

Morgan’s command established Line Boisgervais. In addition, Patterson’s sailors removed most of the naval guns from Louisiana and 

positioned them in a “marine battery” along the riverfront, where 

they could fire across the Mississippi and into the flanks of a British 

army advance (see Map 3). 
•••• 30 ••••

Artillery Duel and Battle, New Year’s Day 1815 

On the first of January 1815, British batteries totaling about 

thirty naval and field guns, howitzers, mortars, and Congreve rockets 

opened fire. One British battery concentrated its fire at the guns on 

the high road on the American right, while another fired from behind 

the Chalmette house at Louisiana. In conjunction with rockets, batteries of howitzers shelled the right and center of the U.S. line, and a 

grand battery of light field guns positioned astride the road provided 

support for the main infantry effort. 

The cannonade surprised the Americans. The Macarty house, 

where Jackson and his staff maintained their headquarters, sustained 

over one hundred hits, but most rounds overshot the U.S. positions 

and landed harmlessly in the fields beyond. Those rounds that struck 

the parapet tended to bounce harmlessly off the improved earthworks. 

After determining the range to the British positions, U.S. artillerists 

responded with effective counterbattery fire from Line Jackson, joined 

by Patterson’s naval batteries across the river. They inflicted great 

damage and destroyed and disabled many of the less-well-protected 

British pieces. While the artillery exchange continued, a British column advanced against the left of Line Jackson to exploit the weakness 

observed during the earlier reconnaissance, but Coffee’s Tennessee 

volunteers easily repulsed the probe. Off in the swamp, Colonel Rennie’s light infantry again advanced to within one hundred yards of 

the American left, where the men took cover and waited for a signal 

to attack. They received a recall order instead. 

After a three-and-one-half-hour cannonade with no significant 

effect, Pakenham ordered the artillery to cease fire. The British fell 

back to their positions near the de la Ronde house, leaving a quantity 

of ammunition and a number of guns on the battlefield—some to 

be captured by U.S. patrols. The action convinced British commanders that only a simultaneous attack on both sides of the Mississippi 

would break the defenses and clear the way to New Orleans. British 

losses for the day numbered thirty killed and forty wounded. The 

Americans suffered eleven killed and thirty-three wounded, with 

casualties disproportionally heavy among those in the rear bringing 

ammunition forward to the batteries.

The Battle of New Orleans, 8 January 1815 

As the Americans wielded picks and shovels to further improve 

their earthworks, Pakenham again reorganized his command and 

planned the next attack. He eventually developed a complex scheme 
R AGUET CANAL

LINE JACKSON

LINE DUPRE

LINE MONTREUIL

LINE BOISGERVAIS

LINE JOURDA N

Patterson’s Marine Battery

Redoubt

Redoubt

Battery

English Turn

M i s s i s s i p p i R

L a k e P ontchar t r a i n

L a k e Borgne

Bayou Bienvenu

Bayou Mazant

Villeré Canal

Bayou Jumonville

Fort St. Leon

Fort St. John

Coquille’s Fort

Fort Villeré

Fort St. Charles

British Batteries

British

Redoubt

Redoubt

NEW ORLEANS

Fisherman’s Camp

Woodsville

N

American Axis of AttackBritish RetreatBritish Counterattack

December 1814–January 1815

NEW ORLEANS AND VICINIT Y

0 5 10

Miles

Map 3
•••• 32 ••••

of maneuver involving a river crossing and three coordinated assaults. 

Getting Thornton’s Light Brigade across the Mississippi required moving boats through bayou and canal, over land, and then to the river 

by cutting an access through the levee. After landing on the opposite 

bank, his 700-man brigade—comprised of his 85th Regiment of Foot, 

a composite Royal Marine battalion, a detachment of Royal Navy seamen, and some supporting artillery—would attack the U.S. batteries 

along the river and Line Boisgervais. Thornton would then turn the 

captured guns to enfilade Line Jackson in support of the main assault.

Once again, the twenty-one hundred men of Gibbs’ 2d Brigade, or 

Right Column, would conduct the primary effort against the American left. The 4th, 21st, and 44th Regiments of Foot would advance in 

column, close to the edge of the swamp, where the irregular wood 

line would obscure the Americans’ view for much of the distance. 

Advancing under cover of darkness, it was imperative that the assaulting regiments reached the ditch at first light. Using bound bundles 

of sticks, called fascines, to bridge the ditch and ladders to scale the 

earthwork, the British would then assault the apparently weaker U.S. 

left flank. Keane’s 3d Brigade, or Left Column, twelve hundred men 

strong, would conduct a supporting attack against the right of Line 

Jackson. Colonel Rennie’s battalion, composed of the light infantry 

companies detached from the regiments in Brig. Gen. John Lambert’s 

brigade, would attack the redoubt that blocked the levee road at the 

extreme right of Line Jackson. The 93d Highland and 5th West India 

Regiments of Keane’s main column would either exploit a success by 

Rennie or support Gibbs by attacking the American center. General 

Lambert’s 1st Brigade with the 7th and 43d Foot—arguably the most 

reliable troops in the army—and the 1st West India Regiment, minus 

the light infantry companies detached to Rennie, would remain in reserve, ready to exploit a breach of the U.S. line. As Pakenham’s staff 

completed the plan, the last of his artillery and infantry arrived to 

bring his strength to more than nine thousand men. Meanwhile, British soldiers fashioned bundles of sticks into fascines for crossing the 

canal and ladders to scale the breastworks. Before the attack, soldiers 

would place the fascines and ladders in the battery positions that were 

abandoned after the 1 January artillery battle, and designated men of 

the 44th would carry them forward with the leading assault companies.

By 7 January, about five thousand men defended Line Jackson. 

The fortification bristled with eight batteries that mounted twelve 

artillery pieces of various calibers and stretched from the Mississippi 

River across the open fields for one thousand yards, then continued 

into the cypress swamp for another five hundred yards. Engineers had 
A 7th U.S. Infantry 

Sergeant, 1815, during the 

Battle of New Orleans,

 by Don Troiani

(Don Troiani Image Bank)

•••••••••••••••
•••• 34 ••••

constructed a redoubt, or “demi-bastion,” on the right and in front of 

the line at a point where the canal intersected the road along the river. 

Maj. Howell Tatum, the topographic engineer on Jackson’s staff, noted, 

“Two embrasures were constructed in its base to rake the Canal and 

plane in front of the line, and two others in its face for the purpose of 

raking the Levey & road. It was encircled by a [moat].” At designated 

Battery One, the Americans placed two brass 12-pounders and a 51⁄2-

inch howitzer—manned by regular artillerymen and supported by a 

company of the 7th U.S. Infantry—in the strongpoint. A bridge over 

the Rodriguez Canal connected the small outwork to the main line. 

Battery Two rested ninety feet from the redoubt on the main 

line. It consisted of a 24-pounder manned by U.S. sailors. Baratarian privateers served two 24-pounders at Battery Three, fifty yards 

down the line. Next, only twenty yards away, U.S. sailors manned 

a 32-pounder at Battery Four. Regular artillerymen manned two 

6-pounders at Battery Five. Over two hundred yards separated Batteries Four and Five, but the range of the naval ordnance on the right 

enabled them to engage troops assaulting on the left with enfilade 

fire. Just thirty-six yards from Battery Five, a 12-pounder, crewed by 

militiamen that counted a number of veterans of Napoleon’s army 

among its French immigrant members, constituted Battery Six. Just 

before Jackson’s line entered the cypress swamp, regular artillerists 

and Tennesseans manned Batteries Seven and Eight. Battery Seven 

consisted of an 18-pounder and a 6-pounder field gun, and Battery 

Eight had a small brass carronade loaded with grapeshot and canister 

(or case shot), which contained hundreds of small musket-ball-size 

projectiles. Thus, the British would face heavy cannon fire as they 

crossed the two thousand yards of open ground that lay before Jackson’s earthwork (Map 4).

The American infantry took position along the line between the 

batteries in several brigade-size units. The brigade of regulars and 

Louisiana volunteer militia deployed on the right and extended to 

the left as far as Battery Five. Commanded by Colonel Ross, the 

brigade included the 7th U.S. Infantry (minus those stationed at Fort 

St. Philip); Beale’s riflemen; Plauché’s battalion; Maj. Pierre Lacoste’s 

battalion of Orleans Free Men of Color; D’Aquin’s Saint-Domingue 

Free Men of Color; several companies of the 44th U.S. Infantry commanded by Capt. Isaac Baker; and a company of marines under the 

command of 1st Lt. Francis DeBellevue. General Carroll’s division 

of Tennessee militia manned the line from Battery Five to a point 

beyond Battery Eight, supported by two regiments of Brig. Gen. 

John Adair’s recently arrived brigade of Kentucky militia posted 
B B

B

3 4 5 6 7 8 2 1

93d

4th

21st

44th

95th

43d

West Indian

7th

West Indian

K E A NE

PAK E N H A M

L I N E J AC K S ON

R O S S C A R R O L L C O F F E E

R o d r i g u e z C a n al

M

I

S

S

I

S

I

S

P

P

R

I

V

I

E

R

CYPRESS SW AMP

DE LA RONDE

L A C OST E

VILLERÉ

BIENVENU

CHALMET T E

M A C A R T Y

LANGUILLE

N

8 January 1815

B AT TLE OF NEW ORLEANS

0 500

Yards

British Axis of AdvanceAmerican BatteryBritish Battery

X

B

Map 4
•••• 36 ••••

behind their center. From the left flank of Carroll’s division, Coffee’s 

brigade held the remainder of Line Jackson into the cypress swamp, 

including where it turned ninety degrees to the left to refuse the flank. 

American skirmishers and Choctaw Indians deployed into the swamp 

to harass any British movement in that area, while the 10th Regiment 

of Louisiana militia posted in reserve behind Coffee’s brigade. 

Morgan’s brigade, with the 1st and 2d Regiments of Louisiana 

militia, defended the west bank. Just before the battle, Jackson 

reinforced them with a battalion of Louisiana drafted militia and 

a regiment from Adair’s Kentucky brigade. After receiving these 

reinforcements, Morgan had nearly one thousand men. He began 

to construct a second line lower down the river along the Raguet 

Canal to better support Patterson’s marine battery on the Mississippi’s bank, and improved his main defense on Line Boisgervais, 

opposite Line Jackson. 

The British attack went awry almost from the start. Numerous 

problems hampered Thornton’s crossing and reduced the size of 

his assault force. When the British finally launched their boats, the 

Mississippi current carried them about one thousand yards below 

the intended landing site, causing further delay. Growing impatient, 

Pakenham signaled the main attack to commence at about 0500 

without waiting for the diversionary attack on the west bank. 

Rocket and artillery batteries fired as skirmishers from the 95th 

Rifles and the battalion light infantry companies moved forward. 

Withdrawing American pickets gave the alarm, so that U.S. forces 

were alert and ready when the fog lifted and the British came into 

view. The batteries of artillery on the American left opened a heavy 

fire. The green-clad British riflemen rushed the canal, scrambled into 

the ditch, but could not cut their way up the rampart. Meanwhile, 

U.S. artillery fire became more deadly the closer the main British 

columns approached. Gibbs’ brigade inclined to the left into the open 

fields and presented a more lucrative target. British artillery failed 

to silence the U.S. guns, and as the advancing brigade came within 

range, the Tennessee and Kentucky infantry opened with deadly volleys of rifle and musket fire. 

Although they were supposed to follow closely behind the skirmishers of the 95th, Gibbs’ column halted when officers of the 44th

discovered that the fascines and ladders that were supposed to be 

prepositioned had not been brought forward as planned. While waiting for a detachment to bring them up, the rest of the regiment’s lead 

elements, contrary to orders, halted in the open and traded shots with 

the Americans. As small arms, grape, canister, and solid shot took 
•••• 37 ••••

their toll, many of the British fell back in disorder and took cover in 

furrows, ditches, or the previously abandoned artillery positions. After 

officers rallied their troops, the British advanced once more, but in 

the withering fire, only about four hundred reached the U.S. line. A 

few managed to claw their way up the embankment, but the British 

could not get enough men over the wall to overwhelm the defenders 

before either being killed, wounded, or captured. 

Keane’s brigade fared no better. Patterson’s naval battery on 

the west bank commenced firing as the column advanced along 

the river. Pakenham rode forward toward Gibbs’ column and sent 

orders for Keane’s men to follow him. Keane complied, and in an 

effort to minimize the damage from Patterson’s guns on the west 

bank, he led most of his men obliquely across the American right 

to assault the center. When they came within range, the American 

infantry—standing four ranks deep behind a protective parapet—

fired withering volleys of rifle and musket fire, as the guns of Battery Four opened at point-blank range. The 93d Highlanders took 

a severe punishing as they approached the American line. Their 

attack ground to a halt, broken, and they withdrew leaving behind 

many dead and wounded. 

Battle of New Orleans, 1815, by Don Troiani,

depicting Rennie’s attack on the bastion

 (Don Troiani Image Bank)

•••••••••••••••
•••• 38 ••••

Rennie’s battalion came on in a rush along the levee road and 

initially enjoyed some success. After driving in the U.S. pickets it 

reached the redoubt. Not wanting to hit their withdrawing pickets, the 

Americans in the bastion had held their fire until it was too late and 

had to evacuate as the redcoats entered the position. With Keane’s 

brigade no longer following them, the success could not be exploited. 

Consequently, some U.S. regulars and Beale’s riflemen poured fire 

into the attackers, killing Rennie and two other officers as they tried 

to lead an attack across the bridge into the main line. Infantrymen of 

the 7th Regiment then attacked and drove the surviving British out of 

the bastion. The entire action lasted about twenty-five minutes. The 

withdrawing British light infantry continued to suffer under heavy 

infantry and artillery fire. 

By that time the entire attack had stalled, Lt. Col. Timothy Jones’ 

flanking maneuver through the swamp had failed, with Jones mortally wounded. Back with the main body of his brigade, Gibbs too 

fell mortally wounded. A messenger reported that Keane had been 

seriously wounded and was out of action. Pakenham came forward 

to rally the troops but was also mortally wounded. It is said that 

before he was carried to the rear where he died, he ordered Lambert 

Battle of New Orleans and Death of Major General Pakenham 

on the 8th of January 1815, engraving by Joseph Yeager from a 

painting by William Edward West (Library of Congress) •••••••••••••••
•••• 39 ••••

to commit the reserve, but U.S. fire had pinned it down as well. In 

an hour and a half, hundreds of British lay dead and wounded on 

the field, and many units were badly disorganized. With many senior 

officers killed or wounded, General Lambert assumed command and 

halted the attack on the east bank. 

On the west bank, Thornton’s brigade, reduced in number to 

about five hundred sixty men due to a shortage of boats, had finally 

advanced after the attack on the east bank had already started. It 

first moved to capture Patterson’s guns that were enfilading the attack 

on Jackson’s line. The British quickly routed the forward deployed 

pickets of Maj. Paul Arnaud’s Louisiana battalion and Col. John 

Davis’ Kentucky regiment, who withdrew to the line along the Raguet 

Canal. Thornton then attacked the U.S. line and Patterson’s batteries, 

forcing the Americans to retreat to Line Boisgervais. Although the 

withdrawing U.S. sailors managed to spike some of the cannon, most 

fell intact to the British, who lost six killed and seventy-six wounded, 

compared to one dead, three wounded, and fifteen missing Americans.

Ultimately, Thornton advanced to about twelve hundred yards 

from Morgan’s second line. As a detachment of his men destroyed the 

U.S. naval batteries, Thornton sent word to Lambert that he would 

need two thousand men to assault the main U.S. entrenchment and 

A panoramic view of the Battle of New Orleans, by Jean 

Hyacinthe de Laclotte (Library of Congress)

•••••••••••••••
•••• 40 ••••

hold the west bank position. Lambert, having already decided not 

to renew the attack on Line Jackson, ordered Thornton to retire and 

withdraw back across the Mississippi. The battle was over. 

Lambert asked Jackson for a truce to gather the dead and to 

treat the wounded. The two sides agreed to a 300-yard-wide zone 

extending from Line Jackson in which the Americans would recover 

and care for the British casualties that remained on the field. British 

casualties in the battle on the east bank amounted to 285 killed, 1,265 

wounded, and 484 captured or missing. The Americans suffered 13 

dead, 30 wounded, and 19 captured or missing in the main battle. 

For the next week, the U.S. and British troops watched each other 

across their lines and contemplated their next moves. As the British 

buried their dead and evacuated their wounded seventy miles to the 

fleet, a general air of defeat hovered over the camp. Naval officers 

like Admiral Cochrane wanted to make another attempt, but the 

army officers had had enough. Some of Jackson’s subordinates urged 

him to attack, but he realized that the American army had the good 

fortune of fighting from behind prepared positions, and he did not 

care to risk a battle in the open. Since 23 December, the land battles 

had cost a total of 333 U.S. and 2,459 British casualties.

The Battle of Fort St. Philip, 9–18 January 1815

The day after the Battle of New Orleans, a British squadron—

consisting of a sloop-of-war, a gun-brig, a schooner, and two bomb 

vessels—approached Fort St. Philip. The fort, which was built on 

the foundation of an old Spanish work at Plaquemines Bend on the 

east bank of the Mississippi River, had its position strengthened in 

recent weeks by Jackson’s engineers and artillerists. Maj. Walter H. 

Overton commanded the post whose armament consisted of twentynine 24-pounder guns, a 6-pounder cannon, eight 51⁄2-inch howitzers, 

and one 13-inch mortar in the fort and two 32-pounders in an earthen 

battery at water level. Two companies of regular artillerymen, two 

companies from the 7th Infantry, and two of Louisiana volunteer 

militia, including one of Free Men of Color, manned the post, while 

a U.S. Navy gunboat lay offshore. 

At 1500 on 9 January, British barges were taking soundings of 

the river bottom about one and one-half miles below the fort when 

the Americans opened fire with their cannons. Although they drove 

the scouts back, the artillerymen had revealed the maximum range 

of their guns. The British ships anchored a safe 3,960 yards below the 

fort, and their two bomb vessels opened fire with mortars. Problems 

with fuses and ammunition rendered the U.S. mortar incapable of 
Genl. Andrew Jackson: The Hero of New Orleans,

by N. Currier (Library of Congress)

•••••••••••••••
•••• 42 ••••

counterbattery fire, and consequently the garrison hunkered down 

as it waited for the British to approach close enough to engage. The 

shelling continued into the night. Several armed launches pulled 

close to the fort firing grape and round shot from their bow guns as 

a diversion for the larger vessels. When the British ships closed the 

range, however, U.S. artillery fire drove them back. The bombardment 

continued intermittently for the next eight days. When the garrison 

received a fresh supply of ammunition and fuses for the piece, the 

fort’s mortar went into action. Its fire effectively disrupted the British 

formation. Just after dawn on 18 January, the British weighed anchor 

and retreated downriver. The Americans suffered two dead and seven 

wounded, while the British reported no casualties. 

Meanwhile, back at the Chalmette Plantation, the two sides 

exchanged prisoners, and on the evening of 18 January, the British 

completed their withdrawal from the battlefield, leaving behind 

fourteen spiked artillery pieces. The retreat was executed in such 

secrecy that Jackson did not learn of it until the next day when 

a British doctor approached with a letter from Lambert asking 

the Americans to care for eighty patients too badly wounded to 

make the journey to the fleet. By the evening of 27 January, all 

the landing forces had re-embarked. 

Undeterred, Admiral Cochrane decided to revert to the earlier 

plan to take New Orleans by moving overland from Mobile. He 

dispatched a messenger to Colonel Nicholls at Apalachicola with 

orders to send one force of Indian allies northeast to raid the 

Georgia frontier and another northwest to cut off Fort Stoddert 

and the communities north of Mobile. Cochrane’s fleet would 

attack up Mobile Bay and put Lambert’s army ashore to capture 

Fort Bowyer before marching from Mobile to Baton Rouge. After 

cutting New Orleans off from the rest of the United States, the 

army would entrench and wait for Jackson’s army to attack—turning the tables of 8 January. 

The Capture of Fort Bowyer, 9–12 February 1815

The British received reinforcements of infantry and artillery 

before they withdrew from the Lake Borgne area. Meanwhile, 

General Lambert decided on a plan to put a brigade ashore at the 

end of Mobile Point to capture Fort Bowyer and the entrance to 

Mobile Bay. In addition to clearing the way to Mobile, a quick 

victory would help restore morale. The rest of the army would 

land on Dauphin Island to further secure the entrance to the bay 

and to create a supply base. Following the reduction of the fort, 
•••• 43 ••••

Lambert would decide whether to continue up the peninsula to 

seize Mobile before making a second attempt against New Orleans. 

With the memory of the unsuccessful attempt to capture the fort 

the previous September still fresh in mind, the British determined 

to carry the works at the lowest possible cost. 

On 6 February, now Lt. Col. William Lawrence and the garrison of 375 U.S. regular artillerymen and infantrymen watched 

as British warships anchored a safe distance offshore. Two days 

later, twelve hundred British soldiers landed on the peninsula. 

Deployed along Fort Bowyer’s less defended landward side, the 

British effectively cut the bastion off from resupply and reinforcement. Colonel Dickson then landed with 450 artillerymen and six 

guns, two howitzers, and eight mortars, and Lt. Col. John Fox 

Burgoyne of the Royal Engineers came ashore with the army’s 

Sappers and Miners. 

At dawn on 9 February, the defenders discovered that the British had cut a trench parallel to the fort’s north curtain wall, and 

by the end of the day, the redcoats had extended the length of the 

trench to one hundred fifty yards. British infantrymen took particular aim at U.S. gun crews as both sides continued to exchange 

artillery and musket fire. The next day, the attackers cut another 

trench and extended it three hundred yards to join the first one. 

By early morning on 11 February, the British had advanced a sap, 

or approach trench, to within thirty yards of the fort’s protective 

ditch, as their batteries opened an intense cannonade. At about 

1000, the firing ceased, and a British officer advanced under a flag 

of truce to present Lawrence with General Lambert’s demand to 

surrender. If refused, Lambert promised to allow the U.S. soldiers’ 

dependent women and children time to leave before he initiated 

an assault. 

With no hope of reinforcement, ammunition running low, and 

facing overwhelming odds, the colonel knew further resistance 

would prove futile. After consulting his officers, Lawrence agreed 

to capitulate, and so notified his counterpart that afternoon. The 

garrison marched out into captivity at noon the next day. The 

five-day siege had cost the British 13 killed and 18 wounded, while

the Americans suffered 1 dead, 10 wounded, and 366 captured. 

Brig. Gen. James Winchester, commander of the U.S. forces 

defending Mobile, had sent a column to the fort’s relief that attacked a British picket post and captured seventeen redcoats, 

but not before Lawrence had surrendered. Following the British 

occupation of the fort, Admiral Cochrane and General Lambert 
•••• 44 ••••

gave the British Army an opportunity to rest before resuming the 

invasion. Two days later, the sloop-of-war HMS Brazen arrived 

with the news that a preliminary peace agreement had been signed 

in Ghent, Belgium. 

Although U.S. and British commissioners had concluded a 

treaty on 24 December 1814, the war had not ended on that day. 

It is therefore a mistake to believe that the Battle of New Orleans 

was fought after the war had ended. The U.S. government in 

Washington learned of Jackson’s victory on 4 February 1815, 

followed two days later by the arrival of the official copies of the 

Treaty of Ghent. The British Parliament ratified the treaty on 30 

December 1814; the U.S. Senate followed suit on 16 February 

1815. The next day, Secretary of State James Monroe, on behalf 

of the United States, exchanged the signed and ratified copies with 

a British ambassador in Washington. The day after, as specified 

in the treaty, the War of 1812 officially ended when peace was 

proclaimed on 18 February 1815. 

Jackson received notification of the war’s termination on 13 

March. He immediately ordered a cessation of hostilities. The 

The Signing of the Treaty of Ghent, Christmas Eve, 1814,

by Sir Amédée Forestier (Smithsonian American Art Museum) •••••••••••••••
•••• 45 ••••

next day, he released the militia and volunteers from federal service and sent them home for discharge and final pay. Jackson also 

revoked the order of 15 December that had placed New Orleans 

under martial law, and he proclaimed a “pardon for all military 

offenses committed.” He sent some of the regular units to replace 

the volunteers manning forts in the district. News of the armistice 

reached Mobile on 14 March, and British troops embarked and 

sailed for Europe the following day.

Analysis

The importance of the Gulf campaign is difficult to gauge. A 

successful British invasion would have cut American commerce 

moving along the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers from access to the 

sea, with dire economic consequences. It also would have allowed 

Britain to seize control of the Louisiana Territory. Had the war 

continued, these would have been serious threats. But the Treaty 

of Ghent, already negotiated but not yet ratified by the time of 

the battle of New Orleans, made these points moot. Perhaps the 

British might have reconsidered the treaty’s terms if they had 

captured New Orleans; but Great Britain, tired by the long war 

with Napoleon, was in no mood to continue a conflict that it had 

never wanted in the first place just for the chance of gaining five 

hundred thousand acres of North American wilderness. As it happened, both sides readily embraced the treaty’s call for returning 

to prewar territorial boundaries. 

Another possible danger stemming from a British victory 

at New Orleans is that Britain might have turned the region 

over to Spain rather than to the United States on the grounds 

that Spain was the rightful prewar owner. But if Britain had 

insisted on transferring Louisiana to Spain, it is unlikely that 

beleaguered nation would have been able to hold the territory 

against an aggressive, expansionist United States. Already fighting a losing battle to retain its Latin American colonies from 

indigenous independence movements, Spain was in no position 

to defend its North American territories from encroachment. 

Spain acknowledged this reality in 1819 when it ceded Florida 

to the United States. In exchange, the two nations agreed on a 

firm boundary between the United States and Spanish territory 

west of Louisiana. Even this did not save the Spanish empire in 

North America, as two years later the region’s population won 

its independence from Spain and established the country of 
•••• 46 ••••

Mexico, thus ending Spain’s 300-year presence in North America. 

In short, had Britain won the battle of New Orleans, it is difficult 

to see how it or any European power could have stopped the relentless westward drive of the American people. 

Last but not least, a British victory might have reinvigorated 

efforts to establish an Indian confederacy to bottle the United 

States up along the eastern seaboard. But this too seems unlikely. 

British negotiators at Ghent had already abandoned this goal in 

the quest for peace. Had the British changed their minds, an Indian confederacy would have had little chance of survival given 

America’s decisive victories over Tecumseh and his adherents 

during the war. If the War of 1812 had accomplished anything, 

it had ended Indian power east of the Mississippi once and for 

all—power which, given America’s rising population and Indian 

vulnerabilities, could never have held the United States in check 

in any case.

The impact of the last major battle of the War of 1812 is 

questionable, and it is a befitting description for a war whose 

entire legacy is ambiguous. After roughly two and a half years 

of fighting, the two sides called it quits without resolving any of 

the issues that had led to war. America’s bid to conquer Canada 

had failed miserably, with the two sides agreeing to return to the 

prewar international boundaries. British infringement on U.S. 

maritime rights at sea, a major irritant that had led the United 

States to declare war, ended, but only because Britain had defeated 

Napoleonic France and had no further need to continue these 

measures. In fact, Britain refused to renounce the right to impose 

similar hardships on neutrals in the future, although as events 

turned out it would never apply them against the United States 

again. After spending over $90 million and suffering over 6,700 

battlefield casualties (88 percent of whom came from the Army 

and militia), the United States thus had little to show for its June 

1812 decision to declare war on Great Britain.

If the war neither redrew the map of North America nor established America’s rights to ply the seas free of British harassment, it 

nevertheless had some important consequences. It cleared the way 

for further westward expansion by completing the destruction of 

Tecumseh’s confederacy, and spurred domestic manufacturing. In 

the military realm, the nation overcame initial missteps to develop 

viable combat forces led by a new cohort of talented, battle-tested 

officers. One such officer, Winfield Scott, would dominate U.S. 

military affairs for another forty years. Early war disasters also 
•••• 47 ••••

sparked reforms, such as the wartime formation of a small General 

Staff and a postwar revamping of the U.S. Military Academy to 

produce a more professional officer corps. These and other initiatives came to fruition under the energetic leadership of John C. 

Calhoun, the secretary of war from 1817 to 1825. The benefits 

would be in full evidence several decades later when Scott would 

lead American arms to victory in the Mexican War of 1846–1848.

Wars bring fame to the successful, and as so often happens in 

American history, some warriors are able to transform battlefield 

victories into success at the ballot box. Two such men were Maj. 

Gens. Andrew Jackson and William H. Harrison, who became 

presidents of the United States in 1829 and 1841, respectively. A 

third albeit lesser hero of the war, Zachary Taylor, became president in 1849, although his performance in the Mexican War was 

a greater factor than his 1812 service in propelling him into the 

presidency. Victory did not always translate into political success, 

however. Fame from both the War of 1812 and the Mexican War 

was not sufficient to win the White House for Scott when he ran 

for president in 1852.

The War of 1812 is often called America’s “Second War for Independence.” This is not literally true, as the United States was never 

in danger of becoming a British colony again. Yet, there is a grain of 

truth to the notion, at least in the abstract. Great Britain had never 

fully implemented the 1783 treaty that had ended the American War 

of Independence, and it certainly did not treat Americans as equals 

on the international stage. Early American defeats seemed only to 

reaffirm in British minds America’s status as a rather uncouth and 

backward relative. Many Americans also harbored self-doubts, with 

the burning of Washington, D.C., in August 1814, adding insult to 

the injuries inflicted by the many embarrassing defeats of the previous two years. But this perception began to change in the summer 

of 1814, when American arms defied one of the most professional 

armies in the world at Chippewa, Plattsburgh, and Baltimore. The 

victory at New Orleans, fought against a large contingent of British veterans of the Napoleonic War, amplified the successes of the 

previous year tenfold. The fact that news of Jackson’s victory arrived 

on the east coast of the United States just before news of the peace 

treaty convinced many Americans that they had trounced the British 

and won the war. The Battle of New Orleans thus helped generate 

a wave of national pride and confidence in the United States that 

historians would later label the “Era of Good Feelings.” Having 

shaken thoughts of inferiority and self-doubt, Americans would 
•••• 48 ••••

go forward with optimism and confidence to conquer a continent 

in the coming decades. Largely ignored in Europe at the time, in 

retrospect the War of 1812 indicated that the United States was 

beginning to come of age.
•••• 49 ••••

•••

The Author

Joseph F. Stoltz III is the Rowan Postdoctoral Fellow in Military 

History at the United States Military Academy and the associate 

editor of The West Point History of Warfare. He received his Ph.D. 

from Texas Christian University and his master’s and bachelor’s 

degrees from the University of New Orleans. His Ph.D. dissertation 

examined the role of the Battle of New Orleans in American memory 

and culture over the past two centuries.
•••• 50 ••••

•••

Further Readings

Brooks, Charles B. The Siege of New Orleans. Seattle: University of 

Washington Press, 1961.

Brown, Wilburt S. The Amphibious Campaign for West Florida and 

Louisiana, 1814–1815: A Critical Review of Strategy and Tactics 

at New Orleans. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1969. 

Carter, Samuel, III. Blaze of Glory: The Fight for New Orleans, 

1814–1815. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1971.

Latour, Arsène Lacarrière, and Gene A. Smith, ed. Historical Memoir 

of the War in West Florida and Louisiana, 1814–15. Gainesville: 

University Press of Florida, 1999.

Owsley, Frank, Jr. Struggle for the Gulf Borderlands: The Creek War 

and the Battle of New Orleans, 1812–1815. Tuscaloosa: University 

of Alabama Press, 2000.

Pickles,Tim. New Orleans 1815: Andrew Jackson Crushes the British. 

Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, Ltd., 1993.

Reilly, Robin. The British at the Gates: The New Orleans Campaign 

in the War of 1812. Toronto: Robin Brass Studio, 2002.

Remini, Robert V. The Battle of New Orleans: Andrew Jackson and 

America’s First Military Victory. New York: Penguin Books, 2001.

For more information on the U.S. Army in the War of 1812, please 

read other titles in the U.S. Army Campaigns of the War of 1812 series 

published by the U.S. Army Center of Military History.

(www.history.army.mil)

•••• 52 ••••

PIN : 104650–000

New Orleans 1814-1815