New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1853-01-08
EIGHTH OF LANLL.4RY.

observance. The courts suspend their bushes
public bodies do not sit, legal and commerce:
transactions are suspended, and the people d'
vote their minds to patriotic "reminiscences an
feelings Such is the tribute the present gent
ration pays to the gallant achievements,
which this day is the anniversary. Well wol
thy is it to be honored celebrated and remen
bered in all time to come by the freemen {
America, and by the citizens of this now grea
and prosperous city.
Far, far distant be the day when the re
currence of this anniversary shall cease to ex
cite thrill of grateful, proud and inspiring
emotions in the hearts of our people May the,
indeed, with each succeeding year, learn to ap
preciate more highly the value, the Importance
and the brilliancy of those deeds of heroic CON
stancy and frmness, which saved NewOrleans
from the pollution of a foreign soldiery, and our
Republic from the dishonor andincalculable evils
Of an English possession of this invaluable en-
trepot of the great valley of the Mississippi.
The battle of the Eighth of January closed in a
blaze of glory, the most splendid, successful,
and remarkable defence in modern times The
more the history of that defence is studied, the
warmer grows our admiration Gifts ability, gal
lantry and skill 1t is great error to imagine
that NewOrleans was saved by the single action
of the Eighth of January, wherein our soldiers
enjoyed the protection of an embankment, and
the British were~ exposed in an open plain.
We showed in an article of the 23d December,
that the victory had been gained before. that
the prestige of success had been secured for our
army by the brilliant conception of the night
attack of 23d December. There were other
events, which had contributed to produce this
condition of affairs The gallant sea fight at
the entrance of Lake Borgne, in which Lieuten-
ant T. Ap Catesby Jones-now Commodore
with few hundred American soldiers, held for
some time at bay force of twelve hundred
English sailors and marines, and only yielded
when nearly all his men and vessels were dis
abled, and after he had inflicted a severe loss
upon the enemy, had kinded an ardent courage
and enthusiasm among our citizens. Our SOL
diers hurried to emulate the heroic deeds of our
sailors.
Hence, the steadiness, nerve and courage,
displayed by the raw troops, which jackson
had hastily gathered here, in every encounter
with the British, from the affair of the 23d,
through several succeeding conflicts, which, but
for the transcendant glory of the Sth, would
have been remembered as conspicuous achieve
ments The affair of the 2Sth December, the
tremendous bombardments of the British bat
terry of thirty guns of the heaviest calibre, which
in q few hours were entirely dismantled by the
superior force and courage of our artillery prac-
tice, the solid advance and discontinue of the
British army on the LIST of January, together
with many severe skirmishes, make up an ap-
propriate chapter of incidents occurring be
tween the Esd of December and the 9Th of Janu-
airy, in all of which our army maintained, in
every position, its superiority over that of the
British, and showed that there was head to
direct, as well as heart to impel its movements
Never was there stronger illustration of the
necessity of an able General to give full effect to
the courage of an army, than is contained in n
comparison of the defence of this city in 1914 and
'15, with the disastrous and disgraceful affair at
Washington short time before. In the latter
affair, brave and we'll appointed army, greatly
superior to the enemy in numbers, but wretch
edly commanded, was put to fight by British
column of less than four thousand men within
sight of the Capitol whose presence should have
inspired every American with inyincible courage
and determination. That Capitol was burnt
with an American force lowering around which,
under proper command, would have been ade-
quate to annihilate that of the British The
same British army which accomplished this feat
came to repeat their exploit and Vandalism
upon this city, then remote and but recently
acquired possession of our Confederacy Their
numbers were augmented by large additions
from the gallant Peninsula army of Wellington
which had just terminated its brilliant career
by driving Napoleon's armies from Spain They
came to this city. flushed with hundred vic
tories, and under Generals who had never
known defeat. They found defenceless city
A few thousand troops had been hurried hther
from various points of the country They found
a rude, discordant, ill-appointed force, to whom
all the usages and emergencies of civilized war
fare were utterly strange and new But they
were brave, as all Americans are brave--they
we're full of National pride and patriotism, as
all Americans, and especially those whose lives
are passed on the frontier, far removed from the
contagion and corruption of foreign influence,
And, above all, they were commanded by one
of those leaders whom emergencies and circum-
stances have so often, in the history of mankind.
drawn from the walks of private citizenship, to
PROSTATE and destroy the best conceived designs
and ablest chiefs of an invading foe. jackson
was here, and infused his spirit and determine
ton into his feeble little army. He had never
maneuvered or commanded troops against
disciplined force. But nature had supplied him
with qualities more valuable than the highest
art and profoundest science, lie knew no such
word as defeat. The city was to be defended or
he should die on its ramparts He communica-
ted this heroic resolve to his command, and that
little army became invincible even by one of the
best appointed armies that Great Britain ever
sent forth to execute scheme of aggression
and aggrandisement
This day is commemorative of the glorious
conclusion of that unexampled defenee--com-
of a battle which exhibited result
that cannot be paralelled in the history Of
modern warfare. On this day thirty-eight
years ago, less than four thousand raw Ameri-
can troops met twelve thousand British regulars
and destroying more than three thousand OF
their enemy, experienced a loss of seren killed
thirteen vounded Surely facts SO eloquent