Perth Amboy evening news., 1920-04-05
Fiue Minutes A Day
With Our Presidents
The Hero of New Orleans
BY JAMES MORGAN.

The Hero OF New Orleans.
When fame Knocked at Andrew
Jackson's doo it found him a store
keeper and a farmer on the Tennes-
see frontier, where he lived near
Nashville in a tour room farmhouse
which he had named the Hermitage.
The Wal of 1912 having aroused
the Indians of the West, jackson
shook off his protesting physicians
and, with the bullet wounds of his
tavern fight against the Bentons vet
~unhealed, advanced upon the Creek
nation in Alabama. His arm was in
a sling, leaving the left sleeve of his
coat empty, and his shoulder was yet
too sore to bear the weight of an
epaulette. S~quirming with pain, he
could not climb into the saddle with
U assistance, nor could he ride long
without stopping to be washed from
head to feet in solution of sugar of
lead to keep down the Inflammation.
In seven crushing victories in as
many months. he broke the power of
the savage allies of England. After
N of the battles, a tender pity was
awakened in him for an Indian baby,
still clasped in the arms of its mother
as she lay among the lead on the
field. The squaws among his prison
ers stolidly refusing to nurse 1t, he
took the motherless infant to his tent
and finally to the Hermitage, where
the red boy-grew up like a son of the
family.
In his home no one could be gentler
than this hare hating, rough fighting
man, who gave his plain, simple I'M
educated wife the chivalrous devo-
ton of a knight and the happiness
she had missed in her first marriage.
Childless like Washington and Mad
ison before him, he adopted one Mrs.
Jackson's nephews, who was re-
chrfstened Andrew Jackson, and
brought up another who wore the
of Andrew Jackson Donaldson.
1t was to fight the red foe and
to defend the frontier that Jackson
entered the war; but when he had
fought his way through h Creek
country, he found himself face to
face with the white foe on the shore
of the Gulf of Mexico. First repel-
ling the British from Mobile, next
he expelled them from Pensacola,
they had stolen into the terri
tory of neutral Spain, and thence he
marched to the defense of New
Orleans.
With the Punishment of Napoleon
to Elba, England was left free to
deal with her one remaining enemy,
the United States, n an immense
fleet, with 10000 soldiers and sailors.
was Fastening over the sea to capture
New Orleans. The future of the en-
tire West seemed to be at risk, and
the K~entuckians and Tennesseeans
rushed to Jackson's standard.
BY closing the mouth of the Miseis-
sippi with a strong fertilization.
Jackson deprived the British of the
advantage of their sea power and
compelled them to attack the city by
land, the decisive battle opening in
the misty dawn of Jan. s, 1915. The
story that the Americans won the
day from behind piles of cotton bales
Is a familiar myth. They had dis
carded them early in the campaign
finding that the flaming cotton
ignited by the fire of the enemy, was
more a peril than a protection.
Mother earth V New Orleans. 1t
was an early example of trench var
fare, now so familiar.
The battle of New Orleans is re-
markable in W respects. 1t was n
of the most complete disasters in the
records of civilized warfare, and one
Of the most useless engagements yer
fought. In 23 minutes the British
lost 2,117 men to the Americans IS
and the war a been over Is
days! Yet it was not until Feb. 10
that Jackson heard of the treaty of
peace. although it had been signed
at Client on the day before Christ
mas.
Had there been an electric tele-
graph the battle would not have been
fought: there would have been no
hero of New Orleans, and jackson
never would have been President.
The man vas unambitious in politics.
He had made only a single speech in
his one term in Congress. Promoted
to the Senate he had not even an
swered the roll calls in that chamber,
and had resigned in a year. After
ward he resigned from the Supreme
Court of the State also, and retired
from the law to attend to his store
and his farm, where doubtless he
would ia been content to pass the
rest of his days.
When people began to talk of maxi
ing the victor OF New Orleans Presi-
dent. he himself is said to have
laughed at the proposal as an absurd
ity. When others laughed at it, he
changed his mind.
Circumstances c~onspired to force
Jackson into the White House. First.
as Major General in the Regular
Army he invaded Spanish territory
on a hot trail" for hostile Seminoles
who were accused OF plotting with
, the Indians. That episode made him
the center of a furious storm of ap-
plause and denunciation. The storm
grew in fury when he became the
Governor of Florida, after it's cession
by Spain, and when he proceeded to
exercise all the despotic powers of a
Spanish captain general. In the end,
his enemies aroused his political am
bition and melted him to seek the
Presidency as q vindication from
their bitter abuse.
Copyright, 1920 by James Morgan:
published by special arrangement
with The Mcclure Newspaper Syn
dictate.