page_title: Battle of Horseshoe Bend (1814)
section_title: Battle
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Horseshoe Bend (1814) / Battle
caption_attribution_description: English: Battle of Horseshoe Bend
context_page_description: The Battle of Horseshoe Bend, was fought during the War of 1812 in the Mississippi Territory, now central Alabama. On March 27, 1814, United States forces and Indian allies under Major General Andrew Jackson defeated the Red Sticks, a part of the Creek Indian tribe who opposed American expansion, effectively ending the Creek War.
context_section_description: On March 27, 1814, General Andrew Jackson led troops consisting of 2,600 American soldiers, 500 Cherokee, and 100 Lower Creek allies up a steep hill near Tehopeka.  From this vantage point, Jackson would begin his attack on the Red Stick fortification.  At 6:30am, he split his troops and sent roughly 1,300 men to cross the Tallapoosa River and surround the Creek village.  Then, at 10:30 a.m., Jackson's remaining troops began an artillery barrage which consisted of two cannons firing for about two hours. Little damage was caused to the Red Sticks or their 400-yard-long, log-and-dirt fortifications.  In fact, Jackson was quite impressed with the measures the Red Sticks took to protect their position. As he later wrote:
  It is impossible to conceive a situation more eligible for defence than the one they had chosen and the skill which they manifested in their breastwork was really astonishing. It extended across the point in such a direction as that a force approaching would be exposed to a double fire, while they lay entirely safe behind it. It would have been impossible to have raked it with cannon to any advantage even if we had had possession of one extremity.
  Soon, Jackson ordered a bayonet charge. The 39th U.S. Infantry, led by Colonel John Williams, charged the breastworks and engaged the Red Sticks in hand-to-hand combat. Sam Houston (the future statesman and leader of Texas) served as a third lieutenant in Jackson's army.  Houston was one of the first to make it over the log barricade alive and received a wound from a Creek arrow that troubled him for the rest of his life.
  Meanwhile, the troops under the command of General John Coffee had successfully crossed the river and surrounded the encampment.  They joined the fight and gave Jackson a great advantage.  The Creek warriors refused to surrender, though, and the battle lasted for more than five hours.  At the end, roughly 800 of the 1,000 Red Stick warriors present at the battle were killed.  In contrast, Jackson lost fewer than 50 men during the fight and reported 154 wounded.
  After the battle, Jackson's troops made bridle reins from skin taken from Indian corpses, conducted a body count by cutting off the tips of their noses, and sent their clothing as souvenirs to the "ladies of Tennessee."
  Chief Menawa was severely wounded but survived; he led about 200 of the original 1,000 warriors across the river and toward safety, to join the Seminole tribe in Spanish Florida.
caption: Map of Alabama during the War of 1812[6]
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "5312", "Image ImageLength": "2988", "Image Make": "samsung", "Image Model": "SAMSUNG-SM-G870A", "Image Orientation": "Rotated 90 CW", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "G870AUCU2BOF3", "Image DateTime": "2015:11:05 11:45:25", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "246", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 2, 0, 0]", "Image GPSInfo": "3160", "Thumbnail ImageWidth": "512", "Thumbnail ImageLength": "288", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail Orientation": "Rotated 90 CW", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "3308", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "18923", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/40", "EXIF FNumber": "11/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "40", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2015:11:05 11:45:25", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2015:11:05 11:45:25", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "133/25", "EXIF ApertureValue": "227/100", "EXIF BrightnessValue": "401/100", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "57/25", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire", "EXIF FocalLength": "24/5", "EXIF SubSecTime": "334", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "334", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "334", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "5312", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2988", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "3130", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "31", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF ImageUniqueID": "F16QLHF01SB"}