Tennesseans, to Arms!
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| Tennessee Volunteer Infantry in line of battle. Horseshoe Bend National Military Park. Painting by Keith Rocco. |
Within forty-eight hours of the Duck River Massacre, General Thomas Johnson with an detachment of 500 men of the 6th Brigade, Tennessee Militia had taken the field. A second force under command of Colonel Pillow from west Tennessee also set out in pursuit of the Creeks. Neither met with much success and was forced to abandon pursuit after a short time. The only casualty suffered on this punitive expedition was the shooting and subsequent scalping of a lone Creek warrior by Pillow’s men. An act that accomplished nothing militarily but did serve to exacerbate an already tense situation. The ineffectiveness of the brief campaign of reprisal was likely due to the fact that the Tennessee Militia at the time of the massacre was without it’s commanding General, Andrew Jackson. Jackson had been in Georgia on personal business when the Creeks struck the Duck River settlement. Making a hasty return to his state, Jackson fired off a letter to Governor Blount in Knoxville seeking authorization to lead a full-scale military expedition into the Creek nation to “ demand the perpetrators, at the Point of the Bayonet, if refused, that we make reprisals, and lay their Towns in ashes. . .I only want your orders, the fire of the militia is up, they burn for revenge, and now is the time to give the creeks the fatal blow, before the[y] expect it.”
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| Major General Andrew Jackson Ca. 1814 |
The Creek Campaign, the War of 1812 and the making of Andrew Jackson
The atrocity visited on the Manly and Crawley families the previous spring was still fresh in the mind of Tennesseans when word came that America and England were once again at war. In the summer of 1812, the Madison Administration, pursuant to a long record of grievances, formally declared war on Great Britain June the 18th. Initially, the theater of action was in the north centered around the struggle for Canada. Invasion followed by folly best described the American effort to conquer the neighbor to the north. Acts of individual bravery and heroism on both sides marked the war’s early campaigns but as a cohesive military effort, it was lacking as things began to stalemate along the border between Canada and the United States. In the south, the war was limited to recruiting and one small military expedition by Major General James Wilkinson against Spanish held Mobile in present day Alabama. However, in July of 1813, militia from the Mississippi Territory intercepted a party of Creeks returning from an expedition to gather arms and munitions from the Spanish at Pensacola. The small skirmish at Burnt Corn Creek resulted in an Indian victory after the militia were driven from the field. The larger significance was what followed as a result.
On August 30, emboldened by their recent victory, a large force of Creeks attacked militia and civilians held up inside Fort Mims on the Alabama river roughly 45 miles north of Mobile. The killing was indiscriminate with only 36 survivors out of roughly 550 soldiers, men, women, and children inside the fort. The devastation panicked the Southwest and a call to arms was raised throughout the region. Andrew Jackson had already taken the field the previous January at the head of the Tennessee State Militia bound for Natchez to await further orders. When the only order was to disband or for Jackson’s men to reenlist as regular army under General Wilkinson, Jackson defiantly ordered his men to remain under arms. He personally led his army the 500 miles back up the Natchez Trace to Tennessee. This show of stubborn frontier character earned him the epithet “Old Hickory” a nickname that would serve him well throughout his life. When news of the Fort Mims massacre reached Jackson at Nashville, he immediately mustered 2,500 militia and volunteers and rode off to war. By October Jackson’s army was on campaign descending deeper into present-day Alabama. The Tennesseans were part of a three column strategy that never fully materialized. At least not as planned. For most of the campaign, Jackson’s Division went it alone, fighting as they marched, and almost starving by late November having never yet seen a supply column. Only Jackson’s sheer determination and personal grit kept his men in the field during the fall of 1813. In late winter, events began to turn in Jackson’s favor and 1814 would be a much better year. In February Jackson’s Division was reinforced by the 39th Infantry of U.S. Regular Army. They provided a disciplined corps that Jackson needed desperately.
By March, the division was once again moving against the Creeks and caught up with them as what became known as the Battle of Horseshoe Bend. At 4:00 a.m. on March 27, 1814, Jackson's army was encamped about six miles from the place known to the Creeks as Tohopeka, the more common name being Horseshoe Bend. Jackson arrived on the field later that morning and at about 10:00 o'clock began bombarding the Creek position. After a lengthy firing of the cannon, General John Coffee described what followed. "The firing of [the] cannon and small arms in short time became general and heavy, which animated our Indians [allied Cherokee], and seeing about one hundred of the warriors and all the squaws and children of the enemy running among the huts of the village which was open to our view, they could no longer remain silent spectators, while some kept up a fire across the river (which is about 120 yards wide) to prevent the enemy's approach to the bank, others plunged into the water and swam the river for canoes that lay on the other shore in considerable numbers, and brought them over, in which crafts a number of them embarked, and landed on the bend with the enemy." Shortly after noon, Jackson ordered a general advance on the enemy's works. As the drummer of the 39th sounded the advance, Major John Reid recalled; "Never were men more anxious to be led to the charge than both our regulars and militia. The long roll was beating, & the troops in motion. It was not fear, it was not anxiety or concern for the fate of those who were so soon to fall, but it was a kind of enthusiasm that thrilled through every nerve, & animated me with the belief that the day was ours, without adverting to what it must cost us." The two forces were joined and the killing soon became general and in earnest. Both sides seemed to want to see the thing played out to the last act.
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| The Creek onslaught breeches the walls of Fort Mims. Horseshoe Bend National Military Park. |
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| The U.S. 39th Infantry charges against the Creek barricade. Horseshoe Bend National Military Park. Painting by Keith Rocco. |
The Battle of Horseshoe Bend
By March, the division was once again moving against the Creeks and caught up with them as what became known as the Battle of Horseshoe Bend. At 4:00 a.m. on March 27, 1814, Jackson's army was encamped about six miles from the place known to the Creeks as Tohopeka, the more common name being Horseshoe Bend. Jackson arrived on the field later that morning and at about 10:00 o'clock began bombarding the Creek position. After a lengthy firing of the cannon, General John Coffee described what followed. "The firing of [the] cannon and small arms in short time became general and heavy, which animated our Indians [allied Cherokee], and seeing about one hundred of the warriors and all the squaws and children of the enemy running among the huts of the village which was open to our view, they could no longer remain silent spectators, while some kept up a fire across the river (which is about 120 yards wide) to prevent the enemy's approach to the bank, others plunged into the water and swam the river for canoes that lay on the other shore in considerable numbers, and brought them over, in which crafts a number of them embarked, and landed on the bend with the enemy." Shortly after noon, Jackson ordered a general advance on the enemy's works. As the drummer of the 39th sounded the advance, Major John Reid recalled; "Never were men more anxious to be led to the charge than both our regulars and militia. The long roll was beating, & the troops in motion. It was not fear, it was not anxiety or concern for the fate of those who were so soon to fall, but it was a kind of enthusiasm that thrilled through every nerve, & animated me with the belief that the day was ours, without adverting to what it must cost us." The two forces were joined and the killing soon became general and in earnest. Both sides seemed to want to see the thing played out to the last act.
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| The impressive defenses built by the Creek Indians ultimately became a barrier that trapped them in and prevented escape. Horseshoe Bend National Military Park. Painting by Keith Rocco. |
The action lasted into the night until it simply became to dark to conduct any sort of cohesive maneuver. On the next day, Andrew Jackson road over the battlefield as victor over the vanquished. His cost in the battle had amounted to just over 200 casualties of which 70 were among the allied Cherokee and friendly Creek. With the defenders it was a far different story. The Creeks suffered a crushing defeat losing over 800 out of 1000 effectives engaged. Though it wasn't known immediately, the Red Stick faction of the Creek nation had been broken. By late summer the Creeks admitted defeat and signed the treaty of Fort Jackson on August 9, 1814. By the end of the month Jackson had moved his headquarters to Mobile.
