of the United States, and was given command of the Department of
the South. The pendulum had swung the other way, with a vengeance! But
Jackson rose magnificently to this increased responsibility. He
discovered that the English were in force at Pensacola, which was in
Florida and therefore on Spanish territory; but he did not hesitate. He
marched against the place with an army of three thousand, stormed the
town, captured it, blew up the forts, which the Spaniards hastily
surrendered, and so made it untenable as an English base. Perhaps no
other exploit of his career was so audacious, or so well carried out.
Pensacola subdued, he hastened to New Orleans, which was in the gravest
danger.

The overthrow of Napoleon and his banishment to Elba had given England a
breathing-space, and the veteran troops which had been with Wellington
in Spain were left free for use against the Americans. A great
expedition was at once organized to attack and capture New Orleans, and
at its head was placed General Pakenham, the brilliant commander of the
column which had delivered the fatal blow at Salamanca. A fleet of fifty
vessels, manned by the best sailors of England, was got ready, ten
thousand men put aboard, and in December, a week after Jackson's arrival
at New Orleans, this great fleet anchored off the broad lagoons of the
Mississippi delta. Seventeen thousand men, in all, counting the sailors,
who could, of course, be employed in land operations; and a mighty
equipment of artillery, for which the guns of the fleet could also be
used. The few American gunboats were overpowered, and Pakenham proceeded
leisurely to land his force for the advance against the city, which it
seemed that nothing could save. On December 23d, his advance-guard of
two thousand men was but ten miles below New Orleans.

On the afternoon of that very day, the vanguard of Jackson's
Tennesseans marched into New Orleans, clad in hunting-shirts of
buckskin or homespun, wearing coonskin caps, and carrying on their
shoulders the long rifles they knew how to use so well. They had made
one of the most remarkable marches in history, in their eagerness to
meet the enemy, and Jackson at once hurried them forward for a night
attack. It was delivered with the greatest fury, and the British were so
roughly handled that they were forced to halt until the main body of the
army came up.

When they did advance, they found that Jackson had made good use of the
delay. With the