ompanies detached at
Martinique and the two at Barbados. The whole regiment was then
stationed in Trinidad, seven companies being at St. Joseph's and three
at Orange Grove. This arrangement lasted until March, 1814, when the
head-quarters and four companies were moved to Martinique, four
companies to St. Lucia, and two to Dominica.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 35: This island had been restored to France by the Treaty of
Amiens.]

[Footnote 36: The grenadier company of the 1st West India Regiment lost
1 rank and file, killed; 1 drummer, 18 rank and file, wounded; 1
subaltern, missing.]

CHAPTER XIII.

THE EXPEDITION TO NEW ORLEANS, 1814-15.

In July, 1814, the 1st West India Regiment was removed to Guadaloupe,
except two companies detached to St. Martin's and Marie-Galante, and
remained so stationed until it was selected to take part in the
expedition to New Orleans.

In June, 1812, the United States of America had declared war against
Great Britain, Washington had been captured by the British on July 24th,
1813, and the war had been carried on with varying success until towards
the close of the year 1814. In October of that year an expedition to New
Orleans was decided upon; the force was to rendezvous at Negril Bay,
Jamaica, and for that place the 1st West India Regiment embarked at
Point a Prene, Guadaloupe, on November 14th, 1814. Lieutenant-Colonel
Whitby, who had for the first time joined the regiment on the previous
day, was then in command.

The assembly of the fleet, and the concentration of troops at a point
so near to their own coast, had aroused the suspicions of the Americans;
and the treachery of an official in the garrison office at Jamaica
enabled them to receive positive information as to the aim and
destination of the expedition. This official communicated the
intelligence to an American trader residing in Kingston, and the latter
at once sailed in a coasting schooner for Pensacola; where General
Jackson, who commanded the United States army of the South, was on the
point of marching to the relief of St. Mary's, then being attacked by a
naval force under Rear-Admiral Cockburn. The American general, upon
learning of the proposed expedition, at once marched to the Mississippi,
concentrated a force of 13,000 men in and around New Orleans, and threw
up works on either side of the river to defend the passage in the
neighbourhood of the town.

On the 26th of November, 1814, the British fleet, u