his
men to rebel, and his provisions to fail, until acorns were saved and
eaten. The United States could not much longer fight the British and
the Indians together. Let the Creeks not give up.

The Horseshoe was rightly named, for a sharp curve of the Tallapoosa
River enclosed about one hundred acres of brushy, timbered bluffs and
low-land, very thick to the foot. The entrance to the neck was only
three hundred yards wide. On the three other sides the river flowed
deep.

Menewa was the field commander of the Red Sticks, at this place. He
showed a great head--he was half white and half red, but all Creek in
education. Across the neck, at its narrowest point he had a barricade
of logs erected, from river bank to river bank.

The barricade, of three to five logs piled eight feet high and filled
with earth and rock, was pierced with a double row of port-holes: one
row for the kneeling warriors, and one for the standing warriors. The
barricade was built in zigzags, along a concave curve, so that
attackers would be cut down by shots from two sides as well as from in
front. By reason of the zig-zags it could not be raked from either end.

All around the high ground back of the barricade, trees were laid, and
brush arranged so that the warriors might, if driven, pass back from
covert to covert, until they reached the huts of the women and children
and old men, at the river, behind. Here a hundred canoes were drawn
up, on the bank, in readiness.

But the Red Sticks of Chief Menewa had no thought of flight. They were
one thousand. Their prophets had assured them over and over that the
medicine of the Creek nation was strong, at last; that the Great Spirit
was fighting for them; that the bullets of the Americans would have no
effect, and that the Americans themselves would die before the
barricade was reached. The cloud would come and help the Creeks, with
hail--hail like hominy mortars!

On March 24 "Old Mad Jackson," just appointed by President Madison to
be major-general in the United States army, set out against
"Crazy-war-hunter" Menewa at Tohopeka.

The way was difficult, through dense timber, swamps and cane-brakes.
Alabama, in these days, had been only thinly settled by white people.

He had three thousand men: a part of the 39th U. S. Infantry, a
thousand Tennessee militia, six hundred friendly Creeks and Cherokees.
He had two cannon: a six-pounder and a three-pounder.

His chief assistant was Gener