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In this compelling episode, retired Colonel Bill Rutledge takes us back to the War of 1812 and the Battle of New Orleans. Discover how Andrew Jackson’s strategic brilliance and local alliances with figures like pirate Jean Lafitte led to a startling American victory against the seasoned British forces. This narrative not only highlights military strategies but also explores the cultural dynamics of early 19th-century America.
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World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War, Afghanistan, and our other wars and conflicts. America’s fighting men and women strapped on their boots and picked up their guns to fight tyranny and stand for liberty. We must never forget them. Welcome to America’s veteran stories with Kim Munson. These stories will touch your heart, inspire you and give you courage. We stand on the shoulders of giants. Here’s Kim Munson.
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And welcome to America’s Veterans Stories with Kim Munson. Be sure and check out the website. That is AmericasVeteransStories.com. And the show comes to you because of a trip that I took in 2016 with a group that accompanied four D-Day veterans to Normandy, France, for the 72nd anniversary of the D-Day landings. And returned home realizing that we need to know the stories of our veterans, of our military, of our history. Hence, America’s Veterans Stories was born. I am so thrilled to have on the line with me Colonel Bill Rutledge, retired United States Air Force. He’s 95 years young, and he has traveled the world. And he is one of the most intellectually curious people that I have ever met. And he shares so much of what he knows with me, with you. And and he’ll come up with some different suggestions. For example, last year, right before the Heisman Trophy was awarded in early December, he said, Kim, we should do a show about John Heisman. And he was a remarkable man. So we did. And people have said they so enjoyed that. And so he’s had different subjects that he said, you know, this might be good for a show. And the most recent one is the Battle of 1812. And either I wasn’t paying attention in history class or I wasn’t being taught this. But he said that Andrew Jackson was absolutely pivotal regarding our American history. So we decided during Christmas week we were doing special long version shows for the Kim Munson show. So we did part one of the Battle of 1812, and that was broadcast on December 26th. And now we’re going to do part two with Colonel Bill Rutledge. Colonel Rutledge, welcome to the show.
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Good morning, Kim.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, it is great to have you, and we are recording this and we’ll broadcast this weekend. But for those that may not have heard the interview on December 26th, could you give us a bit of a recap on what we talked about?
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Yes. One of the reasons that you hadn’t heard much about the battle, nor had I, was that When we were in high school and college and we studied about the War of 1812, we talked about some of the incidents about how they came and burned the Capitol and the White House in Washington and how we had a battle for Baltimore. And Francis Scott Key was a captive of the British aboard ship, and he wrote the Star-Spangled Banner the next day. based upon what he’d observed. So we heard things like that, and then we heard that the treaty with England to end the war had actually happened on Christmas Eve in Ghent, Belgium, in 1814, and therefore that the Battle of New Orleans was really irrelevant because it didn’t happen until 1815. But as I started learning more about it, I realized that we’d been misinformed because it was only people who were negotiating who signed on Christmas Eve in Ghent. But the peace treaty had not been approved by Parliament or by our Senate. And so consequently, the British were continuing in their pursuit of getting control of the whole Mississippi Valley by force. conquering the forces in New Orleans, in occupying New Orleans. So we, like most Americans who love American history, were never exposed to the details. I became very interested in it because of a pure coincidence. When I was a young lieutenant, I was on a military court-martial quite often, and I met a young lieutenant who was a JAG officer, and he had finished law school and was serving two years in the Air Force. And he came into the courtroom and introduced himself. And I asked him who he was, and he said, my name is John Lafitte. Well, I knew enough about American history that John Lafitte was in charge. He was a head man for the pirates. who were in the area of New Orleans. And so that made me get curious. And I started reading more about Jean Lafitte. But then it made me realize the big issue was a battle, and we had never read much about it. So I became very, very interested in it and started going to the libraries. And I found this one book. It’s called The Battle of New Orleans. And it’s written by a gentleman called Robert R-E-M-I-N-I, Romania, I presume. And it is exceptional. It tells so much about what transpired. And last week we talked about the preface up until the time of the battle. So I’d like to start with the arrival of Jackson in New Orleans and then as the British started arriving also. so we can see the transition. Now, Jackson arrived in New Orleans on or about the 1st of December, 1814. He had learned through some brief intelligence that the British were assembling a large force in Jamaica, and from every indication he had had, that they were probably going to go into New Orleans so they could gain control of the whole Mississippi Valley, and perhaps acquire a lot more of the land they had lost in the Revolutionary War. So this is sort of what was going on. Now, the British actually landed south of New Orleans on or about the 16th of December, Jackson didn’t know of their presence because it was many miles away, and it was on the other side of a swamp and a lake, and there was nobody living down there. So it wasn’t until the 23rd that one of the people who had lived on one of the plantations south of New Orleans, he had been captured by the British, and he escaped. He actually jumped out of a second-story window and started running because he wanted to get to Jackson and let him know what happened. By some miracle, he was able to get through the bush and get up the peninsula. It took him many hours, but he finally got to Jackson sort of midday on the 23rd and said, the British are coming up. the peninsula, they’re only maybe 15 miles at the most south of us, and Jackson immediately took action. And this is what’s so different about Jackson. He decided to attack, and his purpose was to attack them as a surprise element to stop their progress so that he could prepare a defense line in preparation for the whole assault that the British were planning.
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So how many British soldiers were there, Colonel Rutledge?
SPEAKER 02 :
Their whole group, counting the naval assembly down south of there and the ones that were landing, the large number was close to 20,000. But the actual soldiers who had had combat experience and had helped defeat Napoleon in Europe. There were about 4,000. Their estimates were 4,000 to 6,000 were landed and were moving up. Now, that doesn’t mean that these were all fighters. Some of those were support people. But the people who were going to come forward on their main attack numbered somewhere between 2,000 and 3,000.
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But these were soldiers that had, as you said, they had fought Napoleon, they’d been victorious. I mean, they had a lot of battle experience, didn’t they?
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Well, they had, and they were accustomed to fighting the protocol of a battle in Europe where they would fight with a procedure. And Jackson and the people that he had were countrymen who lived out in the woods in Tennessee and Kentucky and west of the Appalachians. And they were individual hunters, but they were very good shots. And another thing that happened to enhance Jackson’s force was— the presence of Jean Lafitte and his pirates. Now, we call them pirates, but they actually were commissioned by some foreign country to go out and capture ships and cargo. They weren’t out for the regular traditional capture of ships and treasury and things, as we think of pirates. Actually, Lafitte had been approached by the British in August of 1814, and they wanted to get him and some of the Indian tribes in that area to be allies with the British when they made their land attack. Lafitte, his heritage, of course, was French, But he felt American, and he thought over the proposal that the British made, which was very, it could have been very great for him and his pirates. They would have gotten a fortune. But he put them off for several weeks until the British finally realized that he was not going to assist them. But when Jackson got there, Lafitte went directly to Jackson and told him, I’ve got enough ammunition to cover 30,000 soldiers. Now this is a staggering amount of ammunition and weapons. And he said, furthermore, my gun crews are the most experienced and probably the best shots in this part of the world. Jackson at first did not want to take their assistance, but the mayor and the governor finally persuaded him that it would be a wise thing to do because Lafitte was dependable and he could produce what he said. And Jackson, as he reviewed his supplies, he realized he was short on ammunition, he was short on Cannon balls and other things would go in. He even could use a few more cannon. So he acquiesced and said, all right, we’ll do this. That was one of the best decisions. in American military history.
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So let’s stop right there, Colonel Rutledge, and go to break here in just a moment. We’re going to continue the discussion regarding the Battle of New Orleans. This show comes to you because of great sponsors. One of those is Hooters Restaurants, and they have five locations, Loveland, Aurora, Lone Tree, Westminster, and Colorado Springs. It’s a very interesting story, how I got to know them. It’s a story about freedom and free markets and capitalism and politicians, bureaucrats, and interested parties, those PBIs. But a great place to get together to watch all the playoff games, and they do have specials for lunch Monday through Friday, and Wednesday is their Wings Day special. So, again, that is Hooters Restaurants. We will be right back with Colonel Bill Rutledge.
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All of Kim’s sponsors are an inclusive partnership with Kim and are not affiliated with or in partnership with KLZ or Crawford Broadcasting. If you would like to support the work of The Kim Munson Show and grow your business, contact Kim at her website, kimmunson.com. That’s kimmunson, M-O-N-S-O-N dot com.
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And welcome back to America’s Veteran Stories with Kim Munson. Be sure and check out our website. That is AmericasVeteranStories.com. And on the line with me is Colonel Bill Rutledge, retired United States Air Force. He is 95 years young. And as I mentioned in the first segment, he is one of the most intellectually curious people that I have ever met in my life. He’s traveled the world, so interested in people and their stories. And he is sharing that with me, with you. And we’re talking about the Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812. And Colonel Rutledge, you were talking about Jean Lafitte. And I do find it interesting that Lafitte, even though he was offered a tremendous amount of money by the British, He didn’t take it because you said that he felt American. I find that such an important point that people need to understand.
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Well, it was difficult to understand anyway because the role of the pirates or privateers, as they call themselves, was to enhance their group. But he also… He didn’t like the British. He wasn’t as bad and as strong in his feelings as Andrew Jackson was. Jackson hated the British, period, because of his experiences during the American Revolution when he was a young man. But I think I need to start moving the calendar forward. Jackson arrived in New Orleans in early December. And he found that he had just a conglomerate of interests, of cultures, of languages. There was French, there was Spanish, there was English, as far as languages spoken and cultures. There were many, many hundreds of freed slaves who had their own citizenship. There were, of course… thousands of slaves in the Mississippi Delta area. So he decided the only way he could control anything was martial law. So he established martial law on or about the 15th of December. And it’s interesting that coincidentally, about the time he was doing that, the British were landing on the South Peninsula and nobody knew about it. And So, as I mentioned just a few moments ago, Jackson, when he learned on the 23rd that the British were moving north, he took the initiative of attack. So he took the element of surprise, and when he hit the British, there was another element of war that was affected here, and that is concentrator forces. And the British… They were divided. Their forces, they’d only moved forward maybe a thousand because it was very difficult to get through the swamps and to get on good dry land and to establish their camp from which they would have the base for going forward in the battle. And the actual commander of the army had not yet arrived to put the army together. So it was one of the brigadiers who was there, and so he was in charge of approximately 1,000 troops when Jackson attacked on the 23rd. Now, Jackson’s purpose was only to deter them right then so that he could back up and build barricades to protect New Orleans and protect them from the British Army when they made their frontal attack. So on the 23rd after he took the attack, then he and his forces moved back about a mile from the point of engagement. Well, the British also moved back to where their camp was. So there was no action much going on then. But the British commander arrived two days later. On the 25th, the British commander arrived, and he said, He decided he would have to get his forces together, and then he would take a preliminary assault against Jackson’s line to find out where his strong points were, where the weak points. So by the 28th, the new commander had been there now for three days. He had assembled his forces, and he was going to do probing along Jackson’s defensive lines. In the interim, Jackson had been taking all of his troops and any volunteers he could get for the city to go out and dig a huge ditch that went many hundreds of yards from the riverbank all the way over to the swamp. And as he dug the ditch, then they would throw all the mud up and make a barricade that ended up being as high as eight feet high and as thick as they could make it with all of that mud. And this was going to be like a fortress wall, and this was going to be his first line of defense against a frontal attack. Because he was not sure about whether they could hold, he went back another mile closer to New Orleans, had built a second barrier. And behind the second barrier, then he would hold his reserves. So these were all preparations that were transpiring from the 23rd until the 28th. On the 28th, the British made their probe. So they sent out some skirmishers, and they checked all along the lines. to try to find out where his cans were concentrated, how high the walls were, and whether or not they could be flanked over in the swampy area. They knew they couldn’t go around the river because Jackson had built his barricade all the way to the riverbank. But over in the swampy area, there was a chance that they could, flank and turn the corner there and get behind the American lines. So this was all at preparation. So the 28th, they came out, and now they had all their forces, but they just sent people out in smaller groups to test everything. Once they had done that, then they backed up, and they waited, and they were preparing for their big frontal attack. And Jackson, meanwhile, had another several days. So from the 28th, while they’re preparing, the British commander then decided on New Year’s Day that he would do an attack not with his infantry, but he would use his artillery, his cannons, to test out the defensive walls, and also to see where Jackson’s artillery batteries were located and see if he could destroy them. So this was the next action that actually occurred, and it was on New Year’s Day, 1815. First thing in the morning, the British started shooting. And they had all their cannons going. And after maybe an hour or so, the Americans started counter with their own artillery. So this lasted for a number of hours, from early after sunrise in the morning until afternoon in the early afternoon. There was cannon fire on both sides. And their targets primarily were… on the part of the British to test the walls but also to try to do damage to Jackson’s artillery at the end of the day when they looked it over it turned out that Jackson’s artillery was better than the British because most of the cannon crews were pirates and they had had more experience plus Jackson had knowing the terrain better, had built wooden platforms under where his cannons were to support them on the ground, which was very low and very marshy. And the British, in some cases, had not done so. But the key thing was that the gunners and their skill were such that even the British were shocked. because as they look after action, they found that several of their batteries had been either destroyed completely or damaged, and they wanted to relocate some of them. And damage to the Americans was almost none because of the skill of the artillery. Now, one of the very important factors, too, was that Jackson had personally located every single one, and he had eight batteries stretching from the Mississippi all the way east to the swamp. And he looked at every angle, and he also had his batteries at a higher elevation than the British. Not very much higher, but it was higher enough to give him an advantage so that when you’re shooting a cannon down, you can be more direct than when you have to shoot uphill and you have to arch your shots. So the first tended to be a standoff, but overall it was a gain on the part of the American capability to use their cannons.
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Boy, that is absolutely fascinating. And I know that we only have a certain amount of time, but how did Jackson become, how did he know this? Was it experience or just people kind of, they’re born with it? How did he know this?
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One of the things that’s amazing about Jackson is that he had never before had occasion to concentrate his forces against experienced fighters. He had grown up fighting out of the bush, and he had had a lot of contacts in fights with Indians, all various tribes. He had a huge fight with the Creek Indians in southern Alabama and southern Georgia the summer of 1814. But he’d never engaged in organized arming like that before, and he certainly never concentrated artillery. So it’s amazing to think of the ingenuity that he had. I mean, the closest parallel I could find in my reading was Patton in World War II. Patton was a guy who led from the front, who did a great job on motivating his men and, in general, using a lot of his ingenuity in countering and reversing a really bad situation in North Africa in the fall of 1942 and early in 1943. And he was the closest general I could spot compared to Jackson. But Jackson was unique. It was almost one of those God-given situations where he was the right man at the right place at the right time.
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Boy, that is absolutely fascinating. I’m talking with Colonel Bill Rutledge, retired United States Air Force. We’re talking about the Battle of New Orleans during the War of 1812. I did want to mention the U.S. MC Memorial Foundation. Paula Sarles is the president of the foundation and her team. are working diligently to raise the money for the remodel of the Marine Memorial, official Marine Memorial, right here in our state, out in Golden at 6th and Colfax. And a great gift would be to honor your loved one’s military service by buying a brick that will be on one of the pathways of service. But you can get all the information and see what they’re going to do by going to usmcmemorialfoundation.org. That is usmcmemorialfoundation.org. We will be right back with Colonel Bill Rutledge.
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God bless us. Land that I love.
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And welcome to America’s Veterans Stories with Kim Munson. Be sure and check out our website. That is AmericasVeteransStories.com. I am on the edge of my seat regarding the Battle of New Orleans, which was fought during the War of 1812. It was fought early in 1815. So, Colonel Rutledge, you’ve got this set up for us, the British Empire. We had kind of the first battle, and it was almost a standoff. However, if you really looked at it, it was probably somewhat of a pyrrhic victory for Jackson. So what happens after that?
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Well, first of all, the Battle of New Orleans, like many protracted battles, actually extended over almost a month. Now, the first contact was on the 23rd of December. 1814, followed by the 28th, in which the British probed to try to determine the strength or weaknesses of Jackson’s defense. And then on the 1st of January, 1815, extensive battle with cannon on both sides. But the big battle was all getting ready for the 8th of January. Now, it was coordinated because… The commander of the British Army actually was subordinate to an Admiral Cochran, who had been appointed for the whole responsibility for the whole war in America. So they coordinated their actions, and that the Admiral, between the 8th and the 9th, was going to move some of his ships up the Mississippi to try to be in support of and hopefully to break through and go north. They were 80 miles south of New Orleans. Also, on the night of the 7th, the British used some flatboats and moved several battalions of soldiers over the Mississippi after dark and also some artillery to the west side of the river. This was also a strategic position, but it was not the critical one. The critical one was going to be a frontal attack going straight up the peninsula against Jackson’s army. So the morning of the 8th was cold and foggy. And if you’ve ever been in a deep fog down along a river or on the oceans, you’ll know that you’ve seen nothing. You can hardly see 20, 30 feet in front of yourself. So as the sun rose that morning, the American defensive soldiers were behind the barricade. The guns were all manned. They had all anticipated battle on the 8th. And so the thick fog was there and started burning off. And so they’d assembled in… I planned to make an attack around 7, but it was so foggy they couldn’t even see. So it was closer to 8 when it started thinning out so you could see the assembled forces. And as the Americans were looking over their barricade, they could see this confrontation of the British soldiers. And it’s very much like a picture, a motion picture, where you see thousands of soldiers in their various uniforms, and most of them, of course, were the red coats, which was distinguishing characteristics. But there were also some Scotch soldiers there, Highlanders, who wore kilts as well as red jackets. And then they were all assembled in order, in ranks, and with their rifles attached. Except they had muskets. I shouldn’t call them rifles. And they had their bayonets. And with the light and everything shining on them. And then each unit had their flags. So the flags were flying in the breeze. And they had young boys who were playing their drums. And then they also had one young man who was key to a lot of the command, who was a bigler. And so this is what the Americans looked at, and it was massive, and they had never seen anything like it before. The British were very confident that they would be able to go and scale the walls and go in and capture New Orleans. Part of their plan was one whole group, a brigade, no, it was a regiment, It was called the 44th, and it was mostly from Ireland, commanded by a British officer. And they were to run forward with ladders to help scale the walls. So consequently, they were supposed to be in front of one of the three brigades. They didn’t get there on time. So the commander kept waiting for him, and then he finally just got nervous and said, we’re going to go. So they started their action by rockets. So when the rockets went off, this was to let the unit know it’s time to advance. They were advancing in three columns, but then they tended towards converging into one massive column. in the middle of the front. And so as they started forward, they were still looking for the 44th to show up. They finally started moving, but unfortunately, the front lines had already gotten close enough to the Americans that the Americans had been holding back their fire until the British were about 300 yards out. And then all of a sudden, the cannons, all of the American cannons went off, and they were using shrapnel canisters and small cannonballs and things. And it was devastating. And then the American infantry, at the range when they got to 200 yards, that’s when they started using their muskets and their rifles. And the British didn’t have the rifles. The Americans didn’t. especially the ones from Tennessee, had these long rifles that were much more accurate and could fire straighter, and these guys were hunters. So they didn’t shoot just into a group. They would aim and shoot for an individual. So the firepower was devastating. Within an hour, really less than an hour, was it clear that The British would not be able to breach the walls. And not only that, it was a killing field. It was devastating. And many of the British troops, in order to survive, they just fell on the ground. They made out like they were wounded. Of course, many were wounded. But the firing was devastating. And within… an hour or so, then the fellows with the rifles, especially, were aiming at the leaders. This is traditional anyhow. So they killed three generals. In other words, each of the brigades, their commanding officers were killed. All the field-grade officers were down. The field-grade officers were majors, lieutenant colonels, and colonels. There was not, after an hour, there was not a single British officer over the rank of captain or lieutenant that was still standing on the field. And the soldiers began to retreat, run just to get out of the firepower. And some of those who were up close to the wall just fell into these trenches, hoping that they’d be safe therein. So within an hour or so, everything had turned. And by two hours, you looked out on the field, and it was nothing but wall-to-wall red. And this wasn’t just blood. It was the redcoats. And the casualties were so staggering that, like one of the people said, you could walk around. 100 yards straight out from your barricade and not even put your foot on the ground because there’s so many soldiers that you’re going to have to step on. Now, many of the people were wounded, but a lot were killed. The after-action report that afternoon, after it was all over, the British had lost between 2,000 and 2,200 killed, wounded, or captured people. Andrew Jackson had lost less than a dozen. It was just an unbelievable, staggering battle. Now, while this was going on, on the west side of the Mississippi, the British had a smaller force than we did, but the British had a better leader, and they broke through the Americans on the west side of the Mississippi. And they actually progressed closer to New Orleans than the main battlefield. What happened was that after the main battle on the east side turned so bad for the British, they were fearful that their people on the west side of the bank would be cut off. So they were told to withdraw. So very good luck for the Americans. The British started drawing back on the west side. And then they went back across the river and joined those people who’d already been badly bashed during the first part of the war. I mean, during the first part of the battle. So that day, the 8th was the key to the whole battle.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay. As a military man, do you think that was a wise decision, even though the British had broken through to pull them back? Or what do you think?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, it was one of those things of necessity. They had to pull them back because if they had been extended too far north, then Jackson could send more of his troops over on the other side and confront them and probably capture them because they were out of position and they didn’t have enough backup on the west side. They had a better commander who was so He was very offensive-minded, and actually he was outnumbered. But he united his people, had them put those bayonets on and charged, and they scared the Kentucky militia. The Kentucky soldiers who were over there assembled so badly that they broke and ran. So the Kentucky militia was… Although it was numerically larger, they did not have the fighting experience that the British had that were attacking them. That’s why the British made such great advances on the west side of the Mississippi. They were still several miles south of New Orleans, but they were many, many yards further advanced than the barricade on the east side of the Mississippi.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay, let’s stop right there. I’m talking with Colonel Bill Rutledge regarding the Battle of New Orleans, which was the main battle was fought on January 8, 1815, and this was during the battle with the British in the War of 1812. I did want to mention the Center for American Values, which is located in Pueblo, Colorado. Pueblo is known as the home of heroes because there are four Medal of Honor recipients that grew up in Pueblo, Colorado. Andrew Dix, who’s one of those Medal of Honor recipients, and Brad Padula, who is an Emmy Award-winning documentary maker. They decided that they wanted to honor our Medal of Honor recipients. We need to keep these stories alive and then also create educational programs that we will continue to instill in ourselves and our children these values of honor, integrity, and patriotism. So to get more information, go to AmericanValueCenter.org. That’s AmericanValueCenter.org. And we will be right back with Colonel Bill Rutledge.
SPEAKER 09 :
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SPEAKER 05 :
From the mountains to the prairies,
SPEAKER 08 :
And welcome back to America’s Veterans Stories with Kim Munson. Be sure and check out our website. That is AmericasVeteranStories.com. We’re talking with Colonel Bill Rutledge, retired United States Air Force, regarding the Battle of New Orleans during the War of 1812 with the British. And it is amazing. I mean, it’s staggering that you would say that the casualties were 2,000 to 2,500 for the British and around a dozen for the Americans. I mean, that is absolutely remarkable. So what happens after the shooting stops, Colonel Rutledge?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, on the afternoon of the 8th, there was a general ceasefire. And the ceasefire was so that both sides… could go and get their wounded and take them back for treatment on both sides. When the Americans were so successful, though, that morning, there were many of the Americans that wanted to pursue the British as they retreated. But Jackson very wisely would not let them pursue, period. He did not want to endanger them. on a killing field when they were all protected behind the barricade. But they did have an understanding with the British that they would both go out peacefully, no more firing, and remove their wounded and take them back for treatment. Now, many of the British, actually, who had surrendered or were wounded were so close to the American side that they were taken into New Orleans for treatment and they were treated very well. New Orleans concentrated all of their help and many homes were turned over to be used for like aid stations for British soldiers because we didn’t have anybody wounded hardly. So the whole city of New Orleans was almost like a big hospital taking care of British soldiers. So this was a very important part of the overall actions from that day. But they’re attacked and blunted. Now, there are a few interesting satellites. It was a tactic in the procedure, and it went not only during that time, all the way up through the Civil War, that most of your drummers and buglers were teenage boys, some of them very young. And there were some cases. as young as 10 years of age. And when the battle had ceased, the firing, the British had a bugler, and he had climbed up a tree, maybe 100 yards or so, from the American defensive position, and he’d been blowing his bugle. So nobody wanted to shoot him, but when all the battle was over, They went out and got him down from the tree and took him into the American sides. And all the Americans were applauding him and commending him for staying on at his battle location throughout all the shooting. And, of course, this is, again, a procedure that was followed with drummer boys. You never consciously would wound one of these really children. So this was one of those side effects. Now, by the late afternoon, everything had been gone back to their own areas. Americans stayed behind their barricades, and the British did. But meanwhile, way south, the British Navy tried to come up the river, and there was a fort that had been built by the French, and it was called Fort St. Louis, and it was 80 miles south, and it was built on the west bank of the Mississippi. It was on some dry, elevated ground, and it was approachable by part of the Mississippi, but the approach area was very shallow. So the British ships that wanted to attack it They couldn’t get their guns in close enough. They were over two miles away from the fortress. The fortress had been strengthened. Andrew Jackson, after he got to New Orleans, one of the first things he did was go down there and examine the fort, improve some of the fortification defenses, put more people there, bring more artillery pieces down to make it to a point where that the British could not get by there to go up the river. The British tried by using shallow boats and things, but they weren’t capable of getting it done. But they stuck to it and tried for many days. And it turned out that after an additional week of trying, trying to get to the fortress, the British finally gave up. So the Battle of New Orleans actually took almost three weeks, as you extend it back, before the British finally decided, we’re not going to make it. It’s just not going to happen. So by that time, they’d had time to pull back their wounded, their soldiers, their logistics support, which was terrible. And so many of the British soldiers, they were almost starving. They hadn’t had enough food for a long, long time. So they were just so elated, the soldiers, the real fighters, to get out of that area. One of the ironies is that the British were so confident that they were going to capture New Orleans and they were going to destroy it. that actually many of the senior officers’ wives had come aboard the ships from England because they were going to New Orleans because they understood that New Orleans was a great shopping area. And not only did they not get there, but most of them lost their husbands in combat.
SPEAKER 08 :
Wow. What a story. So we’ve got just a few minutes left. How should we button this up, Colonel Rutledge?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, the important factor was that the treaty that had been signed again on the 24th of December had to be ratified, and it wasn’t ratified. So… New Orleans mayor and the governor, after the battle, they wanted Jackson to stop having martial law. And he said, no. He said, I’m not doing that. We’re going to control it. Nobody else is going to enter or leave New Orleans without my permission. We still must be prepared for a counterattack at some times by the British. And he said, we will not leave here until I say something in writing And that took almost two months, because what happened, communications were so bad, that the people in the East did not know what had happened in New Orleans for about a month. The Americans on the East Coast were very depressed. Some of the New England states had actually met in Hartford, Connecticut, to consider seriously withdrawing the states to secede from the Union. It was that depressing. And then once the word reached the East Coast, everything changed. The whole country became optimistic. Jackson became a national hero. And then when Jackson finally saw a signed document from the U.S. Senate and by the President, saying that the war is over. Then he said, okay, we will stop having martial law. And then he went back east. He didn’t get back there for a couple of months, but he was a national hero, and he deserved it because there was no other leader in that era with his military expertise and self-confidence, to use men with no official military training and defeat the best army in the world. So these are sort of the after effects. And, of course, his great success led to his being so popular, which in turn meant that eventually he became the president for two terms, in the 1820s and 1830s. Boy, I find this just absolutely…
SPEAKER 08 :
you know, remarkable. And I see so many parallels between the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. And so not once, but twice, these Americans actually defeated the most powerful force in the world. And I think that we can take a lot of A lot of inspiration from that because as Americans, that DNA runs through our blood as well. So this has just been a great interview, Colonel Rutledge. I so greatly appreciate you sharing this, researching this. Thank you so much.
SPEAKER 02 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 08 :
My friends, indeed, it is so important to know these stories, and we do stand on the shoulders of giants. So God bless you, and God bless America.
SPEAKER 05 :
Thank you for listening to America’s Veteran Stories with Kim Munson. Be sure to tune in again next Sunday, 3 to 4 p.m. here on KLZ 560 and KLZ 100.7.
SPEAKER 01 :
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