ce of the
second division, while the British left was contending with the
American right. Johnson's corps consisted of nine hundred men, and the
five brigades under governor Shelby amounted to near eighteen hundred,
in all, not exceeding two thousand seven hundred men.

In the midst of these arrangements, and just as the order was about to
be given to the front line to advance, at the head of which general
Harrison had placed himself with his staff, colonel Wood approached him
with intelligence, that having reconnoitered the enemy, he had
ascertained the singular fact, that the British lines, instead of the
usual close order, were drawn up at _open order_. This fact at once
induced general Harrison to adopt the novel expedient of charging the
British lines with Johnson's mounted regiment. "I was within a few feet
of him," says the gallant colonel John O'Fallon, "when the report of
colonel Wood was made, and he instantly remarked, that he would make a
novel movement by ordering colonel Johnson's mounted regiment to charge
the British line of regulars, which, thus drawn up, contrary to the
habits and usages of that description of troops, always accustomed to
_the touch_, could be easily penetrated and thrown into confusion, by a
spirited charge of colonel Johnson's regiment." This determination was
presently made known to the colonel, who was directed to draw up his
regiment in close column, with its right fifty yards from the
road--that it might be partially protected by the trees from the
artillery--its left upon the swamp, and to charge at full speed upon
the enemy.

At this juncture, general Harrison, with his aids-de-camp, attended
likewise by general Cass and commodore Perry, advanced from the right
of the front line of infantry, to the right of the front column of
mounted troops, led by colonel James Johnson. The general, personally,
gave the direction for the charge to be made. "When the right battalion
of the mounted men received the first fire of the British, the horses
in the front column recoiled; another fire was given by the enemy, but
our column getting in motion, broke through the enemy with irresistible
force. In one minute the contest was over. The British officers seeing
no prospect of reducing their disordered ranks to order, and seeing the
advance of the infantry, and our mounted men wheeling upon them and
pouring in a destructive fire, immediately surrendered."[A]

[Footnote A: Official Despatch.]