lves that they would never surrender until the ramparts were
demolished over their heads and no more than a corporal's guard
survived. This was Andrew Jackson's way.

Four British ships, with a total strength of seventy-eight guns, sailed
into Mobile Bay on the 15th of September and formed in line of battle,
easily confident of smashing Fort Bowyer with its twenty guns, while the
landing force of marines and Indians took position behind the sand dunes
and awaited the signal. The affair lasted no more than an hour. The
American gunnery overwhelmed the British squadron. The _Hermes_
sloop-of-war was forced to cut her cable and drifted under a raking fire
until she ran aground and was blown up. The _Sophie_ withdrew after
losing many of her seamen, and the two other ships followed her to sea
after delaying to pick up the marines and Indians who merely looked on.
Daybreak saw the squadron spreading topsails to return to Pensacola.

Andrew Jackson was eager to return the compliment but, not having troops
enough at hand to march on Pensacola, he had to wait and fret until his
force was increased to four thousand men. Then he hurled them at the
objective with an energy that was fairly astounding. On the 3d of
November he left Mobile and three days later was demanding the surrender
of Pensacola. The next morning he carried the town by storm, waited
another day until the British had evacuated and blown up Fort Barrancas,
six miles below the city, and then returned to Mobile. Sickness laid him
low but, enfeebled as he was, he made the journey to New Orleans by easy
stages and took command of such American troops as he could hastily
assemble to ward off the mightiest assault launched by Great Britain
during the War of 1812. It was known, and the warning had been repeated
from Washington, that the enemy intended sending a formidable expedition
against Louisiana, but when Jackson arrived early in December the
Legislature had voted no money, raised no regiments, devised no plan of
defense, and was unprepared to make any resistance whatever.

A British fleet of about fifty sail, carrying perhaps a thousand guns,
had gathered for the task in hand. The decks were crowded with trained
and toughened troops, the divisions which had scattered the Americans at
Bladensburg with a volley and a shout, kilted Highlanders, famous
regiments which had earned the praise of the Iron Duke in the Spanish
Peninsula, and brawny negro detachments recruit