1812: The Rivers of War (51 page)

As he was led toward General Jackson’s headquarters in New Orleans, Sam Houston found himself fighting the urge to laugh. Jackson had set himself up in the Cabildo, the former Spanish colonial administration center that fronted on the city’s main square. The Cabildo was a huge building, and they were still, he guessed, a corridor or two away from Jackson’s office. And …

He could already hear the general hollering.

“
Be damned to your poltroon concerns, sir! Those men have volunteered to fight the enemy, and so they shall! D’you think I care about your tender sensibilities?”

Mumble, mumble. That would be the voice—voices it sounded like—of whoever was coming under the lash of Jackson’s fury.

Sam could practically see the sneer on the general’s face that so obviously came with the next holler.

“
And where are your volunteers, sir? You—damn all rich men!—who tell me you cannot serve in your country’s colors because you have to remain on your plantations to keep your slaves in order. But—but!—insist that I cannot put arms into the hands of freemen of color who are willing to step forward bravely and serve their country. And why? Because they might inspire insurrectionary thoughts in the same slaves who keep you paralyzed! Was ever such a monstrous logic advanced in the supposed service of a republic?”

Mumble, mumble—cut very short, this time.

“
Get out! GET… OUT. Now, sir. And take the rest of these wretched traitors with you! GET OUT!”

Sam took the arm of the nervous officer who was leading him and Driscol, and drew the man to the side of the corridor. Major Driscol quickly followed suit. A moment later, a dozen men came pouring past. They weren’t quite stampeding.

“He’s a brute!” Sam heard one of them hiss to another. “Just as we were warned!”

After they were past, the young lieutenant shot Sam an apologetic look. “The general’s been in a picklish mood these past few days. Ever since the ruckus started after he accepted Governor Claiborne’s proposal to allow the free men of color—that’s what they call some of the niggers down here, sir—to go ahead and form the two battalions they offered to set up.”

Dubiously, he added: “Can’t say I think much of the idea myself. The plantation owners are up in arms about it all over Louisiana.”

“Why?” Sam asked. “If I’ve got this right, no one’s proposing to arm any slaves.”

The lieutenant shook his head. “Still. The niggers will get ideas.”

Sam marveled at the stupidity of the lieutenant’s statement. As if slaves needed to “get ideas.” Hadn’t the young idiot ever heard of the great rebellion in Santo Domingo? Or the dozens of much smaller slave insurrections that had taken place across North America, over the past century or so?

“Has it ever occurred to you, Lieutenant, that the ‘idea’ of rebellion is instilled in a man the moment you put him in chains? It doesn’t really take anything more than that, you know—although, to be sure, whipping him on a regular basis will speed the process marvelously.”

The youngster gaped up at him.

Doesn’t understand a word.

Oh, well. Perhaps the practical aspect of it…

“Leaving that aside, if I understand you correctly, you feel we should allow the British to defeat us today—they will take the slaves themselves, you know—lest victory take them from us on the morrow. That is the logic of the plantation owners, yes?”

The youngster was still gaping.

Not a word. I might as well be citing the Iliad to him, in the original Greek.

Oh, well.

Best to remind him of the most practical side of all.

“As it happens, General Andrew Jackson is in command here. Not you, and certainly not a passel of plantation owners who refuse to fight. And as I recall, he instructed you to bring me to him. Yes?”

Sam gave him a friendly smile and made a shooing motion with his hands. “Best we be about it then, eh? The general tends to get riled when his orders aren’t followed. If you hadn’t noticed.”

The lieutenant literally jumped. Two inches off the floor, by Sam’s estimate. “This way, sir!”

Whatever residual fury Jackson might have been harboring vanished the instant he saw Houston and Driscol.

“Sam!” he exclaimed, rising from his desk and coming around to greet him, hand outstretched. “I was beginning to worry that you might not get here before the fighting started. You blasted dawdler!”

But the words were said with a grin, and the vigor of Jackson’s handshake matched the expression on his face.

“We had a long ways to come, General,” Sam pointed out mildly.

“So you did. And how many did you bring with you?”

Sam ran through a quick sketch of the forces that had marched into New Orleans with him that morning.

“No Cherokees?” Jackson asked, frowning.

“They’ll be coming along presently, sir. Captain Ross and Major Ridge, at least—but John told me he thought Major Ridge would be able to convince some two hundred of his tribesmen to volunteer. I expect them within a day or two.”

“Two hundred …” Jackson mused, his eyes a little unfocused as his head turned toward the nearest window. “Well, I can use them. I’ve got some Choctaws, but not many. And—well, come here, Sam, I’ll show you.”

Houston followed the general, with Driscol in tow. Once they got to the window, Jackson leaned over the sill and pointed to the southwest. The line of his finger passed over the Spanishstyle
buildings that fronted the main square, aimed at the countryside beyond. Sam could see a stretch of the Mississippi to his right, but most of what Jackson was pointing to just looked like a mass of luxuriant vegetation. Cypress swamps, mainly, with the more regular patterns of sugar or indigo plantations close to the river.

“Ever seen this country?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, except for a narrow stretch of plantations along the bank, it’s almost all swamps and marshes. Bayous, and the like. How familiar are your Cherokees with that sort of terrain? Fighting in the wretched stuff, I mean.”

Sam shrugged. “Not as familiar as Choctaws, of course. But they’ll do well enough. Woods are woods and water’s water, however you mix them up. There’s plenty of both where they come from. And they’re used to fighting as irregulars.”

Jackson smiled coldly. “Which the British are not. So let’s see how well the bastards handle wild savages on their own ground.” The smile widened, slightly. “Begging your pardon, Colonel. Congratulations on the promotion, by the way. And my compliments for your gallant stand at the Capitol.”

Jackson thrust himself away from the window and turned to face Driscol. His eyes flicked to the stump. “And you’ll be Major Driscol, I assume. My compliments to you as well, sir.”

Driscol nodded. “Pleasure to make your acquaintance, General.”

Jackson studied him for a moment. Then, abruptly: “I’ve been told—in the form of a letter from General Scott forwarded to me by Mr. Monroe—that you’re possibly the best trainer of troops in the United States Army. How well do you get along with darkies, Major?”

If the sudden shift of topic confused Driscol, there was no sign of it. “Well enough, sir.”

Sam’s smile must have been more apparent than he thought—or he’d simply forgotten how perceptive Jackson was, under that bellicose exterior. The general’s eyes moved to him instantly.

“You seem amused by the major’s response, Colonel. Why?”

Sam hesitated a moment. Most white men would be offended at the notion that they had any special affinity with Negroes. Driscol…

Wouldn’t.

“Patr—uh, Major Driscol gets along famously with the fellows, sir. A considerable number of the artillerymen we brought are black sailors, as well as the entire logistics train.”

“So I’d heard.” Jackson frowned. “You took a hellish risk there, Sam. I’m surprised half of those darkie teamsters didn’t run off with the goods. They may be a servile race by nature, but they’re always quick enough to steal.”

Sam started to reply, then decided there was no point getting into an argument with Jackson on the subject. If the general was often prepared to countenance measures that other white men would shy away from, he didn’t really differ that much from accepted opinion on the various races which inhabited America. Black people were servile; shiftless; stupid; lazy; and generally unreliable. Indians were certainly not servile, but they were just as shiftless; in most regards, just as stupid; and even lazier and less reliable.

Sam shared none of Jackson’s opinions with regard to Indians, and as time went on he was becoming increasingly skeptical of the standard view of Negroes. Whether or not the race was servile by nature, it was simply impossible to determine. Most of them were born into slavery, after all, and even the freedmen were usually given little chance to demonstrate their abilities. So who could really know?

As for the rest, the main conclusion he’d come to was that broad racial categories were too often swamped by the wide variations between individuals to mean very much.

That was a safe enough place to differ with the general, he decided.

“That’s as may be, sir. But I have confidence in Henry Crowell—he’s in the way of being my quartermaster—and I let him pick the rest.”

Jackson grunted. “Well, true enough. I’ve got several hands on my plantation I never worry about. And when it comes to it, one of the darkie blacksmiths in Nashville is more reliable than most of the white ones. Does better work, too. Don’t even think he has any white blood, either.”

His thin smile returned, as he looked back at Driscol and jerked his head toward Houston.

“May I assume, Major, that you share the heretical notions of young Sam here?”

Driscol restricted himself to a curt nod. Houston chuckled. “I think you’ll find, sir—assuming you can get Patrick to open his mouth—that Major Driscol’s notions are generally a lot more heretical than mine.”

Jackson grunted again. “Well enough. The reason I ask, Major, is because I believe we have something of an opportunity here—if I can find the right man to shape it up. Have you gotten word of my little dispute with some of the local notables—as they see themselves—over the issue of the free men of color?”

Sam cleared his throat. “It was difficult not to overhear, sir. Though we don’t know any of the details.”

“Ha! Heard me, did you? Good. I hope I was hollering loud enough for them to hear me all the way across Lake Pontchartrain.” He strode over and resumed his seat, clasping his hands on the desk.

“Here’s how it stands. New Orleans has a large number of free Negroes. I’m not talking about the usual run of freedmen, either, but people who’ve been free for generations. The Spanish and French are lax about such things, you know. For all practical purposes, many of the freedmen here are black Creoles to match the white ones. Some of them are wealthy—some are even slave owners themselves.”

Sam had never been to New Orleans before, but he already knew that much. The black Creole population of the city was rather notorious among southerners in the United States.

Jackson’s eyes were now on Driscol. “The point’s this, Major. The two battalions I’ve got are made up of such soldiers. One of them is a battalion of native-born men—that’s under Major Pierre Lacoste—and the other is made up of black Creoles who fled here recently from Hispaniola. Major Louis Daquin’s in charge of that group. But that still leaves a large population of free Negroes in the city who are not enrolled at all. Some are Creoles, some came here from elsewhere in America—and most of them aren’t more than a generation removed from slavery.”

Jackson’s lips twisted. It was half a sneer, half a grimace at the folly of men. “The free men of color are quite full of themselves, you see. Those black Creoles, from what I can tell, will parse the various shades of color more tightly than a white man. They’d not be partial to allowing common darkies to join their battalions. D’you follow me?”

Driscol nodded. “What sort of men are these others, sir? Field hands? Laborers?”

Jackson shrugged. “A fair number. But a lot of them have a trade. Ironworking, usually, since New Orleans has a lot of that work.”

“And how much time would I have to train them?”

Jackson took off his hat, laid it on the desk, and ran fingers through his stiff, sandy-gray hair. “Not long, I’m afraid. Just a few days ago, Admiral Cochrane crushed the little fleet of gunboats I had on Lake Bourgne. Luckily, from reports I’ve gotten, it seems the British don’t have enough flat-bottom boats to move on New Orleans through Lake Pontchartrain. I’ve lost track of their movements since then, but they’ll have to land somewhere in the bayous and march on New Orleans from Lake Bourgne. I expect we’ll begin engaging the enemy within a week or two.”

Apologetically, insofar as Jackson could manage such a thing: “I realize it’s not much time, Major. I don’t expect miracles. Still, I can use anything I can get. Once General Coffee and General Carroll get here, I’ll have several thousand good troops. Militiamen, but they’re mostly veterans from Tennessee. Other than that, my forces are the most gol-derned collection of odds and ends you can imagine. Some navy regulars, Creole battalions—white as well as black—other volunteers. Ha! I’ve even accepted the offer of the Lafitte brothers and their Lake Baratarian Algerines to fight with us.”