a brilliant General “of a constancy to which difficulties only added
strength,” who by joining his Army to that of Peru, Argentina, and
Chile, could make sure for all time to come, the liberation of the whole
of Spanish America. But it was also plain to San Martin that Bolivar
would never consent to share his command with any other man.
Therefore, San Martin offered to lay down the sword of supreme command
of his forces in Peru, and serve as an ordinary officer under Bolivar.
This Bolivar refused.
San Martin was pushed to the wall. There was left only one of two things
for him to do--either to return to Peru and wage an unequal and
possibly losing warfare against the Spaniards without the help of
Bolivar,--or to withdraw.
He withdrew in silence.
But why in silence? Why did he not explain so that people might
understand and not misjudge him?
In a letter that he wrote from Peru to Bolivar, giving his reasons for
retiring, he told why he was silent:--
“_The sentiments which this letter contains will remain buried in
the most profound silence. If they were to become public, our
enemies might profit by them and injure the cause of Liberty; while
ambitious and intriguing people might use them to foment discord._”
Again he said, “It shall not be San Martin who will give a day’s delight
to the enemy.”
And on leaving Peru, he said in his farewell to the People, “My
countrymen, as in most affairs, will be divided in opinion--their
children will give a true verdict.”
* * * * *
And their children have justified his faith.
To-day, his body rests in the Cathedral of Buenos Aires.
And to-day the school-children of Argentina are taught to love and
reverence the Father of their Country who never thought of himself--Jose
de San Martin.
MARCH 15
ANDREW JACKSON OLD HICKORY
_Our Federal Union: It must and shall be preserved!_
ANDREW JACKSON’S _Toast on Jefferson’s Birthday_
_I want to say that Andrew Jackson was a Tennessean; but Andrew
Jackson was an American, and there is not a State in this Nation
that cannot claim him, that has not the right to claim him as a
national hero...._
_I should not say that Old Hickory was faultless. I do not know
very many strong men that have not got some of the defects of their
qualities. But Andrew Jackson was as upright a Patriot, as honest a
man, as fearless a gentleman, as ever any Nation had in public or
private life._
_President_ THEODORE ROOSEVELT
ANDREW JACKSON was born in the Carolinas, March 15, 1767
Won the Battle of Talladega against the Creeks, 1813
Won the Battle of New Orleans against the British, January 8, 1815
Was made Governor of Florida, 1821
Was elected President, 1828; again, 1832
He died, June 8, 1845
He is sometimes called “Old Hickory”
MISCHIEVOUS ANDY
“Set the case! You are Shauney Kerr’s mare, and me Billy Buck. And I
should mount you, and you should kick, fall, fling, and break your neck,
should I be to blame for that?”
Imagine this gibberish, roared out by a sandy-haired boy, as he came
leaping from the door of a log-schoolhouse, ready to defy all the other
boys to a race, a wrestle, or a jumping match, while he playfully laid
sprawling as many of his friends as he could trip unawares.
There you have Andy Jackson!
Andy, tall, lank, red-headed, blue-eyed, freckled, barefoot, and dressed
in coarse copperas-coloured clothes, was the son of a poor Scotch Irish
widow. He was born and reared in the Carolinas. He lived with his mother
in the Waxhaws Settlement. His home was a log-cabin in a clearing.
His mother earned her living and that of her two youngest boys. She had
great ambitions for Andy. She sent him to school in the little
log-schoolhouse. And, when she had earned enough money, she paid his
tuition at a country academy.
No boy ever lived who liked fun better than Andy. He ran foot-races,
leaped the bar, and high-jumped. To the younger boys, who never
questioned his mastery, he was a generous protector. There was nothing
he would not do to defend them.
But boys of his own age and older, found him self-willed, somewhat
overbearing, easily offended, very irascible, and on the whole difficult
to get along with.
He learned to read, write, and cast accounts--little more.
_James Parton_ (_Retold_)
READING THE DECLARATION
Andy was nine years old when the Declaration of Independence was signed
at Philadelphia.
In August, some one brought a Philadelphia newspaper to the Waxhaws. It
contained a portion of the Declaration. A crowd of Waxhaw Patriots
gathered in front of the country store owned by Andy’s Uncle Crawford.
They were eager to hear the Declaration read aloud. Andy was chosen to
read it.
He did so proudly in a shrill, penetrating voice. He read the whole
thing through without once stopping to spell out the words. And that was
more than many of the grown men of the Waxhaws could do in those pioneer
days, when frontier log-schoolhouses were few and far between.
OUT AGAINST TARLETON
Andrew Jackson was little more than thirteen, when the British Tarleton
with his dragoons, thundered along the red roads of the Waxhaws, and
dyed them a deeper red with the blood of the surprised Patriot Militia.
For Tarleton fell upon the Waxhaws settlement, and killed one hundred
and thirteen of the Militia, and wounded a hundred and fifty more.
The wounded men were abandoned to the care of the settlers, and
quartered in the cabins, and in the old log Waxhaw meeting-house, which
was turned into a hospital.
Andrew’s mother was one of the kind women who nursed the soldiers in the
meeting-house. Andrew and his brother Robert assisted her in waiting
upon them. Andrew, more in rage than pity, though pitiful by nature,
burned to avenge their wounds and his brother’s death. For his eldest
brother, Hugh, had mounted his horse the year before, and ridden
southward to join the Patriot forces. He had fought gallantly, and had
died bravely.
Tarleton’s massacre at the Waxhaws, had kindled the flames of war in all
that region of the Carolinas. The time was now come when Andrew and
Robert were to play men’s parts. Carrying their own weapons, they
mounted their grass ponies--ponies of the South Carolina swamps, rough,
Shetlandish, wild--and rode away to join the patriots.
Andrew and Robert served in a number of actions, and were finally taken
captive.
They were at length rescued by their mother. This heroic woman arrived
at their prison, and by her efforts and entreaties, succeeded in
bringing about an exchange of prisoners.
Andrew and Robert were brought out of prison and handed over to her. She
gazed at them in astonishment and horror,--so worn and wasted the boys
were with hunger, wounds, and disease. They were both ill with the
smallpox. Robert could not stand, nor even sit on horseback without
support.
Two horses were procured. One, Mrs. Jackson rode herself. Robert was
placed on the other, and held in his seat by some of the prisoners to
whom Mrs. Jackson had just given liberty.
Behind the sad procession poor Andrew dragged his weak and weary limbs,
bare-headed, bare-footed, without a jacket, his only two garments torn
and dirty.
The forty miles of lonely wilderness to the Waxhaws were nearly
traversed, and the fevered boys were expecting in two hours more, to
enjoy the comfort of home, when a chilly, drenching rain set in. The
smallpox had reached that stage when a violent chill proves wellnigh
fatal. The boys reached home and went to bed.
In two days Robert Jackson was dead, while Andrew was a raving maniac.
But the mother’s nursing and his own strong constitution brought Andrew
out of his peril, and set him on the way to slow recovery.
_James Parton_ (_Retold_)
AN ORPHAN OF THE REVOLUTION
Andrew Jackson was no sooner out of danger, than his courageous mother
resolved to go to Charleston, a distance of nearly two hundred miles,
and do what she could for the comfort of the prisoners confined on the
reeking, disease-infested prison-ships.
Among the many captives on the ships, suffering hunger, sickness, and
neglect, were Mrs. Jackson’s own nephews and some of her Waxhaw
neighbours. She hoped to obtain their release, as she had that of Andy
and Robert.
She arrived at Charleston, and gained admission to the ships. She
distributed food and medicines, and brought much comfort and joy to the
haggard prisoners.
She had been there but a little time when she was seized by ship-fever.
After a short illness she died. She was buried on the open plain, and
her grave was lost sight of. Her clothes, a sorry bundle, were sent to
her boy at the Waxhaws.
And so Andrew Jackson, before reaching his fifteenth birthday had lost
his father, mother, and two brothers. He was an orphan, a sick and
sorrowful orphan, a homeless orphan, an orphan of the Revolution.
Many years later on his birthday, on the very same day when he disbanded
the Army with which he had won the Battle of New Orleans, he said of his
mother:--
“How I wish _she_ could have lived to see this day! There never was a
woman like her. She was gentle as a dove and brave as a lioness....
“Her last words have been the law of my life. When the tidings of her
death reached me, I at first could not believe it. When I finally
realized the truth, I felt utterly alone.... Yes, I was alone. With that
feeling, I started to make my own way....
“The memory of my Mother and her teachings, were after all the only
capital I had to start in life with, and on that capital I have made my
way.”
_James Parton and Other Sources._
THE HOOTING IN THE WILDERNESS
It was night in the Tennessee Wilderness. A train of settlers from the
Carolinas, with four-wheeled ox-carts and pack-horses, and attended by
an armed guard, was winding its way along the trail through the forest
toward the frontier-town of Nashville. They had marched thirty-six
hours, a night and two days, without stopping to rest. They were keeping
a vigilant outlook for savages.
At length, they reached what they thought was a safe camping-ground. The
tired travellers hastened to encamp. Their little tents were pitched.
Their fires were lighted. The exhausted women and children crept into
the tents, and fell asleep.
The men, except those who were to stand sentinel during the first half
of the night, wrapped their blankets around them and lay down under the
lee of sheltering logs with their feet to the fire.
Silence fell on the camp.
All slept except the sentinels and one young man. He sat with his back
to a tree, smoking a corn-cob pipe. He was not handsome; but the direct
glance of his keen blue eye and his resolute expression, made him seem
so in spite of a long thin face, high forehead somewhat narrow, and
sandy-red hair falling low on his brow.
This young man was Andrew Jackson,--mischievous Andy of the
Waxhaws,--now grown to be a clever, licensed, young lawyer. He was
going with the emigrant train to Nashville in order to hang out his sign
and practise on the frontier.
He sat there in the Wilderness, in the darkness, peacefully smoking. He
listened to the night sounds from the forest. He was falling into a
doze, when he noted the various hoots of owls in the forest around him.
“A remarkable country this, for owls,” he thought, as he closed his eyes
and fell asleep.
Just then an owl, whose hooting had sounded at a distance, suddenly
uttered a peculiar cry close to the camp.
In a moment, young Jackson was the widest awake man in Tennessee.
He grasped his rifle, and crept cautiously to where his friend Searcy
was sleeping, and woke him quietly.
“Searcy,” said he, “raise your head and make no noise.”
“What’s the matter?” asked Searcy.
“The owls--listen--there--there again! Isn’t that a little _too_
natural?”
“Do you think so?” asked Searcy.
“I know it,” replied young Jackson. “There are Indians all around us. I
have heard them in every direction. They mean to attack before
daybreak.”
In a few minutes, the men of the camp were aroused. The experienced
woodsmen among them listened to the hooting, and agreed with young
Jackson, that there were Indians in the forest. Jackson advised that the
camp should be instantly and quietly broken up, and the march resumed.
This was done, and the company heard nothing more of the savages.
But a party of hunters who reached the same camping-ground an hour after
the company had left it, lay down by the fires and slept. Before day
dawned, the Indians were upon them, and killed all except one of the
party.
But the long train of emigrants, men, women and children, were safely
continuing their wearisome journey through the Wilderness. At last, they
reached Nashville to the joy of the settlers there.
And a great piece of news young Andrew Jackson brought with him to
Nashville--the Constitution of the United States had just been ratified
and adopted by a majority of the States of the Union.
_James Parton_ (_Retold_)
FORT MIMS
The War of 1812 was made terrible by an uprising of the Indians. The
Creeks, incited and armed by British officers, attacked Fort Mims in
Alabama, and, with unspeakable atrocities, massacred over five hundred
helpless men, women, and children.
The howling savages at their bloody work made so hideous a scene, that
even their Chief, a half-breed Indian named Weatherford, was filled with
horror. He tried to protect the women and children. But his savage
followers broke all restraint, and nothing could stop their cruel
butchery. The Creeks ended by setting fire to the ruins of the fort.
This Indian massacre at Fort Mims was one of the bloodiest in history.
The news reached Tennessee, arousing the country. Andrew Jackson rose
from a sick-bed, called together an army of volunteers, and led them
against the Creeks.
DAVY CROCKETT
_“Go ahead!” Davy Crockett’s motto_
When Andrew Jackson called for volunteers to punish the Creeks, Davy
Crockett, the famous Tennessee bear-hunter, came hurrying to enlist. He
was a backwoodsman, born and reared in a log cabin in the Wilderness.
Armed with his long rifle and hunting-knife, dressed in a hunting-shirt
and fox-skin cap with the tail hanging down behind, he was a
picturesque figure.
He was merry as well as fearless, and kept the soldiers in a constant
roar of laughter with his jokes and funny stories. He was kind-hearted,
and gave away his money to any soldier who needed it.
“Go ahead!” was his motto whenever facing difficulty or dangers.
Some years after the Creek War, he took part in the struggle for Liberty
in Texas.
With Travis and Bowie, he defended the Alamo.
“Go ahead! Liberty and Independence for ever!” wrote Davy Crockett in
his diary just before the Alamo fell.
CHIEF WEATHERFORD
Andrew Jackson carried forward his Indian campaign with crushing effect.
Blow after blow fell upon the doomed Creeks, and at the Battle of the
Horseshoe, he annihilated their power for ever.
The Creeks were conquered; but their Chief, Weatherford, was still at
large. Andrew Jackson gave orders for his pursuit and capture. He wished
to punish him for his part in the massacre at Fort Mims.
The Creek force under Weatherford had melted away. The warriors who were
left after the battle, had taken flight to a place of safety, leaving
him alone in the forest with a multitude of Indian women and children,
widows and orphans, perishing for want of food.
It was then that Weatherford gave a shining example of humanity and
heroism. He might have fled to safety with the rest of his war-party. He
chose to remain and to attempt, at the sacrifice of his own life, to
save from starvation the women and children who were with him.
He mounted his gray steed, and directed his course to General Jackson’s
camp. When only a few miles from there, a fine deer crossed his path and
stopped within shooting distance. Weatherford shot the deer and placed
it on his horse behind the saddle.
Reloading his rifle with two balls, for the purpose of shooting Big
Warrior, a leading Chief friendly to the Americans, if he gave him any
trouble, Weatherford rode on. He soon reached the outposts of the camp.
He politely inquired of a group of soldiers where General Jackson was.
An old man pointed out the General’s tent, and the fearless Chief rode
up to it.
Before the entrance of the tent sat Big Warrior himself. Seeing
Weatherford, he cried out in an insulting tone:--
“Ah! Bill Weatherford, have we got you at last?”
With a glance of fire at Big Warrior, Weatherford replied with an
oath:--
“Traitor! if you give me any insolence, I will blow a ball through your
cowardly heart!”
General Jackson now came running out of the tent.
“How dare you,” exclaimed the General furiously, “ride up to my tent
after having murdered the women and children at Fort Mims?”
“General Jackson,” replied Weatherford with dignity, “I am not afraid of
you. I fear no man, for I am a Creek warrior.
“I have nothing to request in behalf of myself. You can kill me if you
desire. But I come to beg you to send for the women and children of the
war-party, who are now starving in the woods. Their fields and cribs
have been destroyed by your people, who have driven them to the woods
without an ear of corn. I hope that you will send out parties who will
conduct them safely here, in order that they may be fed.
“I exerted myself in vain to prevent the massacre of the women and
children at Fort Mims. I am now done fighting. The Red Sticks are nearly
all killed. If I could fight you any longer, I would most heartily do
so.
“Send for the women and children. They never did you any harm. But kill
me, if the white people want it done.”
While he was speaking, a crowd of officers and soldiers gathered around
the tent. Associating the name of Weatherford with the oft-told horrors
of the massacre, and not understanding what was going forward, the
soldiers cast upon the Chief glances of hatred and aversion. Many of
them cried out:--
“Kill him! Kill him! Kill him!”
“Silence!” exclaimed Jackson.
And the clamour was hushed.
“Any man,” added the General, with great energy, “who would kill as
brave a man as this, would rob the dead!”
He then requested Weatherford to alight, and enter his tent. Which the
Chief did, bringing in with him the deer he had killed by the way, and
presenting it to the General.
Jackson accepted the gift, and invited Weatherford to drink a glass of
brandy. But Weatherford refused to drink, saying:--
“General, I am one of the few Indians who do not drink liquor. But I
would thank you for a little tobacco.”
Jackson gave him some tobacco, and they then discussed terms of peace.
Weatherford explained that he wished peace, in order that his Nation
might be relieved of their sufferings and the women and children saved.
“If you wish to continue the war,” said General Jackson, “you are at
liberty to depart unharmed; but if you desire peace you may remain, and
you shall be protected.”
And as Weatherford desired peace, General Jackson sent for the women and
children and had them fed and cared for.
When the war was over, Weatherford again became a planter, for he had
been a prosperous one before he led his Nation, the Creeks, on the
war-path.
He lived many years in peace with white men and red, respected by his
neighbours for his bravery, honour, and good native common-sense.
To the day of his death, Weatherford deeply regretted the massacre at
Fort Mims. “My warriors,” said he, “were like famished wolves. And the
first taste of blood made their appetites insatiable.”
_James Parton and Other Stories._
SAM HOUSTON
Years before the fall of the Alamo, during the Creek War, at the Battle
of the Horseshoe, Andrew Jackson had just given the order for a part of
his troops to charge the Indian breastwork. The troops rushed forward
with loud shouts.
The first in that rush was a young Lieutenant, Sam Houston.[5] As he
led the way across the breastwork, a barbed arrow struck deep into his
thigh. He tried to pull it out, but could not. He called to an officer,
and asked him to draw it out.
The officer tugged at its shaft twice, but failed.
“Try again!” shouted Sam Houston, lifting his sword, “and if you fail
this time, I will smite you to the earth!”
The officer, with a desperate effort, pulled out the arrow. A stream of
blood gushed from the wound. Sam Houston recrossed the breastwork to the
rear, to have it dressed.
A surgeon dressed it and staunched the flow of blood. Just then Andrew
Jackson rode up to see who was wounded. Recognizing his daring
lieutenant, he forbade him to return to the fight.
Under any other circumstances, Sam Houston would have obeyed without a
word. But now he begged the General to allow him to go back to his men.
General Jackson ordered him most peremptorily not to cross the
breastwork again.
But Sam Houston was determined to die in that battle or win fame for
ever. And soon after, when General Jackson called for volunteers to
storm a ravine, Sam Houston rushed into the thick of the fight, and the
next minute he was leading on his men. He received two rifle-balls in
his right shoulder, and his left arm fell shattered at his side. At
last, exhausted by the loss of blood he dropped to the ground.
He eventually recovered; and the military prowess and heroism which he
had displayed throughout this battle, secured for him the lasting regard
of Old Hickory.
_Retold from the “Life of Sam Houston”_
WHY JACKSON WAS NAMED OLD HICKORY
When Andrew Jackson, with his Tennessee riflemen, was camping at Natchez
waiting for orders to move on to New Orleans, he received a despatch
from the War Department. It ordered him to dismiss his men at once.
Jackson’s indignation and rage knew no bounds. Dismiss them without pay,
without means of transportation, without provision for the sick! Never!
He himself would march them home again through the savage Wilderness, at
his own expense! Such was his determination.
And when his little Army set out from Natchez for its march of five
hundred miles through the Wilderness, there were a hundred and fifty men
on the sick-list, of whom fifty-six could not raise their heads from the
pillow. There were but eleven wagons to convey them. The most
desperately ill were placed in the wagons. The rest of the sick were
mounted on the horses of the officers.
General Jackson had three fine horses, and gave them up to the sick,
himself briskly trudging on foot. Day after day, he tramped gayly along
the miry roads, never tired, and always ready with a cheering word for
others.
They marched with extraordinary speed, averaging eighteen miles a day,
and performing the whole journey in less than a month. And yet the sick
men rapidly recovered under the reviving influence of a homeward march.
“Where am I?” asked one young fellow who had been lifted to his place in
a wagon, when insensible and apparently dying.
“On your way _home_!” cried the General merrily.
And the young soldier began to improve from that hour, and reached home
in good health.
Many of the volunteers had heard so much of Jackson’s violent and hasty
temper, that they had joined the corps with a certain dread and
hesitation, fearing not the enemy, nor the marches, nor diseases and
wounds, so much as the swift wrath of their Commander. How surprised
were they to find, that though there was a whole volcano of wrath in
their General, yet to the men of his command, so long as they did their
duty and longer, he was the most gentle, patient, considerate, and
generous of friends.
It was on this homeward march that the nickname of Old Hickory was
bestowed upon Andrew Jackson by his men. First of all the remark was
made by a soldier, who was struck with his wonderful pedestrian powers,
that the General was _tough_. Next it was observed of him that he was as
_tough as hickory_. Then he was called _Hickory_. Lastly the
affectionate adjective _old_ was prefixed. And ever after he was known
as Old Hickory.
_James Parton_ (_Retold_)
THE COTTON-BALES
We have all heard tell that Andrew Jackson and his riflemen fought the
Battle of New Orleans from behind cotton-bales.
This is a mistake. Yet it is true that Old Hickory did commandeer a
whole cargo of cotton-bales, and with them built a bastion in front of
his guns. But at the very first bombardment, the balls from the British
batteries knocked the bales in all directions, while wads from the
American guns and spurting flames from the muzzles of the rifles set
some of the bales afire. They fell smouldering into the ditch outside,
and lay there sending up smoke and choking odours.