1812: The Rivers of War

by Eric Flint

  Hopefully, Driscol and his men would make the difference. At least now the far right of the Morgan Line would be anchored by solid troops, with real artillery, to match Lieutenant Philibert’s unit on the far left by the river.

  Once he reached his own battery’s position, Patterson nodded to his men but kept walking farther upriver. Just fifty yards or so, to the spot where Driscol had left the one white sergeant in his battalion. Anthony McParland, that was, whom Driscol had given a special assignment.

  Patterson had wondered about that. Perhaps Driscol had left McParland behind because he was so young and Driscol didn’t quite trust him in a battle. But McParland had been at the Chippewa, and apparently done well enough that Driscol—a hard man, that, too—had seen fit to promote him. So that didn’t make sense.

  Perhaps it was because, being white, Driscol trusted McParland to handle a task that he feared one of his Negro soldiers would fumble. But that didn’t make much sense, either, because the task itself was as simple as any task gets: when the time came, light a flare. Any plantation owner routinely assigned far more complex chores to his slaves.

  Patterson came upon McParland unawares. The teenage sergeant, fuse in hand and ready to be lit in a nearby campfire, was chatting away pleasantly with some of Patterson’s sailors.

  “—so then I told the general, straight to his face, that my da didn’t raise me to shine another man’s boots, and he could damn well shine them himself or have a lackey do it.” Forcefully, McParland spat in the fire. “I was a soldier, tarnation, not a blasted servant.”

  A grin creased the youngster’s face.

  “A word to the wise, boys. Old Winfield’s a wizard on the battlefield, but he’s a nasty old woman any other ways. Well, he like to have a fit. The next thing I knew he had me in front of a firing squad with none other than my own Sergeant Driscol—yeah, he was just a sergeant back then—in charge of the business. And I knew the sergeant would do it, without blinking an eye.”

  Another gob of spit unerringly struck the flames.

  “Driscol’s not exactly human, you know. Mostly human, sure, but there’s some troll blood in him. There’s trolls in Scotland, and that’s where his family comes from originally.”

  One of the sailors was bold enough to argue the point. “Ah, I don’t think so. My family’s from Scotland, too, back when, and they never talk about no trolls.” Hastily, seeing McParland’s gathering frown, he added: “I don’t doubt you, mind. Not about Driscol! I’ve seen him. But don’t forget that Scots got a lot of old Viking blood in us, too—and, sure as shooting, there’s trolls in Norway and places like that.”

  Two or three of the sailors nodded sagely.

  Mollified, McParland continued. “Well, yeah, you might be right at that. Anyway, there I was, standing in front of a firing squad. General Scott himself was watching, sitting on his horse. I looked him square in the eye and said, ‘Fire away and be damned!’ ”

  McParland paused, chuckling.

  “What happened then?” asked one of the sailors eagerly. He looked to be no older than McParland.

  “Well—heh—I was young and stupid, in those days. I didn’t think they’d actually do it. But Driscol—he’s a troll, didn’t I tell you?” McParland looked momentarily aggrieved. “Why, the bastard took my own words as the signal and ordered them to fire. Next thing I knew I was knocked off my feet by the blast. ’Sa good thing—I found out later—Driscol had told all the men to aim no higher than my chest, or the powder burns would have scarred me for life, point-blank range like it was. But the guns were loaded with blanks, it turned out. General Scott’s mean as a snake about some things, but he’s still a general as good as they come. He just wanted to establish what was what. As it was . . .”

  He shook his head. “Well, let’s put it this way, boys. General Scott never told me again to shine his boots, but if he had, I’da done it and not given him no back talk. Don’t think I wouldn’t. And I never again doubted that Patrick Driscol would do exactly what he said he’d do. You might as well argue with a rock as argue with him.”

  Silence fell on the little group squatting about the campfire. Then, as one man, they all looked at the squat flare positioned not twenty feet away.

  “So, you gonna do it?” asked one of the sailors. “We all heard General Morgan, when he come by earlier, telling you not to fire it unless he gives you the order.”

  McParland hawked, spat. Another gobbet caused a small hiss in the fire. “Don’t matter what Morgan says. The sergeant—ah, Major Driscol—told me to fire that flare the moment I think the British are coming for sure. And start waving that big flag over there.”

  There was a furled banner resting against a nearby tree. Patterson hadn’t noticed it earlier.

  Hawk. Spit. Hiss.

  “So General Morgan can go fuck himself, for all I care. If he hollers about it afterward, the troll will eat him.”

  Smiling, Commodore Patterson walked quietly away. He didn’t believe most of that story. Someday, if he had the chance, he’d ask Driscol what really happened. But he didn’t wonder any longer why Driscol had left McParland in charge of the flare.

  The sun was setting now.

  It would happen tomorrow. The commodore had spent most of the day downriver, watching the enemy with an eyeglass, making their preparations. Patterson knew that Jackson still thought they’d do no more than send a token force across the Mississippi; a feint, essentially, to distract him while they launched a massive frontal assault on his own lines. But Patterson had seen the effort the British had put into widening the canal over the previous week. That was no feint.

  The enemy would strike here first, and they’d strike hard and fast, with their best units. He was sure he understood their battle plan: overwhelm the Americans on the right bank, seize Patterson’s big guns and turn them to fire enfilade on the Jackson Line. And only then start their assault on the east bank.

  They might well succeed, too, given the weakness of the American forces on the west bank and the incapacity of its commanding general. But, if nothing else, Patterson was now confident that Driscol would hold them off long enough to allow Patterson to destroy his own cannons. Whatever else, the British would not use those splendid American guns against American soldiers. And without those guns, any victory on the west bank would be ultimately meaningless. They couldn’t reach New Orleans from this side of the river. Not when Patterson still had the Louisiana anchored there to destroy any attempt to cross over.

  “Are the spikes ready?” he asked his chief gunnery mate.

  “Yes, sir.” The sailor nodded toward freshly dug pathways leading to the riverbank. “And I’ve got everything ready, like you said, so we can pitch the guns into the Mississippi after we’ve spiked them.”

  Patterson nodded. He hoped he wouldn’t have to, of course. But . . .

  Just like McParland, and Driscol, he’d do whatever needed to be done.

  Across the river, Colonel Thornton lowered his eyeglass slowly. He hadn’t been able to get a good view at any time over the past two days, as the new American unit had arrived to reinforce Morgan’s forces. Just enough to know that they were an artillery unit, which seemed mostly composed of black soldiers.

  That probably meant U.S. Navy regulars, which was the last thing Thornton wanted to encounter after he crossed the river. At least, he knew of no other American forces that had large numbers of black soldiers who handled cannons with such apparent familiarity.

  Damnation.

  The key to the whole assault was speed. It wasn’t enough to just defeat the Americans over there. They had to be routed. Sent scampering in such haste and confusion that they wouldn’t have time to spike the big guns or pitch them into the river. Or haul them out of danger altogether.

  Until that new unit had arrived, Thornton had thought he had an excellent chance of doing so. British intelligence was quite good now, with a number of American deserters coming across the line, in addition to the runaway slaves, and Th
ornton had known that most of the forces over there were militia units. Some of them newly arrived from Kentucky, ill trained, inexperienced, and apparently almost completely unsupplied.

  Now . . .

  Thornton did his best to look on the bright side. Even if he failed to capture the guns, he was still confident that he could seize the west bank. In that event, the siege would simply settle in. Over time—not without great difficulty, but it could be done—the British could transport the big guns from the naval vessels on Lake Bourgne, down the canals and across the river. Step by step, day by day, if they controlled the west bank they could keep shifting those guns closer and closer to New Orleans, forcing Jackson to retreat to the city. Wellington’s veterans had plenty of experience with sieges—far more, after all the years in the Peninsular War, than the Americans did.

  Thornton shook his head. He wasn’t privy to the inner councils of the British high command, but he knew that Cochrane and the top generals thought a peace treaty was in the making. However good the British army was at fighting sieges, it was still a fact that sieges took time. And time was probably the one essential item of which they were in the shortest supply.

  “Well, Colonel?”

  Thornton almost jumped, he was so startled. He turned to find General Pakenham standing behind him.

  “Sir. Sorry, I didn’t hear you coming.”

  “Yes, I know. You seemed quite lost in your thoughts. I’d appreciate knowing what they are.”

  Thornton hesitated. He wasn’t familiar enough yet with Pakenham to know how much his new commander would welcome in the way of frankness. Robert Ross had always encouraged his subordinates to speak their mind, although he’d never shuffled the responsibility for making a decision onto them. But many British generals regarded a contrarian view from subordinate officers as just a hair short of treason—or cowardice in the face of the enemy—both of which were capital crimes.

  Pakenham was personally intimidating, too, in a way that the relatively lowborn, plain-faced and easygoing Ross had not been. He was tall, handsome, vigorous, poised—the spitting image of an Anglo-Irish aristocrat. Add to that his own reputation, and the fact that his sister had married Wellington . . .

  Pakenham smiled, slightly. “I am quite aware of your splendid reputation as a commander in battle, Colonel Thornton. I really would appreciate hearing what you think.”

  “Yes, sir.” Thornton nodded across the river. “They’ve added a new artillery unit over there, sir. They’ve got a twelve-pounder and at least one six-pounder. Somewhere around three hundred men, as near as I can determine. Most of them seem to be black soldiers. That probably means U.S. Navy regulars.”

  Pakenham gazed across the Mississippi. There was nothing to be seen over there now but darkness, with only the last moments of sunset to illuminate the area.

  “Possibly. But I think not. Just this morning, two more runaway slaves arrived in our lines. From the city itself, these, not one of the nearby plantations. They tell us that Jackson had a new battalion of freedmen formed up, less than three weeks ago. That’s probably them, in which case they’ll be even more inexperienced than the usual militia force.”

  Thornton started to speak; then, still hesitant despite Pakenham’s tacit reassurance, closed his mouth.

  “Yes, Colonel?”

  “Something still doesn’t make sense here, sir. A new black battalion wouldn’t be given guns. Muskets, at the most, and probably the poorest ones available. But twelve-pounders? There has to be more involved.”

  Pakenham nodded. “Oh, surely. From what we can glean from the runaways, the unit indeed has a core of U.S. Navy sailors. But nine-tenths of them are completely new. Former slaves, mostly, who were employed in various crafts throughout the city.”

  “I see. Do we know the name of the commanding officer?”

  Pakenham shook his head. “The slaves—as usual—knew precious little in the way of details.”

  The tall British commander paused. He was looking down at Thornton in a peculiarly stiff-necked way that made the colonel uneasy, until he remembered that Pakenham had suffered two neck wounds in his career. The first, according to rumor, had given his head a peculiar cock to the side. The second, fortunately, had done the same on the other side. So now Pakenham’s head sat unerringly straight, but to the natural stiffness of an Anglo-Irish aristocrat was added the immobility of matching wounds. Under other circumstances, it might all have been quite amusing.

  U.S. Navy regulars . . . black sailors . . . an unknown commander. Thornton had an uneasy feeling he knew who they were. Might be, at least.

  His own Eighty-fifth, blessedly, had not suffered badly at the Capitol because Ross had chosen to give them a rest after Bladensburg. So he’d used the Fourth as the lead regiment in the assault there.

  Used them up, it might be better to say. The Fourth had suffered terrible casualties in that assault, even during the brief time it had lasted. The American battery positioned between the two wings of the American legislative house had been murderous.

  “Sir, have you considered the possibility—”

  “Yes, Colonel, I know. It might be the same men who were at the Capitol. And with the same commander. Driscol, if I recall the name properly. Ross told me about him. Still . . .”

  Pakenham studied the darkness across the river. “War is always a murky business. It might not be them, too. And even if it is, there aren’t more than a dozen or so veterans in the lot. Most of that unit will be greener than an Irish spring. We have no choice other than to press forward as we planned, and I’m confident we can handle the worst.”

  He paused, for a moment. “Still, let’s not be foolhardy. I was trying to decide anyway, and now I have. I’ll add one of the two new regiments to your assaulting force, Colonel, along with some of the West Indian troops. That’ll give you about two thousand men. Even if that new unit is in fact Driscol’s, you’ll outnumber them heavily.”

  That would be a help. A tremendous help.

  All the more so, because of the quality of the reinforcements. Major General John Lambert had just arrived with the Seventh Fusiliers and the Forty-third Light Infantry: seventeen hundred men, in all. Both were veteran units, fresh from the campaigns in Spain and southern France and covered with laurels from them. Like Pakenham himself, Lambert had served under Wellington and was one of his young protégés.

  The colonel’s spirits were rising quickly. Thornton was a very experienced combat commander, and he knew full well that the single most important factor when it came to winning battles was usually the crudest and simplest. Numbers. With two thousand men instead of a thousand, he’d have an overwhelming force, once he got across the river.

  That assumed, of course, that he’d be able to send the militia forces scampering. But Thornton was quite confident on that matter. It was the American artillery units over there that worried him. With two thousand men, though, he should be able to simply overrun them. And he’d have enough men to be able to afford heavy casualties, if that was what it took to do the job.

  “The Forty-third, I think,” Pakenham mused. “They’re light infantry and will move faster. I’d planned to keep them in reserve, but if your assault fails, they’d probably prove useless to me anyway.”

  “Yes, sir. I’d much appreciate that, sir. And . . .”

  Pakenham’s smile, this time, was not thin at all. “Oh, you needn’t be concerned about that, Colonel. I shall make it clear to the Forty-third’s commander—that’s Colonel Rennie, by the way—that you are in command.”

  Thornton nodded. The one problem with adding a new unit on the eve of an operation was that quarrels might arise between the commanders. All the worse when, as in this instance, Thornton hadn’t even known the name of the Forty-third’s commander, so recently had the regiment come into camp. But Rennie would be familiar with Pakenham—and Thornton, to his considerable relief, was discovering that Pakenham had the same sureness as a commander that Robert Ross had possessed. He’d
make clear enough to the fellow that Thornton was his superior officer in the coming assault.

  “You’d best get ready now, Colonel Thornton,” Pakenham stated. “I want your men starting into the barges as soon as the sunrise fades.”

  CHAPTER 44

  JANUARY 8, 1815

  The British assault started falling behind schedule almost immediately. Admiral Cochrane had insisted from the beginning on having his sailors widen the canals, where the British soldiers would have preferred simply to haul the barges across land using rollers and brute force. Unfortunately, Pakenham had chosen not to dispute the issue with the admiral—and now Colonel Thornton was paying the price.

  The British engineers and sailors had labored round the clock. They’d erected a dam across the canal a short distance from the river, and left a levee standing between the end of the canal and the Mississippi. The plan was to load all the soldiers in the barges, and cut the levee. The canal was lower than the Mississippi, so the water rushing in would reach the dam, be blocked, and quickly fill the lower portion of the waterway, enough to enable all the barges to sortie as one.

  After his men had clambered into the barges, the levee was cut and the waters rushed in. To his horror, Thornton watched the dam collapse. In their hurry to make the deadline, the engineers had been sloppy in their work. The thing was just too flimsily made to withstand the sudden pressure.

  To make things worse, the banks of the canal also caved in at several points. Looking up and down the line of the canal, Thornton saw that most of the barges were hopelessly stuck in the mud.

  “God damn all admirals and their schemes,” he hissed.

  “What was that, sir?” asked one of his aides.

  Thornton shook his head. “Never mind. Nothing for it, now. We’ve got no choice but to offload the barges and haul them down to the river by brute force.”