Queen (21 page)

Andrew's division set off for New Orleans in the middle of the worst

winter anyone could remember.

    General Wilkinson wanted Andrew's men, but not Andrew. He ordered them

    to make camp at Natchez, to await developments. This made sense to Andrew

    for it would position his unit to respond to any British invasion along

    the coast, not just at New Orleans. Then an order arrived from the War

    Office ordering Andrew to disband his men and return to Nashville.

    Andrew understood the ploy immediately. Without funds to feed his men,

    they would be easy recruits for Wilkinson. He wrote accepting the

    dismissal of his services, but insisted that he would return his men to

    their homes at his own expense.

    The bad weather got worse, but Andrew triumphed. He led his men on an

    impossible journey through the snow and bitter cold, cajoling, urging,

    encouraging, careless of his own comfort, and he became the stuff of

    legend. His soldiers revered him for it, called him tougher than hickory,

    and because he was their father, he became known to them, and to the

    country, as Old Hickory.

    On their return to Nashville, tattered and torn, cold and weary, reduced

    to eating horseflesh, never having fired a shot in anger, they were feted

    as heroes and showered with honors.

    James glowed with pride and patriotism. Under the circumstances he could

    not possibly ask for the return of his loan, for it was his money that

    had sustained the gallant soldiers through their arduous trek.

    Nor could he refuse Andrew another loan, for another expedition, this

    time against the Creek, in Alabama.

122 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

Tecumseh-Crouching Panther-had inspired many of the younger braves

throughout the country, and if many rejected his calls for violence,

several listened. A half-breed, William Weatherford, whose father laid

claim to being the principal Creek chief, organized a war party, and

attacked and destroyed the settlement at Fort Mims in southern Alabama.

Encouraged by this success, other Creek had joined him, and now much of

Alabama was under threat.

    The news came to Andrew on his sickbed. He had been wounded by Thomas

    Benton and his brother Jesse, after a silly misunderstanding that had led

    to a duel between Jesse and Billy Carroll, Andrew's brigade inspector.

    Andrew had no part in it, and, wanting to keep his nose clean with

    Washington, had discouraged the antagonists, but to no avail. The duel

    was fought with Jesse winning the toss. He fired first but missed, and

    panicked, and turned his back on Billy Carroll, who promptly shot him in

    the rump.

    Tennessee thought Jesse's discomfort was a grand joke, but Tom Benton,

    who had been a favorite of Andrew's, took his brother's side. He accused

    Andrew of inciting the duel, and Andrew had threatened to horsewhip him.

    It all came to a head at the Nashville Inn when Thomas and Jesse, with

    some others, attacked Andrew. John Coffee, guns blazing, put them to

    flight, but Andrew was severely wounded, shot twice in the arm, and the

    doctors recommended amputation.

"I will keep my arm," Andrew said.

    Rachel and Alfred nursed him, but none of their ministrations succeeded

    as well as the news that two hundred and fifty whites had been massacred

    at Fort Mims, and Weatherford was marching north, to other white

    settlements.

    "By the eternal, these people must be saved," he announced, and Tennessee

    agreed.

    Andrew got up from his bed and made ready for war. The governor of

    Tennessee commissioned a punitive expedition, and John Coffee formed the

    cavalry.

The day had come. This was Andrew's time.

    He borrowed more money from James, against the promise of repayment as

    soon as he had Treasury funds, and again, James gave it willingly.

    BLOODLINES 123

All Andrew had to do was ask.

    James didn't tell anyone but Sally about the loan, because when he told

    her, she was angry. Andrew had often borrowed small sums from James and

    never repaid them. He still owed five thousand from the Natchez

    adventure. Now there was more.

    It was the first sustained argument of their marriage, for James could

    not make her see his position, nor could he tell her with any truth what

    his position was. The loans made him feel part of the war, part of the

    adventure, but obviated any risk, except the financial one which he could

    well afford. Until this time, he had shared all his money dealings with

    Sally, but now he began to close this part of his life to her, and kept

    his business to himself.

The Creek War, as it came to be called, was a triumph for Andrew, and all

who served him loyally. Sam Houston used his formidable knowledge of the

Creek and their customs to send spies to the Indians, and encouraged those

who had not fought to join with Old Hickory, who was undefeatable. Cher-

okee and Chickasaw, Choctaw and some Creek joined with Andrew. The spies

reported Weatherford's numbers and intentions. Davy Crockett led a small

band of men in forays of lightning speed and ferocity, aided by the shock

of surprise, which all reinforced the concept of Andrew's invincibility.

It was winter again, and the Creek were poorly supplied. Armed only with

bows and arrows, a few muskets, and a desperate faith in their cause, they

soon fell to the greater numbers and artillery of the army that they

faced.

    Andrew's obstacles were not all of Indian invention, but all added to his

    reputation. Four times, his poorly fed, poorly uniformed, and poorly

    supplied troops rebelled, and each time Andrew suppressed the mutiny by

    the sheer force of his personality and his iron determination. Still weak

    from loss of blood, wracked with dysentery, and living on acorns and

    horseflesh, he would not ask men to endure anything he would not suffer

    himself.

    He thought of the men as his children, and called them such. In the case

    of Private John Woods, he sacrificed one of his children. Woods was

    condemned to death for refusing to obey

124 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

a disciplinary order. Andrew believed he was part of a previous mutiny, but

Woods, who was seventeen, had only recently taken his brother's place in the

ranks. Militiamen, irregular volunteers, were seldom put to death, no matter

how grave their offense, and Andrew had the power to reduce the sentence,

but, like Abraham sacrificing Isaac, he chose not to do so, and no divine

power stayed his hand.

Woods was duly executed by firing squad.

    There was little talk of mutiny after that, and his men came to respect

    Andrew as never before.

    Still he stared at disaster. After Andrew had won two small victories, some

    Creek sued for peace, and Governor Blount of Tennessee was prepared to

    parlay. The increasing disaster that was the war against the British had

    soured him on military conquest, but Andrew would not accept his orders to

    abandon his base and return to Nashville. In a passionate letter to Blount

    he insisted that the frontier would never be peaceful until this

    insurrection was put down, and demanded more men. His obstinacy, and the

    War Office, which was desperate for any success, no matter how small,

    persuaded Blount, and Andrew marched on with five thousand extra troops.

    After several minor battles he surrounded the Creek stronghold at Horseshoe

    Bend. Believing that the Great Spirit had promised them victory, the Creek

    fought almost to the last man, and by the end of the day the battlefield

    was a scene of carnage. Weatherford himself had not been at Horseshoe Bend,

    and Andrew went in search of him. At Fort Toulouse, which was renamed Fort

    Jackson, Weatherford surrendered.

    The Creek war was over, and the victorious troops and their general went

    home.

To glory.

    To a population utterly depressed by a failed war with Britain, Andrew was

    the hero they needed. His fame spread throughout the land, and cheering

    crowds lined the streets on his approach to Nashville. A state dinner was

    organized, and a victory parade.

    All the buildings were draped in flags and bunting, and people came from

    all over Tennessee to see the triumph. Andrew sat on the official stand

    with Rachel, and because all his lieutenants and men were marching, James

    and Sally were invited

    BLOODLINES 125

to sit with them. Sally had baby Mary with her, and Rachel looked after

Andrew junior, while Andrew dandled Lincoyen on his knee.

    Bands played, people cheered, and the soldiers were resplendent. James felt

    himself in the company of heroes. He never asked Andrew for the return of

    his money, nor was it ever offered. As the troops marched past the

    reviewing stand to the salutes of their general, someone called out three

    cheers for Old Hickory. The crowd took it up, and the air resounded with

    the calls of Andrew's name. James, standing beside him, was moved to tears.

    But Andrew had a surprise for them all. After the soldiers came a dozen

    Indian braves, prisoners, whom Andrew had brought back as hostages, or as

    evidence of the battles he had fought.

    They were the finest of the fine-on horseback, nearly naked, bedecked in

    war paint and feathers. The crowd hushed in awe at sight of them, for these

    were the warriors as they were seen only in battle, in dead of night or

    heat of day, when very few white men lived to describe them, and no white

    woman had survived the encounter.

    Their squaws walked behind them, and half-breeds with drums. Priests of the

    Cherokee and Chickasaw chanted ancient hymns in praise of the victor.

    To James, it was the most exotic and extraordinary experience of his life,

    and it caught at his soul.

    Before him was man in his purest, simplest form. Man of the wilderness, at

    one with the wild, lord of a lawless world, where survival required a

    consummate union with the earth and the heavens. Man the hunter, living

    from the land, and taking from it only what could be given back.

    Andrew had no need to guess what James was thinking, for he felt it, and

    assumed that every man would when confronted with the challenge of these

    splendid creatures. Yet he owed a debt to his friend, and tried to

    communicate to him what his money had bought.

    "It is to do battle on the plains of Mount Olympus," he said softly, so

    only James could hear, and perhaps Lincoyen.

    "The landscape itself could be the domain of the gods, for it is the very

    best of America, pristine and pure. The unsullied handiwork of God."

126 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

He didn't speak for a moment, but stared at the Indians.

    "These are not ordinary men," he said. "These are the most noble animals,

    bred by Hermes and blessed by Apollo. To do battle with them is to

    challenge the authority of Zeus."

    Suddenly, some strange and mysterious anger exploded in him, and he

    turned to James in fury.

    "And I choose to do it! I am not chosen by some panel or drafted by some

    committee! It is not my fate, for I am master of my own destiny. I choose

    to challenge these colossi, and I win! "

    Andrew had James completely in his thrall, and turned back to look at his

    prisoners again.

"They are magnificent," he said softly.

    At that moment, James would have given everything he possessed,

    everything in the world-he would have sold his soul to the devil-to know,

    if only for a moment, the heroic, surpassing majesty it must be to kill

    an Indian.

    1~6

Andrew had other spoils of war. Sent to negotiate a peace treaty with the

Creek, he gave them an ultimatum, and would not concede one single point

of it.

    Under threat of war and destruction, and in return for some small

    annuities to the chiefs, the elders of the tribes of the Creek, in

    council, ceded to Andrew Jackson, representative of the United States

    government, twenty-three million acres of land.

    It was half of the ancient realm of the Creek and covered most of Alabama

    and part of Georgia. Tennessee was no longer the frontier.

    For the restless, journeying settlers, a new paradise had been found.

    But before they could take possession of it, Andrew had to win another

    battle.

    BLOODLINES 127

    In order to teach the Americans a lesson, a small British expeditionary

    force had attacked the capital, Washington, and had set fire to the

    president's home. They withdrew and attacked Baltimore, but were repelled

    by gunfire. It didn't matter. The point had been made.