General Coffee's Route to New Orleans

Profile manager: Mary Richardson [send private message]

... ... ... ... served for Tennessee in the War of 1812
Service started:
Unit(s):
Service ended:

• War of 1812 Georgia
• War of 1812 Mississippi Territory
• War of 1812 Louisiana
• War of 1812 Kentucky
• War of 1812 Tennessee

John R. Coffee

General John Coffee

"On September 20, 1814, an order is entered: The volunteer horsemen will rendezvous at Fayettesville on the 28th and will march the earliest possible to Fort St. Stephens. On October 4, 1814, in a letter to General Jackson. General Coffee says: "I shall take up the line of march, cross the Tennessee River at the upper end of the shoal by Levi Colbert 's, James Brown, Richlands' and to Fort St. Stephens." On November 1, 1814, he was at Fort Mimms, just above Mobile, then went to Pensacola, returning to Fort Mimms November 14, then took Old Trails due west, camping at Corson's Ferry, November. 18, and at Liberty, near Amite City, December 5, 1814, and at Sandy Creek, near Baton Rouge, on December 13, 1814, whence the famous march to New Orleans."^[1]

General Coffee's Route to New Orleans

CAMP AT CARSON’S FERRY TOMBIGBY, November 18, 1814. (Excerpt from Letters of General John Coffee to His Wife, 1813-1815)

" I wrote you a few days since by mail, and since I returned from Pensacola, in which I gave you a detailed account of our procedure while gone to that place which I hope you will have recd. ere this reaches,—Major McCulloch since hearing the accident of his little son breaking his thigh, has determined to return home immediately, by whom I send you this line,—no change of things since I wrote you, only our movements are more definite, I am ordered to go directly to Baton Rouge on the Mississippi, which place is about 60 miles below Natchez, and from here is about 250 miles. I am now crossing the Bigby and will in two days take up the line of march for that place, with about eighteen hundred men, the balance of my command say about 1000 men will fall back and scour the Escambia and Cahaba rivers—it is believed that we shall only be wanted to maintain and protect the country until the arrival of the Tennessee Militia, who will be all sufficient for that purpose when they arrive—I think by Christmas and in a few days after I shall be at home ... "^[2][3]

November the 24th 1814, Jackson's Army, headed to New Orleans and General Coffee's Brigade, headed to Baton Rouge, crossed paths. They camped at Gattlin's on the west bank of the Chickasaw-Hay River on the old Federal Road. Coffee led his brigade, which consisted largely of free blacks and American Indian warriors from allied Southeast tribes, at the Battle of New Orleans.^[4]

At this point reconnaissance was poor and General Jackson had no idea when or where the British invasion would take place, he only knew it was imminent. One possibility was that the British would enter Lake Ponchatrain from the Gulf of Mexico and proceed to Baton Rouge and blockade the Mississippi River at Baton Rouge thereby isolating the Île d'Orléans (Isle of Orleans).

MOUTH OF SANDY CREEK, December 15, 1814. (Excerpt from Letters of General John Coffee to His Wife, 1813-1815)

I arrived at this place, which is twenty miles above Baton Rouge on the ninth instant, after sixteen days marching from the Cut-off, worse than any I ever experienced. The line of march was on a parallel with the sea coast, and distant from it generally forty or fifty miles, crossing all the little Rivers that are very numerous in this Country, having the whole, to swim, bridge or ferry. It rained on us twenty days successively and heavier rains than you ever saw fall,—I have selected this place on the bank of the Mississippi and distant above Orleans a little upwards of an hundred miles, as a suitable spot to forage the horses and feed the men untill further orders. This day by express I recd. dispatches from General Jackson at Orleans, saying the enemy in numbers had arrived, and was seen laying off Cat and Ship Islands, which is opposite the outlet from Lake Ponchetrain, and a little East of the mouth of the Mississippi River—the General says, the River is so well fortified they cannot approach that way, then the only way they can possibly came in will be through the lake, if so perhaps they may attempt landing on this side, and marching by land, in that event I shall be ready to meet them, in the swamps, when one Tennessean can run down ten sailors, and worn out Europeans, through mud, water, and brush,—I do not believe they will ever land, but should they attempt it, I have no doubt as to the result, being favourable to our army.—what has become of General Carroll. I cannot hear one word of him, surely he is coming on although he must come slow.

I am still of opinion our services will not be wanted here long, if the enemy land at all they will do it very shortly which will bring the thing to a quick issue, and if they disappear and the Tennesseans and Kentuckians get down and properly arranged. I expect we will be ordered to Tennessee, in a month from this time,—but at present I expect you need not look for me untill about the first of February when I have but very little doubt, but I shall have the pleasure to see you at home....^[5][6]

Lt. Neal B. Rose, Brigade Quartermaster, Volunteer Mounted Gunmen, Camp near Sandy Creek, Mississippi Territory, of money owed Rebecca Clark. 1814 Dec. 11.^[7]

Isle of Orleans

Henry Skipwith was the newspaper publisher in Clinton, East Feliciana Parish, Louisiana. He was born in Virginia in 1816, and at the age of eight years was adopted by his uncle, Thomas Bolling Robertson, the second governor of the state of Louisiana. He wrote the following account in 1889.

"Hitherto my narrative depicts the pioneers developing and expanding the arts of peaceful civilization, building homes, clearing, fencing, planting orchards and farms during a period of peace, the calm influences of which were only disturbed in 1810 by the brief and bloodless revolt which expelled the Spanish authority. Nov, in 1814, the first call is made upon them to defend the homes they have built. Gen. Coffee, whose headquarters were established at Baton Rouge late in the summer of 1814, had sent his worn out cavalry horses into the East Feliciana pastures to rest and recruit. An order to him from Gen. Jackson, dated New Orleans, Dec. 17th, summoned him to come with all the men, horses and arras he could raise, and "not to sleep until he got there," caused the sending of couriers with the startling news that "The British had landed, and Gen. Jackson, in New Orleans, was badly in need of men, arms and horses." The news thrilled all hearts in the scattered hamlets of East Feliciana like the sound of the midnight tocsin stirred the emotional Parisians. It looked like the land had been sown with the fabled Dragon's teeth to see an armed and mounted man spring out of every canebrake. "

"Gen. Coffee's recruited cavalry horses were started in a gallop back to Baton Rouge, each with East Feliciana rider on his back, with his sire's old rifle, which had sent messages of death to the British on the Revolutionary battlefields Even the 12-year-old boys caught up the shaggy, pot-gutted ponies in their canebrake hiding places, saddled them up and spurred on to Baton Rouge. Old John Rowley nailed up a blanket as a substitute for the unfinished door of his log cabin, and committing Esther and the twins to the care of God, galloped off with his rifle for Baton Rouge."

"On the night of December 23rd, when Gen Coffee sent an answer to his chief's peremptory order of the 17th from his camp, fifteen miles above New Orleans, saying: "I am here with fifteen hundred armed and mounted men," all East Feliciana, from the boy of twelve to the grey beard of seventy slept under the folds of brave Coffee's banner that night. When Coffee on the 27th and 28th was retiring sullenly, disputing every inch of the way from the shore of Lake Borgne to the famous field of Chalmette, the sharp crack of the East Feliciana rifle revived the echoes of Guilford Court House, Camden, and King's mountain, in the swamps of Lake Borgne. It is painful to narrate that, as Coffee retired before Packenham's veteran Ieigions, many a saddle was emptied of its bold East Feliciana riders."^[8]

Troops Arrival

"Jackson’s call upon Coffee, Carroll, and others had been quickly responded to. Coffee came speedily over the long and tedious route from Fort Jackson, on the Alabama River, to Baton Rouge, and was now encamped, with his brigade of mounted riflemen, on Avart’s plantation, five miles above New Orleans. The active young Carroll, who had left Nashville in November with Tennessee militia, arrived in flat-boats and barges at about the same time, and brought into camp a regiment of young, brave, well-armed, but inexperienced soldiers, expert in the use of the rifle, and eager for battle. They landed on the 22d of December, and were hailed by Jackson with great joy. A troop of horse, under the dashing young Hinds, raised in Louisiana, came at about the same time."^[9]

The French and Spaniards had claimed the rich, fertile soil on either side of the Mississippi River, planting cotton, indigo, and sugar cane. The section of the east bank of the river from what is now Upperline Street to General Taylor Drive was a plantation originally owned by Valentin Robert Avart. The plantation was divided upon Avart’s death in 1816 and General Wade Hampton of South Carolina acquired a large portion of it.^[10]

General Coffee's journal shows that after the Battle of New Orleans, March 15,1815, the orders were: On the 17th instant the brigade of Tennessee volunteers, mounted gunmen, under my command, will commence its march to Nashville, in the State of Tennessee; the route by which I shall march will be to Baton Rouge, Washington, W. T. McKearin's Choctaw Line, Choctaw Agency, Chickasaw Agency, Tennessee River, Colbert's Ferry, Columbia and to Nashville." ^[11]This also is believed to be the return route of General Jackson.

Battle of New Orleans

HISTORIC RESOURCE STUDY, Chalmette Unit, Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve by Jerome A. Greene, September 1985

Sources

1. ↑ Publications of the Louisiana Historical Society, New Orleans ..., Volumes 7-10 By Louisiana Historical Society, page434 out of 580
2. ↑ [http://genealogytrails.com/ala/history_jcoffee2.html
3. ↑ https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=2UlHAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PP7 Tennessee Historical Magazine: Volume 2, page 264]
4. ↑ Major Howell Tatum's Journal While Acting Topographical Engineer (1814) to General Jackson, Commanding - Scholar's Choice Edition
5. ↑ http://genealogytrails.com/ala/history_jcoffee2.html
6. ↑ https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=2UlHAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PP7 Tennessee Historical Magazine: Volume 2, page 264]
7. ↑ The Historic New Orleans Collection (THNOC) Folder 87. Account by [Lt. Neal] B. Rose, [Brigade Quartermaster, Volunteer Mounted Gunmen], Camp near Sandy Creek, M[ississippi] T[erritory], of money owed Rebecca Clark. 1814 Dec. 11. Attests to claim of Rebecca Clark, owner of farm at Sandy Creek, for corn and fodder in support of [Brig.] Genl. [John] Coffee's troops. Signed: N. B. Rose, Brig. Q. Master; and John Coffee, Brig. Genl. Endorsed for payment by Maj. Genl. Andrew Jackson; signed: Andrew Jackson, Major Genl. Cmdg, 7th M. District, New Orleans. Payment receipted by Rebecca Clark; signed: Rebecca Clark. 2 pp. 1 item.
8. ↑ [https://archive.org/details/eastfelicianalou00skip East Feliciana, Louisiana by Skipwith, Henry. from old catalog] page
9. ↑ http://freepages.history.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~wcarr1/Lossing2/Chap42.html
10. ↑ NOLA History: The Neighborhoods of Uptown New Orleans, by EDWARD BRANLEY
11. ↑ Publications of the Louisiana Historical Society, New Orleans ..., Volumes 7-10 By Louisiana Historical Society, page116