Andrew Jackson

Battle of New Orleans 1814

BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS

Clearly his biggest victory in life, the event that made him a legend was the Battle of New Orleans. The battle took place in 1814, 18 days after the treaty of Ghent had been made - news had yet to arrive in the States. 

On one side was 36 year old British Officer Sir Edward Pakenham who had been told to "keep fighting even if he heard of peace" by the British War Office.  Pakenham was the brother in law of the Duke of Wellington,  a battle veteran who had won many battles with his Dragoons. He led a force of 8000 men; "The British regulars included the 4th, 7th, 21st, 27th, 43rd, 44th, 85th, 93rd Highlanders, a 500-man "demi-battalion" of the 95th Rifle Brigade, 14th Light Dragoons, and the 1st and 5th West India Regiments of several hundred free black soldiers recruited from the British West Indies colonies. Other troops included Hitchiti Indians led by Kinache."

Sir Pakenham

Jackson had a rag tag army to defend the city made up of anyone he could get to fight with him. "Jackson's total of 4,732 men was made up of 968 Army regulars,58 Marines, 106 Navy seamen, 1,060 Louisiana militia and volunteers (including 462 blacks), 1,352 Tennessee militia, 986 Kentucky militia, 150 Mississippi militia, and 52 Choctaw warriors, along with a force from pirate Jean Lafitte's Baratarians. Jackson also had the support of the warships in the Mississippi River, including USS Louisiana, USS Carolina, and the steamboat Enterprise." Reportedly both freed slaves and hookers helped make up his army.

Free Men or Colour 
and Volunteers 
- Battle of New Orleans  H. McBarron

"Once Jackson arrived in New Orleans, notice came that the British had been sighted near Lake Borgne, east of the city. In response, Jackson declared martial law, requiring every weapon and able-bodied man around to defend the city. Over 4,000 men came to the city’s aid, including a number of aristocrats, freed slaves, Choctaw people, and the pirate Jean Lafitte. Jackson also drafted a number of civilians, soldiers, and enslaved people to build breastworks spanning from the Mississippi to a large swamp, a structure that became known as “Line Jackson.” Logs, earth, and large cotton bales coated with mud were used to protect batteries of cannons. These defensive structures proved vital to the success of the United States in the battle."

Jean Lafitte

"The main attack began in darkness and a heavy fog, but the fog lifted as the British neared the main American line, exposing them to withering artillery fire. Lt-Col. Thomas Mullins, the British commander of the 44th (East Essex) Regiment of Foot, had forgotten the ladders needed to cross the eight-foot deep and fifteen-foot wide canal, and the British fell into confusion. Most of the senior officers were killed or wounded; within a few minutes, the American 7th Infantry arrived, fired upon the British in the captured redoubt; within half an hour, Rennie and nearly all of his men were dead. 

The British infantrymen flung themselves to the ground, huddled in the canal, or were mowed down by a combination of musket fire and grapeshot from the Americans. A handful made it to the top of the parapet but were killed or captured. American Major Howell Tatum later said the enemy casualties were “truly distressing…some had their heads shot off, some their legs, some their arms. Some were laughing, some crying…there was every variety of sight and sound.”

The assault on Jackson’s fortifications was a fiasco, costing the British some 2,000 casualties including three generals and seven colonels—all of it in the span of 30 minutes. Future President James Monroe would later praise Jackson: “History records no example of so glorious a victory obtained with so little bloodshed on the part of the victorious.”  

Death of Pakenham - F. Darley

While Sir Pakenham rallied his troops, grapeshot from US artillery shattered his left knee and killed his horse. As he was helped to his feet by his senior aide-de-camp, Major Duncan MacDougall, Pakenham was wounded a second time in his right arm. After he mounted MacDougall's horse, more grapeshot ripped through his spine, fatally wounding him, and he was carried off the battlefield on a stretcher. He was laid beneath the oaks which today still bear his name.

The battle lasted about two hours. Despite being outnumbered, the Americans wounded approximately 2,000 British soldiers while suffering less than 65 casualties of their own.

Shortly before the British withdrawal, Andrew Jackson reentered New Orleans to the sounds of “Yankee Doodle” and a public celebration worthy of Mardi Gras. Newspapers in the beleaguered city of Washington, D.C. labeled him the national savior. The festivities only continued the following month, as news of the Treaty of Ghent reached American shores. When Congress ratified the agreement on February 16, 1815, the War of 1812 came to an official end." Battle of New Orleans History Channel   Wikipedia Pakenham Brittanica

Battle of New Orleans - Jean Laclotte

Eyewitness accounts Battle of New Orleans
       (Battle of 1812) "Just then the wind got up a little and blew the smoke off, so that we could see the field. It then appeared that the flag had been raised by aBritish Officer wearing epaulets. It was told he was a Major. He stepped over the breastwork and came into our lines. Among the Tennesseans who had got mixed with us during the fight, there was a little fellow whose name I do not know; but he was a cadaverous looking chap and went by that of Paleface.
          As the British Officer came in, Paleface demanded his sword. He hesitated about giving it to him, probably thinking it was derogatory to his dignity, to surrender to a private all over begrimed with dust and powder and that some Officer should show him the courtesy to receive it.
   Just at that moment, Col. Smiley came up and cried, with a harsh oath, 'Give it up-give it up to him in a minute.' The British Officer quickly handed his weapon to Paleface, holding it in both hands and making a very polite bow. A good many others came in just about the same time.
       ...When the smoke had cleared away and we could obtain a fair view of the field, it looked, at the first glance, like a sea of blood. It was not blood itself which gave it this appearance but the red coats in which the British soldiers were dressed. Straight out before our position, for about the width of space which we supposed had been occupied by the British column, the field was entirely covered with prostrate bodies. In some places they were laying in piles of several, one on the top of the other." (anonymous eyewitness)

JACKSON'S EARLY YEARS - ORPHAN

biography.com entry 
     "Andrew Jackson was born on March 15, 1767, to Andrew and Elizabeth Hutchinson Jackson, Scots-Irish colonists who emigrated from Ireland in 1765. Though Jackson’s birthplace is presumed to have been at one of his uncles' houses in the remote Waxhaws region that straddles North Carolina and South Carolina, the exact location is unknown since the precise border had yet to be surveyed. Jackson’s birth came just three weeks after the sudden death of his father at the age of 29."  

Wiki Page on Old Hickory
Old Hickory's Youth 

Jackson was a lean figure, standing at 6 feet 1 inch tall, and weighing between 130 and 140 pounds on average. Jackson also had an unruly shock of red hair, which had completely grayed by the time he became president at age 61. He had penetrating deep blue eyes. Jackson was one of the more sickly presidents, suffering from chronic headaches, abdominal pains, and a hacking cough. Much of his trouble was caused by a musket ball in his lung that was never removed, that often brought up blood and sometimes made his whole body shake.

Growing up an orphan
     "Jackson was left with a permanent scar from his imprisonment after a British officer gashed his left hand and slashed his face with a sword because the young boy refused to polish the Redcoat’s boots.

Popular depiction of Jackson being scarred by a British soldier
for not polishing his boots.

While in captivity the brothers (Robert and Andrew) contracted smallpox, from which Robert would not recover. A few days after the British authorities released the brothers in a prisoner exchange arranged by their mother, Robert died. 

Not long after his brother's death, Jackson's mother died of cholera contracted while she nursed sick and injured soldiers. At the age of 14, Jackson was orphaned, and the deaths of his family members during the Revolutionary War led to a lifelong antipathy of the British. source

Various pix of Andrew Jackson's Home

OH's home

Brief Bio
   
"Andrew Jackson's parents were Scotch-Irish folk who came to America two years before his birth in 1767. His mother was widowed while pregnant with him. The Revolutionary War that soon followed, was very bloody in the rather wild and poor country where they lived, and Jackson at 13 years, joined a regiment.  Captured by the British, he was wounded and nearly killed by a sword for not polishing a British officer's boots. He and his brother, imprisoned together, contracted smallpox; Jackson's mother got the boys released, but his brother died on the long trip home. The mother later went to tend wounded American prisoners and was fatally stricken by cholera.

Letter from his mother: "Andrew, if I should not see you again, I wish you to remember and treasure up some things I have already said to you; in this world you will have to make your own way. To do that you must have friends. You can make friends by being honest and you can keep them by being steadfast. You must keep in mind that friends worth having will in the long run expect as much from you as they give to you. To forget an obligation or be ungrateful for a kindness is a base crime - not merely a fault or sin, but an actual crime. Men guilty of it sooner or later must suffer the penalty. In personal conduct be always polite but never obsequious. None will respect you more than you respect yourself. Avoid quarrels as long as you can without yielding to imposition. But sustain your manhood always. Never bring a suit in law for assault and battery or for defamation. The law affords no remedy for such outrages that can satisfy the feelings of a true man. Never wound the feelings of others. Never brook wanton outrage upon your own feelings. If you ever have to vindicate your feelings or defend your honor, do it calmly. If angry at first, wait until your wrath cools before you proceed." (It appears he broke each of these rules, from promising to protect the Cherokee to constant duels and battles with his adversaries.)

Early Youth (age 15-21)

Jackson, living with neighbors and relatives, managed to finish school... At 17 set out to become a lawyer, acting as clerk for a lawyer in Salisbury, North Carolina, in return for access to his books... Living in a tavern with other students, he gained a reputation for charisma, wildness and hooliganism. 

Early Years in Tennessee

There were few lawyers in what was to be the state of Tennessee, but with land changing hands everyday, and new institutions being founded, there was plenty of legal action, and cheap, rapidly appreciating land to grab for oneself.

The ambitious 21 year old set out to cultivate the bearing of a "gentleman" responding to any insult with a challenge to a duel or... with whipping or caning. (In Jackson's first duel, they) agreed to fire in the air and declare the matter settled.

...The new public prosecutor had to regularly bushwhack through dense forest where hostile Indians might attack. He showed precocious leadership once, leading his older companions out of a trap laid by Indians.

Rachel Robards

He married Rachel Donelson Robards, the estranged wife of an abusive husband. Jackson threatened the husband's life for implying he (Jackson) was dishonoring his wife. Jackson and Rachel were married for two years before finding that the marriage was invalid. They discovered the truth when the divorce did occur, and promptly married a second time. (Used against him later in his run for President).

BACKSTORY

Before the Presidency

      "The Revolutionary War wiped out (Jackson's) remaining family. Fighting in the Carolina back country was savage, a brutish conflict of ambushes, massacres, and sharp skirmishes. Jackson's oldest brother Hugh enlisted in a patriot regiment and died at Stono Ferry, apparently from heatstroke. 

After admission to the bar in 1787, he accepted an offer to serve as public prosecutor in the new Mero District of North Carolina... Arriving in 1788, He built a legal practice, entered into trading ventures, and began to acquire land and slaves." (link cite above)

ANDREW JACKSON AND THE INDIAN WARS

Junaluska (Cherokee: Tsunu’lahun’ski) (c.1775 – October 20, 1868), was a leader of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians who reside in and around western North Carolina. He fought alongside Andrew Jackson, and saved his life, at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, though later in life he regretted having done so.

Junaluska Cherokee Warrior

"As long as the sun shines and the grass grows, there shall be friendship between us, and the feet of the Cherokee shall be toward the east." —Andrew Jackson to Junaluska 

"If I had known that Jackson would drive us from our homes, I would have killed him that day at the Horse Shoe." Junaluska at the start of the "Trail of Tears."


WHAT HAPPENED AT HORSE SHOE BEND?

Context: Fort Mims Massacre



"On August 29, 1813, two black slaves tending cattle outside the stockade reported that "painted warriors" were in the vicinity, but mounted scouts from the fort found no signs of the war party. Major Beasley, the commander, had the second slave flogged for "raising a false alarm". Beasley received a second warning the morning of the assault by a mounted scout, but dismissed it...

The Red Sticks attacked during the mid-day meal... The (Creeks) held an impromptu council to debate whether to continue the fight or withdraw. By 3 o'clock, it was decided that the Tensaw Native Americans led by Dixon Bailey would have to be killed to avenge their treachery at Burnt Corn. 

The Creeks launched a second attack... the defenders fell back into a building called the 'bastion'. The Red Sticks set fire to the 'bastion' which then spread out to the rest of the stockade. The warriors forced their way into the inner enclosure and, despite attempts by Weatherford, killed most of the militia defenders, the mixed-blood Creek, and white settlers. 

Creek Delegation in Washington arguing for rights.

The defense collapsed entirely and 500 militiamen, settlers, slaves and Creeks loyal to the Americans died or were captured, with the Red Sticks taking 250 scalps... While they spared the lives of almost all of the slaves, they took over 100 of them captive. 
At least three women and ten children are known to have been made captive... When a relief column arrived from Fort Stoddard a few weeks later, it found 247 corpses of the defenders and 100 of the Creek attackers. 

After their victory, the Red Sticks "razed the surrounding plantations.... They slaughtered over 5,000 head of cattle, destroyed crops and houses, and murdered or stole slaves."

Jackson debating with a Creek warrior

The Fort Mims battle set the stage for Andrew Jackson and the Battle of Horseshoe Bend.

On March 27, 1814, United States forces and Indian allies under Major General Andrew Jackson fought the "Red Sticks," ("red stick" in French is baton rouge) a part of the Creek Indian tribe who opposed American expansion, effectively ending the Creek War.

Shawnee Hero undefeated in battle: 
Tecumseh

The Shawnee war leader Tecumseh visited Creek and other Southeast Indian towns in 1811–1812 to recruit warriors to join his war against American territorial encroachment. 

The Red Sticks, young men who wanted to revive traditional religious and cultural practices, were already resisting assimilation. They began to raid American frontier settlements. When the Lower Creek helped U.S. forces to capture and punish leading raiders, the Lower Creek were punished in turn by the Red Sticks.

In 1813, militia troops intercepted a Red Stick party returning from obtaining arms in (Spanish colonial) Pensacola. While they were looting the material, the Red Sticks returned and defeated them, at what became known as the Battle of Burnt Corn. Red Sticks' raiding of enemy settlements continued; and in August 1813 they attacked an American outpost at Fort Mims.


After the Fort Mims massacre, frontier settlers appealed to the government for help... On March 27, 1814, General Andrew Jackson led troops consisting of 2,600 American soldiers, 500 Cherokee, and 100 Lower Creek allies up a steep hill near Tehopeka. From this vantage point, Jackson would begin his attack on the Red Stick fortification.



He split his troops and sent roughly 1,300 men to cross the Tallapoosa River and surround the Creek village.  Jackson's remaining troops began an artillery barrage which consisted of two cannons firing for about two hours. Little damage was caused to the Red Sticks or their 400-yard-long, log-and-dirt fortifications. In fact, Jackson was quite impressed with the measures the Red Sticks took to protect their position. 

As Jackson later wrote: "It is impossible to conceive a situation more eligible for defence than the one they had chosen and the skill which they manifested in their breastwork was really astonishing. It extended across the point in such a direction as that a force approaching would be exposed to a double fire, while they lay entirely safe behind it. It would have been impossible to have raked it with cannon to any advantage even if we had had possession of one extremity."

Battle of Horseshoe Bend

Battle of Horseshoe Bend

Soon, Jackson ordered a bayonet charge. The 39th U.S. Infantry, led by Colonel John Williams, charged the breastworks and engaged the Red Sticks in hand-to-hand combat. Sam Houston (the future statesman and leader of Texas) served as a third lieutenant in Jackson's army. Houston was one of the first to make it over the log barricade alive and received a wound from a Creek arrow that troubled him for the rest of his life.

...The Creek warriors refused to surrender; the battle lasted for more than five hours. Roughly 800 of the 1,000 Red Stick were killed. Jackson lost fewer than 50 men during the fight with 154 wounded.

JACKSON'S LIFE SAVED BY A CHEROKEE

In 1813 when the Cherokee raised up 636 men against the Red Stick faction of the Creek Indians in Alabama, Junaluska personally recruited over a hundred men to fight at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend.  Junaluska saved Jackson from an attacker, prompting the Tennessean to declare, “As long as the sun shines and the grass grows, there shall be friendship between us.” 

After the battle, Jackson's troops made bridle reins from skin taken from Indian corpses, conducted a body count by cutting off the tips of their noses, and sent their clothing as souvenirs to the "ladies of Tennessee."

On August 9, 1814, Andrew Jackson forced the Creek to sign the Treaty of Fort Jackson. The Creek Nation was forced to cede 23 million acres - half of central Alabama and part of southern Georgia - to the United States government; this included territory of the Lower Creek, who had been allies of the United States.  Of the 23 million acres Jackson forced the Creek to cede 1.9 million acres which was claimed by the Cherokee Nation, which had also allied with the United States. Jackson was promoted to Major General after getting agreement to the treaty.

Capture of Pensacola

After the battle, Jackson sent his friend and trusted scout, John Gordon, Captain of the Spies, to secretly go to the Spanish fort at Pensacola to find out if the British were using it as a base to arm the rebellious red stick Creeks. 

Gordon traveled through hundreds of miles of hostile Creek territory to find the British flag flying at Pensacola and British officers arming and training Creeks. Jackson took Pensacola, a controversial move which led ultimately to further battle against the British in New Orleans. (further increasing his fame prior by winning a battle with Spanish troops)

Capturing Pensacola, Florida against a country
we weren't at war with.

FROM THE NATIVE AMERICAN POV:


"Andrew Jackson tops list of worst presidents for Natives." from "Indian Country Today"

"Andrew Jackson: A man nicknamed “Indian killer” and “Sharp Knife” surely deserves the top spot on a list of worst U.S. Presidents. Andrew Jackson “was a forceful proponent of Indian removal,” according to PBS. Others have a less genteel way of describing the seventh president of the United States.

“Andrew Jackson was a wealthy slave owner and infamous Indian killer, gaining the nickname ‘Sharp Knife’ from the Cherokee,” writes Amargi on the website Unsettling America: Decolonization in Theory & Practice. “He was also the founder of the Democratic Party, demonstrating that genocide against indigenous people is a nonpartisan issue. His first effort at Indian fighting was waging a war against the Creeks. President Jefferson had appointed him to appropriate Creek and Cherokee lands. 

In his brutal military campaigns against Indians, Andrew Jackson recommended that troops systematically kill Indian women and children after massacres in order to complete the extermination. The Creeks lost 23 million acres of land in southern Georgia and central Alabama, paving the way for cotton plantation slavery. His frontier warfare and subsequent ‘negotiations’ opened up much of the southeast U.S. to settler colonialism.”

Andrew Jackson was not only a genocidal maniac against the Indigenous Peoples of the southwest, he was also racist against African peoples and a scofflaw who “violated nearly every standard of justice,” according to historian Bertram Wyatt-Brown. 

As a major general in 1818, Andrew Jackson invaded Spanish Florida chasing fugitive slaves who had escaped with the intent of returning them to their “owners,” and sparked the First Seminole War. 

During the conflict, Jackson captured two British men, Alexander George Arbuthnot and Robert C. Ambrister, who were living among the Seminoles. The Seminoles had resisted Jackson’s invasion of their land. One of the men had written about his support for the Seminoles’ land and treaty rights in letters found on a boat. 

Two soldiers tried and executed

Andrew Jackson used the “evidence” to accuse the men of “inciting” the Seminoles to “savage warfare” against the U.S. He convened a “special court martial” tribunal then had the men executed. “His actions were a study in flagrant disobedience, gross inequality and premeditated ruthlessness… he swept through Florida, crushed the Indians, executed Arbuthnot and Ambrister, and violated nearly every standard of justice,” Wyatt-Brown wrote.

In 1830, a year after he became president, Jackson signed a law that he had proposed – the Indian Removal Act – which legalized ethnic cleansing. Within seven years 46,000 indigenous people were removed from their homelands east of the Mississippi. Their removal gave 25 million acres of land “to white settlement and to slavery,” according to PBS. The area was home to the Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw and Seminole nations. In the Trail of Tears alone, 4,000 Cherokee people died of cold, hunger, and disease on their way to the western lands."

JACKSON AS SLAVE OWNER

Old Hickory - his nickname -
some say it refers to the whip he used to beat slaves.

“Stop the Runaway,” Andrew Jackson urged in an ad placed in the Tennessee Gazette in October 1804. The future president gave a detailed description: A “Mulatto Man Slave, about thirty years old, six feet and an inch high, stout made and active, talks sensible, stoops in his walk, and has a remarkable large foot, broad across the root of the toes — will pass for a free man.…”

Jackson, who would become the country’s seventh commander in chief in 1829, promised anyone who captured this “Mulatto Man Slave” a reward of $50, plus “reasonable” expenses paid. Jackson added a line that some historians find particularly cruel. It offered “ten dollars extra, for every hundred lashes any person will give him, to the amount of three hundred.” The ad was signed, “ANDREW JACKSON, Near Nashville, State of Tennessee.”

SLAVERY ON JACKSON'S ESTATE

"Historians have mostly overlooked the slave experience at The Hermitage... Some slaves lived in yard cabins, as close as ninety feet away from the main house. One of those slaves, for example, was a man named Charles, who served as Jackson’s personal slave and carriage driver. 

Hannah, slave of Jackson

     Other slaves lived much farther away, in quarters close to the fields in which they worked. Like on many Southern plantations, these slaves would have labored at the plantation’s main focus: agricultural production, primarily cotton, but also corn, hemp, and tobacco. Additionally, slaves raised livestock and ran the cotton gin and grain mill on the property. 
     One final responsibility was tending to Jackson’s stable of racehorses. Jackson had a longtime trainer, an enslaved man named Dinwiddie, who trained Old Hickory’s equestrian stock. As an elite Southern planter, Jackson recognized the importance of slave property to his financial security and, when he could, sought to increase the number of slaves he owned. 

Slaves at the Hermitage 1867

     Between 1812 and 1820, Jackson’s enslaved population increased from twenty to forty-four. By the time he was president, he owned nearly one hundred slaves; an estate inventory following Jackson’s death counted 161 slaves, split between The Hermitage and a Mississippi plantation.
   Ignored in Hannah’s recollections (sidebar) was the violence visited upon The Hermitage slave community, such as when Jackson ordered runaway male slaves whipped upon capture. 
    In 1804, for example, Jackson placed a newspaper advertisement describing a runaway slave named Tom Gid. He promised “ten dollars extra, for every hundred lashes any person will give him, to the amount of three hundred” if Tom were captured outside of the state. (Tom does not appear to have been captured.) 

    In the case of one repeat offender named Gilbert, running away cost him his life. In August 1827, Jackson’s overseer, Ira Walton, determined to whip Gilbert in front of the other slaves to send a message; instead, the slave fought back and ended up dead from a knife wound.
    Female slaves were not immune to violence either. In 1815, one of Jackson’s nephews informed him that “[y]our wenches as usual commenced open war” against the overseer. This familiar behavior stopped after the slave women were “brought to order by Hickory oil,” a reference to being whipped.  
    In 1821, the Jacksons were living in Florida while Andrew served as territorial governor. During one of his absences, Rachel wrote to her husband that her slave, Betty, “has been putting on some airs, and been guilty of a great deal of impudence.” Her sin was washing clothes for individuals in the neighborhood without Rachel’s “express permission.” 
    Jackson instructed several of the men who formed part of their Pensacola household to punish Betty with fifty lashes at “the public whipping post” if she refused to obey his wife. Betty was “capable of being a good & valluable servant,” he wrote one of the men, “but to have her so, she must be ruled with the cowhide.”

Alfred in his room at the Hermitage

POLITICAL STANCE ON "STATES RIGHTS"

From AJ's papers at the Univ of Tenn
   
    "Jackson’s presidency defined itself in two central episodes: the nullification crisis and the “Bank War.”  Jackson took office amid mounting sectional acrimony over the “American System” program of fostering economic development through transportation subsidies and through protective tariffs on imports to aid American manufacturers.  Many Southerners believed these policies promoted Northern growth at their expense.  
     Jackson curbed the American System by vetoing road and canal bills, declared the existing tariff unconstitutional... Jackson acted quickly to uphold federal supremacy by force if necessary.  He declared the Union indivisible and branded nullification as treason." (cite from UofTenn)

Campaign poster 1832

Battle of Stono Ferry
       Wiki Entry

"The American loss in the battle was 34 killed, 113 wounded and 155 missing. Among the dead was Hugh Jackson, elder brother of future President Andrew Jackson, who was felled by heat and exhaustion."

JACKSON DUELS

First recorded assassination attempt of a President.



On January 30, 1835, the first recorded attempt to kill a sitting President of the United States took place just outside the United States Capitol. When Jackson was leaving through the East Portico after the funeral of South Carolina Representative Warren R. Davis, Richard Lawrence aimed a pistol at Jackson, which misfired. Lawrence then pulled out a second pistol, which also misfired. Speculation is that the humid weather caused the double misfiring...




Lawrence was brought to trial on April 11, 1835, at the District of Columbia City Hall. The prosecuting attorney was Francis Scott Key. At his trial, Lawrence was said to rant wildly. He refused to recognize the legitimacy of the proceedings. 
     
He told those assembled in the courtroom, "It is for me, gentlemen, to pass judgment on you, and not you upon me." After five minutes of deliberation, the jury found Lawrence "not guilty by reason of insanity". Lawrence remained in custody in a number of institutions and hospitals. In 1855, he was committed to the newly-opened Government Hospital for the Insane (later renamed St. Elizabeth's Hospital), in Washington, D.C., where he remained until his death on June 13, 1861.


Jackson believed that Lawrence was part of a conspiracy and that he had been put up to the assassination attempt by the President's political enemies. Senator John C. Calhoun made a statement on the Senate floor that he was not connected to the attack. 

John Calhoun "the man who started the Civil War"

Nevertheless, Jackson believed that Calhoun, an old enemy, was behind the attempt. There were others he suspected including Nicholas Biddle, President of the Bank of the United States, a bank that Jackson was afraid to recharter. Jackson also suspected his former friend and supporter, Senator George Poindexter of Mississippi, 

Senator Poindexter

who had used Lawrence to do some house painting a few months earlier. Poindexter was unable to convince his supporters in Mississippi that he was not involved in a plot against Jackson, and he was defeated for re-election. 

No evidence was ever discovered that connected Lawrence to Calhoun, Biddle or Poindexter in any plot to kill Jackson.

Three of Jackson's infamous duels

First - slighted by losing a case in court.

First Duel
Andrew Jackson's first duel (that we have any record of) was set against Waightstill Avery, a successful attorney and veteran of the American Revolution. During Jackson's early years as an attorney he faced off against Avery in a civil suit. Avery at this time was a much more experienced attorney than Jackson.

Mr. Avery

During the trial, Avery who outmatched Jackson considerably, took one of Jackson's arguments and turned it around so badly on him that Jackson felt he had been slighted. Jackson immediately wrote out a challenge for a duel in an old law book and handed it to Avery. Avery didn't take this challenge seriously so the next day at court Jackson challenged him again, and a time and place were set for the two to duel later that evening.

By the time the two had met at the place where they were to duel Jackson had cooled down a bit. The second's of both men assured each of them that their honor would remain intact if they chose not to shoot one another. Nevertheless both men stepped off but ultimately decided not to shoot each other, with each man firing a single shot in the air. Jackson and Avery considered themselves satisfied without bloodshed, and according to Avery's son remained on friendly terms afterwards.

Dueling The Governor

Gov. Sevier

The build up to Andrew Jackson's duel with John Sevier, the first Governor of Tennessee, took a couple of years of bitter rivalry to develop into a duel.  

Sevier decided to run for the post of Commander of the Militia after his three-term limit was up. His opponent for the post was Jackson, and the election that followed was close enough to be determined a draw. According to Tennessee law at the time it was then up to the Governor (Jackson's friend) to choose the next militia commander. Governor Roane chose Jackson. This defeat to Jackson left Sevier feeling bitter, especially since Sevier had a great deal more military experience than Jackson at this time.

...During the election Roane, with Jackson backing him, accused Sevier of bribery and fraud because they believed that Sevier had changed the original land claims for the state of Tennessee. This hurt Sevier's reputation, but did not stop him from defeating Roane for the Governor's seat.

With Sevier now the Governor again, and Jackson still the Commander of the Militia both men saw each other on a regular basis, and Sevier had not forgotten Jackson's accusations during the election. During a heated exchange out in the courthouse square in Knoxville, Sevier accused Jackson of adultery.

This accusation led to shots being fired (no one was hurt), and Jackson having to be pulled away from Sevier. The next day he sent Sevier a letter challenging him to a duel. After some disagreements regarding where they were to duel (dueling in Tennessee was illegal) they settled on meeting at Southwest Point (in Virginia at the time) to settle their feud.

Accounts differ as to what happened next, but Jackson arrived at the agreed location first, waiting several hours for Sevier who had been delayed. After awhile, Jackson, believing Sevier was not going to show up, began to head back to Knoxville when he encountered Sevier on the road heading to the agreed location. Both men began exchanging insults on the road, and during the argument Sevier's horse ran off with his firearms. Jackson pulled out his firearm and began chasing Sevier who had to hide behind a tree while their second's tried to calm them down. Eventually, Jackson was calmed down and both men parted ways without any bloodshed.

One of the few daguerreotype photographs of Andrew Jackson. | Source

   Third Duel

  "As an adult, Jackson was six feet tall, but never weighed over 145 pounds. His thin frame actually saved his life in the 1806 duel with Charles Dickinson. Dickinson was an expert marksman, while Jackson was neither a quick shot nor an especially good one. Jackson decided not to compete with Dickinson for the first shot, but to take the hit, and rely on his willpower to sustain himself until he could aim deliberately and shoot to kill. 
     On the day of the duel, Jackson wore a dark blue frock coat and trousers of the same material. Dickinson got a shot off first, as Jackson had planned. James describes what happened: "A fleck of dust rose from Jackson's coat and his left hand clutched his chest. For an instant he thought himself dying, but, fighting for self-command, slowly he raised his pistol. Dickinson recoiled a step horror-stricken. "My God! Have I missed him?"   
    Overton [Jackson's second] presented his pistol. "Back to the mark, sir!" Dickinson folded his arms. Jackson's spare frame straightened. He aimed... and fired. Dickinson swayed to the ground... [and later died]." 
     Jackson's surgeon found that Dickinson's aim had been perfectly true, but he had judged the position of Jackson's heart by the set of his coat, and Jackson wore his coats loosely.

        ...."Dickinson's bullet shattered two of Jackson's ribs and buried itself in his chest, near his heart. Jackson's left boot filled with blood from the wound. More than a month passed before he could move around without difficulty. The wound never properly healed and caused Jackson considerable discomfort for the rest of his nearly 40 years. 

         ...."During a September 1813 gunfight with the Benton brothers in downtown Nashville, the cause of which is a little cloudy, Jackson was shot by a slug and a ball. The slug shattered his left shoulder and the ball embedded against his left humerus. Jackson bled profusely, soaking two mattresses after being moved to a room in the Nashville Inn. Every physician in town tried to stanch the flow of blood, and all but one recommended amputation of the left arm. Jackson refused: "I'll keep my arm" was the last thing he said before becoming unconscious. Both wounds were dressed with poultices."

Jackson Killing Charles Dickson in a duel

In later years Jackson was plagued by his ailments, and took to "blood letting" himself with his own pocket knife. A hair analysis done from Jackson hair at the Hermitage shows Old Hickory died of lead poisoning from the two bullets lodged in his body.  (As if the two men who put them there, had their final victory over him years after the fact.)  From Nebraska dept of Public Health:
  "Lead can damage the body even if you are exposed to small amounts of lead over a long period of time. Lead exposures can cause:  

High blood pressure, Digestive problems 
infertility (NOTE: Jackson's only children were adopted) Memory loss and difficulty concentrating
Irritability and mood disorders"

From US National Library of Medicine:  The symptoms of lead poisoning may include:   
• Abdominal pain and cramping (usually the first sign of a high, toxic dose of lead poison)
• Aggressive behavior
• Anemia
• Difficulty sleeping
• Headaches
• Hearing loss
• Irritability
• Low appetite and energy

      "To say that Andrew Jackson had medical problems would be the understatement of the century. Starting with a head wound sustained while a prisoner during the Revolutionary War — he was only 13 at the time, Jackson’s entire life was spent plagued with one malady or another. He was shot at least twice in duels, both leading to chronic injuries. He also very likely got malaria during the War of 1812. This situation was complicated by the fact that the standard treatments for maladies during the 19th century was ingestion of heavy metals (either calomel — mercurous chloride — or sugar of lead — lead acetate) and chronic bloodletting....
         ....Jackson reported chronic diarrhea, abdominal complaints, and constipation throughout his life. It is difficult to attribute these to any specific cause considering that Jackson had so many. It is possible that the malaria caused the diarrhea, but exposure to heavy metals can also do that. He also reported coughing and chest pain....  He had the bullet removed from his shoulder with no anesthetic. He regularly bled himself, so he was walking around with all these diseases with less blood than he should have had. This, I think, explains why he could be hot tempered: he was constantly in pain." source:
 

Takes a Bullet In a Street Fight
          ... Jackson carried Dickinson's bullet for the rest of his life. Later, in 1813, during a hiatus in his military service during the War of 1812, Jackson fought in a Nashville street brawl against the Benton brothers, Jesse and Thomas Hart. There he took a bullet that nearly cost him an arm.

BELIEFS


Religion and Fraternal Order
 Grand Master of the Masonic Lodge
      "Jackson was initiated into Harmony Lodge No. 1 in Tennessee. He would be instrumental in founding other lodges in the state. He was the only President to have been a Grand Master of state (high ranking Freemasons included Washington, Monroe, Benedict Arnold) until Harry S. Truman in 1945"

Grandmaster of the Tennessee Lodge

Presbyterian
          "Although he had little interest in religion early on, Jackson became increasingly religious, eventually joining the Presbyterian church in 1838... Jackson found no conflict between his religious views and his strong support for the institution of slavery; nor did he perceive any conflict with his support for the forcible relocation of Native Americans...

Religious Quotations:  Andrew Jackson: "Well, sir, I thank God that there is such a place of torment as hell." young Nashville lawyer: "Why, General Jackson, what do you want with such a place of torment as hell?" Andrew Jackson: "To put such damned rascals as you are in, that oppose and vilify the Christian religion." -- date unspecified, from Autobiography of PeterCartwright 

       "I was brought up a rigid Presbyterian, to which I have always adhered. Our excellent constitution guarantees to every one freedom of religion, and charity tells us, and you know Charity is the real basis of all true religion, and charity says judge the tree by its fruit. All who profess Christianity, believe in a Saviour and that by and through him we must be saved. We ought therefor to consider all good Christians, whose walk corresponds with their professions, be him Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Baptist, Methodist or Roman Catholic. Let it be remembered by your Grandmother that no established religion can exist under our glorious constitution." -- letter to Ellen Hanson, 25 March 1835

   

Military 




BATTLE OF HORSESHOE BEND 
  
"Andrew Jackson personally led the militia against the Red Sticks In retaliation for the massacre at Fort Mims, Jackson burned the Creek villages of Tallussahatchee and Artussee and massacred the men, women, and children... ‘We shot them like dogs,’ recalled a young Davy Crockett, who regretted the savage revenge and would later become one of Jackson’s staunchest foes. 
     At Horseshoe Bend, Jackson, with the help of the Cherokee, defeated the remnant of the Red Sticks and accepted the surrender of the Red Stick chieftain, Red Eagle (William Weatherford, a ‘half-breed’ son of a white trader and a Creek woman). From his service in the Creek War, Jackson became known as ‘Old Hickory’ among Americans and ‘Jacksa Chula Harjo’ (‘Jackson, Old and Fierce’) among the Creek." source:   



 
12 minutes on the war of 1812

INDIAN KILLER

      "During the War of 1812 he led U.S. troops on a five-month campaign against the British-allied Creek Indians... The campaign culminated with Jackson’s victory at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in March 1814... After this military success, the U.S. military promoted Jackson to major general." source

            Jackson remained in the regular army after the war. Late in 1817, he received orders to subdue the Seminole Indians, who were raiding across the border from Spanish Florida. Liberally interpreting his vague instructions, Jackson effected a lightning conquest of Florida itself. 
      He captured its bastions at St. Marks and Pensacola and arrested, tried, and executed two British nationals whom he charged with abetting the Indians. Foreign diplomats and some congressmen demanded that Jackson be repudiated and punished for his unauthorized invasion, but at the urging of Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, President James Monroe (did not). 
     ... Jackson's action served American ends of nudging Spain to cede Florida in an 1819 treaty. A private controversy smoldered for years between Jackson, Monroe, and Secretary of War John C. Calhoun over whether Jackson had in fact exceeded orders. It finally broke open in 1831, contributing to a political rupture between then-President Jackson and his vice-president Calhoun." source:

Jackson Portrait while in Florida

Various Pix
Paintings of Old Hickory in Battle "leading the charge."

TRAIL OF TEARS


The Smithsonian on his Cherokee Policies
     "In March 1814, Jackson tracked the Red Sticks to Horseshoe Bend, a peninsula formed by the Tallapoosa River in what is now Alabama, and launched a frontal assault on their breastworks. His troops might have been repulsed had the Cherokees not crossed the river and attacked from the rear. Caught between two attacking forces, the Red Sticks lost nearly 900 warriors in what proved to be the decisive battle of the war.
        That day, a Cherokee named Junaluska saved Jackson from an attacker, prompting the Tennessean to declare, “As long as the sun shines and the grass grows, there shall be friendship between us.” 
     But in the peace treaty he negotiated with the Creeks, Jackson confiscated 23 million acres of land in Alabama and Georgia—some of which belonged to the Cherokees.

Major Ridge was a Cherokee who fought and
won treaty rights, married a European woman.
On June 22, 1839,
Ridge, his father, and Boudinot were
killed in revenge for having signed the treaty to
cede Cherokee lands.

          In 1816, the Cherokees’ principal chief, Pathkiller, sent a delegation to Washington to reclaim that land. The delegates, who included Ross and Ridge, made quite an impression while mingling with the city’s elite. Ridge sang a Cherokee song so raunchy his interpreter declined to translate it. (“It’s just like a white man’s song,” Ridge joked in his limited English, “all about love and whiskey.”) Even so, a reporter from one newspaper, the National Intelligencer, wrote that “their appearance and deportment are such to entitle them to respect and attention.”
        Because of his fluency in English, Ross became one of the Cherokees’ lead negotiators, and he proved more than a match for Secretary of War William Crawford. “It is foreign to the Cherokee principle to feign friendship where it does not exist,” Ross said, implying a contrast with Washington bureaucrats. 

Major Ridge and John Ross were Cherokees who fought within the system for rights.

     “You have told us that your Government is determined to do justice to our nation and will never use oppressive means to make us act contrary to our welfare and free will.” The treaties the Cherokees had signed generally required them to give up large tracts of land but guaranteed their rights to whatever remained. Now they wanted those rights enforced.       
      After more than a month of back-and-forth debate, Crawford finally relented: the United States would restore the bulk of the land the Cherokees claimed. 
 (From Smithsonian article: The Cherokees Vs. Andrew Jackson")

Overview of Military Record
  
           "Not all his enlisted men were enthusiastic for the fighting. There were mutinies; the men were hungry, their enlistment terms were up, they were tired of fighting and wanted to go home. Jackson wrote to his wife about "the once brave and patriotic volunteers .. . sunk ... to mere whining, complaining, seditioners and mutineers.. .." 
     When a seventeen-year-old soldier who had refused to clean up his food, and threatened his officer with a gun, was sentenced to death by a court-martial, Jackson turned down a plea for commutation of sentence and ordered the execution to proceed. He then walked out of earshot of the firing squad. (Executed for refusing to clean his plate.)

   (When) he fought the Battle of Horseshoe Bend against a thousand Creeks (his) white troops had failed in a frontal attack on the Creeks, but the Cherokees with him, promised governmental friendship if they joined the war, swam the river, came up behind the Creeks, and won the battle for Jackson."  

Old Hickory in Washington 


 4 minutes on Jackson in Washington

 campaign posters

Various posters





POLITICAL CAREER

Jackson Betrayed by Electoral College
       "America has never seen a presidential candidate like this before. Detractors point to his lack of political experience, his poor grasp of policy, his alleged autocratic leanings and his shady past. They believe this man without much of a political platform (but with interesting hair) has neither the qualifications nor the temperament to be president. Yet in defiance of conventional wisdom, he is leading his three main rivals in the race for the White House, and party bigwigs are at a loss how to respond. No, it’s not Donald Trump. His name is Andrew Jackson, and the year is 1824...

            "Known by his supporters as Old Hickory, Jackson stirred passions in the American people that his presidential rivals John Quincy Adams, William Crawford and Henry Clay could only dream of. Tens of thousands flocked to the charismatic outsider who positioned himself as a steadfast defender of the Republic. Jackson’s rallies dwarfed those of his rivals. Yet he had little political experience and plenty of baggage. Jackson was, his rivals believed, more of a celebrity than a serious candidate.

         "In the election, held in December 1824, Jackson stunned his rivals to win a clear plurality in the popular vote and Electoral College. With 99 Electoral College votes to Adams’ 84, Crawford’s 41 and Clay’s 37, Jackson was short of an outright majority, but undoubtedly had the strongest claim to the White House. 
     However, with no overall winner, the decision was put to the House of Representatives, which was then under the speakership of failed candidate Henry Clay. Clay threw his support not to Jackson but to second-placed John Quincy Adams. When Adams became America’s sixth president he returned the favor, appointing Clay his secretary of state.

           ...A furious Jackson, however, blasted the deal as a “Corrupt Bargain.” From his perspective, Clay and Adams had conspired against him, putting their own interests above of the will of the people.

            "Whatever the truth, the deal backfired. The snub steeled Jackson for revenge and allowed him to paint the administration as corrupt and out of touch. What’s more, it fired up Jackson’s supporters and united a broad coalition of politicians and voters including many who had not supported him the first time round. This coalition would grow into a brand new political entity—the Democratic Party. It would also catapult Jackson to the White House just four years later, where he became one of America’s most consequential and controversial presidents. 

            ...."After the controversy of 1824, the election of 1828 was surely the most ill-tempered presidential campaign in history. Jackson’s supporters slammed Adams as effete and elitist. In an assault that puts Trump’s insults to shame, they claimed, falsely, that as minister to Russia, Adams procured an American virgin for the Czar. They were, in effect, calling the president a pimp. Meanwhile Adams and his allies hit back, attacking Jackson as barely literate, as a bigamist and as a murderer who had executed several of his own soldiers for minor infractions. Astonishingly, all these accusations were true, and yet—in a sign that should worry Trump’s antagonists—none of them stuck. Instead, they seemed to make Old Hickory even more popular, underscoring the fact that he was quite unlike most politicians. Jackson won the 1828 election in a landslide. Politico: Source

Birth of the Democratic Party
         "The negative reaction to the House's decision resulted in Jackson's re-nomination for the presidency in 1825, three years before the next election. It also split the Democratic-Republican Party in two. The grassroots supporters of “Old Hickory” called themselves Democrats and would eventually form the Democratic Party. 
         Jackson's opponents nicknamed him "jackass," a moniker that the candidate took a liking to—so much so that he decided to use the symbol of a donkey to represent himself. Though the use of that symbol died out, it would later become the emblem of the new Democratic Party."

As President    "Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, and other Whig leaders proclaimed themselves defenders of popular liberties against the usurpation of Jackson. Hostile cartoonists portrayed him as King Andrew I. Behind their accusations lay the fact that Jackson, unlike previous Presidents, did not defer to Congress in policy-making but used his power of the veto and his party leadership to assume command. The greatest party battle centered around the Second Bank of the United States, a private corporation but virtually a Government-sponsored monopoly. When Jackson appeared hostile toward it, the Bank threw its power against him. Clay and Webster, who had acted as attorneys for the Bank, led the fight for its recharter in Congress. "The bank," Jackson told Martin Van Buren, "is trying to kill me, but I will kill it!" Jackson, in vetoing the recharter bill, charged the Bank with undue economic privilege. source

FIRST ELECTION INAUGURAL RIOT 
IN WHITE HOUSE

Wild First Inauguration
     "It was one of the foulest presidential campaigns in American history. The race for the White House in 1828 pitted incumbent John Quincy Adams against Andrew Jackson, hero of the Battle of New Orleans.... Jackson was America's first "Frontier President" – the first president who did not come from the nation’s east-coast elite. His victory was seen as a triumph for the common man and for democracy. The celebration of his inauguration was an opportunity for America’s ordinary citizen to rejoice. Margaret Smith was a long-time pillar of Washington society. She describes Jackson's inauguration in a letter to a friend: "[Washington] March 11th, Sunday [1829]
     "Thursday morning. . . Thousands and thousands of people, without distinction of rank, collected in an immense mass round the Capitol, silent, orderly and tranquil, with their eyes fixed on the front of that edifice, waiting the appearance of the President in the portico. The door from the Rotunda opens, preceded by the marshals, surrounded by the Judges of the Supreme Court, the old man with his grey locks, that crown of glory, advances, bows to the people, who greet him with a shout that rends the air, the Cannons, from the heights around, from Alexandria and Fort Warburton proclaim the oath he has taken and the hills reverberate the sound. It was grand, - it was sublime!
      ..."When the speech was over, and the President made his parting bow, the barrier that had separated the people from him was broken down and they rushed up the steps all eager to shake hands with him. It was with difficulty he made his way through the Capitol and down the hill to the gateway that opens on the avenue. Here for a moment he was stopped. 
    The living mass was impenetrable. After a while a passage was opened, and he mounted his horse which had been provided for his return (for he had walked to the Capitol) then such a cortege as followed him! Country men, farmers, gentlemen, mounted and dismounted, boys, women and children, black and white. Carriages, wagons and carts all pursuing him to the President's house. . . . [W]e set off to the President's House, but on a nearer approach found an entrance impossible, the yard and avenue was compact with living matter."

Jackson Inaugural - from White House History collection

      ..."But what a scene did we witness! The Majesty of the People had disappeared, and a rabble, a mob, of boys, negros [sic], women, children, scrambling fighting, romping. What a pity what a pity! No arrangements had been made no police officers placed on duty and the whole house had been inundated by the rabble mob. We came too late.
        At one time, the President who had retreated and retreated until he was pressed against the wall, could only be secured by a number of gentleman forming around him and making a kind of barrier of their own bodies, and the pressure was so great that Col. Bomford who was one said that at one time he was afraid they should have been pushed down, or on the President. It was then the windows were thrown open, and the torrent found an outlet, which otherwise might have proved fatal. ("EyewitnessToHistory.com")The President, after having been literally nearly pressed to death and almost suffocated and torn to pieces by the people in their eagerness to shake hands with Old Hickory, had retreated through the back way or south front and had escaped to his lodgings at Gadsby's.        
     Cut glass and china to the amount of several thousand dollars had been broken in the struggle to get the refreshments... Ladies fainted, men were seen with bloody noses and such a scene of confusion took place as is impossible to describe, - those who got in could not get out by the door again, but had to scramble out of windows. 

FIGHTING THE SUPREME COURT

Vs Supreme Court
      Worcester V Georgia. "President Andrew Jackson reportedly responded: "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!" This derives from Jackson's comments on the case in a letter to John Coffee, ". . . the decision of the Supreme Court has fell still born, and they find that they cannot coerce Georgia to yield to its mandate." (allowing Indians rights to their property)

Cherokee Case
    PBS: Landmark Cases. The Cherokee Indian Cases 


"In 1828, the state of Georgia passed a series of laws stripping local Cherokee Indians of their rights. The laws also authorized Cherokee removal from lands sought after by the state. In defense, the Cherokee cited treaties that they had negotiated, as an independent "nation," with the United States, guaranteeing the Cherokee nation both the land and independence. After failed negotiations with President Andrew Jackson and Congress, the Cherokee, under the leadership of John Ross, sought an injunction ("order to stop") at the Supreme Court against Georgia to prevent its carrying out these laws."

Indian Removal Act
   Indian Removal Act - via History.net   "President Andrew Jackson signed this into law on May 28, 1830. Although it only gave the right to negotiate for their withdrawal from areas to the east of the Mississippi river and that relocation was supposed to be voluntary, all of the pressure was there to make this all but inevitable. All the tribal leaders agreed after Jackson’s landslide election victory in 1832."

          
 "Many point the finger at President Andrew Jackson... consistent with his Indian policies. Throughout this legal battle, Jackson supported Georgia's attempts to assert state authority over the Cherokee people.(cite link above)

Smithsonian's account of Indian Act
      "He signed and implemented the Indian Removal Act of 1830, which gave him the power to make treaties with tribes that resulted in their displacement to territory west of the Mississippi River in return for their ancestral homelands. 
         Jackson also stood by as Georgia violated a federal treaty and seized nine million acres inside the state that had been guaranteed to the Cherokee tribe. Although the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in two cases that Georgia had no authority over the tribal lands, Jackson refused to enforce the decisions. 
      As a result, the president brokered a deal in which the Cherokees would vacate their land in return for territory west of Arkansas. The agreement resulted after Jackson’s presidency in the Trail of Tears, the forced relocation westward of an estimated 15,000 Cherokee Indians that claimed the lives of approximately 4,000 who died of starvation, exposure and illness.
           Jackson also nominated his supporter Roger Taney to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Senate rejected the initial nomination in 1835, but when Chief Justice John Marshall died, Jackson re-nominated Taney, who was subsequently approved the following year. Justice Taney went on to be best known for the infamous Dred Scott decision, which declared African Americans were not citizens of the United States and as such lacked legal standing to file a suit. He also stated that the federal government could not forbid slavery in U.S. territories." source  

First Lady Rachel
      "The Jacksons never had any biological children but adopted three sons, including a pair of Native American infant orphans Jackson came upon during the Creek War—Theodore, who died in early 1814, and Lyncoya, who was found in his dead mother’s arms on a battlefield. The couple also adopted Andrew Jackson Jr., the son of Rachel's brother Severn Donelson. On December 22, 1828, two months before Jackson's presidential inauguration, Rachel died of a heart attack, which the president-elect blamed on the stress caused by the nasty campaign. She was buried two days later, on Christmas Eve." (cite link above)



Controversial Wedding 
       "Why was their union controversial? Because she was married to somebody else when they met. Her husband was abusive and unappreciative; he constantly accused her of flirting with other men. Divorce was really unusual at that time, and it was really hard to get. Her husband, at that point, did file for divorce, but then he took a lot of time to actually get it. During that time, she and Jackson had eloped and then came back to the frontier, where her family accepted him as their sister's new husband, and so did the neighbors and the friends. Then the former husband's divorce finally came through, and he charged her with adultery. She could've gone and fought the divorce, but then she'd still be married to a man she couldn't stand, and so they just let it go through." (cite link above)

White House Version of Rachel's Bio
 "Rachel Donelson Jackson was buried in the garden at The Hermitage, her home near Nashville, Tennessee, on Christmas Eve in 1828. Lines from her epitaph--"A being so gentle and so virtuous slander might wound, but could not dishonor"--reflected his bitterness at campaign slurs that seemed to precipitate her death." from white house.gov

Brittannica Bio
 "Rachel was known as a friendly, vivacious young woman. When she was 17, she met Lewis Robards, whom she married on March 1, 1785. However, he proved a pathologically jealous and abusive husband who falsely accused Rachel of adultery despite having had adulterous relationships himself. The couple separated in 1788, and despite several attempted reconciliations, his fierce temper and violent behaviour convinced her to leave him permanently in 1790. Aided by the young lawyer Andrew Jackson, who had been boarding at her mother’s house, Rachel journeyed to Natchez, Mississippi, to live with relatives."  Brittanica.com

        tragic love story
             US News version of the affair

The Petticoat Affair
       Wiki version 

Children (including a native American orphan) 

         "In 1808, the Jacksons took in one of the infant twins of Rachel’s brother Severn Donelson and raised him as their own. They named him Andrew Jackson Jr. (1808-1865)

          ...In addition to being the adopted father of (Rachel's son from her previous marriage) Andrew Jr., Jackson served as guardian for numerous children although not all of them lived with the Jacksons....Among these were the children of General Edward Butler who had named Jackson as their guardian. Caroline, Eliza, Edward, and Anthony did not always live at The Hermitage.

Andrew Jackson Jr. (Nee Donelson)

            Jackson also served as guardian for Rachel’s brother Samuel Donelson’s sons after Samuel died in 1804. The boys, John Samuel, Andrew Jackson and Daniel did live part-time at The Hermitage...  Andrew Jackson Donelson (1799-1871) who became his protégé. Jackson assured that he received an appointment to West Point and that he studied law at Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky. Eventually, Donelson served as personal secretary to Jackson during his presidency.

ADOPTION OF A NATIVE AMERICAN

            Lyncoya, Jackson's Native American Child. In 1813, Andrew Jackson sent home to Tennessee a Native American child who was found on the battlefield with his dead mother. This boy, Lyncoya, (c1811-1828), may have originally been intended as merely a companion for Andrew Jr., but Jackson soon took a strong interest in him.

            Lyncoya was educated along with Andrew Jr., and Jackson had aspirations of sending him to West Point, as well. Unfortunately, political circumstances made that impossible, and he instead trained as a saddle maker in Nashville. He died of tuberculosis in 1828.

           ...The last of the children embraced by the Jacksons was Andrew Jackson Hutchings (1812-1841). Hutchings was the grandson of Rachel’s sister and the son of a former business partner of Jackson’s. Both of his parents died by the time he was five. So in 1817, little Hutchings, as the family called him, came to live permanently at The Hermitage. He attended school with Andrew Jr. and Lyncoya."

Adoption of Lyncoya
         "The Battle of Horseshoe Bend in central Alabama, was a particularly brutal engagement. Scores of Creek Indians lay dead. 
         One of Jackson’s soldiers discovered a little boy, perhaps three-years-old, wandering around nearby, crying in search of his family... The soldier brought the child to General Jackson, asking what he should do with him... “Bring him to Mrs. Jackson,” he instructed.
         ...Rachel Donelson and Andrew Jackson had been married for more than twenty years, but had been childless...  

Lincoya Becomes a Jackson
      
     "Although it may have been more like foster-parentage than formal adoption, the (Creek) boy was named Lincoya, nurtured by the Jacksons and raised as their own. He was fed and clothed and educated the same as his “brother” Andrew Jackson Junior – and the other nieces, nephews and wards that the Jacksons raised in guardianship. (But did not live in their main house).  
            ...By the time he reached puberty, he had become a gifted horseman, and had natural instincts for the basic survival skills of his Indian heritage, energies that may well have been admired by the rambunctious Jackson himself.... Lincoya never seemed to be able to become the “young master” of the Hermitage like his foster-brother Andrew Jackson, Jr. He tried to run away several times while he was still a young boy, hoping to rejoin his Creek tribe. 
    In the little that is known of him, Lincoya always spoke well of the Jacksons... (source link above)

Painting from 1860 showing a dead mother and the live baby Lyncoya

Death

 
Legend
(via the Hermitage)

Death 

"After completing his second term in the White House, Jackson returned to the Hermitage, where he died on June 8, 1845, at the age of 78. The cause of death was lead poisoning caused by two bullets that had remained in his chest for several years. He was buried in the plantation’s garden next to his beloved Rachel.
    " source 
     "Andrew Jackson evaded death many times in his life. After dying at the age of 78, researchers many years later analyzed a strand of Jackson’s hair to discover his real cause of death. Official cause was listed as heart failure and dropsy. His friends said he died from (the drug) calumel. In 1999, researches at Ohio U analyzed his hair, it was reported that the real cause was lead poisoning leached from the duelists bullets. "Jackson's enemies would never know they finally achieved satisfaction."  source. 

His last words:    "When I have Suffered sufficiently, the Lord will then take me to himself -- but what are all my sufferings compared to those of the blessed Saviour, who died upon that cursed tree for me, mine are nothing." -- statement made during his final illness, 1 June 1845 

    "God will take care of you for me. I am my God's. I belong to him, I go but a short time before you, and I want to meet you all in heaven, both white & black. 
    "What is the matter with my Dear Children, have I alarmed you? Oh, do not cry -- be good children & we will all meet in heaven." 

    -- final words, 8 June 1845


SHIFTING LEGACY

Shifting Legacy
      "Of all presidential reputations, Andrew Jackson’s is perhaps the most difficult to summarize or explain. Most Americans recognize his name... His face adorns our currency, keeping select company with George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and the first secretary of the treasury, Alexander Hamilton. 
      He .. fought duels and street brawls, defied superiors, shot captives and subordinates, launched a foreign invasion against orders, and (disputably) stole another man’s wife. As president he was, depending on whom one asked, either our greatest popular tribune or the closest we have come to an American Caesar." source

Social Legacy
     "Jackson’s lasting political legacy instead comes from expanding the vote to all white males (not just landholder), and the tragic effects of the Indian Removal Act of 1830." (cite link above)

Dark Legacy Belongs To US
       "When asked... why he named the award after Jackson, a Democrat, he simply replied that Jackson was the greatest American president who ever lived. Abraham Lincoln," he said, "was the worst."(cite link above)


From Revered to Reviled 

      "It's no secret that Andrew Jackson's legacy is complicated. He's described by the organization that wants him off the $20 bill as "the slave-trading, Indian-killing seventh President."

Worst Great President
         "But Jackson's sense of honor was far less about protecting a good reputation than instilling a fearsome one through terrible violence. He was a smoldering latrine fire of resentments and rage. And in many ways, quarrels about honor obsessed his presidency." (cite link above)

Harriet Tubman Ousts Jackson off the $20
      
        Library of Congress photo. H Lindsay
    ..."Tubman, an African-American and a Union spy during the Civil War, would bump Jackson — a white man known as much for his persecution of Native Americans as for his war heroics and advocacy for the common man — to the back of the $20, in some reduced image along with the White House. " source:

TWO HISTORIANS DISCUSS JACKSON:

Some quotes an interviews with author Mark Cheathem on Jackson:





Mark Cheathem, Professor at Cumberland University, discussing his book.


Review of Mark Cheathem's: "Andrew Jackson and the Rise of the Democratic Party" (2018) review (slightly negative). 

    Cheathem concludes (Jackson's) "modern-day significance lies not in the way in which he epitomized democracy; rather... the way.. his failure to embody democratic ideals... reveals twenty-first-century shortcomings... The inability of Jackson and his contemporaries to realize the fullest expression of a democratic society should challenge us to examine whether the United States has achieved that goal and, if not, to consider how we can transcend our own societal prejudices" (p. 216)."

"Many Americans view Andrew Jackson as a frontiersman who fought duels, killed Indians, and stole another man's wife... Jackson treated slaves as property to be bought and sold..." argued for the "destruction" of the Cherokee nation, the Presidence-elect was identified as a "slave owner who derived his income" from slavery."

Mark Cheathem author "Andrew Jackson, Southerner"

"Jackson and his America achieved great things while committing grievous sins." 

Jon Meachem, author "American Lion"

  
 C-span Book Discussion with author Jon Meachem (video)

        "Mr. Meacham contends that President Jackson, the founder of the Democractic party and American’s seventh president, was a man of many contradictions who was responsible for the removal of Indians from their land and alternately encouraged granting greater power to the electorate... "

Jon Meachem Quotes on Andrew Jackson  
        “Always take all the time to reflect that circumstances permit, but when the time for action has come, stop thinking.” Jackson

        “A contemporary recalled that when Emily’s children and, later, those of Sarah Jackson, Andrew Jackson, Jr.’s wife, were infants and became “restless and fretful at night, the President, hearing the mother moving about with her little one, would often rise, dress himself, and insist upon having the child, with whom he would walk the floor by the hour, soothing it in his strong, tender arms, while he urged the tired mother to get some rest.” At White House meals, Jackson wanted the family’s youngsters to dine at the table with him: they were not to be kept in the kitchen or nursery, but at the center of the household.”  

     “It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their selfish purposes...” Jackson

     “When the laws undertake to add to these natural and just advantages artificial distinctions, to grant titles, gratuities, and exclusive privileges, to make the rich richer and the potent more powerful, the humble members of society—the farmers, mechanics, and laborers—who have neither the time nor the means of securing like favors to themselves, have a right to complain of the injustice of their Government.” Jackson

Here's a 50 minute podcast with author Mark Cheathem on Jackson:

The Enslaved Household of President Andrew Jackson

By: Callie Hopkins

In January 1829, less than two months before he became president,  ordered an inventory of his slaves. The inventory recorded the names, ages, and familial relationships of ninety-five enslaved individuals who lived and worked at The Hermitage, his Tennessee plantation.

 When President-elect Jackson left for the White House, he brought some of these enslaved people with him. The 1830 census listed fourteen enslaved individuals in Jackson’s household – eight women and six men – and many scholars suggest that his household grew during the course of his presidency.
 Jackson also made significant improvements to the White House during his administration, including the construction of the North Portico and a new stable, as well as the addition of running water to the house, projects that almost certainly made use of enslaved labor, either from Jackson’s own household or 

Unlike some other slave-owning presidents, Jackson did not leave behind many public statements or writings on the morality of slavery. He never explicitly defended the institution, but he also never questioned it or displayed any qualms about his own role as a slave owner. The paternalistic ideal of slavery, common in this era, claimed that slave ownership was morally acceptable as long as owners served as paternal figures for their enslaved people, offering food, shelter, and other necessities. In managing his own human property, Jackson sought a balance between authority and kindness, punishment and forbearance.
 He fretted about whether one enslaved man’s death “might have been produced by the illtreatment [sic] of the overseer” and insisted that those he hired to manage the farm “treat my negroes with humanity.” (When not having them whipped by others).

...Slavery was... the primary source of Jackson’s personal wealth, and he wanted to protect his assets. 
When he wrote to Graves W. Steele, the overseer accused of causing an enslaved man’s death at The Hermitage, he demanded “a full account of your guardianship with the loss of my property.”  This choice of language suggests that he cared more about the financial impact of the death than he did about the man’s life.

Gracy Bradley and Alfred Jackson's Cabin at The Hermitage, enslaved families would have lived in cabins like this one.

Like many slave owners, President Jackson did not always live up to his stated ideals. He ordered harsh, even brutal, punishment for enslaved people who disobeyed orders. When an enslaved woman named Betty was judged to be “guilty of some improper conduct,” he wrote to his overseer that she “must be ruled with the cowhide” and should be given fifty lashes the next time she misbehaved.

When an enslaved man ran away from The Hermitage, the punishment was even more extreme. He put an advertisement in the Tennessee Gazette that promised a reward for the man’s return, “and ten dollars extra, for every hundred lashes any person will give him, to the amount of three hundred,” which would almost certainly have killed the runaway man.
 More importantly, even when Jackson did live up to paternalistic ideals, the enslaved people he owned could not leave his property without his consent, had no access to education, and worked long hours with no pay.

As is often the case with enslaved families, the individuals we know the most about are those who worked closely with the president, and thus appear in the written record created by Jackson and his family members. George, an enslaved man and the son of longtime Hermitage cook Old Nancy, served as Andrew Jackson’s manservant. He was in his early twenties when Jackson brought him to the White House.

 He slept in the president’s bedroom, on a pallet next to his bed, so that he was accessible any time Jackson needed him. A manservant was always on call, with no real time off. George remained at the president’s side for decades, whether he wanted to or not. When Jackson died in 1845, George was standing next to his sickbed.

George had no immediate family of his own when he came to the White House, but others were separated from their family members. Charles was a carriage driver and had been Andrew Jackson’s manservant during his military campaigns. He spent some portion of the Jackson presidency at the White House, but his wife Charlotte and their three young children remained at The Hermitage.

That separation seems to have strained the relationship between Charles and (his wife) Charlotte. Our best evidence about their lives comes from Jackson’s correspondence with a potential buyer for Charlotte and the three children. In November of 1830, he wrote two letters to Robert Johnstone Chester, offering Charlotte and the three children to him for $800. Jackson wrote that Charlotte had specifically asked to be sold to Chester, “being disconted [sic] where she now is.”

Jackson emphasized how this sale would be in the best interest of the enslaved people involved. He had only purchased Charlotte in the first place, he wrote, because Charles had asked him to, and he was only willing to sell her now because Charles had agreed to it. “I did not wish to separate her & her children, from charles, particularly his children,” Jackson wrote, ignoring the reality that he had already separated them by bringing Charles to Washington, D.C. and leaving the rest of the family in Tennessee. 

Jackson had had every intention of sending Charles home until he heard of this request: “I enquired of charles whether he was contented to part with her & the children; he replied in the affirmative.”

The sale, however, likely never happened. Charlotte and her children appear in Hermitage records in the 1840s and 1850s, long past the date of this proposed transaction.

 Jackson called (Charlotte) “one of the best servants I ever saw, were it not for her ungovernable temper, and tongue.” 

...Historian William Seale argued that Jackson increased the number of enslaved people and decreased the number of free, hired servants in his household over the course of his presidency to save money, so he may have viewed the purchase of additional enslaved laborers as a cost-cutting measure.  It was a greater investment upfront than hired labor, but it yielded a lifetime of labor for the president.

(Includes a photograph of an excerpt from Andrew Jackson’s bank book for April 16, 1832, showing a check to his adopted nephew Major A.J. Donelson for “a mulato girl, slave, bought by him for Andrew Jackson, which he has given to Mary Rachel, daughter of A. J. and Emily Donelson”)

In late 1831, Jackson purchased a “servant Boy – named Adam” from Colonel John Gibbons Stuart of Virginia.  Adam worked in the White House for at least a year, and maybe longer.

 Another young enslaved child, an eight-year-old girl named Emeline, came into the White House early in 1832. She was purchased as a gift for Mary Emily Donelson, Jackson’s grandniece, by his nephew, Major Andrew Jackson Donelson. Donelson made the purchase on the president’s behalf and Jackson reimbursed him for the girl afterward.

 Mary Emily lived in the White House with her father, who served as the president’s private secretary, along with many members of her extended family. Emeline, on the other hand, probably never lived with her family again.

...With such an extensive household full of relatives, Jackson needed a large domestic staff. While in D.C., he purchased and her sister Louisa to help fill this need. Gracy was a skilled seamstress and also acted as Sarah Yorke Jackson’s lady's maid. Louisa became a nurse for Jackson’s grandchildren.

(Article includes a photo of a check for Gracy Bradley from Andrew Jackson’s bank book for March 23, 1832, showing a check of $400 “to son for Negro Girl Grace”)

In addition to running the household and serving the family, Andrew Jackson used enslaved labor to support his favorite hobby – breeding and racing horses. In April 1832, Graves W. Steele, Jackson’s Hermitage overseer, wrote to tell him that three promising colts were ready to travel to Washington, D.C. He dispatched three enslaved boys – Byron, Jesse, and Jim – along with horse trainer William Alexander to bring them to the White House.
 Byron was about twelve years old at the time and Jim may have been as young as nine; Jesse’s age is unknown.

There is so much we do not know about the lives of the enslaved White House staff under Andrew Jackson. The 1829 Hermitage slave inventory was the last one Jackson completed, and it says nothing about each person’s work assignment or who might have been brought to the White House."


QUOTABLE JACKSON:

1. and 2. On banking

“The bank, Mr. Van Buren, is trying to kill me. But I will kill it.” Three days later, Jackson announced his veto of the bank charter.

“I have been afraid of banks.” Jackson is often quoted as saying "I have always been afraid of banks," but the actual quote was, "Ever since I read the history of the South Sea Bubble, I have been afraid of banks."

3. On killing Charles Dickinson in a duel
Though Dickinson shot first and hit Jackson squarely in the chest, nearly killing him, Old Hickory calmly took his shot as if he had not been wounded at all. When a friend expressed his astonishment at Jackson's composure, Jackson stated, “If he had shot me through the brain, sir, I should still have killed him.” 

4. On running for president
"Do they think that I am such a damned fool to think myself fit for President of the United States? No, sir; I know what I am fit for. I can command a body of men in a rough way, but I am not fit to be President." 

5. On his demeanor
"I was born for a storm, and a calm does not suit me." 

6. On living
“I try to live my life as if death might come for me at any moment.” Though that may have been true, he was also prepared to fight death tooth and nail. When an assassin tried to kill him in 1835, Jackson beat him in the face with his cane.

7. On spelling
“It’s a damn poor mind that can think of only one way to spell a word.”

8. On regrets
The day after Van Buren was elected president, Jackson took the time to reflect on his own presidency with a friend. When asked if he had any regrets about the last eight years, this was his response: “[That] I didn’t shoot Henry Clay and I didn’t hang John C. Calhoun.” 

9. Further thoughts on John C. Calhoun
"John Calhoun, if you secede from my nation, I will secede your head from the rest of your body." As The Week says, this one is unverified, but given Jackson's character and relationship with Calhoun, it's likely.

10. On the privileged
“It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their own selfish purposes.”

11. On taxes
"The wisdom of man never yet contrived a system of taxation that would operate with perfect equality."

12. On Kentuckians

Kentucky sent 2300 militiamen to back Jackson up during the Battle of New Orleans in 1815. Astonished that so many of them showed up without weapons, he uttered the now-famous quote that is proudly emblazoned as Kentucky pride on t-shirts: “I never in my life seen a Kentuckian who didn’t have a gun, a pack of cards, and a jug of whiskey.”