66 
ral Jackson had his head quarters. About one hundred paces 
farther, commences the right of the line, to the defence of which 
this general owes his great renown. I left the carriage here, and 
went along the remainder of the line, at most a mile in length, 
with the right wing on the river, and the left resting on the cy¬ 
press swamp. 
The English landed in Lake Borgne, which is about three miles 
distant from General Villaret’s dwelling. On the 23d of Decem¬ 
ber, a company of soldiers attacked this house, and took two of 
the general’s sons prisoners. The third of his sons escaped, and 
brought to General Jackson, whose head quarters were at that 
time in the city, the intelligence of the landing and progress 
of the British. Immediately the alarm guns were fired, and the 
general marched with the few troops and militia under his com¬ 
mand, not two thousand in number, against the habitation of Vil- 
laret. The English had established themselves here, with the 
intent to attack the city directly, which was without the least pro¬ 
tection. The general advanced along the line of the woods, and 
nearly surprised the English. He would probably have captured 
them, if he had had time to despatch a few riflemen through the ge¬ 
nerally passable cypress swamp to the right wing: and had not the 
night come on, and a sudden fog also prevented it. He judged 
it more prudent to fall back, and stationed his troops at the nar¬ 
rowest point between the river and the cypress swamp, while he 
took up his head quarters in the habitation of M‘Carthy. 
There was a small ditch in front of his line, and on the next 
day some young men of the militia commenced, on their own 
motion, to throw up a little breast-work, with the spades and 
shovels they found in the habitation. This suggested to the ge¬ 
neral the idea of forming a line here. This line was, however, 
the very feeblest an engineer could have devised, that is, a strait 
one. There was not sufficient earth to make the breast work of 
the requisite height and strength, since, if the ground here was 
dug two feet, water flowed out. To remedy this evil in some 
measure, a number of cotton bales were brought from the ware¬ 
houses of the city, and the breast-work was strengthened by them. 
Behind these bales artillery was placed, mostly ship’s cannon, 
and they endeavoured, by a redoubt erected on the right wing at 
the levee, to render it more susceptible of defence; especially 
as no time was to be lost, and the offensive operations of the 
British were daily perceptible; still the defensive preparations 
which General Jackson could effect were very imperfect. The 
English force strengthened itself constantly, they threw up bat¬ 
teries, widened the canal leading from Villaret’s to Lake Borgne, 
so as to admit their boats into the Mississippi, and covered this 
canal by several detached entrenchments. 
