The American Military Frontiers: The United States Army in the West, 1783-1900

4: Asserting National Sovereignty

57 With the War Department now headed by the innovative, energetic, and ambitious John Calhoun, the army seemed poised to assume an ever-larger role in asserting national sovereignty across the borderlands . Seizing on a series of public relations disasters, the economic panic that swept the country in 1819, and the reduced military threat resulting from new agreements with Spain and great britain, however, Calhoun’s political rivals joined forces with conservative congressmen to reduce the army and to block the secretary’s efforts at organizational reform. the public expected the army to help secure the nation’s imperial designs, but its role in implementing the government’s controversial indian policy, its composition, and the embarrassing behavior by some officers and enlisted men buttressed the case of its critics. indeed, the inconsistencies between public expectations of and attitudes toward the army would continue to haunt the frontier regulars for decades to come. in the late 1810s, explosive events in florida highlighted the army’s historic affiliation with the borderlands. About a thousand Red Sticks had migrated to florida following the disaster of Horseshoe bend. believing that indian alliances with Spain or britain still posed a significant threat, Andrew Jackson, now commanding the Southern Division, +fou r∂ Asserting national sovereignty 58 chapter four brigadier general edmund P. gaines, heading the military department facing the florida frontier, and Lieutenant Colonel thomas S. Jesup, stationed in Louisiana with his third infantry Regiment, were ready to use any excuse to act. in late summer 1816, for example, Jesup breathlessly announced that he had “positive information” about an impending Spanish attack against new orleans and insisted that “abundant evidence” indicated that the british would strike against florida and Cuba. if these attacks were allowed to occur, the United States would “find the tomahawk constantly raised and actively employed against us.” to forestall these threats, Jesup developed plans to invade Cuba.1 the predicted assaults never came, but skirmishing between Seminoles, escaped slaves, Red Sticks, Lower Creeks, state militiamen, and U.S. regulars along the georgia borderlands continued even after the destruction of negro fort, once a center for dissident activities. in 1813, georgia militia had established fort Mitchell (Russell County, Alabama), and the government would add a trading factory four years later. in early 1818 Jackson and gaines mustered three thousand volunteers and Creek allies to supplement their regulars. Disregarding orders, Jackson invaded florida that March. At St. Marks, he executed two britons suspected of aiding the Seminoles, then pushed on to Pensacola, proclaiming “that sound national Policy will dictate holding Possession as long as we are a republick.” His preemptive strike, Jackson added, “puts an end to all indian wars.”2 More than anywhere else in the three decades following the War of 1812, military action in florida would determine the course of national expansion. Jackson’s belligerence was a key factor in Spain’s decision in 1820 to ratify the transcontinental treaty, in which it agreed to cede florida to the United States. but it also had unintended consequences in Washington. the general’s high-handed actions infuriated Calhoun, and some in Congress compared Jackson’s activities to the usurpation of civil power by Caesar, Cromwell, and napoleon. others pointed to the diminished international threats to security resulting from the new pact with Madrid as well as to recent agreements with great britain that demilitarized the great Lakes (the Rush-bagot treaty) and resolved longstanding Canadian border disputes east of the Rocky Mountains (the Convention of 1818). in light of these developments, antiregular sentiment indeed seemed to be on the rise. “A most noble competition exists asserting national sovereignty 59 Ft. Strother Tallushatchee Talladega Horseshoe Bend Nashville Knoxville Ft. Scott Negro Fort St. Augustine New Smyrna Ft. Drane Ft. King Withlacoochee Dade defeat Ft. Brooke Okeechokee Pensacola Mobile Ft. Mims Ft. Stoddert Ft. Mitchell Ft. Hawkins OCCUPYING THE SOUTHERN FRONTIERS T om b i gn ee Ri v e r T e n n e s s e e R i v e r Battle Creek cession robert F. Pace 60 chapter four between the two houses to see which shall do the army the most spite,” observed the caustic Winfield Scott. Secretary of the treasury William Crawford pounced upon the opportunity to score political points against Calhoun and Jackson, both of whom he saw as rivals for the presidency. As the shock of the Panic of 1819 and the sectional...