CHALMETTE. Said to be just below the city of New Orleans. We left quarantine about 11 P. M. and reached here about 8 this morning. Many were left behind, too sick to be moved. We have put up our tents, and have been looking about. It is a large camp ground and from all signs was lately occupied and was left in a hurry. Odds and ends of camp furniture are scattered about, and there are many signs of a hasty leave-taking. A few of us went back across the country to a large woods, where we found many trees covered with long gray moss, hanging down in great bunches from the branches. We took all we could carry to make a bed of, for it is soft as feathers.
Later. The doctor won't allow us to use our bed of moss. Says it would make us sick to sleep on it, and much worse than the ground. This is said to be the very ground where General Jackson fought the battle of New Orleans and a large tree is pointed out as the one under which General Packenham was killed. Ancient-looking breastworks are in sight and a building near our tents has a big ragged hole in the gable which has been patched over on the inside so as to leave the mark as it was made, which a native tells me was made by a cannon ball during the battle of New Orleans. The ground is level and for this country is dry. The high bank, or breastworks, cuts off the view on one side and a board fence cuts off a view of the river. Towards the city are enough trees to cut off an extended view in that direction, so we have only the swamp back of us to look at. But this beats quarantine and I wish the poor fellows left there were well enough to get here. There are several buildings on the ground, which the officers are settling themselves in, while a long shed-like building is being cleared out for a hospital. It has been used for that, I judge, and is far better than the one at quarantine. We brought along all that were not desperately sick and have enough to fill up a good part of the new hospital. Walter Loucks has rheumatism in his arms and suffers all the time. He and James Story are my tent mates. We have confiscated some pieces of board to keep us off the ground. Company B has been hard hit. We left seven men at Baltimore, seven at Fortress Munroe and seven at our last stopping-place. It seems to go by sevens, as I find we have seven here in our new hospital. This with the four that have died makes thirty-two short at this time.
SOURCE: Lawrence Van Alstyne, Diary of an Enlisted Man, p. 78
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Edward Pakenham (19 March 1778 – 8 January 1815) was an Anglo-Irish officer in the British Army who rose to prominence during the Napoleonic Wars and died while commanding British forces at the Battle of New Orleans. Born into an influential Irish family, he was the son of Thomas Pakenham, 2nd Baron Longford and brother-in-law of Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington through his marriage to Catherine Pakenham’s sister. Entering the army as a young man, Pakenham served in campaigns in the West Indies, Denmark, and especially the Peninsular War, where he distinguished himself at battles such as Battle of Salamanca and Battle of the Nive. In 1814 he was sent to North America to lead British operations in the War of 1812, but was killed while rallying his troops during the assault on American defenses outside New Orleans, making him one of the most notable British casualties of the conflict.
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