After Napoleon’s defeat in the spring of 1814, the British were free to concentrate on their war in America. With a strategic focus on coastal regions and American trade and transportation, the British army attacked and burned Washington in August 1814. Although unable to take Baltimore the following month, the British nonetheless moved ahead with a plan to attack New Orleans.
Apprised of a possible invasion on the Gulf Coast, the commander of the U.S. Seventh Military District, Andrew Jackson, left Mobile, Alabama, for New Orleans on November 22. Recently promoted to Major General in the Regular Army for his successful campaign against the Creek Indians, Jackson reached the city on December 1 and began the task of assembling an army, which eventually consisted of Tennessee and Kentucky frontiersmen, Louisiana militia, New Orleans businessmen, Free Men of Color, Choctaw Indians, smugglers, privateers, sailors, marines, and United States troops.
On January 8, 1815, Maj. Gen. Andrew Jackson's hastily assembled army won the day against a battle-hardened and numerically superior British force. The resounding American victory at the Battle of New Orleans soon became a symbol of American democracy triumphing over the old European ideas of aristocracy and entitlement. The battle was the last major armed engagement between the United States and Great Britain.