The red-coated sentries were stalked and the pickets were ambushed by the Indian fighters who spread alarm and uneasiness.

Meanwhile Pakenham was making ready with every resource known to picked troops, who had charged unshaken through the slaughter of Ciudad Rodrigo, Badajoz, and San Sebastian, and who were about to justify once more the tribute to the British soldier: "Give him a plain, unconditional order--go and do _that_--and he will do it with a cool, self-forgetting pertinacity that can scarcely be too much admired." It was Pakenham's plan to hurl a flank attack against the right bank of the Mississippi while he directed the grand assault on the east side of the river where Jackson's strength was massed.

To protect the flank, Commodore Patterson of the American naval force had built a water battery of nine guns and was supported by eight hundred militia.

Early in the morning of the 8th of January twelve hundred men in boats, under the British Colonel Thornton, set out to take this west bank as the opening maneuver of the battle.

Their errand was delayed, although later in the day they succeeded in defeating the militia and capturing the naval guns.