David Crockett_ The Lion of the West - Michael Wallis [59]
To stay occupied, the soldiers fortified their camp with protective palisades and blockhouses, and by mid-November Camp Strother was upgraded a notch and became Fort Strother. Facing almost certain famine, with still no real relief in sight, the men mostly stayed in their huts and tents when not on a guard or work detail. The large hog pen remained empty. For some sustenance, soldiers chewed on old boiled beef hides and supped on bitter broths of stewed acorns and mashed hickory nuts.12 Any scraps of dried meat they managed to finagle were so salty it only made their constant thirst that much worse. Whiskey rations were long gone, and tobacco was difficult to come by. To add to their misery, the temperatures were dropping by the day.
“The weather also began to get very cold,” wrote Crockett, “and our clothes were nearly worn out, and horses were getting very feeble and poor. Our officers proposed to Gen’L Jackson to let us return home and get fresh horses, and fresh clothing, so as to be better prepared for another campaign.”13
Jackson refused to let the men go home, which resulted in a near mutiny. Many years later, Crockett—no longer a lowly private—took a few liberties with the facts when relating the story of “Old Hickory Face,” as Crockett later called his former commanding general.14 Crockett claimed to have been a participant in the mutinous activity against Jackson, but it is doubtful he was. He described the mutiny as a success. In fact, Jackson actually triumphed after he called the mutineers’ bluff and rode out before them, brandishing a musket and personally threatening to shoot the first soldier who dared desert the ranks and go home. He stared down the whole brigade just as he done years before with Russell Bean.
“In the end Jackson was compelled to accede,” Jackson biographer H. W. Brands wrote of the aborted mutiny.
The general could threaten to blow mutineers to kingdom come, but neither his threats nor his cannons could put food in the men’s mouths or clothes on their backs. In the weeks after the showdown he quietly discharged the most malcontented, judging their departure good riddance, and he allowed the others, including Crockett, to take a few weeks to refresh, restock, and get ready for the final offensive against the Red Sticks.15
Despite documented evidence to the contrary, some researchers believe Crockett remained with Jackson’s army for several more weeks and did not return home until late January 1814. That was not the case. Crockett’s first term of enlistment officially ended on Christmas Eve 1813. Records show that he served three months and six days at eight dollars per month pay, plus allowance for use of his horse, and travelling expenses.16 The total due Crockett came to $65.59.
With his pay tucked away in his woolen hunting shirt, Crockett mounted up and turned northward to Tennessee and to his home. Polly and the boys, Wesley and William, were waiting, and so was his daughter, Margaret, or “Little Polly,” just a year old. All the way back on that long ride, Crockett had to wonder if the girl would even remember him.
SEVENTEEN
“ROOT HOG OR DIE”
CROCKETT CLEARLY REALIZED that the war against Great Britain and their Indian allies was far from over. Despite a joyous reunion with family at Kentuck, in January 1814, he knew he could not stay long. In only nine months he would be off again for another round of fighting. Still, this interlude gave him time to get reacquainted with Polly and their three children. He also put in some crops, laid in a stack of firewood, and tended to repairs on the family’s cabin. And, of utmost importance, with no officers around barking orders, he also was allowed the luxury of hunting anytime he pleased.
Crockett had to have been happy to sleep with Polly in