Elizabeth and Andrew Jackson, Sr., sailed their home on the coast of Northern Ireland to seek a better future for themselves and their young sons, Hugh and Robert, in America.

Enticed by tales of fertile land in the “Garden of the Waxhaws,” the small family settled near some of Elizabeth’s sisters in the Carolina Backcountry. In 1767, while pregnant with her third child, Elizabeth buried her beloved husband after he died from an injury suffered on their farm. For solace and protection, the family moved in with her sister Jane Crawford’s family.

When the baby came, Elizabeth named her son Andrew in memory of his father. The young Jackson and Crawford boys grew up along the Camden-Salisbury branch of the Great Wagon Road, which gave them the opportunity to meet many travelers who brought news and trade goods with them. The boys worked on the farm and hunted the forests. In addition to attending church and school, Andrew enjoyed wrestling and foot races.

Far away from the big city of Charleston and an ocean away from London, the family enjoyed a typical frontier life in their log cabin.

The Drums of War: Revolution Reaches the South

In 1776, news of the Declaration of Independence made its way down the Great Wagon Road to the Waxhaws settlement. Elizabeth supported the fight for independence from the British Crown. She told her boys the same stories that had been passed down to her about the mistreatment of her family by the English for generations.

Andrew was only 9 years old at the time, but he was surrounded by a community that wanted to fight for their liberty. Just down the road lived Major Robert Crawford, his aunt Jane’s brother-in-law, with whom Jackson sometimes stayed because he lived closer to Jackson’s school. Major Crawford’s house was a large home that was always full of activity, where people debated politics, troops camped from time to time, and supplies were gathered and stored for the Patriot forces.

That year the Jackson boys watch some of the local men leave as they traveled south to Charleston where they defended the city in the Battle of Suliivans Island. After the men returned home to the Waxhaws with their story of victory, the boys listened eagerly, but the war was still something far away from them.

The First Sacrifice: The Loss of Hugh Jackson

The British thought that they could easily conquer the South.

The city of Savannah, Georgia, was captured by the British forces in December 1778. The next step would be for the Crown to take Charleston. The Patriots would not make it an easy task for the British to accomplish. Hugh Jackson, the eldest of the Jackson brothers, was ready to fight. Elizabeth allowed him to join men from the Waxhaws, including William Richardson Davie and Robert Crawford, as they traveled on horseback to defend Charleston.

On June 20, 1779, members of the Continental Army and Patriot militia assaulted a British garrison at Stono Ferry. Hugh Jackson had felt ill on the day of the battle. William Richardson Davie, someone whom the Jackson brothers admired greatly, implored Hugh not to join in the fight that day, telling him to stay in camp and recover. Hugh would not be deterred and joined in the battle. The battle waged in the extreme heat of a Lowcountry summer. The Patriots kept the British from taking Charleston, but they had lost that battle that day.

Sadly, after the battle, Hugh collapsed from heat exhaustion and died. Elizabeth’s eldest son was laid to rest at the Waxhaw Meeting House cemetery, like his father had been. Accounts say that Elizabeth was distraught and still lamenting his loss a year later. The following year, the British started for Charleston again. After several battles and skirmishes between Savannah and Charleston, the British forces moved on to the Charleston neck on March 29, 1780. Charleston was under siege until May 12, 1780, when American General Benjamin Lincoln finally surrendered to the Crown.

This had the Patriots, who remained in the Backcountry, on high alert.

Tarleton’s Terror and the Buford Massacre

On May 28, 1780, news had reached the Waxhaws reporting that the British Legion had been seen south of the settlement. The Patriots of the Waxhaws knew that they were enemies of the Crown, so they decided to take refuge in the woods until the danger had passed.

Having heard rumors about the British kidnapping boys and pressing them into service, Elizabeth allowed Robert and Andrew to hide in the woods with their uncle, cousins, and other Patriot men. Colonel Abraham Buford of Virginia and his men were the only uncaptured remnant of the Continental Army left in South Carolina. On the afternoon of May 29, 1780, the British Legion led by Banastre Tarleton attacked Buford’s men.

The attack was so brutal that Tarleton himself admitted that the Continentals were “cut to pieces” by his men. The next day, while still hiding in the woods, Andrew and one of his cousins watched with their rifles in their hands as the British Legion passed by on the Camden-Salisbury Road. Andrew said that “Tarleton passed within a hundred yards of where I was. I could have shot him.”

The Virginia men who were wounded at the Battle of Buford’s Defeat were collected by the community and carried in wagons to the Waxhaws Meeting House. At the Meeting House, Andrew, his mother, and other community members cared for them. The community members did their best to nurse the wounded soldiers by bandaging them, applying poultices, feeding them, brewing herbal teas, and providing water and whiskey. The injuries sustained in the battle were mostly sword and bayonet wounds.

Andrew reported that “none of the men had less than three or four, and some as many as 13 gashes on them.”

Rallying the Whigs: The Lead-up to Hanging Rock

A few days later, Tarleton and his men were back in the area. Tarleton was going through the Waxhaws, demanding that every adult male swear an oath of allegiance to King George III. James Crawford, along with his sons and his nephews, Robert and Andrew, rode into Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, to avoid having to take part in the British oath. Jackson recalled, “all true Whigs stayed out of their way.”

As the summer passed, many local citizens had seen or heard of the brutal aftermath of Tarleton’s clash with the Virginia Continentals. The Backcountry was erupting with violence at the hands of the Loyalist troops. The Waxhaw men who supported the American cause joined military units led by Thomas Sumter and William Richardson Davie.

These men planned, drilled, and camped on Clem’s Branch. The Crawfords had all enlisted to fight. Elizabeth would allow Robert and Andrew to travel a dozen miles north to visit the camp, but she said that they could only drill. The boys also helped with the supply wagons. She said that her sons were too young to fight.

In late June, the Jackson brothers were excited to see William Richardson Davie arrive in the Waxhaws with a group of cavalry. Davie and Major Robert Crawford, the brother of the uncle that the Jacksons lived with, met often to discuss strategy and to plan operations against the British. In early July, Davie and Sumter planned to attack the British at the Waxhaw Creek ford, just a mile from the Jackson home. However, news of the plan got out, and the British turned back before they could be ambushed by the Whigs.

Later in the month, the word came that the Continental Army was heading south to try to defend the Carolinas.

Knowing that the army was on its way emboldened the Whigs. Sumter and Davie planned to make a simultaneous attack against two British-controlled sites, Rocky Mount and Hanging Rock. Davie, along with 80 horsemen, attacks the Loyalist militia camp at the Hanging Rock outpost. The Crawford men rode with Sumter to Rocky Mount. The young Jackson boys were left at home. Davie returned from Hanging Rock proud of his success. Davie and his men caught the Loyalist militia off guard. They brought back 60 horses with their equipage, 100 muskets and rifles, but no prisoners. Sumter’s attack was unsuccessful at Rocky Mount.

However, Sumter did learn that a detachment of 300 British soldiers had left Hanging Rock to reinforce Rocky Mount.

With the detachment away, Sumter and Davie decided to attack Hanging Rock again. This time the attack would not be a quick raid. It would be a well-planned attack. The Crawford men convinced Elizabeth Jackson to let her sons go with them. They told her that they would not fight, but they needed the boys to help with the horses and other tasks.

Baptism by Fire: The Battle of Hanging Rock

During the night, the Whigs moved south along the road down to Hanging Rock. Once they were close to the outpost, the fighters gathered to prepare for the attack. Sumter planned to attack at daybreak. Troubling news came.

The British detachment had returned from Rocky Mount. Despite the return of the detachment, the Whigs decided to proceed with their plan. At age 13, Andrew Jackson, along with his older brother Robert, waited with anticipation for the fight to start. As the Whigs charged the hill, the boys could here shouts and gunfire. The air began to fill with gunsmoke. As the fighting moved farther south and closer to the center of the British encampent, the sound of fife and drum music could be heard and the boom of the cannons as they projected their 3 pound balls towards the attacking Whig militiamen.

The boys kept up with what was happening from men who were bringing plunder back to where the horses were held. Andrew Jackson recalled hearing men give three cheers, followed immediately by three more cheers. Later he learned that the first three were from the British for King George and the second three were from the Whigs for George Washington. With plenty of plunder captured and hordes of British soldiers down on the battlefield, the Whig militia had proved what they were capable of doing in battle.

Sumter ordered the men to withdraw by stating, “Boys, it is not good to pursue a victory too far.”

As the Whigs started returning to collect their horses, the Jackson boys eagerly awaited the return of their Crawford kin. Then they saw their Uncle James and his two sons, Will and Tommy, carrying their cousin Jim. Jim had been shot. He was too weak to ride a horse. The family decided to leave Jim by the creek. Jim’s coat was folded and put under his head so that he might have some comfort as they left him to die. Heartbroken over Jim, but proud of their victory, the Crawfords and Jackson had a mix of emotions as they rode back home.

General Thomas Sumter described Hanging Rock as “a great victory, but it will scarcely even be heard of, as we are but a handful of raw militia, but if we had been commanded by a Continental officer, it would have sounded loud in our honor.” Andrew Jackson considered Hanging Rock to be his first field of battle and said that everything that he knew about military tactics, he had learned from the men who fought that day.

Upon reaching home, the family told Jim’s wife, Christiana, that she was now a widow. Elizabeth and Christiana took a wagon to Hanging Rock to retrieve Jim’s body and to render any aid that they could to the wounded there. Arriving near nightfall, they received miraculous news. Jim survived. They took him home the following morning.

He recovered quickly and was back in the fight in the fall.

Guerrilla War in the Backcountry

In August, after Lord Cornwallis’s men had defeated Gates and his Continentals and militia, Tarleton attacked and defeated Sumter’s men when they were resting at Fishing Creek. Fearing what would come as the British under the command of Lord Cornwallis headed north, Elizabeth decided that it was best to flee the area. Robert stayed in the Waxhaws.

Elizabeth and Andrew, along with her sister Margaret, her brother-in-law George, and a slave named Charlotte, traveled north to Mecklenburg County, then further north to the Guilford Courthouse area.

The family was back home by early spring. Tories had been harassing Whig families, so Elizabeth gave both boys permission to fight in defense of their homes and for liberty. At the end of March, Andrew, Robert, and their uncle James were part of a group of men guarding Captain Land’s house while he had gone to visit his family. Andrew and another man were outside in the yard. They could see movement near the corn crib. They immediately cocked their guns. Andrew rested his rifle in the fork of an apple tree as he called out, “Who goes there?” No one replied.

Then suddenly, he could see the flashes as flintlocks fired, and he could hear lead balls whizzing by. The man who was standing beside him fell dead. Andrew ran to the cabin for cover as at least a dozen Tories were firing at him. Once in the cabin, he reloaded his rifle and went to the west door. The Whigs decided that they would open the door and fire a volley together into the yard. After the door was opened, James Crawford and another man who was standing next to Andrew were both hit. Someone extinguished the fire, so that the Tories could not see the people in the cabin as well. Captain Land and the men were firing as fast as they could, but they were outnumbered by the Tories.

Suddenly, the firing stopped, and the defenders of the cabin heard their attackers gallop off on their horses. James Crawford was taken back to the family cabin, but he was mortally wounded. He struggled to recover for a few more weeks before the Tory’s ball took his life.

The Jackson brothers rode along with Sumter and other Whig leaders as they patrolled the Waxhaws and attacked Tory targets. Andrew recalled that he and Will Polk had been chased by British cavalry down a country lane that had high split rail fences on both sides. They managed to evade capture.

Capture and Defiance: The Scars of a Prisoner of War

On April 10, 1781, the Jackson brothers, along with Jim and Tommy Crawford, set out on a rainy day to meet with other Whig militiamen at the Waxhaw Meeting House. The men heard horses approaching from the north and assumed that it was Billy Nisbet and other Whigs. They were wrong. It was a group of Tory militia and British Dragoons. They attacked before the Whigs had time to react to what was happening. The Jacksons and Crawfords made their escape by heading south towards Cane Creek, but they were being pursued by the enemy.

As they crossed the creek, Jim’s horse got stuck in the mud. As the others rode on, Jim was beaten by a British dragoon. The remaining three hid deep in the woods of the valley by the creek. That evening, the British burned the Waxhaw Meeting House.

When they awoke the next morning, Tommy, the eldest of the group, went out to scout around to find out what was happening. The Jackson brothers waited for their cousin, but he did not return. Hungry after being on the run and in hiding, the brothers decided to leave their homes and walk to Tommy’s house to see if his wife would cook them breakfast. Thinking that they were safe at the cabin with a lookout posted on the road, the brothers began to eat and rest.

But they did not know that Tommy had been captured, and a local Tory was leading British dragoons to the cabin through the woods.

Before the lookout could warn them, the Loyalists burst into the cabin and began looting it. Andrew and Robert Jackson were captured by the British as their prisoners. A British officer told Andrew to clean his boots, but Andrew refused, saying, “Sir, I am a prisoner of war, and claim to be treated as such.” The angry officer drew his sword. Andrew raised his arm to protect himself. The sword cut Andrew’s arm and forehead, leaving him scarred for life. The officer then turned to Robert to clean his boots. Of course, Robert also refused and was cut by the officer’s sword.

The boys were then marched to the prison at Camden, over 40 miles away. While they were locked in the prison, the Battle of Hobkirk’s Hill happened nearby. The British boarded up the windows so the Patriot prisoners could not see the fighting, but this did not stop Andrew. He cut a pine knot out of one of the boards, so he would have a hole to look out of to see the battle.

Prison, Disease, and Ultimate Heartbreak

The conditions in the prison were horrible. Andrew and Robert’s wounds from the sword were not cared for properly and became infected. Many of the prisoners were ill, and both of the boys got sick with smallpox.

Then hope came. Women from the Waxhaws, including their mother, arrived in Camden. The sister of one of the Whig militia leaders managed to negotiate a prisoner exchange, which allowed for the release of several men from the Waxhaws, including the Jacksons.

Elizabeth Jackson took the boys home, but Robert was too sick to survive. Robert died from smallpox and his infected wounds. Andrew was also sick and it took a long time for him to be nursed back to health. When Andrew started feeling better, his mother decided to go to Charleston. Men from the community, including two of her nephews, were being held in prison ships in Charleston harbor. Elizabeth and the Waxhaw women that went with her did their best to nurse the sick prisoners that had cholera. But unfortunately, Elizabeth also came down with cholera.

Elizabeth died and was buried in an unmarked grave in Charleston.

Now, Andrew was all alone in the world. He stayed in South Carolina for a few more years. He worked at a government station, learned saddlery, and even taught school for a while. He left his home in the Waxhaws to go to Salisbury, North Carolina, to study law.

From Orphan to the Oval Office

This brave boy of the Waxhaws went on to do great things in his life. He became a lawyer and served as a solicitor and as a judge of the State Supreme Court of Tennessee. He was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and the U. S. Senate. He led the United States forces to victory over the British in the Battle of New Orleans in January 1815.

In 1821, Jackson served as the Governor of Florida. In 1828, Andrew Jackson was elected to be the Seventh President of the United States. During his two terms as president, he strengthened the powers of the presidency and helped shape the Democratic Party. Jackson stood for the “common man” and the spirit of the American frontier. He felt that we needed a strong union and often disagreed with his Vice President John C. Calhoun, another South Carolinian, who was a supporter of states rights. He was opposed to the National Bank and paid off the national debt. He enforced the Indian Removal Act that led to the Trail of Tears.

Andrew Jackson retired to his home, the Hermitage, near Nashville, Tennessee and died there on June 8, 1845.