Historical Memoir of the War in West Florida and Louisiana in 1814-15 with an Atlas Revised Edition

by Arsene LaCarriere Latour

Widely regarded as the best eyewitness account of the Battle of
New Orleans, Arsène LaCarrière Latour’s Historical Memoir records first-hand the dramatic events of the climactic military campaign of the War of 1812. This revised and expanded edition includes a substantial new biographical introduction based on a group of manuscripts relating to the battle recently acquired from Latour’s descendants in France.

Only months after the battle ended, Latour, who was General Andrew Jackson’s principal army engineer, began interviewing witnesses and key participants in order to create a comprehensive record based on first-hand accounts. The work’s most significant value derives from these accounts--of numerous individuals who participated in a crucial moment in the history of the United States-- reproduced in the book’s appendix.

As the first full-length treatment of the New Orleans campaign, the book also offers perceptive analysis of battle preparations, terrain, and strategy by the man who designed many of the American defenses. This new edition also includes nine three-color foldout maps illustrating the course of the battle. Latour characterized it as a conflict "which preserved our country from conquest and desolation." As a key figure in the conflict who knew many of the other main actors and personally collected their reports and observations, Latour provides a record which will never be replaced.

Gene A. Smith, associate professor of history at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, wrote Iron and Heavy Guns: Duel
Between the Monitor and Merrimac and "For the Purposes of Defense": The Politics of the Jeffersonian Gunboat Program, and is the coauthor of Filibusters and Expansionists: Jeffersonian Manifest Destiny, 1800-1821.

400pp. 6 X 9. Appendixes (letters), notes, index, 9 foldout maps.
ISBN 0-8130-1675-4 Cloth, $49.95