17. America’s Toughest President
Andrew Jackson was not a particularly nice man. As a general, he had been all too eager to hang his men for disciplinary infractions. He was also the only American president to have made his wealth primarily as an active wholesale slave dealer – a career considered disreputable even by many slave owners. However, Jackson was good at kicking ass and taking names.
He began his ass kicking career during the American Revolution, joining a militia at age thirteen. A year later, a fourteen-year-old Jackson defiantly refused to shine a British officer’s shoes, which earned him a sword slash across his face and hand. That left the future president with a burning hatred of the British. He paid them back with interest at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815, when his men killed, wounded, and captured about 2500 British, while suffering only 300 casualties of their own.
