The following is excerpted from “American Lion, Andrew Jackson in the White House” by Jon Meacham and describes what took place upon inauguration day, 1829:
“It is possible that Jackson’s failure to communicate directly with Adams helped lead to the disaster that followed, a legendary scene in American history that has forever linked Jackson with the image of a crowd trashing the White House. ‘No arrangements had been made’, Mrs. Smith noted, and ‘no police officers placed on duty and the whole house [was] inundated by the rabble mob.’”
“The reception Jackson had planned turned chaotic, with his enthusiastic followers filling the house past capacity. ‘The Majesty of the People had disappeared, and a rabble, a mob, of boys, negroes, women, children, scrambling, fighting, romping replaced it’, said Mrs. Smith….Standing in the mansion, Jackson was nearly crushed by the visitors. His aides formed a protective ring around the president and spirited him back to Gadsby’s.”
