Andrew Jackson was born in the Waxhaw settlement on the 15th of March, 1767, so near the border of North and South Carolina as to leave it a question of contention as to which State may claim the honor of his nativity. His father, Andrew Jackson, came over from Carrickfergus, on the north coast of Ireland, in 1765. His mother was Elizabeth Hutchinson. The father died before the birth of Andrew. His birthplace was a rude log cabin of the border. His education was limited to the elementary studies of the country schools of his day. At the age of fourteen he entered the colonial army, and, young as he was, displayed the same spirit of patriotic courage and indomitable will that made him famous. Two elder brothers had entered the army before him, and both gave their lives a sacrifice to the cause of liberty. The mother died soon, of grief and the hardships of war. Young Andrew was taken prisoner, and roughly treated by his captors. He was nearly starved in prison at Camden. While thus confined, an English officer insolently ordered him one day to black his boots. Jackson indignantly refused, for which offense the brutal officer beat him over his head with his sword, inflicting injuries which caused suffering in after life. This incident is related to have greatly intensified Jackson's hatred of the English throughout his life. An orphan, and alone in the world, when the War of the Revolution was over he was apprenticed to learn the saddler's trade. At eighteen he began the study of law, in the office of McCoy, in Salisbury. In 1788, Jackson was appointed public prosecutor for western North Carolina, now Tennessee. He removed and located at Nashville, and very soon was engaged in an active and remunerative practice. In 1796, he sat as a delegate in the convention at Knoxville, to frame a constitution for Tennessee, admitted into the Union as a State in that year. He was the first representative in Congress of the new State. But one year afterward, he was elected a senator of the United States Congress. In 1798, he resigned his seat in the Senate to accept an appointment as judge of the Supreme Court of his State, which office he held for six years. He engaged repeatedly in personal rencounters and duels, and in the latter received wounds that caused him great physical suffering during life.