If Andrew Jackson and Lord Packenham had spent more time watching television or read a newspaper now and then, they would have known that the war was over and gone home instead of fighting over possession of New Orleans. But that would wrecked the careers of both Jimmy Driftwood and Johnny Horton.

I know of no serious dispute about who wrote the words to the Battle of New Orleans. The royalties paid for Jimmy's farm and provided a level of retirement he could not have earned from teaching. The tune was the old fiddle tune "8th of January" also known in some circles as "Old Jake Gilly". The tune was well known in Stone County where Jimmy was raised.

Jimmy used to tell how he had written the song to help him teach a history lesson, and that may have been the truth but Jimmy was an entertainer and a gifted storyteller as well as a singer and song writer.

As for the copyright, I do not know a lot about how that works, but Warden may have held the copyright as the publisher. Driftwood was the writer.