Stevens ended up joining American soldiers under General Andrew Jackson, serving in the now-famous Battle of New Orleans.
During the battle Stevens was wounded in the head by a musket ball, an injury which would trouble him for the rest of his life.
[1][2] Stevens returned to Brookville after the war and began studying law, being admitted to the Indiana bar in 1817.
During this brief first stint in the General Assembly, the famously short-tempered Stevens began a legal squabble with James Noble (one of Indiana's U.S.
Senators at the time) which ended with the Franklin County Circuit Court fining both men five-hundred dollars.
[1][2] Stevens moved to Vevay, Indiana in 1817, where he helped to organize a local branch of the state bank.
After an old friend, John Test, visited Stevens in the hospital and reported to Governor Conrad Baker about the former justice's poor mental state, Baker and his associates raised money to have a suit tailored and gifted to Stevens to commemorate his long and successful career in law.