{207}
_Their Number and Importance--Jefferson's Opinion of them--A London
Journal's Prediction--Some of their Captures, and some of their
Battles--The Yankee's Laughable Exploit._
|In the naval operations of this, as of the preceding year, privateers
played an important part. A large number had been commissioned;
during the entire war, the whole number set afloat was two hundred
and fifty-one. Fifty-eight of these belonged in the port of Baltimore,
fifty-five in New York, forty in Salem, Mass., thirty-one in Boston,
fourteen in Philadelphia, eleven in Portsmouth, N. H., and ten in
Charleston, S. C.
These vessels were commonly small, or of moderate size, and were swift
sailers. They carried a few broadside guns; but the peculiar feature of
their armament was a long gun, generally an eighteen-pounder, mounted on
the deck and turning on a swivel, so that it could be instantly pointed
in any direction, no matter what might be the position of the vessel.
This gun was called Long Tom.
These privateers not only captured merchant {208}ships, but even fought
with the smaller naval ves sels of the enemy, and sometimes conquered
them. And they often had a double character, taking cargoes of
merchandise for distant ports and at the same time being ready to fight
on the way.
There was in 1812, as there has been since, more or less sentimental
objection to privateering, which had come down from the days when
privateers and pirates were the same. The argument in favor of the
system was set forth with great clearness by Thomas Jefferson, in an
article published about a month after the war began. He said:
"What is war? It is simply a contest between nations of trying which can
do the other the most harm. Who carries on the war? Armies are formed
and navies manned by individuals. How is a battle gained? By the death
of individuals. What produces peace? The distress of individuals.
What difference to the sufferer is it that his property is taken by a
national or private armed vessel? Did our merchants, who have lost
nine hundred, and seventeen vessels by British captures, feel any
gratification that the most of them were taken by his Majesty's
men-of-war? Were the spoils less rigidly exacted by a seventy-four-gun
ship than by a privateer of four guns? and were not all equally
condemned? War, whether on land or sea, is consti{209}tuted of acts
of violence on the persons and property of individuals; and excess of
violence is the grand cause that brings about a peace. One man fights
for wages paid him by the Government, or a patriotic zeal for the
defence of his country; another, duly authorized, and giving the proper
pledges for good conduct, undertakes to pay himself at the expense
of the foe, and serve his country as effectually as the former, and
Government, drawing all its supplies from the people, is in reality as
much affected by the losses of the one as the other, the efficacy of its
measures depending upon the energies and resources of the whole.
"In the United States, every possible encouragement should be given to
privateering in time of war with a commercial nation. We have tens of
thousands of seamen that without it would be destitute of the means of
support, and useless to their country. Our national ships are too few
to give employment to a twentieth part of them, or retaliate the acts of
the enemy. But by licensing private armed vessels, the whole naval force
of the nation is truly brought to bear on the foe; and while the contest
lasts, that it may have the speedier termination, let every individual
contribute his mite, in the best way he can, to distress and harass the
enemy and compel him to peace." {210}The truth is, privateering is
the most merciful part of war; for it damages the enemy by capturing
property rather than by destroying life, and in so doing it throws the
immediate burden upon the commercial community behind the armies,
who have to a large extent the power of making war and peace without
personal risk to themselves, and often exhibit a willingness to
sacrifice the lives of soldiers with the greatest freedom, so long
as their own property is secure. Show them that their property is not
secure in war, and you give them a strong motive for making peace.
In modern times, the men who are to risk their lives if war arises,
generally have little to say on the question whether there shall be a
war; while those who are to risk their ships and cargoes, often have a
determining voice. The greater that risk, the less the probability of
war.
When the great powers of Europe drew up and signed the Treaty of Paris
in 1856, they abolished privateering, so far as they were concerned. The
lesser powers of Europe, and some of those on this continent, accepted
the general invitation to join in the treaty. The United States
Government replied that it would join in it, provided a clause were
inserted to the effect that private property on the high seas, if not
contraband of war, should be ex{211}empt from seizure not only by
privateers but by the public armed vessels of an enemy. The great powers
that originally made the treaty refused to insert any such clause;
thereby confessing that their object was not to exempt private property
from the burdens and derangements of war, but merely to control the mode
of its seizure, and to secure for themselves with their large navies an
advantage over nations that in time of peace have small navies or none
at all. So the United States retains to this day her right to send out
privateers if she becomes involved in war with any maritime people.
One at least of the London journals, the _Statesman_, foresaw the danger
from privateers in 1812. When war was threatened, it said: "America
cannot certainly pretend to wage a maritime war with us. She has no navy
to do it with. But America has nearly a hundred thousand as good seamen
as any in the world, all of whom would be actively employed against our
trade on every part of the ocean, in their fast-sailing ships of war,
many of which will be able to cope with our small cruisers; and they
will be found to be sweeping the West India seas, and even carrying
desolation into the chops of the Channel."
All this, and more, the two hundred and fifty privateers accomplished.
They cruised in every sea, {212}and wrought such havoc with British
commerce as had never been known before. Coggeshall's history of the
service enumerates about fifteen hundred prizes taken by them in the
two and a half years of war, and these were not all of the captures by
privateers alone; while the government war-vessels, in their cruises,
added considerably to the number.
The fortunes of the privateers were of the most varied kind. Some
of them made long cruises without falling in with a single British
merchantman of which they could make a prize. Others took enough to
enrich every man of the crew. The _Surprise_, of Baltimore, took twenty
in a single month. The _True-Blooded Yankee_ was one of the most daring
and most fortunate. On one cruise she took twenty-seven prizes in
thirty-seven days. On the same cruise she captured a small island on the
coast of Ireland, and held possession of it for six days. She also
took a small seaport town of Scotland, and burned seven vessels in the
harbor. A partial list of the spoils with which she was laden when she
arrived in a French port, will give some idea of the business. She
had eighteen bales of Turkish carpets, forty-three bales of raw silk,
weighing six tons, twenty boxes of gums, twenty-four packs of beaver
skins, one hundred and sixty dozen swan skins, forty-six packs of
other skins, a hundred and {213}ninety hides, a quantity of copper, and
various other articles.
The _York_, of Baltimore, after cruising on the coast of Brazil and
through the West Indies, returned home with prizes valued at $1,500,000.
The _Snapdragon_, of Newbern, N. C., captured a brig with a cargo,
mainly dry goods, worth half a million dollars, and got safely into port
with her.
The _Saucy Jack_, of Charleston, took the ship _Mentor_, with a cargo
valued at $300,000, and sent her into New Orleans; and a short time
afterward the same privateer took a brig with $60,000 worth of dry
goods.
The _Yankee_, in a cruise of a hundred and fifty days, scoured the
whole western coast of Africa, taking eight prizes, and came home with
thirty-two bales of fine goods, six tons of ivory, and $40,000 in gold
dust; all together worth nearly $300,000.
The _Leo_, of Baltimore, captured an East India-man worth two and a half
million dollars, which was recaptured by an English sloop-of-war, though
not till the Leo had taken off $60,000 in bullion.
The _Governor Tompkins_, of New York, near the Madeira Islands captured
the _Nereid_, with an assorted cargo valued at $375,000.
The _St. Lawrence_, with a cargo valued at over $300,000, was captured
and sent into Portsmouth, {214}N. H., where she was proved to be an
English vessel, and condemned, though she had professed to be American.
Perhaps the most valuable single prize taken in the war was the _Queen_,
captured by the _General Armstrong_, of New York. She carried sixteen
guns, and was not taken without a stubborn fight, in which her captain,
first lieutenant, and nine men were killed. She was valued at nearly
$500,000, but on her way into port was wrecked off Nantucket.
One prize contained wine and raisins valued at $75,000; another, $70,000
worth of cotton; another, $20,000 worth of indigo; another, seven
hundred tons of mahogany; another $70,000 worth of rum and sugar;
another, $150,000 worth of gums, almonds, and beeswax; another, $23,000
in specie, and still another, $80,000 in specie.
All this looks very much like robbery, and in truth it was robbery,
unless the war, on the part of the Americans, was justifiable. But it is
certainly more humane to conquer the enemy by robbing his merchants than
by killing his men; and there can be no question that the exploits
of these privateers did more to bring the war between England and the
United States to an end, and prevent another one, than drawn battles,
however gallantly fought, and futile expeditions against Canada.
{215}But the exploits of the privateers did not consist solely in
plundering unarmed merchantmen. They were often pursued and attacked by
British men-of-war, and some of the English packet-ships carried heavy
guns, and would not surrender without a desperate fight.
The privateer schooner _Governor Tompkins_, a few days after the capture
of the Nereid in December, 1812, gave chase to what appeared to be a
large merchantman. But she proved to be a frigate in disguise, and a
sudden squall sent the schooner under her guns before she could change
her course. The frigate opened fire at once, and her first broadside
killed two men and wounded six. It also blew up a box of cartridges and
set fire to some pistols and tube-boxes in the companion-way, all of
which exploded and went flying in every direction. The schooner's little
battery returned the fire, but her principal exertions were to get out
of the way of her powerful antagonist. A chase of two hours ensued,
during most of which time the vessels were within gunshot and the firing
was kept up. The _Tompkins_ threw overboard all the lumber from the
deck, and two thousand pounds of shot, and got out her sweeps, and so
escaped. Her captain, Nathaniel Shaler, said in a letter describing the
action: "The name of one of my poor fellows who {216}was killed ought to
be registered on the book of fame, and remembered with reverence as long
as bravery is considered a virtue. He was a black man, by the name of
John Johnson. A twenty-four-pound shot struck him in the hip, and took
away all the lower part of his body. In this state the poor, brave
fellow lay on the deck and several times exclaimed to his shipmates,
'Fire away, boys! neber haul de color down!' The other was also a black
man, by the name of John Davis, and was struck in much the same way. He
fell near me, and several times requested to be thrown overboard, saying
he was only in the way of the others."
Captain Boyle, in the privateer _Comet_, of Baltimore, made a remarkable
cruise, early in 1813, on the coast of Brazil and in the West Indies.
On the 14th of January he overhauled a Portuguese brig-of-war which
was convoying three English merchantmen--a ship and two brigs--from
Pernambuco. Boyle informed the captain that he had no right to do
anything of the sort, and that he should proceed to make prizes of them.
As the man-of-war insisted on protecting them, there was a fight--one
vessel against four, for the merchantmen were heavily armed. It began at
half past eight o'clock in the evening, and was carried on by moonlight.
Every vessel had on a crowd of canvas. The _Comet_ {217}ran alongside
the ship and one of the brigs, and opened her broadside upon both of
them. The man-of-war then fired grape and round shot into the _Comet_,
which returned the compliment, but stuck close to the merchantmen. They
frequently separated, to give the man-of-war a chance at the privateer,
when the privateer would pour a whole broadside into them, and then
turn his attention to the larger antagonist. An hour after midnight,
the ship, which had been badly cut to pieces and len-dered unmanageable,
struck her flag; and soon afterward the two brigs, which had been
almost as badly damaged, surrendered. All this while the man-of-war was
hovering near and exchanging occasional broadsides with the _Comet_,
till the moon set, and it became dark and squally. One of the brigs had
been taken possession of by Boyle; the other and the ship, assisted by
the man-of-war, escaped him and made their way back to Pernambuco.
On the man-of-war the first lieutenant and five men were killed, and
several wounded, the captain mortally.
On the 25th of the same month, the privateer _Dolphin_, Captain W. S.
Stafford, cruising off the coasts of Spain and Portugal, fell in with a
large ship and a brig, and fought them both. The privateer carried ten
guns, the ship sixteen, and the {218}brig ten. After a spirited action,
in which the _Dolphin_ lost four men, she captured both of them, and
sent them home to Baltimore. The same privateer, in November, was
attacked just outside of Charleston harbor by five boats from an English
man-of-war. Captain Stafford tore one of the boats to pieces by a
discharge of grape-shot, and as the other boats had employment enough
in saving their unfortunate comrades, the attack failed. The man-of-war
then fired a broadside at the _Dolphin_ and sailed away.
The privateer _Lottery_, Captain Southcomb, while at anchor in
Chesapeake Bay, February 15th, was captured by nine British barges, in
which were two hundred and forty men; but not till after a fight of
an hour and a half, in which the six guns of the _Lottery_ had made
sickening havoc with the men in the crowded barges. Captain Southcomb
was badly wounded.
On the 11th of March the privateer _General Armstrong,_ Captain Guy R.
Champlin, of New York, encountered, off Surinam, what she supposed to
be an English privateer. The _Armstrong_ bore down upon her, fired the
starboard broadside, wore ship and gave her the larboard broadside, and
was then about to attempt boarding, but found out that the enemy was
a frigate, carrying twenty-four guns. The bat{219}tle lasted three
quarters of an hour, when the _Armstrong_ succeeded in getting away.
Captain Champ-lin, badly wounded, lay on the cabin floor, directly over
the magazine, with a pistol in his hand, when he overheard some talk
about striking the colors. He immediately ordered the surgeon to go
on deck and tell the men that if any one of them dared to strike the
colors, he would discharge his pistol into the magazine and blow them
all up together. In his log-book he wrote: "In this action we had six
men killed and sixteen wounded, and all the halyards of the headsails
shot away; the fore-mast and bowsprit one quarter cut through, and all
the fore and main shrouds but one shot away; both mainstays and running
rigging cut to pieces; a great number of shot through our sails, and
several between wind and water, which caused our vessel to leak. There
were also a number of shot in our hull."
The privateer _Young Teazer_ met a singular fate. In June she was chased
by a British man-of-war. Her lieutenant had been once captured, and
released on parole, and had gone into the service again without waiting
to be exchanged. When he saw a probability of another capture, he seized
a firebrand and ran into the cabin, and in another moment the vessel was
blown to fragments, and {220}every man on board perished, except seven
sailors who were standing on the forecastle.
The privateer _Wasp_, carrying two guns, had a battle of nine hours'
duration, on the 31st of July, with the British war-schooner _Bream_,
of ten guns. For the last forty-five minutes the action was at close
quarters, and the _Wasp_ then surrendered.
In August the privateer _Decatur_, carrying seven guns, Captain
Dominique Diron, was cruising in the track of West India traders, when
on the 5th she encountered the English war-schooner _Dominica_, of
sixteen guns, and after a bloody battle captured her. It was at first
a running fight, the _Dominica_ firing frequent broadsides, and the
_Decatur_ answering with her Long Tom and volleys of musketry. After
several futile attempts to board, Captain Diron succeeded in forcing his
bowsprit over the enemy's stern, and sending the jib-boom through her
mainsail. The next moment, while a part of his crew kept up the musketry
fire, the remainder rushed on board the _Dominica_, and a hand-to-hand
slaughter at once began. Men were cut down with swords, and shot with
pistols, till the deck was covered with the dead and wounded. The
English crew did not surrender till their captain, G. W. Barrette, was
killed, all the other officers except the surgeon and one midshipman
either killed or wounded, and {221}altogether sixty men disabled. Of the
_Decatur's_ men, five were killed and fifteen wounded.
The _Globe_ privateer had a desperate fight, on the 3d of November, with
two heavily armed packet brigs. Broadside after broadside was exchanged
at the distance of a few yards, and the brigs were compelled to strike.
But when the _Globe_ hauled alongside to take possession of one of them,
she raised her colors again and fired a broadside; after which both
brigs sailed slowly away, while the Globe, which had lost twenty-three
men, was too badly crippled to follow.
The privateer _Saratoga_, of four guns, captured the English mail packet
_Morgiana_, which carried eighteen guns, by boarding. There was an
obstinate defence, and two of the packet's men were killed and five
wounded, while the _Saratoga_ lost three killed and seven wounded.
During the fight the mail was thrown overboard.
Near the Canary Islands a British sloop-of-war decoyed the privateer
_Grampus_ under her guns, and then suddenly opened her ports and gave
her a whole broadside at half pistol-shot. This discharge killed the
captain and one man and wounded several others, and damaged the rigging
badly, so that: the Grampus escaped with difficulty.
On Monday, the 5th of July, the _Yankee_, a fishing{222}smack, was
fitted out in New York harbor to capture by stratagem the British
sloop-of-war _Eagle_. A calf, a sheep, a goose, and three fishermen were
placed conspicuously on the deck, while below were concealed forty men
armed with muskets. She then sailed down the bay. The _Eagle_ overhauled
her, and ordered her to report to the Commodore. Suddenly, at the signal
word "Lawrence," the forty men appeared, levelled their muskets across
the deck of the _Eagle_, and with one volley killed three of her men and
drove the others below. She struck without firing a gun, and as she
was taken up the harbor she was greeted by the cheers of a multitude of
people who were on the Battery, celebrating Independence day.
While an American fishing-smack was thus capturing a British
sloop-of-war in the harbor of New York, on the other side of the ocean
the London _Evening Star_ was just saying: "The American navy must
be annihilated; her arsenals and dockyards consumed. The American
merchant-vessels ought perhaps to be permitted to arm against the
pirates of the Mediterranean or the Ladrones of China; but, like certain
places of entertainment in England, they ought to be compelled to
exhibit in large letters, on their main-sails, _Licensed to carry guns,
pursuant to a British act of Parliament._"