For six days the weather continued to be very uncertain, and the Ranger
ran from point to point between the Scotch and Irish coasts, waiting for
a chance to slip in the port of Carrickfergus and have it out, yardarm
to yardarm, with the Drake. At last, on the morning of the 24th of
April, Paul Jones found himself off the harbor’s mouth. The bay, the
castled crag, the picturesque town, and the handsome sloop of war looked
as lovely in the brilliant morning light as in the soft afternoon glow
when the Ranger had first reconnoitered the town.
But no longer was the American vessel unsuspected. By the time she had
passed the headland and got in full view of the town and shipping her
warlike character was suspected, although she showed no colors, her
ports were closed, and only a few of her company were allowed upon deck.
But the Carrickfergus people had heard about the daring American cruiser
that had been hovering off the coasts of the three kingdoms for ten
days, and the Drake felt disposed to find out the standing of the
strange ship in the offing. As the Ranger neared the harbor’s mouth her
people could hear the creaking of the capstan and the hoarse rattle of
the hawser as the Drake’s anchor was being rapidly tripped. Nothing
could have pleased Paul Jones more than this, and he smiled as he said
to his sailing master:
“Keep off a little, Mr. Stacy. The Drake evidently wishes for a personal
interview with us, and I would like to oblige her. I think, though, we
will come about, so as to show her as little as possible of ourselves,
in order that she may come out as far as possible.”
The Ranger then went completely about, as if she were running away.
Still she had thrown her main topsail aback and had hauled up her
courses.
The Drake then determined to send out a boat to reconnoiter. As the
Ranger’s stern was still kept toward the boat nothing could be
discovered of her character, and the boat came on within hailing
distance. The Ranger, however, did not hail. The boat continued to
advance, and finally hailed. Stacy, under Paul Jones’s orders, answered
the hail.
“What ship is that?” was called from the boat.
Paul Jones, standing at Stacy’s elbow, told him in a low voice what to
say.
“The Mind-your-business-and-keep-off,” Stacy rattled off so fast that he
could not possibly be understood.
The boat stopped for a moment and then pulled a little nearer, and the
officer in it stood up and shouted in a clear voice:
“What ship is that?”
“The worst we’ve seen for ten years,” bawled Stacy, pretending that he
understood the hail to be about the voyage.
“You are a fool,” called the officer, examining the ship carefully as
the boat rapidly pulled nearer and nearer, but still puzzled by her. “I
asked the name of your ship.”
“Much obliged for your information,” Stacy answered, “particularly as
it’s the hardest thing in the world generally for a respectable merchant
vessel to get a civil word out of you cocky man-of-war’s people.”
By this time the boat was directly under the Ranger’s quarter, and there
could be no pretense of not understanding the officer’s final hail.
“I ask you, for the third time, what ship is that?”
“And I answer, for the third time, she is the Lord Chatham, bound for
Leith from Dublin, short of——”
“Water,” suggested Paul Jones. “That’s the only thing we are not short
of.”
“Short of water,” continued Stacy; and then, prompted again by Paul
Jones, he cried:
“Have you heard anything of that American cruiser which has been
prowling about, capturing merchant ships and frightening the coast
people out of their wits?”
“No,” said the officer, now completely off his guard. “We would give a
thousand pounds to meet her.”
“Our captain says come aboard, then,” said Stacy, “and he can give you
some information about the Ranger that he guarantees is absolutely
true.”
The boat then came alongside, a ladder was lowered, and the officer came
up on the port side. Just then one of the Ranger’s boats was dropped
from the davits; it was quickly filled with men, and in another minute
the men in the Drake’s boat were informed that they were prisoners. As
the officer stepped upon deck Paul Jones advanced.
“I am sorry to begin our acquaintance so unpleasantly, sir, but you are
my prisoner. This is the American sloop of war Ranger, and I am Captain
Paul Jones.”
The officer uttered an exclamation of anger. The name of Paul Jones was
already well known, and one glance had shown him the true state of
affairs.
“Make yourself as easy as possible,” said Paul Jones. “Yours is the
fortune of war; but you will be treated with every consideration, and
will, no doubt, be shortly exchanged.”
The other officers then came forward and politely condoled with the
unlucky officer, while his men were sent below.
The whole thing had been witnessed from the Drake, which now had no
doubt of the Ranger’s character, and lost no time in preparing to come
out. The alarm had been given, and five vessels, filled with people
anxious to see the contest between the two ships, put off from the
shore. Alarm fires were set blazing, and the black smoke was wafted high
in the noonday light. The tide was unfavorable, so that the Drake worked
out very slowly. The Ranger now threw off every disguise. Her guns were
run out and her men called to quarters by the tap of the drum, and she
waited gallantly for her adversary. She drifted fast to windward, so
that she was several times forced to put up her helm in order to run
down toward her enemy, when she would throw her main topsail aback and
lie with her courses in the brails.
The men were at their quarters, but laughing, joking, and singing, as it
was the custom to permit them a little jollity at the moment of going
into battle. They watched the Drake making her way slowly, with light
and baffling winds, toward mid-channel, and exchanged squibs and songs
about her. Bill Green was in his glory. As he was to take the wheel as
soon as the ball opened, he was relieved until the first lieutenant
called him. Paul Jones was very glad to have him relieved, as his songs
inspired the men. Bill, seated on one of the long guns, with folded arms
and his cap stuck rakishly on the back of his head, proceeded to troll
out, in his rich voice, one of his favorite songs, which he claimed to
have composed expressly for the occasion.
“Yankee sailors have a knack,
Haul away! Yo ho, boys!
Of hauling down a British Jack,
Haul away! Yo ho, boys!
Come three to one, right sure am I,
If we can’t beat them, still we’ll try
To make Columbia’s colors fly.
Haul away! Yo ho, boys!”
The sailors caught the refrain at once, and every time it was repeated
they roared out a musical chorus of
“Haul away! Yo ho, boys!”
“Yankee sailors when at sea,
Haul away! Yo ho, boys!
Pipe all hands with merry glee
While aloft they go, boys!
And when with pretty girls on shore,
Their cash is gone, and not before,
They wisely go to sea for more.
Haul away! Yo ho, boys!
“Yankee sailors love their soil,
Haul away! Yo ho, boys!
And for glory ne’er spare toil,
But flog its foes, you know, boys!
Then while its standard owns a rag
The world combined shall never brag
They made us strike the Yankee flag.
Haul away! Yo ho, boys!”
Loud cheers and laughter greeted this song, the officers smiling at the
enthusiasm aroused, and Paul Jones handed Bill two gold pieces.
“That’s for your rattling good song, my man,” said he, “and the Ranger
will never discredit the flag she fights under.”
Thus, in good spirits and with bold composure, the Ranger’s people spent
the golden hours of the forenoon and a part of the afternoon, waiting
for their gallant enemy.
[Illustration: “_Haul away! Yo ho, boys!_”]
It was well on toward four o’clock before the Drake weathered the
headland, and lay a straight course for the saucy American, that was
waiting for her under easy canvas. As the Drake stood for the American
ship she set her colors, and at the same moment the Ranger flung out the
Stars and Stripes. No more songs and laughter then. Everybody was ready,
and grimly expectant. Danny Dixon, beating the drum, walked once around
the ship to give warning that the action was about to begin.
The Ranger filled on the starboard tack, and stood off the land so as to
engage in mid-channel. Here was indeed an enterprise that would have
appalled a less daring spirit than that of Paul Jones. He was alone, in
the narrow seas of the greatest naval power on earth, with the land as
well as the water crowded with his enemies. The hillsides were full of
people, and the shores were alive with boats. The three kingdoms were in
plain sight, and he, with one small sloop of war, stood ready to give
battle to a hitherto unconquered foe. But literally, the sense of fear
seemed unknown to Paul Jones, and great as might be the odds against
him, greater was the genius with which he could withstand them.
The Drake, having approached within hail, spoke the Ranger, as a matter
of form. The voices echoed clearly over the water in the still, sunny,
spring afternoon, and it was plainly seen in the mellow light that Paul
Jones, who stood by the sailing master’s side on the Ranger, dictated
the reply, which was a cool defiance in these words:
“This is the Continental ship Ranger. We wait for you, and beg you will
come on. The sun is but little more than an hour high, and it is time to
begin.”
Scarcely were the words spoken, when the Ranger’s helm was ported, and,
bringing her broadside to bear on the advancing ship, she roared out the
first volley. The Drake answered it promptly, and in another moment the
ships were running free, close together, under a light wind, and keeping
up a furious cannonade.
On board the Ranger, Paul Jones walked the quarter-deck unharmed, amid a
shower of musketry, which the Americans returned with interest. Captain
Burden, of the Drake, showed an equal disregard of danger, but within
half an hour of the firing of the first broadside he was mortally
wounded by a musket shot in the head. The fire of the Ranger was much
more effective than the Drake’s, and the damage done by her guns was
terrific. The Drake’s fore and main topsail yards were completely shot
away, the main topgallant mast and mizzen gaff hanging up and down the
mast, her jib hanging over her lee into the water, her sails and rigging
in rags, and she had been hulled repeatedly. Twice had her ensign been
shot away, and twice the gallant British tars had hoisted it, but just
as the sun was sinking, when the captain and first lieutenant of the
Drake and forty of her officers and men lay killed or wounded upon her
decks, the ensign was dragged down from the shattered spar to which it
hung, and a cry for “Quarter! quarter!” resounded. Instantly the
Americans ceased firing, and in another minute they had boarded the
Drake and hoisted an American ensign upon what was left of the foremast.
The sun was now going down, and the long spring twilight was upon them.
Paul Jones had seen Captain Burden fall, and his first inquiry was,
“Does the captain still live?” He indeed breathed a few times, but in a
little while all was over. The first lieutenant, who was mortally
wounded, survived for two days.
Like most men of great imaginative qualities, Paul Jones had a tender
heart. The sight of the dead and wounded always affected him, and the
spectacle of brave men dying in gallant combat with him touched him
peculiarly. In spite of his hazardous position—for he was still in the
midst of enormous danger, with a crippled ship to take care of—he
ordered the dead removed below, the captain being laid out in the cabin
and covered with the tattered ensign he had so well defended, and the
wounded promptly attended to. Meanwhile the Ranger, which was
comparatively uninjured, and had only lost one officer and one man, gave
a tow-line to the Drake, and passed out of the lough and up St. George’s
Channel. As soon as a place of comparative safety was reached, about
midnight, the Ranger hove to, and preparations were made to bury the
dead with suitable honors.
The night sky was clear, and overhead, in the blue-black vault, the
cold, bright stars shone steadily. A fair wind slightly ruffled the
surface of the ocean, and the two ships looked huge and shadowy in the
mysterious half darkness. Few lights were shown, and in the midst of a
deep and awful stillness the boatswain’s pipe resounded with the solemn
call, “All hands on deck to bury the dead!” The flags on both ships were
half-masted out of respect to the dead. On the quarter-deck lay the body
of Captain Burden, wrapped in the flag for which he had given his life.
Next him lay the body of Lieutenant Wallingford, of the Ranger, covered
with the American flag. Then came the bodies of eight British sailors
and one American, sewn up in canvas, and on them, too, lay the colors of
their country. The gangway was open and the plank lay ready. The British
officers were on deck to see the last honors paid their shipmates, while
the other prisoners were permitted to watch from the open portholes.
Paul Jones, in the absence of a chaplain, read the burial service
himself over the brave men who had so gallantly fallen that day in fair
and patriotic fight. His voice sounded inexpressibly solemn as he raised
it in the inspiring words: “I am the resurrection and the life. If a man
shall believe on Me, though he be dead, yet shall he live.”
When the short but impressive ceremony was over, the body of Captain
Burden was first dropped overboard, followed by that of poor
Wallingford. The sailors’ bodies followed in order. As the last dull
splash showed that the melancholy duty was over, the flags were run up
as if by magic on the two ships, and the bugler piped a merry call. Then
every man went to work with a will, taking advantage of the clear night
and good weather to get the shattered Drake into condition, and the
sounds of cheerful toil resounded the whole night through.
It was Paul Jones’s determination to carry the captured Drake directly
to France, for he was the last man in the world to abandon so gallant a
trophy. He had on board the Ranger about a hundred and forty prisoners,
including the wounded, and with his small crew he managed to take care
of them and repair partially the damage done the unfortunate Drake.
The men continued to work with the fierce energy that characterized
those acting under Paul Jones’s command, and within twenty-four hours
jury masts had been set up and rigged, new sails had been bent, the
holes in the hull planked over, and Paul Jones was ready to make his way
to France.
He had, indeed, struck terror to the trading vessels of the region, but,
the alarm being given, he knew that war-ships were already after him.
The wind shifting and threatening a gale, he determined to pass by the
north of the channel and around the west coast of Ireland, which would
bring him directly in the spot of his performance the day before. This
Paul Jones considered an advantage, as his enemies would scarcely be
looking for him in the very place he had just left. As he passed so
close to the port of Carrickfergus, from which he had taken the three
fishermen on the evening of the 21st, he concluded to send them to their
homes, much to their delight. Their own boat had been lost, and he
determined to give them a good one out of the many he had on board. It
was toward dusk when the boat was lowered and the men called upon deck.
Among the prisoners were two sick men from Dublin, that Paul Jones also
determined to send to their homes, and these two were also sent for on
deck. When they arrived, Paul Jones handed them some money.
“This is the last shilling that I have in the world at present, but you
are welcome to it,” he said to the sick men. They responded with a
feeble but grateful “Thankee, sir.” To the fisherman he said: “The boat
I give you is yours, and in it you will find a sail of the Drake’s. That
will show what has become of her.”
The fishermen looked completely dazed by their good fortune, for the
boat given them was much larger and better than their own. They
recovered their senses, though, after they got into the boat, and as
they passed under the Ranger’s quarter they gave three rousing cheers
for Captain Jones. The captain raised his cap in reply, and in another
moment the ship was sailing past the harbor, past the town, with its
lights dimly visible, past the castle on the rock, where a brightly
lighted tower stood watch, and, weathering the headland, she was soon
steering a straight course for the North Channel.