At daybreak on the morning of the memorable 23d of September Paul Jones
appeared on the Bon Homme Richard’s deck. A short distance off lay the
Pallas and the treacherous Alliance, which the Bon Homme Richard had
chased during the latter part of the night, mistaking her for a British
frigate.
All three ships were now off Flamborough Head. The day came clear and
bright, with a gentle wind from the south. The delicate chill of the
early dawn crept over the waters, and the eastern sky was aflame with
yellow and pink and purple lights. A rosy mist enveloped the bold
headland, and the waves that eagerly lapped it caught the crimson glow.
The somber North Sea shimmered with a thousand hues, in the golden glory
of the morning. Afar off, the castled height of Scarborough shone white
in the radiant light, and the milky sails of fishing boats flecked the
blue sea. There were no vessels in sight except the two French ships,
for the name of Paul Jones kept the merchant fleets hugging the shore
except under convoy. Something in the lovely scene inspired Paul Jones
with renewed hope. As Dale went up and greeted him on the quarter-deck,
Paul Jones said cheerfully: “Dale, I believe you are right. We have one
more day before us, in which we may immortalize ourselves; therefore I
take heart.”
The men were piped to breakfast at six o’clock, and just as they came on
deck afterward a brigantine was observed, apparently hove to far to
windward. Chase was given, and it was plain that she could not escape.
About noon, however, as Paul Jones, with Dale by his side, was watching
the pursuit of the brigantine, they happened to turn their eyes at the
same moment toward the rocky promontory of Flamborough Head. Just
weathering the headland, they saw a large, white ship, sailing
beautifully, the wind filling her snowy canvas. There was nothing
remarkable in her appearance, but something prophetic seemed to strike
both Paul Jones and Dale. Their eyes met with a meaning look.
“Sir,” said Dale, “that ship—that ship—”
“Is the first ship of the Baltic fleet,” replied Paul Jones in a low,
intense voice. “I feel it, I know it; and there must be more than one
war-ship giving convoy to the fleet.”
The next moment, though, it became necessary to order a boat out to
capture the brigantine, which was now at their mercy. Sixteen of the
best hands on board the Bon Homme Richard were told off for this duty,
and put under the command of Lieutenant Lunt.
“Look out for my signals, Mr. Lunt,” were Paul Jones’s last orders, “for
I expect to fight this day.”
Every eye on the Bon Homme Richard was fixed on the ship that had glided
so beautifully around the promontory. Within ten minutes another sail,
and another, appeared in the wake of the large ship, all rounding the
point. Paul Jones, in a passion of suppressed excitement, seized Dale by
the arm. “Look!” he cried. “It is the Baltic fleet! It is not less than
forty sail, and their convoy, I have heard, is the Serapis frigate,
commanded by Captain Pearson, and the sloop of war Countess of
Scarborough. Ah, Dale, well may your presentiment come true! This is our
day to fight! Call the bugler, set the signal for a general chase, and
prepare for action; and we will fight at close quarters.”
Dale fairly rushed off to give the necessary orders. The men sprang into
the rigging with cheers, and set the fore and main sail. As soon as they
were at quarters, the men, two by two, gave nine cheers for Commodore
Paul Jones. Paul Jones, with sparkling eyes, took off his cap and waved
it.
Just then Bill Green ran across Danny Dixon, who was hanging over the
side, gazing at the stately ships as they came swiftly around the point,
like a flock of huge swans.
“I say, boy,” said Bill, “you’d better be gittin’ that sawdust and
sprinklin’ the deck, to keep your spirits up—’cause I see flunk in your
eye.”
“Well, Mr. Green,” answered Danny, who had a long score of practical
jokes and chaff to pay off, “I’ll be careful and throw a plenty o’
sawdust around the wheel to soak up your blood in case you is welterin’
in gore, and I’ll be proud to take your last messages to your afflicted
widder—”
“Go along with you!” bawled Bill, who was not pleased with these
grewsome suggestions. “I ain’t got no afflicted widder, nor no afflicted
wife neither, you billy-be-hanged imp! I don’t see what boys is made for
no-how, excep’ to be tormentin’ and aggerawatin’! Maybe you ain’t heerd,
youngster, that the British Government has put a price on your head, and
the man that carries you, livin’ or dead, aboard a British ship, gits a
pile o’ money?”
“W’y, that’s very kind and complimentary of the Britishers,” answered
Danny, with a knowing grin. “That’s what they done for Cap’n Paul Jones,
and I’m mighty proud to be rated with him.”
“Jest wait,” answered Bill, “till these ’ere guns gits to barkin’ and
the spars begins to fly ’round like straws when you’re threshin’, and
I’m a-thinkin’ you won’t be as brave as the cap’n.”
“’Tain’t nobody as brave as the cap’n,” answered Danny stoutly, “but I
ain’t a-goin’ to flunk, Mr. Green, and I’m a-goin’ to give you a extry
handful o’ sawdust for to drink up your blood when I begins to lay it on
the deck.”
It seemed as if the ships that came around Flamborough Head were of an
endless fleet. But as soon as they caught sight of the black hull of the
Bon Homme Richard to windward of them, waiting in grim expectancy, with
the American ensign flying and preparations for action going on, they
gave her a wide berth. They also raised the alarm by firing guns,
letting fly their to’gallant sheets, tacking together, and making as
close inshore as they dared.
Meanwhile, the Bon Homme Richard had cleared for action, sent down her
royal yards, the crew were beat to quarters, and signals were made to
the other ships to form the line of battle. The Pallas, under the brave
Cottineau, obeyed the signals with alacrity. The Vengeance was ordered
to bring back the boat with Lunt and his men in it, and to enter the men
on the unengaged side of the Bon Homme Richard if the action should be
begun, and then the Vengeance was to attack the convoy. She, however,
disobeyed all of these orders, and never came into action at all. The
Alliance disregarded all orders and signals, and reconnoitered
cautiously. Captain Landais shouted to the Pallas as she passed, that if
the man-of-war which they knew must convoy such a fleet proved to be the
Serapis, all they would have to do would be to run away!
It was now long past noon, and still the end of the line of merchant
ships had not been reached. At last, as the forty-first vessel rounded
the point and took refuge inshore, a beautiful white frigate with a
smart sloop of war following her appeared. The men on the Bon Homme
Richard had seen a boat putting off from the shore for the frigate, and
they surmised correctly that it was to inform the British frigate that
the American ship was commanded by Paul Jones. Captain Pearson, of the
Serapis, was a brave man, and was delighted at a chance of a fair and
square fight with the American commodore. As Paul Jones had instantly
recognized the Serapis and knew her commander, each captain was
perfectly well aware whom he was fighting.
Captain Pearson first prudently and gallantly secured his convoy by
clawing off the land so that he was outside his ships, and then tacking
inshore so as to be between them and the Bon Homme Richard. The Bon
Homme Richard was now coming down under every sail that would draw. The
Serapis was unmistakably ready to fight, but she stood out to sea, with
the view of drawing the American ship under the guns of Scarborough
Castle. But Paul Jones was too astute for her, and determined to wear
ship, so as to head the Serapis off. By that time Bill Green was at the
wheel, and a good breeze was blowing, enabling the ship to manœuvre
easily. Dale was officer of the deck, and gave the orders, under Paul
Jones’s direction, to steer straight for the British frigate, that was
waiting for the Bon Homme Richard under short fighting canvas.
The whole afternoon had passed in the previous manœuvres, and the early
twilight of September had come before the Bon Homme Richard had
shortened sail, and the two ships were slowly but determinedly
approaching each other for the mortal encounter. The moon had not yet
risen, but the stars were lighted in the deep-blue sky of night, and in
the west a faint opaline glow still lingered. On the chalky cliffs a
moving black mass showed, where thousands of people had assembled to see
the fight, and far in the distance the frowning masses of Scarborough
Castle loomed up, with myriad lights showing like sparks in the purple
twilight. The strong, white flame from the lighthouse at Flamborough
Head flashed like a lance of fire over the dark ocean. The silent
manœuvres of the white-winged ships, the stillness only broken by the
orders given and the “Ay, ay, sir!” of the sailors, which echoed
beautifully over the water, made the ships seem almost like a phantom
fleet. The battle lanterns were lighted, and every preparation was made
for a fight to the death. The Bon Homme Richard was short-handed not
only for men but for officers, and Richard Dale was the only sea
lieutenant Paul Jones had in the unequal fight before him. The men were
stripped to their shirts, except Bill Green and a few others, Bill
alleging that “’Twarn’t wuth while to take off a man’s jacket till he
got warmed up with fightin’!” Danny Dixon, as usual, had discarded his
jacket early in the day, and had made every preparation for a
hand-to-hand fight, although, as he was only a powder monkey, it was not
likely that he would have any fighting at all to do.
It was Danny’s place, though, with another boy, to sprinkle sawdust
along the decks to keep them from becoming slippery with blood. As he
got to the wheel, where Bill Green stood, he threw the sawdust around
liberally, and, although he dared not address the quartermaster, he
remarked in a sly whisper to the other boy:
“Mr. Green, him and me is pertickler friends, so I’m a-goin’ to give him
a extry handful o’ sawdust to soak up his blood, that’ll likely be a
foot deep round about here.”
“Drat the boy!” growled Bill under his breath.
It was now about seven o’clock in the evening, and the ships were
steadily closing. Paul Jones, night glass in hand, walked the
quarter-deck. The Alliance and the Vengeance lay off two miles to
windward, perfectly inactive, and apparently meant to be mere spectators
of the great fight on hand. Their indifference and disobedience to the
signals infuriated the officers and men of the Bon Homme Richard, but
Paul Jones took it with the utmost coolness and composure.
“Let them do as they like,” he said; “the greater glory ours if we win
without them.”
Captain Cottineau, of the Pallas, on seeing the Bon Homme Richard change
her course and wear, rashly concluded that the crew had mutinied, had
killed the commodore, and were running away with the ship. It is a
singular instance of the faith which his associates had in Paul Jones,
that Captain Cottineau should have been convinced of Paul Jones’s death
before the command of the ship could be taken from him.
The captain of the Pallas therefore hauled by the wind and tacked,
laying his head off shore. He did not follow the Bon Homme Richard,
until, seeing her begin the action, he knew that Paul Jones still lived
and commanded.
The ships were now within two cables’ length of each other. Paul Jones
then tacked, in order to cross the bow of the Serapis. At this moment he
perceived a man, at the order of Captain Pearson, fastening the Union
Jack to the mizzen peak.
“Look!” said Paul Jones to Dale, “they are nailing the flag to the mast.
There is no need to nail mine, for the first man that dares to touch it
will never breathe again.”
The Serapis was within pistol shot and to windward, and both ships were
on the port tack. The Serapis hailed as follows:
“This is his Majesty’s ship Serapis, forty-four guns. What ship is
that?”
Stacy, the acting sailing master, answered the hail after Paul Jones’s
directions, who wished to get in a raking position on the bow of the
Serapis.
“I can’t hear what you say,” was the reply through the trumpet.
“What ship is that?” was again called out from the Serapis. “Answer
immediately, or I shall be under the necessity of firing into you.”
At this, Richard Dale, who commanded the gun deck, cried to his men,
“Blow your matches, boys!” and in another instant the Bon Homme Richard
thundered out her broadside. So promptly was this returned from the
Serapis that both reports seemed almost simultaneous. The roar was
tremendous, and echoed and re-echoed over the sea and from the chalky
cliffs.
[Illustration: _At the first discharge two of the guns burst._]
In an instant both ships were enveloped in smoke and utter darkness. By
this time the Bon Homme Richard’s bow was just across the forefoot of
the Serapis. In order to keep the wind and to deaden her way, the Bon
Homme Richard’s topsails were backed, and she passed slowly ahead of the
Serapis, taking the wind out of her sails. The Serapis was a short ship,
and answered her helm beautifully, in contrast to the lumbering Bon
Homme Richard. As soon as the wind reached him again, Captain Pearson,
keeping his luff, came up on the weather quarter of the Bon Homme
Richard, fairly taking the wind out of the American ship’s sails in
turn. The Serapis let fly her starboard batteries, and the Bon Homme
Richard replied with her port batteries; but at the very first discharge
of the six eighteen-pound guns on the Bon Homme Richard, the pieces
being old and defective, two of them burst with a terrific concussion,
tearing out the main deck above them and killing nearly all of the guns’
crews that served them. As soon as the shock subsided, although the
shrieks and groans of the wounded still resounded, Paul Jones ran to the
companion ladder and saw Dale, with a pale but undaunted face, standing
on the shattered gun deck, surrounded by wounded men and the awful
_débris_ of the exploded guns. Most of the ship’s lanterns had been put
out by the concussion, and there was only a dim light that struggled
with the darkness. The moonlight streamed in through the portholes
clouded by the smoke from the Serapis’s guns, which thundered
incessantly, hulling the Bon Homme Richard at every round.
“Two of the guns are gone, sir,” Dale said coolly, “and some of our
brave boys. But we will fight the other four guns as long as they will
hold together.”
“You are a man after my own heart!” cried Paul Jones, “and every gun on
this ship will be fought as long as they will hold together; and if we
go down, it will be with our ensign flying.”
In the midst of the smoke and confusion Dale then saw Danny Dixon
running about picking up a row of cartridges that he had just laid down
for the use of the guns, and which a stray spark might have ignited.
“Right for you, boy!” cried Dale; and then, turning to the men at the
other four eighteen-pounders, he ordered the guns examined. Two of them
were cracked from the muzzle down. This was a terrible blow to the Bon
Homme Richard, as the loss of this battery would leave only thirty-two
twelve-pound guns to fight fifty eighteen-pounders; for, although the
Serapis was classed as a forty-four, she really carried fifty guns.
“Mr. Dale, I’ve got a good crew here as ain’t afeerd o’ nothin’,” said
one of the gun captains, seeing that Dale hesitated to give the order to
load and fire, “and I’ll resk it with these ’ere two eighteens.”
An instant later both of them were fired, and, as soon as the smoke
drifted off, Dale, speechless with dismay, pointed to the two guns. Both
of them were defective, and there was no possibility of firing them
again; the only wonder had been that they had not exploded as the first
two did.
The gun captain, sent by Dale, went up to the commodore on deck, where
he stood calmly giving orders that were distinctly heard above the
uproar, and manœuvring his ship with the same coolness as if he were
working her into a friendly roadstead.
“Sir,” said the man, touching his cap, “Mr. Dale says as how not another
shot can be fired from the eighteen-pounders. They is cracked from
breech to muzzle.”
“I knew it,” answered Paul Jones; “the instant the firing stopped, I
knew it was impossible to fire another shot, for Dale would never have
given it up as long as he could work his guns. Tell Mr. Dale I think the
enemy will soon silence the smaller guns, and that if the ship should
catch fire—”
“She’s a-fire, sir, in a dozen places—”
“Or should leak badly—”
“The water, sir, is pourin’ in by the hogshead through the holes in the
hull—”
“To fight both the fire and the water, and to keep her afloat as long as
possible; and as long as she floats she shall be fought.”
The men on deck heard these gallant words, and a rousing cheer rang out
over the furious din of the cannonade.
Just at that moment a new enemy appeared. The Countess of Scarborough,
that had been gradually drawing within gunshot, delayed by the wind,
which had become light and baffling, now suddenly loomed up in the faint
moonlight on the lee bow of the Bon Homme Richard, and made her presence
known by pouring a raking broadside into the American ship. But seeing,
through the shattered sides of the ship, the blaze and smoke which Dale
and his men were fighting as stubbornly as Paul Jones was fighting the
British, and noticing that nearly every gun on the Bon Homme Richard was
silenced, the sloop of war drew off, to let, as it was mistakenly
thought, the Serapis finish up the unequal fight. The Alliance lay off,
out of gunshot, a picture of beauty in the pale splendor of the night,
but apparently without any intention of taking part in the fight. The
Countess of Scarborough turned her attention toward the cowardly ship,
which finally began to return the cannonade the Countess of Scarborough
opened upon her. The Pallas, though, as if stung by the conduct of her
consort, steered for the Countess of Scarborough, and engaged her with
great spirit.
De Chamillard had held the poop of the Bon Homme Richard with twenty
marines, but after losing several of his men he was driven back step by
step. Paul Jones watched the brave Frenchman; and if he felt agony at
the defeat that threatened him on every hand he gave no sign of it, but
said to De Chamillard, as he came up, grimed with powder, “See, the
Pallas is making amends, like yourself, for the treachery of the
Alliance.”
The slaughter on the decks of the Bon Homme Richard was frightful, and
below she was both leaking and burning. Moreover, there were over a
hundred prisoners on board, that might be liberated by the fire and the
water. But Paul Jones had in young Dale a man like himself, and he felt
sure that Dale was no more likely to lose heart than himself.
The steady and uninterrupted broadside of the Serapis had now silenced
every gun on the Bon Homme Richard, except two small nine-pounders on
the spar deck.
“But there’s another gun on the quarter-deck, my lads,” cried Paul
Jones, “and she’s not so big we can’t haul her over.”
At this the men rallied with a cheer, and as quick as thought the gun
was dragged across the deck, Paul Jones himself helping.
“Now we will make play on her mainmast, boys,” said he, and, pointing
the gun himself, a shot whizzed out and struck the Serapis’s mainmast,
fair and square. Her rigging had caught fire, and the masts, being
painted white, were plainly visible against the background of fire and
smoke.
“A good shot!” shouted the men.
The shot had not been large enough to shatter the great spar, but half a
dozen others following caused it to weaken plainly.
And so, with three nine-pounders against the twenty great guns and
thirty small ones of the Serapis, Paul Jones maintained the honor of the
American flag, and gave no sign of surrender.
The American tops, though, were well served, and Paul Jones saw that the
decks of the Serapis were being swept by the musketry fire of the Bon
Homme Richard, which was but little injured aloft, although her hull was
almost a wreck. He could see on the deck of the Serapis the tall figure
of Captain Pearson, and, although men were falling at every moment
around him, he seemed to possess a charmed life. Besides small arms, the
Americans in the Bon Homme Richard’s tops had hand grenades, which they
threw on the Serapis’s decks with unerring aim. But, although the decks
were swept, the frigate’s batteries were uninjured, her hull was sound,
and she worked beautifully in the light breeze that blew fitfully.
Meaning, therefore, to rake the Bon Homme Richard, she worked slowly
past, keeping her luff, intending to fall broadside off and cross the
Bon Homme Richard’s forefoot. But there was not sea room enough, and the
Serapis, answering her helm perfectly, came up to the wind again, to
keep from fouling her adversary. This movement brought the ships in
line, and, the Serapis losing headway, the Bon Homme Richard’s jib boom
touched her; so the two ships lay for a minute in this singular
position, where neither could fire a gun.
It was then about eight o’clock. The moon, which was rising, passed into
a cloud, and a dense mass of sulphurous smoke enveloped both ships. Not
a gun was fired for several minutes, and a strange and awful silence
suddenly followed the frightful uproar of battle.
In the midst of the darkness and silence a voice shouted from the stern
of the Serapis:
“Have you surrendered?”
To this Paul Jones made that answer which will always mark him as the
bravest of the brave. With his ship aleak and afire in a dozen places,
his guns silenced, his decks swept by uninjured batteries, his hull
riddled, and a hundred mutinous prisoners ready to spring from below
upon him, he called out in a dauntless voice:
“We haven’t begun to fight yet!”
A tremendous cheer burst from the Americans at this, and the Serapis
perceived that she must destroy her enemy before she could conquer him.
She therefore managed to swing clear of the Bon Homme Richard,
determined to get in a raking position, either across the bow or the
stern of the ship. Laying her foresail and fore-topsail aback, and
keeping her helm down while she shivered her after sails, she attempted
to wear short around on her heel. Seeing the Serapis coming down on him,
the Bon Homme Richard drew ahead to lay athwart her. But in the darkness
neither captain could see very well what he was doing, and both ships
came foul, the jib boom of the Serapis passing in over the Bon Homme
Richard’s poop and becoming entangled in the mizzen rigging.
As soon as Paul Jones saw the Serapis’s spar passing over the poop, he
called to the acting sailing master:
“Mr. Stacy, fetch a hawser immediately, and get grappling irons!”
But as the jib boom of the Serapis touched the mizzen rigging of the Bon
Homme Richard, Paul Jones himself, without waiting for the hawser,
seizing the ropes that hung to the bowsprit, with his own hand lashed
the two ships together. In another moment Stacy came running up with a
hawser. In the midst of the uproar, the smoke, the flame, and the
confusion, Stacy bungled with his work, and an oath burst from his lips.
“Don’t swear, Mr. Stacy,” said Paul Jones. “In another moment we may all
be in eternity, and this is no time for blaspheming our Maker.”[4]
Stacy glanced at the great man, who could remember such things at such a
moment. The commodore’s face was pale, and a thin stream of blood
trickled down the side of his head.
“Commodore, you are wounded!” he cried.
“It is nothing,” answered Paul Jones calmly.
The ships were now made firmly fast, but in the smoke and darkness it
was not perceived on board the Serapis. Captain Pearson gave orders to
drop an anchor under his bow, thinking his bold adversary would drift
away.
The tide was strong, and both wind and tide were in the same direction,
so that the ships drifted rapidly together. Their spars, spare anchors,
and every possible object became interlocked, and soon the ships were
fast in a mortal embrace. As the Serapis swung round, with her stern to
the bows of the Bon Homme Richard, her portlids were lowered to prevent
the Americans from boarding her through her ports. The guns were then
fired behind the closed portlids, blowing everything before them. The
British gunners would then have to lean forward into the shattered sides
of the Bon Homme Richard to pass the rammers in the muzzles of their own
guns. The ships caught fire repeatedly from each other, and so terrible
was the smoke and flame upon the lower decks of the Bon Homme Richard
that the men were forced above. They assembled on the foks’l, where they
did good service with muskets and hand grenades.
The Serapis now appeared to have the Bon Homme Richard at her mercy. She
had completely cleared everything out on the gun deck, and the fire was
rapidly gaining on the ship in spite of Dale’s heroic efforts. On the
spar deck Paul Jones still worked the two or three nine-pounders, but
they were nothing against the tremendous metal of the British ship.
But the forcing of the American gunners to the upper deck enabled them
to make it as hot for the British above as the British made it hot for
them below. An awful fusillade was kept up on the spar deck of the
Serapis, and so terrible was it on the quarter-deck that the brave
Pearson, although remaining himself and giving his orders coolly,
ordered all the men below. So effectually were the lower-deck batteries
of the Serapis worked that the Bon Homme Richard was cut entirely to
pieces between decks, especially from the mainmast to the stern. The
rudder and stern frame were cut completely off, and soon the shot began
to pass clear through the ship without finding anything to strike.
The moon was now bright, and the wind having caused the smoke to drift,
Paul Jones perceived the Alliance approaching to windward. He turned to
Dale, who had come on deck. “Thank God,” he said, “the battle is now
over! Yonder is the Alliance.”
The Alliance came on under a fair wind, but, to the consternation of
every one on the Bon Homme Richard, on passing close to leeward she
deliberately fired a broadside into the stern. Immediately every voice
on the commodore’s ship was raised:
“For God’s sake,” they shouted, “stop firing into us!”
The Alliance, though, as she sailed by, fired into the side and the head
of the ship as well as the stern. In vain were three lanterns shown—the
signal of reconnoissance; the Alliance paid no attention to the signal,
and her fire dismounted one or two guns, killed and wounded several men,
and cut the ship up aloft a good deal. One of the men on the Bon Homme
Richard yelled:
“The crew has mutinied, and they are taking the ship to the British!”
This induced several of the faint-hearted to leave their quarters.
Not so Danny Dixon; although but a powder boy of fourteen, he was as
cool as any old hand on board. Paul Jones himself, still bent on
carrying the mainmast of the Serapis, was directing the fire of the
little nine-pounder.
“One more shot,” he called, “and the mast goes!”
The gunner asked for a wad, but none was at hand. Danny Dixon, quietly
stripping off his shirt, handed it to the gunner, saying:
“This ’ere shirt off my back’ll make a good many wads.”
Paul Jones saw the action and heard the words.
“Ah, my brave lad,” he cried, “I shall not forget this.”
“Thankee, sir,” answered Danny with sparkling eyes.
The Bon Homme Richard was getting lower and lower in the water, and at
the same time only the most tremendous exertions kept the fire from
reaching the upper decks. Suddenly the carpenter, the master at arms and
a master gunner came rushing up from below. They had been down in the
hold where the prisoners were, and working the pumps to keep the water
down, which poured in from shot holes below the water line. One of the
pumps had been shot away, and that had demoralized these three men.
Lieutenant Dale was on deck, and as the carpenter rushed up, shouting to
the commodore, “She’s a-sinkin’, sir, and we can’t do no more at the
pumps!” Dale caught the man by the throat.
“You abandoned coward, come below with me instantly! The ship shall not
sink!”
Paul Jones heard every word, and, coming up quickly to Dale, said in his
ear:
“Put the prisoners to the pumps. They are doubtless so terror-stricken
that they are at their wits’ end, and a determined man like you, Dale,
can manage the whole hundred of them”—for there were not less than a
hundred in the hold.
Dale was the very man to carry out this audacious order. He instantly
ran below, and, just as Paul Jones had foreseen, the bold promptness of
one determined officer, armed and resolute, cowed them all. They went to
work at the pumps, when, if they had retained their senses, they might
have stepped on board the Serapis.
In a minute or two more Dale was again on deck, and, going up to the
commodore, said calmly but in a loud voice, so that the men around could
hear him:
“She’s not sinking, sir. I have put that coward of a carpenter to work
with an honest man to watch him, and everything will shortly be right.”
This very much reassured the men, who had no idea of the terrible
destruction below.
Within a few minutes Danny Dixon came up to the young lieutenant with a
solemn face.
“Mr. Dale, please, sir,” he said, “I can’t git no more powder. The
gangway to the powder room is all chock-a-block, and the sentinels won’t
let me pass. I ain’t afeerd o’ the fire, though its blazin’ pretty close
to the magazine. I ain’t afeerd o’ that, sir, but I can’t—”
Before Danny had finished speaking Dale saw a dozen strange faces
crowding up the companion way. In an instant the truth flashed upon
him—some of the prisoners had escaped from the hold. Drawing his pistol,
he marched them immediately back, where again they went to work at the
pumps.
Meanwhile numbers of the men were called from their quarters to put out
the fire in the magazine. Upon going to it, with Danny Dixon following
at his heels, Dale found that the reason the sentinels would not let any
one pass to the magazine was on account of the number of strange faces,
which they, too, knew to be the prisoners, crowding around, and who
might have easily captured the magazine. But Dale, animated by the
spirit of his commander, with two or three resolute men like himself
kept down both the fire and the water in the hold. As a matter of fact,
the Bon Homme Richard was on fire continuously almost from the very
beginning of the engagement.
[Illustration: _Battle of the Bonhomme Richard and the Serapis._
The bold headland of Flamborough is seen on the right. The force of the
explosion on the _Serapis’s_ deck blew the British flag against the
wind.]
The mainmast of the Serapis was still being pounded by the three small
guns on the Bon Homme Richard’s deck, which were worked under the eye of
Paul Jones. Sometimes he himself took a part in the handling and
pointing of the guns, and his indomitable coolness seemed communicated
to the men. The spar deck of the Serapis was still pretty effectually
cleared, but she was unbeaten below. The gun captain, though, who had
come up from below when the great guns burst, now filled a bucket with
hand grenades and climbed into the maintop. The main yard of the Bon
Homme Richard lay directly over the main hatch of the Serapis. He then
lay out on the main yard, until he got to the sheet block, where he
fastened his bucket. Then, with perfect deliberation and unerring aim,
he began to throw his grenades at the open hatchway. Every one went
straight, and every one exploded. Paul Jones, who was on the poop,
called out to him:
“If you could get one down on the gun deck, where there is no doubt some
loose powder about—”
“That’s what I’m arter, sir,” responded the sailor coolly, and within
two minutes one had rolled down the hatchway and had dropped upon a row
of cartridges. An instant and terrific explosion followed. It seemed as
if the whole interior of the ship had been blown out. Every gun was
silenced, and an awful stillness prevailed for a moment or two. Just
then the gunner, who had been below, ran up on the Bon Homme Richard’s
deck, and, terrified out of his life, cried, “I don’t see the
commodore!” and running, aft, he intended to strike the colors. The
ensign had been shot away, however, and was dragging in the water; the
man therefore yelled for “Quarter! quarter!”
Scarcely were the words out of his mouth when he saw a figure at his
side, and felt a stunning blow from a pistol’s butt.
“Do you see the commodore now?” cried Paul Jones; “and let me not hear
any man on this ship beg, like a cur, for quarter!”
The cry for quarter had been heard on the Serapis, and Captain Pearson
called out in the half darkness:
“Do you ask for quarter?”
“No, by heaven!” shouted Paul Jones. “We will give quarter, but we never
ask it.”
About this time one of the prisoners stepped through the side of the Bon
Homme Richard into the Serapis, and reported the desperate condition of
the American ship. Immediately the bugler on the Serapis sounded the
call for boarders, and a number of them, armed with pikes and cutlasses,
appeared at the bulwarks. But Paul Jones, seizing a boarding pike, stood
in the gangway to receive them. It never occurred to the boarders that
there was not a large body to repel them, besides the sailors on deck,
and they retired. But it is a fact that no man touched a pike except
Paul Jones.
It was now about half past ten o’clock. The pallid moon showed the whole
dreadful scene. The Pallas, which had very gallantly made the Countess
of Scarborough haul down her colors, had her hands full transferring the
prisoners from the British ship. As the Alliance, which had been sailing
around the combatants and had fired another broadside into the Bon Homme
Richard, passed the Pallas, Captain Cottineau begged Landais to go to
the assistance of the gallant Bon Homme Richard.
Captain Landais did indeed approach the Bon Homme Richard, but it was
only to fire one last broadside, that did as much harm to the American
as to the British ship. After that he hauled off and did no more damage.
Then the mainmast of the Serapis began to totter, and it was seen that
it must soon go by the board. The small nine-pounders, worked under Paul
Jones’s own eye, the shower of skillfully thrown hand grenades, and the
sharpshooters in the Bon Homme Richard’s tops, made the deck of the
Serapis so hot that scarcely a man dared show himself. On the
quarter-deck especially was this so; and the brave Pearson, while
keeping his place coolly, ordered the men forward, and remained the only
man upon the quarter-deck of his ship.
The Bon Homme Richard now managed to bring one or two more guns to bear,
although her hull was almost destroyed by the Serapis. Both ships were
in a desperate case, but Paul Jones was no nearer surrender than he was
at the beginning of the fight. Pearson, though, realized that he was in
the last extremity, and then, and then only, with his own hand he
managed to lower the flag he had caused to be nailed to the mast. His
action was visible by the light of the full moon, and the lanterns that
made blazing points of flame all over the two warrior ships in spite of
the drifting clouds of black smoke.
Paul Jones’s first order was:
“Cease firing!” and his next words were, “Where is Dale?”
“Here, sir!” cried Dale, coming up. The young lieutenant’s face was
blackened with powder, his epaulet was gone, and he was deathly pale
with suppressed excitement.
“Go immediately on board that ship with such men as you may need, and
bring off her captain and her ensign,” said Paul Jones.
There was no occasion for a bridge between the two fast-locked and
burning ships. Dale ran to the gangway, and with one bound landed on the
bloody deck of the Serapis.
Although the fire of the Bon Homme Richard had ceased, those upon the
lower decks of the Serapis did not know that the colors had been struck,
and they kept up their cannonade through the riddled hull of the Bon
Homme Richard. The smoke still drifted in a sulphurous mass, but Dale at
once distinguished Captain Pearson’s tall figure, as he stood calmly,
with folded arms, on the quarter-deck. Going up to him, Dale removed his
cap and said respectfully:
“Sir, I am directed to bring you on board the Bon Homme Richard.”
Captain Pearson inclined his head silently and stepped forward.
Scarcely were the words out of Dale’s mouth when the first lieutenant of
the Serapis came up from below. Advancing eagerly, he said to his
captain:
“Have the rebels struck, sir?”
Captain Pearson uttered no word, but looked into the lieutenant’s eyes
with an expression of agony.
Then Dale spoke.
“No,” he said. “_You_ have struck, and this ship is our prize.”
The lieutenant, rudely ignoring Dale, again asked the captain:
“Sir, have they struck?”
For answer, the brave Pearson covered his face with his hands. The
lieutenant, turning on his heel, said:
“I have nothing more to say.”
Dale then remarked quietly:
“You will proceed on board the Bon Homme Richard.”
“If you will permit me to go below, I will silence the firing on the
lower deck,” said the lieutenant.
“No!” replied Dale firmly.
By that time the Bon Homme Richard’s men had swarmed over the side, and
some of the British sailors and officers, running up from below and not
knowing that the ship had struck, dashed upon the Americans, and several
blows were exchanged. The officers, though, on both sides quelled the
_mêlée_ and the British sailors then quietly submitted. But another row,
worse than the first, was likely to be precipitated by Danny Dixon. He
marched up to one of the Serapis’s cabin boys, who was about twice as
big as himself, and who was armed with the cabin broom as the most
available weapon he could find at short notice. Getting close up, Danny
bawled at him:
“You are my prisoner!”
The Serapis boy looked with undisguised contempt at Danny, and for
answer said sulkily:
“Go along with you. I ain’t none o’ your prisoner. I’m took by that
pirate Paul Jones, I am.”
Before the words were well out of his mouth Danny hauled off and hit the
boy a resounding slap in the face. The boy promptly responded by
knocking Danny down with his broom.
Just then Bill Green, who had been relieved for a few moments from the
wheel, appeared at Danny’s side, and, collaring him with one hand as
Danny scrambled up, while with the other he seized the cabin boy’s
neckerchief, Bill gave them both a powerful shaking.
“If you two chaps don’t behave yourselves,” he shouted, “I’ll report you
both, and I’ll give you a private wallopin’ o’ my own besides. That’s
the wust o’ boys—they never knows how to behave theirselves. D’ye see
Cap’n Paul Jones and the British cap’n a-maulin’ and a-poundin’ each
other? And don’t you know prisoners ought to be treated kind? That’s why
the officers sets a example to the men and to the wuthless, triflin’,
good-for-nothin’ boys!”
“B—but, Mr. Green,” said Danny, struggling to get his breath in Bill’s
brawny grasp, “he said as the commodore were a pirate, and that’s for
why I hit him.”
“He did, did he?” snorted Bill, highly incensed, and letting Danny go,
while he devoted both hands to the unlucky cabin boy. “Then I wish you’d
’a’ hit him twice as hard; and if it warn’t for them officers over
yonder,” he yelled to the Serapis boy, “I’d give you sech a keel haulin’
as nobody but a Dutchman never had afore. You say Cap’n Paul Jones is a
pirate, do yer?” Here he lifted the boy completely off his feet, while a
well-directed kick emphasized his remarks. “Now, you take that back, or
by the almighty Joshua, I’ll heave you overboard!”
The boy, scared out of his life, sputtered:
“I take it back.”
Bill then turned to Danny, and said, excitedly:
“You oughter git some smart money for that ’ere lick he give you, and
I’m goin’ to see as the commodore knows about it.”
“But, Mr. Green,” said Danny, slyly, “you said as we was to imitate the
cap’ns, and not be maulin’ and poundin’ each other—”
“I didn’t say no sech a thing,” answered Bill, angrily; “I said, as if
anybody was to say Cap’n Paul Jones were a pirate you was to knock his
eyes down into his shoes, and not to leave a whole bone in his skin.
That’s what I said, boy, and you misunderstood me.”
Dale now accompanied the British captain politely to the gangway, where
not even a plank was necessary to step on board the Bon Homme Richard.
As the young lieutenant glanced up and saw Paul Jones waiting to receive
his distinguished prisoners, he saw a red stream had trickled down the
side of the commodore’s head, and one of his epaulets was soaked with
blood.
“My captain, you are wounded!” cried Dale.
“It is but a trifle,” quickly replied Paul Jones. Captain Pearson at
that moment stepped upon the Bon Homme Richard’s deck. He silently
unbuckled his sword and handed it to Paul Jones, who received it with
one hand, and immediately returned it with the other, saying:
“I return it to you, sir, because you have bravely used it.”
The other British officers and men were then passed rapidly aboard the
Bon Homme Richard. The Americans, as if they had only then realized the
magnitude of their victory, suddenly stopped work at the pumps, at
fighting the fire, and at the usual preparations for taking possession
of a ship, and, as one man, they gave three thundering cheers. Paul
Jones, taking off his cap, listened to this heroic music with ineffable
thoughts crowding upon his mind. The moon was now at the full, and
blazed upon the dark bosom of the water with solemn grandeur. Afar off
rose the white cliffs off England, while nearer, but still far, were the
black hulls and shadowy spars of the Alliance, the gallant Pallas, and
the conquered Countess of Scarborough. The air was yet full of the smell
of burned powder and smoldering wood. Across the still and blue-black
sea they could see the lights of Flamborough Head and Scarborough Castle
like star points in the sky.
Paul Jones was roused from the strange mood of triumph, and of sadness
too, by a frightful crash which resounded through both ships.
The tottering mainmast of the Serapis gave one mighty lurch, and then
fell over the side, striking with a sound like thunder. A deep and
terrible silence followed for a moment, and even the exultant cheering
of the Americans, which had not quite ceased, was stilled. There was
something overwhelming in the sight of the brave and lovely Serapis,
that only a few hours before had sailed proudly and defiantly in her
beauty and freedom, now beaten, dismasted, and her colors struck. But
this one short moment of solemnity was followed by another burst of
cheers, and all the fierce commotion of a victorious ship.