CHAPTER XIII

SEABOARD MARITIME OPERATIONS

Upon the Canada frontier the conditions of 1813 had permitted the

United States an ample field for offensive operations, with good

prospect of success. What use was made of the opportunity has now been

narrated. Upon the seaboard, continuous illustration was afforded that

there the country was widely open to attack, thrown wholly on the

defensive, with the exception of preying upon the enemy's commerce by

numerous small cruisers. As a secondary operation of war this has

always possessed value, and better use of it perhaps never was made

than by the American people at this time; but it is not determinative

of great issues, and the achievements of the public and private armed

vessels of the United States, energetic and successful as they were at

this period, constituted no exception to the universal experience.

Control of the highways of the ocean by great fleets destroys an

enemy's commerce, root and branch. The depredations of scattered

cruisers may inflict immense vexation, and even embarrassment; but

they neither kill nor mortally wound, they merely harass. Co-operating

with other influences, they may induce yielding in a maritime enemy;

but singly they never have done so, and probably never can. In 1814 no

commerce was left to the United States; and that conditions remained

somewhat better during 1813 was due to collusion of the enemy, not to

national power.

The needs of the British armies in the Spanish Peninsula and in

Canada, and the exigencies of the West India colonies, induced the

enemy to wink at, and even to uphold, a considerable clandestine

export trade from the United States. Combined with this was the hope

of embarrassing the general government by the disaffection of New

England, and of possibly detaching that section of the country from

the Union. For these reasons, the eastern coast was not included in

the commercial blockade in 1813. But no motive existed for permitting

the egress of armed vessels, or the continuance of the coasting trade,

by which always, now as then, much of the intercourse between

different parts of the country must be maintained, and upon which in

1812 it depended almost altogether. With the approach of spring in

1813, therefore, not only was the commercial blockade extended to

embrace New York and all south of it, together with the Mississippi

River, but the naval constriction upon the shore line became so severe

as practically to annihilate the coasting trade, considered as a means

of commercial exchange. It is not possible for deep-sea cruisers

wholly to suppress the movement of small vessels, skirting the beaches

from headland to headland; but their operations can be so much

embarrassed as to reduce their usefulness to a bare alleviation of

social necessities, inadequate to any scale of interchange deserving

the name of commerce.

"I doubt not," wrote Captain Broke, when challenging Lawrence to a

ship duel, "that you will feel convinced that it is only by repeated

triumphs in even combat that your little navy can now hope to console

your country for the loss of that trade it cannot protect."[128] The

taunt, doubtless intended to further the object of the letter by the

provocation involved, was applicable as well to coasting as to

deep-sea commerce. It ignored, however, the consideration, necessarily

predominant with American officers, that the conditions of the war

imposed commerce destruction as the principal mission of their navy.

They were not indeed to shun combat, when it offered as an incident,

but neither were they to seek it as a mere means of glory,

irrespective of advantage to be gained. Lawrence, whom Broke's letter

did not reach, was perhaps not sufficiently attentive to this motive.

The British blockade, military and commercial, the coastwise

operations of their navy, and the careers of American cruisers

directed to the destruction of British commerce, are then the three

heads under which the ocean activities of 1813 divide. Although this

chapter is devoted to the first two of these subjects, brief mention

should be made here of the distant cruises of two American vessels,

because, while detached from any connection with other events, they

are closely linked, in time and place, with the disastrous seaboard

engagement between the "Chesapeake" and "Shannon," with which the

account of sea-coast maritime operations opens. On April 30 Captain

John Rodgers put to sea from Boston in the frigate "President,"

accompanied by the frigate "Congress," Captain John Smith. Head winds

immediately after sailing detained them inside of Cape Cod until May

3, and it was not till near George's Bank that any of the blockading

squadron was seen. As, by the Admiralty's instructions, one of the

blockaders was usually a ship of the line, the American vessels very

properly evaded them. The two continued together until May 8, when

they separated, some six hundred miles east of Delaware Bay. Rodgers

kept along northward to the Banks of Newfoundland, hoping, at that

junction of commercial highways, to fall in with a West India convoy,

or vessels bound into Halifax or the St. Lawrence. Nothing, however,

was seen, and he thence steered to the Azores with equal bad fortune.

Obtaining thereabouts information of a homeward-bound convoy from the

West Indies, he went in pursuit to the northeast, but failed to find

it. Not till June 9 did he make three captures, in quick succession.

Being then two thirds of the way to the English Channel, he determined

to try the North Sea, shaping his course to intercept vessels bound

either by the north or south of Ireland. Not a sail was met until the

Shetland Islands were reached, and there were found only Danes, which,

though Denmark was in hostility with Great Britain, were trading under

British licenses. The "President" remained in the North Sea until the

end of July, but made only two prizes, although she lay in wait for

convoys of whose sailing accounts were received. Having renewed her

supply of water at Bergen, in Norway, she returned to the Atlantic,

made three captures off the north coast of Ireland, and thence beat

back to the Banks, where two stray homeward-bound West Indiamen were

at last caught. From there the ship made her way, still with a

constant head wind, to Nantucket, off which was captured a British

man-of-war schooner, tender to the admiral. On September 27 she

anchored in Narragansett Bay, having been absent almost five months,

and made twelve prizes, few of which were valuable. One, however, was

a mail packet to Halifax, the capture of which, as of its

predecessors, was noted by Prevost.[129]

The "Congress" was still less successful in material result. She

followed a course which had hitherto been a favorite with American

captains, and which Rodgers had suggested as alternative to his own;

southeast, passing near the Cape Verde Islands, to the equator between

longitudes 24° and 31° west; thence to the coast of Brazil, and so

home, by a route which carried her well clear of the West India

Islands. She entered Portsmouth, New Hampshire, December 14, having

spent seven months making this wide sweep; in the course of which

three prizes only were taken.[130] It will be remembered that the

"Chesapeake," which had returned only a month before the "Congress"

sailed, had taken much the same direction with similar slight result.

These cruises were primarily commerce-destroying, and were pursued in

that spirit, although with the full purpose of fighting should

occasion arise. The paucity of result is doubtless to be attributed to

the prey being sought chiefly on the high seas, too far away from the

points of arrival and departure. The convoy system, rigidly enforced,

as captured British correspondence shows, cleared the seas of British

vessels, except in the spots where they were found congested,

concentrated, by the operation of the system itself. It may be noted

that the experience of all these vessels showed that nowhere was the

system so rigidly operative as in the West Indies and Western

Atlantic. Doubtless, too, the naval officers in command took pains to

guide the droves of vessels entrusted to them over unusual courses,

with a view to elude pursuers. As the home port was neared, the common

disposition to relax tension of effort as the moment of relief draws

nigh, co-operated with the gradual drawing together of convoys from

all parts of the world to make the approaches to the English Channel

the most probable scene of success for the pursuer. There the greatest

number were to be found, and there presumption of safety tended to

decrease carefulness. This was to be amply proved by subsequent

experience. It had been predicted by Rodgers himself, although he

apparently did not think wise to hazard in such close quarters so fine

and large a frigate as the "President." "It is very generally

believed," he had written, "that the coasts of England, Ireland, and

Scotland are always swarming with British men of war, and that their

commerce would be found amply protected. This, however, I well know

by experience, in my voyages when a youth, to be incorrect; and that

it has always been their policy to keep their enemies as far distant

from their shores as possible, by stationing their ships at the

commencement of a war on the enemy's coasts, and in such other distant

situations, ... and thereby be enabled to protect their own commerce

in a twofold degree. This, however, they have been enabled to do,

owing as well to the inactivity of the enemy, as to the local

advantages derived from their relative situations."[131]

The same tendency was observable at other points of arrival, and

recognition of this dictated the instructions issued to Captain

Lawrence for the cruise of the "Chesapeake," frustrated through her

capture by the "Shannon." Lawrence was appointed to the ship on May 6;

the sailing orders issued to Captain Evans being transferred to him on

that date. He was to go to the mouth of the Gulf of St. Lawrence,

seeking there to intercept the military store-ships, and transports

with troops, destined to Quebec and Upper Canada. "The enemy," wrote

the Secretary, "will not in all probability anticipate our taking this

ground with our public ships of war; and as his convoys generally

separate between Cape Race and Halifax, leaving the trade of the St.

Lawrence to proceed without convoy, the chance of captures upon an

extensive scale is very flattering." He added the just remark, that

"it is impossible to conceive a naval service of a higher order in a

national point of view than the destruction of the enemy's vessels,

with supplies for his army in Canada and his fleets on this

station."[132]

Lawrence took command of the "Chesapeake" at Boston on May 20. The

ship had returned from her last cruise April 9, and had been so far

prepared for sea by her former commander that, as has been seen, her

sailing orders were issued May 6. It would appear from the statement

of the British naval historian James,[133] based upon a paper captured

in the ship, that the enlistments of her crew expired in April.

Although there were many reshipments, and a nucleus of naval seamen,

there was a large infusion of new and untrained men, amounting to a

reconstitution of the ship's company. More important still was the

fact that both the captain and first lieutenant were just appointed;

her former first lying fatally ill at the time she sailed. The third

and fourth lieutenants were also strange to her, and in a manner to

their positions; being in fact midshipmen, to whom acting appointments

as lieutenants were issued at Lawrence's request, by Commodore

Bainbridge of the navy yard, on May 27, five days before the action.

The third took charge of his division for the first time the day of

the battle, and the men were personally unknown to him. The first

lieutenant himself was extremely young.

The bearing of these facts is not to excuse the defeat, but to enforce

the lesson that a grave military enterprise is not to be hazarded on a

side issue, or on a point of pride, without adequate preparation. The

"Chesapeake" was ordered to a service of very particular importance at

the moment--May, 1813--when the Canada campaign was about to open. She

was to act against the communications of the enemy; and while it is

upon the whole more expedient, for the _morale_ of a service, that

battle with an equal should not be declined, quite as necessarily

action should not be sought when it will materially interfere with the

discharge of a duty intrinsically of greater consequence. The capture

of a single enemy's frigate is not to be confounded with, or inflated

to, that destruction of an enemy's organized force which is the prime

object of all military effort. Indeed, the very purpose to which the

"Chesapeake" was designated was to cripple the organized force of the

British, either the army in Canada, or the navy on the lakes. The

chance of a disabling blow by unexpected action in the St. Lawrence

much exceeded any gain to be anticipated, even by a victorious ship

duel, which would not improbably entail return to port to refit; while

officers new to their duties, and unknown to their men, detracted

greatly from the chances of success, should momentary disaster or

confusion occur.

The blockade of Boston Harbor at this moment was conducted by Captain

Philip Vere Broke of the "Shannon", a 38-gun frigate, which he had

then commanded for seven years. His was one of those cases where

singular merit as an officer, and an attention to duty altogether

exceptional, had not yet obtained opportunity for distinction. It

would probably be safe to say that no more thoroughly efficient ship

of her class had been seen in the British navy during the twenty

years' war with France, then drawing towards its close; but after

Trafalgar Napoleon's policy, while steadily directed towards

increasing the number of his ships, had more and more tended to

husbanding them against a future occasion, which in the end never

came. The result was a great diminution in naval combats. Hence, the

outbreak of the American war, followed by three frigate actions in

rapid succession, opened out a new prospect, which was none the less

stimulative because of the British reverses suffered. Captain Broke

was justly confident in his own leadership and in the efficiency of a

ship's company, which, whatever individual changes it may have

undergone, had retained its identity of organization through so many

years of his personal and energetic supervision. He now reasonably

hoped to demonstrate what could be done by officers and men so

carefully trained. Captain Pechell of the "Santo Domingo," the

flagship on the American station, wrote: "The 'Shannon's' men were

better trained, and understood gunnery better, than any men I ever

saw;" nevertheless, he added, "In the action with the 'Chesapeake' the

guns were all laid by Captain Broke's directions, consequently the

fire was all thrown in one horizontal line, not a shot going over the

'Chesapeake.'"[134]

The escape of the "President" and "Congress" early in May, while the

"Shannon" and her consort, the "Tenedos," were temporarily off shore

in consequence of easterly weather, put Broke still more upon his

mettle; and, fearing a similar mishap with the "Chesapeake," he sent

Lawrence a challenge.[135] It has been said, by both Americans and

English, that this letter was a model of courtesy. Undoubtedly it was

in all respects such as a gentleman might write; but the courtesy was

that of the French duellist, nervously anxious lest he should misplace

an accent in the name of the man whom he intended to force into fight,

and to kill. It was provocative to the last degree, which, for the end

in view, it was probably meant to be. In it Broke showed himself as

adroit with his pen--the adroitness of Canning--as he was to prove

himself in battle. Not to speak of other points of irritation, the

underlining of the words, "even combat," involved an imputation, none

the less stinging because founded in truth, upon the previous frigate

actions, and upon Lawrence's own capture of the "Peacock." In guns,

the "Chesapeake" and "Shannon" were practically of equal force; but in

the engagement the American frigate carried fifty more men than her

adversary. To an invitation couched as was Broke's Lawrence was doubly

vulnerable, for only six months had elapsed since he himself had sent

a challenge to the "Bonne Citoyenne." With his temperament he could

scarcely have resisted the innuendo, had he received the letter; but

this he did not. It passed him on the way out and was delivered to

Bainbridge, by whom it was forwarded to the Navy Department.

[Illustration: CAPTAIN PHILIP BOWES VERE BROKE.

_From the mezzotint by Charles Turner after the painting by

Samuel Lane in the possession of Lady Saumarez._]

Although Broke's letter did not reach him, Captain Lawrence made no

attempt to get to sea without engagement. The "Shannon's" running

close to Boston Light, showing her colors, and heaving-to in defiance,

served the purpose of a challenge. Cooper, who was in full touch with

the naval tradition of the time, has transmitted that Lawrence went

into the action with great reluctance. This could have proceeded only

from consciousness of defective organization, for the heroic temper of

the man was notorious, and there is no hint of that mysterious

presentiment so frequent in the annals of military services. The wind

being fair from the westward, the "Chesapeake," which had unmoored at

8 A.M., lifted her last anchor at noon, June 1, and made sail. The

"Shannon," seeing at hand the combat she had provoked, stood out to

sea until on the line between Cape Ann and Cape Cod, where she hove-to

on the starboard tack, heading to the southeast. The "Chesapeake"

followed under all sail until 5 P.M., when she took in her light

canvas, sending the loftier--royal--yards on deck; and at 5.30 hauled

up her courses, thus reducing herself to the fighting trim already

assumed by her adversary. The "Shannon," which had been lying stopped

for a long time, at this same moment filled her sails, to regain

headway with which to manoeuvre, in case her opponent's action should

require it; but, after gathering speed sufficient for this purpose,

the British captain again slowed his ship, by so bracing the

maintopsail that it was kept shaking in the wind. Its effect being

thus lost, though readily recoverable, her forward movement depended

upon the sails of the fore and mizzen masts (1). In this attitude, and

steering southeast by the wind, she awaited her antagonist, who was

running for her weather--starboard--quarter, and whose approach, thus

seconded, became now very rapid. Broke made no further change in the

ship's direction, leaving the choice of windward or leeward side to

Lawrence, who took the former, discarding all tactical advantages, and

preferring a simple artillery duel between the vessels.

Just before she closed, the "Chesapeake" rounded-to, taking a parallel

course, and backing the maintopsail (1) to reduce her speed to that of

the enemy. Captain Lawrence in his eagerness had made the serious

error of coming up under too great headway. At 5.50, as her bows

doubled on the quarter of the "Shannon" (1), at the distance of fifty

yards, the British ship opened fire, beginning with the after gun, and

continuing thence forward, as each in succession bore upon the

advancing American frigate. The latter replied after the second

British discharge, and the combat at once became furious. The previous

history of the two vessels makes it probable that the British gunnery

was the better; but it is impossible, seeing the course the action

finally took, so far to disentangle the effects of the fire while they

were on equal terms of position, from the totals afterwards

ascertained, as to say where the advantage, if any, lay during those

few minutes. The testimony of the "Chesapeake's" second lieutenant,

that his division--the forward one on the gun deck--fired three rounds

before their guns ceased to bear, agrees with Broke's report that two

or three broadsides were exchanged; and the time needed by

well-drilled men to do this is well within, yet accords fairly with,

James' statement, that from the first gun to the second stage in the

action six minutes elapsed. During the first of this period the

"Chesapeake" kept moving parallel at fifty yards distance, but gaining

continually, threatening thus to pass wholly ahead, so that her guns

would bear no longer. To prevent this Lawrence luffed closer to the

wind to shake her sails, but in vain; the movement increased her

distance, but she still ranged ahead, so that she finally reached much

further than abreast of the enemy. To use the nautical expression, she

was on the "Shannon's" weather bow (2). While this was happening her

sailing master was killed and Lawrence wounded; these being the two

officers chiefly concerned in the handling of the ship.

[Illustration: Diagram of the Chesapeake vs. Shannon Battle]

Upon this supervened a concurrence of accidents, affecting her

manageability, which initiated the second scene in the drama, and

called for instantaneous action by the officers injured. The

foretopsail tie being cut by the enemy's fire, the yard dropped,

leaving the sail empty of wind; and at the same time were shot away

the jib-sheet and the brails of the spanker. Although the latter,

flying loose, tends to spread itself against the mizzen rigging, it

probably added little to the effect of the after sails; but, the

foresail not being set, the first two mishaps practically took all the

forward canvas off the "Chesapeake." Under the combined impulses she,

at 5.56, came up into the wind (3), lost her way, and, although her

mainyard had been braced up, finally gathered sternboard; the upshot

being that she lay paralyzed some seventy yards from the "Shannon" (3,

4, 5), obliquely to the latter's course and slightly ahead of her. The

British ship going, or steering, a little off (3), her guns bore fair

upon the "Chesapeake," which, by her involuntarily coming into the

wind,--to such an extent that Broke thought she was attempting to haul

off, and himself hauled closer to the wind in consequence (4),--lost

in great measure the power of reply, except by musketry. The British

shot, entering the stern and quarter of her opponent, swept diagonally

along the after parts of the spar and main decks, a half-raking fire.

Under these conditions Lawrence and the first lieutenant were mortally

wounded, the former falling by a musket-ball through his body; but he

had already given orders to have the boarders called, seeing that the

ship must drift foul of the enemy (5). The chaplain, who in the

boarding behaved courageously, meeting Broke in person with a

pistol-shot, and receiving a cutlass wound in return, was standing

close by the captain at this instant. He afterwards testified that as

Lawrence cried "Boarders away", the crews of the carronades ran

forward; which corresponds to Broke's report that, seeing the enemy

flinching from their guns, he then gave the order for boarding. This

may have been, indeed, merely the instinctive impulse which drives

disorganized men to seek escape from a fire which they cannot return;

but if Cooper is correct in saying that it was the practice of that

day to keep the boarders' weapons, not by their side, but on the

quarter-deck or at the masts, it may also have been that this

division, which had so far stuck to its guns while being raked, now,

at the captain's call, ran from them to get the side-arms. At the

Court of Inquiry it was in evidence that these men were unarmed; and

one of them, a petty officer, stated that he had defended himself with

the monkey tail of his gun. Whatever the cause, although there was

fighting to prevent the "Chesapeake" from being lashed to the

"Shannon", no combined resistance was offered abaft the mainmast.

There the marines made a stand, but were overpowered and driven

forward. The negro bugler of the ship, who should have echoed

Lawrence's summons, was too frightened to sound a note, and the voices

of the aids, who shouted the message to the gun deck, were imperfectly

heard; but, above all, leaders were wanting. There was not on the

upper deck an officer above the grade of midshipman; captain, first

lieutenant, master, marine officer, and even the boatswain, had been

mortally wounded before the ships touched. The second lieutenant was

in charge of the first gun division, at the far end of the deck below,

as yet ignorant how the fight was going, and that the fate of his

superiors had put him in command. Of the remaining lieutenants, also

stationed on the gun deck, the fourth had been mortally wounded by the

first broadside; while the third, who had heard the shout for

boarders, committed the indiscretion, ruinous to his professional

reputation, of accompanying those who, at the moment the ships came

together, were carrying below the wounded captain.

[Illustration: THE CAPTURE OF THE _CHESAPEAKE_ BY THE

_SHANNON_.--THE STRUGGLE ON THE QUARTERDECK.

_Drawn by Henry Reuterdahl._]

Before the new commanding officer could get to the spar deck, the

ships were in contact. According to the report of Captain Broke, the

most competent surviving eye-witness, the mizzen channels of the

"Chesapeake" locked in the fore-rigging of the "Shannon." "I went

forward," he continues, "to ascertain her position, and observing that

the enemy were flinching from their guns, I gave orders to prepare for

boarding." When the "Chesapeake's" second lieutenant reached the

forecastle, the British were in possession of the after part of the

ship, and of the principal hatchways by which the boarders of the

after divisions could come up. He directed the foresail set, to shoot

the ship clear, to prevent thus a re-enforcement to the enemy already

on board; and he rallied a few men, but was himself soon wounded and

thrown below. In brief, the fall of their officers and the position of

the ship, in irons and being raked, had thrown the crew into the

confusion attendant upon all sudden disaster. From this state only the

rallying cry of a well-known voice and example can rescue men. "The

enemy," reported Broke, "made a desperate but disorderly resistance."

The desperation of brave men is the temper which at times may retrieve

such conditions, but it must be guided and fashioned by a master

spirit into something better than disorder, if it is to be effective.

Disorder at any stage of a battle is incipient defeat; supervening

upon the enemy's gaining a commanding position it commonly means

defeat consummated.

Fifteen minutes elapsed from the discharge of the first gun of the

"Shannon" to the "Chesapeake's" colors being hauled down. This was

done by the enemy, her own crew having been driven forward. In that

brief interval twenty-six British were killed and fifty-six wounded;

of the Americans forty-eight were killed and ninety-nine wounded. In

proportion to the number on board each ship when the action began, the

"Shannon" lost in men 24 per cent; the "Chesapeake" 46 per cent, or

practically double.

Although a certain amount of national exultation or mortification

attends victory or defeat in an international contest, from a yacht

race to a frigate action, there is no question of national credit in

the result where initial inequality is great, as in such combats as

that of the "Chesapeake" and "Shannon," or the "Constitution" and

"Guerrière." It is possible for an officer to command a ship for seven

years, as Broke had, and fail to make of her the admirable pattern of

all that a ship of war should be, which he accomplished with the

"Shannon"; but no captain can in four weeks make a thoroughly

efficient crew out of a crowd of men newly assembled, and never out of

harbor together. The question at issue is not national, but personal;

it is the credit of Captain Lawrence. That it was inexpedient to take

the "Chesapeake" into action at all at that moment does not admit of

dispute; though much allowance must be made for a gallant spirit,

still in the early prime of life, and chafing under the thought that,

should he get to sea by successful evasion, he would be open to the

taunt, freely used by Broke,[136] of dodging, "eluding," an enemy only

his equal in material force.

Having, however, undertaken a risk which cannot be justified, was

Captain Lawrence also reckless, and vainly confident, in his conduct

before and during the action? Was he foolhardy, or only rash? The

reply, if favorable, is due to one of the most gallant and attractive

personalities in the annals of the United States Navy.

[Illustration: CAPTAIN JAMES LAWRENCE.

_From the painting by Gilbert Stuart in the possession of the New

Jersey Historical Society, Newark, N.J._]

From his action it is evident that Lawrence clearly recognized that a

green crew can be more quickly formed to efficiency at the battery

than to that familiarity with the rigging and the sails, and that

habit of working together about decks, on which manoeuvring power

depends. He therefore chose an artillery duel, surrendering even the

opportunity of raking permitted him by Broke, who awaited his approach

without an attempt at molestation. How far was his expectation as to

the results overstrained? The American crew lost double in proportion

to their enemy; but it did not fail to inflict a very severe

punishment, and it must be added under a very considerable

disadvantage, which there has been a tendency recently to

underestimate. The loss of the head sails, and all that followed, is

part of the fortune of war; of that unforeseeable, which great leaders

admit may derange even the surest calculations. It is not, therefore,

to be complained of, but it is nevertheless to receive due account in

the scales of praise and blame; for the man who will run no risks of

accidents accomplishes nothing.

In the preceding narrative, and in the following analysis, the account

of the British naval writer James is in essentials adopted; chiefly

because, of all historians having contemporary sources of information,

he has been at most pains to insure precision.[137] As told by him,

the engagement divides into three stages. First, the combat side to

side; second, the period during which the "Chesapeake" lay in the wind

being raked; third, the boarding and taking possession. To these James

assigns, as times: for the first, six minutes; for the second, four;

for the third, five; this last being again subdivisible into a space

of two minutes, during which the "Chesapeake" was being lashed to her

opponent, and the actual fighting on her decks, which Broke states did

not exceed three.

The brief and disorderly, though desperate, resistance to boarding

proves that the "Chesapeake" was already beaten by the cannonade,

which lasted, as above, ten minutes. During only six of these,

accepting James' times, was she on equal gunnery terms. During four

tenths--nearly one half--of the gunnery contest she was at a great

disadvantage. The necessity of manoeuvring, which Lawrence tried to

avoid, was forced upon him; and the ship's company, or her

circumstances, proved unequal to meeting it. Nevertheless, though

little more than half the time on equal terms of position with her

opponent, half her own loss was inflicted upon him. How great her

subsequent disadvantage is best stated in the words of James, whom no

one will accuse of making points in favor of Americans. "At 5.56,

having had her jib-sheet and foretopsail tie shot away, and her helm,

probably from the death of the men stationed at it, being at the

moment unattended to, the 'Chesapeake' came so sharp to the wind as

completely to deaden her way." How extreme this deviation from her

course is shown by the impression made on Broke. "As the manoeuvres of

the 'Chesapeake' indicated an intention to haul away, Captain Broke

ordered the helm to be put a-lee, as the 'Shannon' had fallen off a

little." The "Chesapeake's" way being deadened, "the ship lay with

her stern and quarter exposed to her opponent's broadside. The shot

from the 'Shannon's' aftermost guns now took a diagonal direction

_along_[138] the decks of the 'Chesapeake,' beating in her stern

ports, and sweeping the men from their quarters. The shot from the

'Shannon's' foremost guns, at the same time, entering the

'Chesapeake's' ports from the mainmast aft, did considerable

execution." This describes a semi-raking fire, which lasted four

minutes, from 5.56 to 6 P.M., when the ships came together.

The manner of collision and the injuries received bear out the above

account. The quarter of the "Chesapeake" came against the side of the

"Shannon," the angle at the moment, as represented in James' diagram,

being such as to make it impossible that any of the "Chesapeake's"

guns, save one or two of the after ones, could then bear; and as she

was already paying off, they had been in worse position before. "She

was severely battered in the hull, on the larboard quarter

particularly; and several shot entered the stern windows.... Her three

lower masts were badly wounded, the main and mizzen especially. The

bowsprit received no injury." All these details show that the sum

total of the "Shannon's" fire was directed most effectively upon the

after part of the ship, in the manner described by James; and coupled

with the fact that the British first broadside, always reckoned the

most deadly, would naturally take effect chiefly on the fore part of

the "Chesapeake," as she advanced from the "Shannon's" stern to her

bow,[139] we are justified in the inference that the worst of her

loss was suffered after accident had taken her movements out of

Lawrence's instant control. Under these circumstances it may be

claimed for him that the artillery duel, to which he sought to confine

the battle, was not so entirely a desperate chance as has been

inferred.

It may therefore be said that, having resolved upon a risk which

cannot be justified at the bar of dispassionate professional judgment,

Captain Lawrence did not commit the further unpardonable error of not

maturely weighing and judiciously choosing his course. That the crew

was not organized and exercised at the guns, as far as his time and

opportunity permitted, is disproved by incidental mention in the

courts martial that followed, as well as by the execution done. Within

ten minutes at the utmost, within six of equal terms, the

"Chesapeake," an 18-pounder frigate, killed and wounded of the

"Shannon's" ship's company as many as the "Constitution" with her 24's

did of the "Guerrière's" in over twenty;[140] and the "Constitution"

not only was a much heavier ship than her opponent, but had been six

weeks almost continuously at sea. When her crew had been together four

months longer, the loss inflicted by her upon the "Java," in a contest

spread over two hours, did not greatly exceed in proportion that

suffered by the "Shannon"; and the circumstances of that engagement,

being largely manoeuvring, justified Lawrence's decision, under his

circumstances, to have none of it. His reliance upon the marksmanship

of his men is further vindicated by Broke's report that neither vessel

suffered much aloft. The American and best British tradition of firing

low was sustained by both ships. Finally, although the organization of

the "Chesapeake" was not matured sufficiently to hold the people

together, without leaders, after a tremendous punishment by the

enemy's battery, and in the face of well-trained and rapidly supported

boarders, it had so far progressed in cohesion that they did not

flinch from their guns through a severe raking fire. What further

shows this is that the boatswain of the "Shannon," lashing the ships

together in preparation for boarding, was mortally wounded, not by

musketry only but by sabre. When thus attacked he doubtless was

supported by a body of fighters as well as a gang of workers. In fact,

Broke was himself close by.

Under thus much of preparation, certainly not sufficient, Lawrence

chose for action a smooth sea, a royal breeze, an artillery duel, and

a close range. "No manoeuvring, but downright fighting," as Nelson

said of his most critical battle; critical, just because his

opponents, though raw tyros compared to his own crews, had nothing to

do but to work their guns. The American captain took the most

promising method open to him for achieving success, and carried into

the fight a ship's company which was not so untrained but that, had

some luck favored him, instead of going the other way, there was a

fighting chance of victory. More cannot be claimed for him. He had no

right, under the conditions, voluntarily to seek the odds against him,

established by Broke's seven years of faithful and skilful command.

Except in material force, the "Chesapeake" was a ship much inferior to

the "Shannon," as a regiment newly enlisted is to one that has seen

service; and the moment things went seriously wrong she could not

retrieve herself. This her captain must have known; and to the

accusation of his country and his service that he brought upon them a

mortification which endures to this day, the only reply is that he

died "sword in hand." This covers the error of the dead, but cannot

justify the example to the living.

As is customary in such cases, a Court of Inquiry was ordered to

investigate the defeat of the "Chesapeake," and sat from February 2 to

February 8, 1814. Little can be gleaned from the evidence concerning

the manoeuvring of the ship; the only two commissioned officers

surviving, having been stationed on the gun deck, could not see what

passed above. Incidental statements by midshipmen examined confirm

substantially the account above given. One mentions the particular

that, when the head sheets were shot away, "the bow of the 'Shannon'

was abreast of the 'Chesapeake's' midships, and she came into the

wind;" he adds that the mizzen-topsail was a-back, as well as the

main. This is the only important contribution to the determination of

the relative positions and handling of the vessels. As far as it goes,

it confirms a general impression that Lawrence's eagerness prevented

his making due allowance for the way of the "Chesapeake," causing him

to overshoot his aim; an error of judgment, which the accidents to the

headsails converted into irretrievable disaster. The general testimony

agrees that the crew, though dissatisfied at non-receipt of pay and

prize money, behaved well until the moment of boarding. Four

witnesses, all officers, stated as of their own observation that the

"Shannon" received several shot between wind and water, and used her

pumps continuously on the way to Halifax. Budd, the second lieutenant,

"was informed by an officer of the 'Shannon' that she was in a sinking

condition." "The 'Chesapeake' was not injured below her quarters,

except by one or two shot." "The 'Chesapeake' made no water; but the

'Shannon' had hands at the pumps continually." A good deal of pumping

in a ship seven years in commission did not necessarily indicate

injuries in action; Midshipman Curtis, however, who was transferred to

the "Shannon," testified that "the British officers were encouraging

the men by cheering to work at the pumps," which looks more serious.

The purser of the "Chesapeake" swore that she had shot plugs at the

water-line, and that "her sailing master said she had three shot holes

below." The repetition of remarks made by the "Shannon's" officers is

of course only hearsay testimony; but as regards the shots below the

water-line,--as distinguished from the general body of the ship,--this

on the one hand shows that the "Shannon" had her share of bad luck,

for in the smoke of the battle this result is not attributable to nice

precision of aiming. On the other hand it strongly re-enforces the

proof of the excellent marksmanship of the American frigate, deducible

from the killed and wounded of her opponent, and it confirms the

inference that her own disproportionate loss was at least partly due

to the raking fire and her simultaneous disability to reply. Upon the

whole, the conclusion to the writer is clear that, while Lawrence

should not have courted action, the condition of the "Chesapeake" as a

fighting ship was far better than has commonly been supposed. It may

be added that an irresponsible contemporary statement, that his

"orders were peremptory," is disproved by the Department's letter,

which forms part of the Court's record. He was to "proceed to sea as

soon as weather, and the force and position of the enemy, will admit."

Even a successful action must be expected to compel return to port,

preventing his proceeding; and there is an obvious difference between

fighting an enemy when met, and going out especially to fight him. The

orders were discretional.

Whether, by paying attention to favoring conditions, Captain Lawrence

could have repeated the success of Commodore Rodgers in gaining the

sea a month before, must remain uncertain. The "Constitution," under

Captain Stewart, a seaman of very excellent reputation, was unable to

do so, until the winter gales made it impossible for the blockaders to

maintain an uninterrupted watch off Boston. The sailing of the

"President" and "Congress" was the last successful effort for many

months; and the capture of the "Chesapeake" was the first of several

incidents illustrating how complete was the iron-barring of the coast,

against all but small vessels.

Commodore Decatur, having found it impossible to get out from New York

by the Sandy Hook route, undertook that by Long Island Sound. Passing

through Hell Gate, May 24, with his little squadron,--the "United

States," the "Macedonian," her late prize, and the sloop of war

"Hornet,"--he was on the 26th off Fisher's Island, abreast of New

London. Here he remained until June 1, obtaining various information

concerning the enemy, but only certain that there was at least a ship

of the line and a frigate in the neighborhood. On the last named day,

that of the fight between the "Chesapeake" and the "Shannon," the wind

serving, and the two enemy's vessels being far to the southwest of

Montauk Point, at the east end of Long Island, the squadron put to sea

together; but on approaching Block Island, which was close to their

course, two more enemy's cruisers loomed up to the eastward. The

hostile groups manoeuvred severally to get between the Americans and

their ports of refuge, New London in the one quarter, Newport in the

other. In plain sight of this overwhelming force Decatur feared the

results of trying to slip out to sea, and therefore beat back to New

London.[141] The enemy followed, and, having now this division

securely housed, instituted a close blockade. It was apprehended even

that they might endeavor to take it by main force, the defences of the

place being weak; but, as is commonly the case, the dangers of an

attack upon land batteries were sufficient to deter the ships from an

attempt, the object of which could be attained with equal certainty by

means less hazardous, if less immediate.

The upshot was that the two frigates remained there blockaded to the

end of the war; dependent for their safety, in Decatur's opinion,

rather upon the difficulty of the channel than upon the strength of

the fortifications. "Fort Trumbull, the only work here mounted or

garrisoned, was in the most unprepared state, and only one or two

cannon were to be had in the neighborhood for any temporary work which

should be erected. I immediately directed all my exertions to

strengthening the defences. Groton Heights has been hastily prepared

for the reception of a few large guns, and they will be mounted

immediately.... I think the place might be made impregnable; but the

hostile force on our coast is so great that, were the enemy to exert a

large portion of his means in an attack here, I do not feel certain he

could be resisted successfully with the present defences."[142] On

December 6 he reported that the squadron was moored across the channel

and under Groton Heights, which had been fortified; while in the mouth

of the harbor, three gunshots distant, was anchored a British

division, consisting of one ship of the line, a frigate, and two

smaller vessels. Two other ships of the line and several frigates were

cruising in the open, between the east end of Long Island and Gay

Head. This state of affairs lasted throughout the winter, during which

the ships were kept in a state of expectancy, awaiting a possible

opportunity; but, when the return of spring found the hope

unfulfilled, it was plainly idle to look to the summer to afford what

winter had denied. The frigates were lightened over a three-fathom

bar, and thence, in April, 1814, removed up the Thames fourteen miles,

as far as the depth of water would permit. Being there wholly out of

reach of the enemy's heavy vessels, they were dismantled, and left to

the protection of the shore batteries and the "Hornet," retained for

that purpose. Decatur was transferred to the "President," then at New

York, taking with him his ship's company; while the crew of the

"Macedonian" was sent to the lakes. The enemy's vessels then off New

London were three seventy-fours, four frigates, and three sloops.

This accumulation of force, to watch Decatur's two frigates and the

"President," which during October and November was lying at Bristol,

Rhode Island, testified to the anxiety of the British Government to

restrain or capture the larger American cruisers. Their individual

power was such that it was unwilling to expose to attack by them the

vessels, nominally of the same class, but actually much inferior,

which were ranging all seas to protect British commerce. That this

should suffer, and in some considerable degree, from the operations of

well-developed privateering enterprise, pursued by a maritime people

debarred from every other form of maritime activity, was to be

expected, and must be endured; but the frigates carried with them the

further menace, not indeed of serious injury to the colossal naval

power of Great Britain, but of mortification for defeats, which,

however reasonably to be accounted for by preponderance of force, are

not patiently accepted by a nation accustomed to regard itself as

invincible. There are few things more wearing than explaining adverse

results; and the moral effect of so satisfactory a reply as the

victory of the "Shannon" might well have weighed with an American

captain, not to risk prestige already gained, by seeking action when

conscious of deficient preparation. The clamor aroused in Great

Britain by the three rapidly succeeding captures of the "Guerrière,"

"Macedonian," and "Java," was ample justification of the American

policy of securing superior force in single cruisers, throughout their

several classes; a policy entirely consistent with all sound military

principle. It should be remembered, however, that a cruiser is

intended generally to act singly, and depends upon herself alone for

that preponderance of strength which military effort usually seeks by

concentration of numbers. The advantage of great individual power,

therefore, does not apply so unqualifiedly to the components of

fleets, the superiority of which depends upon the mutual support of

its members, by efficient combination of movement, as well as upon

their separate power.

Both the Government and people of Great Britain expected with some

confidence, from the large fleet placed under Sir John Warren, the

utter destruction of the frigates and of the American navy generally.

"We were in hopes, ere this," said a naval periodical in June, 1813,

"to have announced the capture of the American navy; and, as our

commander-in-chief on that station has sufficient force to effect so

desirable an object, we trust, before another month elapses, to lay

before our readers what we conceive ought long since to have

happened."[143] The words of the Admiralty were more measured, as

responsible utterances are prone to be; but their tenor was the same.

Expressing to Warren disappointment with the results so far obtained,

they added: "It is of the highest importance to the _character_ and

interests of the country that the naval force of the enemy should be

quickly and completely disposed of. Their Lordships therefore have

thought themselves justified at this moment in withdrawing ships from

other important services, for the purpose of placing under your

command a force with which you cannot fail to bring the naval war to a

termination, either by the capture of the American national vessels,

or by strictly blockading them in their own waters."[144] This

expectancy doubtless weighed with Broke; and probably also prompted a

challenge sent to Decatur's squadron to meet two British frigates,

under pledge of fair play, and of safe return if victorious. In the

latter case they at least would be badly injured; so in either event

the blockaders would be relieved of much of their burden.

The presence of several American frigates, blockaded close to the

point where Narragansett Bay and Long Island Sound meet, constituted a

great inconvenience to all that region, by attracting thither so many

enemy's cruisers. To a coasting trade--then so singularly

important--projecting headlands, or capes, are the places of greatest

exposure; in this resembling the danger entailed by salients in all

military lines, in fortification or in the field. Traffic between New

England and New York, general and local, had derived a further impetus

from the fact that Newport, not being included in the commercial

blockade, could still receive external supplies by neutral vessels.

Intercourse depended largely on these waters; and it was to them a

grave misfortune that there were no United States frigates left in New

York to divert the enemy's attention. The vexations entailed were

forcibly presented by the Governor of Connecticut.[145] "The British

force stationed in our waters having occasioned great inquietude along

the whole of our maritime frontier, every precaution consistent with

due regard to the general safety has been adopted for its

protection.... In our present state of preparedness, it is believed a

descent upon our coast will not be attempted; a well-grounded hope is

entertained that it will be attended with little success.

Unfortunately, we have not the means of rendering our navigation

equally secure. Serious depredations have been committed even in our

harbors, and to such an extent that the usual communication through

the Sound is almost wholly interrupted. Thus, while anxiously engaged

in protecting our public ships [Decatur's], we are doomed to witness

the unrestrained capture of our private vessels, and the consequent

suspension of commercial pursuits." As "the disapprobation of the war

by the people of Connecticut had been publicly declared through the

proper organs shortly after hostilities commenced,"[146] it may be

supposed the conditions described, accompanied by continual alarms

withdrawing the militiaman from his shop or his harvest, to repel

petty invasion, did not tend to conciliate opinion. An officer of the

Connecticut militia wrote in December, "Our engagements with the enemy

have become so frequent that it would be in vain to attempt a

particular statement of each."[147]

Similar conditions prevailed along the entire seaboard, from Maine to

Georgia; being of course greatest where inland navigation with wide

entrances, like Long Island Sound, had given particular development to

the coasting trade, and at the same time afforded to pursuers

particular immunity from ordinary dangers of the sea. Incidental

confirmation of the closeness of the hostile pressure is afforded by

Bainbridge's report of the brig "Siren's" arrival at Boston, June 11,

1813, from New Orleans. "Although at sea between thirty and forty

days, and great time along our blockaded coast, she did not see one

enemy's cruiser."[148] The cause is evident. The Chesapeake and

Delaware were blockaded from within. Ships watching New York and Long

Island Sound would be far inside the course of one destined to Boston

from the southward. From Hatteras to the Florida line the enemy's

vessels, mostly of small class, kept in summer well inside the line

from cape to cape, harassing even the water traffic behind the

sea-islands; while at Boston, her port of arrival, the "Siren" was

favored by Broke's procedure. In his eagerness to secure action with

the "Chesapeake," he had detached his consort, the "Tenedos," with

orders not to rejoin until June 14. Under cover of her absence, and

the "Shannon's" return to Halifax with her prize, the "Siren" slipped

into a harbor wholly relieved of the enemy's presence. With such

conditions, a voyage along the coast could well be outside the British

line of cruising.

Owing to the difficulty of the New York entrance, except with good

pilotage, and to the absence thence of ships of war after Decatur's

departure, that port ceased to present any features of naval activity;

except as connected with the lake squadrons, which depended upon it

for supplies of all kinds. The blockade of the Sound affected its

domestic trade; and after May its external commerce shared the

inconveniences of the commercial blockade, then applied to it, and

made at least technically effective. What this pressure in the end

became is shown by a casual mention a year later, under the heading

"progress of luxury. A private stock of wine brought the average

'extraordinary' price of twenty-five dollars the gallon; while at the

same period one auction lot of prize goods, comprising three decanters

and twelve tumblers, sold for one hundred and twelve dollars."[149]

The arrival in August, 1813, of a vessel in distress, which, like the

"Siren," had passed along the whole Southern coast without seeing a

hostile cruiser, would seem to show some lapse of watchfulness; but,

although there were the occasional evasions which attend all

blockades, the general fact of neutrals turned away was established. A

flotilla of a dozen gunboats was kept in commission in the bay, but

under an officer not of the regular navy. As might readily have been

foreseen from conditions, and from experience elsewhere, the national

gunboat experiment had abundantly shown that vessels of that class

were not only excessively costly in expenditure, and lamentably

inefficient in results, as compared with seagoing cruisers, but were

also deleterious to the professional character of officers and

seamen. Two years before the war Captain Campbell, then in command

both at Charleston and Savannah, had commented on the unofficer-like

neglect noticeable in the gunboats, and Gordon now reported the same

effect upon the crew of the "Constellation," while thus detached for

harbor defence.[150] The Secretary of the Navy, affirming the general

observation, remarked that officers having knowledge of their business

were averse to gunboat duty, while those who had it yet to acquire

were unwilling, because there it could not be learned. "It is a

service in which those who are to form the officers for the ships of

war ought not to be employed."[151] He therefore had recommended the

commissioning of volunteer officers for this work. This local New York

harbor guard at times convoyed coasters in the Sound, and at times

interfered, both in that quarter and off Sandy Hook, to prevent small

cruisers or boats of the enemy from effecting seizures of vessels,

close in shore or run on the beach. Such military action possesses a

certain minor value, diminishing in some measure the grand total of

loss; but it is not capable of modifying seriously the broad results

of a strong commercial blockade.

The Delaware and the Chesapeake--the latter particularly--became the

principal scenes of active operations by the British navy. Here in the

early part of the summer there seems to have been a formed determination

on the part of Sir John Warren to satisfy his Government and people by

evidence of military exertion in various quarters. Rear Admiral George

Cockburn, an officer of distinction and energy, had been ordered at the

end of 1812 from the Cadiz station, with four ships of the line and

several smaller cruisers, to re-enforce Warren. This strong detachment,

a token at once of the relaxing demand upon the British navy in Europe,

and of the increasing purpose of the British Government towards the

United States, joined the commander-in-chief at Bermuda, and accompanied

him to the Chesapeake in March. Cockburn became second in command. Early

in April the fleet began moving up the bay; an opening incident, already

mentioned,[152] being the successful attack by its boats upon several

letters-of-marque and privateers in the Rappahannock upon the 3d of the

month. Some of the schooners there captured were converted into tenders,

useful for penetrating the numerous waterways which intersected the

country in every direction.

The fleet, comprising several ships of the line, besides numerous

smaller vessels, continued slowly upwards, taking time to land parties

in many quarters, keeping the country in perpetual alarm. The

multiplicity and diverseness of its operations, the particular object

of which could at no moment be foreseen, made it impossible to combine

resistance. The harassment was necessarily extreme, and the sustained

suspense wearing; for, with reports continually arriving, now from one

shore and now from the other, each neighborhood thought itself the

next to be attacked. Defence depended wholly upon militia, hastily

assembled, with whom local considerations are necessarily predominant.

But while thus spreading consternation on either side, diverting

attention from his main objective, the purpose of the British admiral

was clear to his own mind. It was "to cut off the enemy's supplies,

and destroy their foundries, stores, and public works, by penetrating

the rivers at the head of the Chesapeake."

[Illustration: OUTLINE MAP OF CHESAPEAKE BAY AND RIVERS]

On April 16 an advanced division arrived off the mouth of the

Patapsco, a dozen miles from Baltimore. There others successively

joined, until the whole force was reported on the 22d to be three

seventy-fours, with several frigates and smaller vessels, making a

total of fifteen. The body of the fleet remained stationary, causing

the city a strong anticipation of attack; an impression conducing to

retain there troops which, under a reasonable reliance upon adequate

fortifications, might have been transferred to the probable scene of

operations, sufficiently indicated by its intrinsic importance. Warren

now constituted a light squadron of two frigates, with a half-dozen

smaller vessels, including some of those recently captured. These he

placed in charge of Cockburn and despatched to the head of the bay. In

addition to the usual crews there went about four hundred of the naval

brigade, consisting of marines and seamen in nearly equal numbers.

This, with a handful of army artillerists, was the entire force. With

these Cockburn went first up the Elk River, where Washington thirty

years before had taken shipping on his way to the siege of Yorktown.

At Frenchtown, notwithstanding a six-gun battery lately erected, a

landing was effected on April 29, and a quantity of flour and army

equipments were destroyed, together with five bay schooners. Many

cattle were likewise seized; Cockburn, in this and other instances,

offering to pay in British government bills, provided no resistance

was attempted in the neighborhood. From Frenchtown he went round to

the Susquehanna, to obtain more cattle from an island, just below

Havre de Grace; but being there confronted on May 2 by an American

flag, hoisted over a battery at the town, he proceeded to attack the

following day. A nominal resistance was made; but as the British loss,

here and at Frenchtown, was one wounded on each occasion, no great

cause for pride was left with the defenders. Holding the inhabitants

responsible for the opposition in their neighborhood, he determined to

punish the town. Some houses were burned. The guns of the battery were

then embarked; and during this process Cockburn himself, with a small

party, marched three or four miles north of the place to a cannon

foundry, where he destroyed the guns and material found, together with

the buildings and machinery.

"Our small division," he reported to Warren, "has been during the

whole of this day on shore, in the centre of the enemy's country, and

on his high road between Baltimore and Philadelphia." The feat

testified rather to the military imbecility of the United States

Government during the last decade than to any signal valor or

enterprise on the part of the invaders. Enough and to spare of both

there doubtless was among them; for the expedition was of a kind

continuously familiar to the British navy during the past twenty

years, under far greater difficulty, in many parts of the world.

Seeing the trifling force engaged, the mortification to Americans must

be that no greater demand was made upon it for the display of its

military virtues. Besides the destruction already mentioned, a

division of boats went up the Susquehanna, destroyed five vessels and

more flour; after which, "everything being completed to my utmost

wishes, the division embarked and returned to the ships, after being

twenty-two hours in constant exertion." From thence Cockburn went

round to the Sassafras River, where a similar series of small injuries

was inflicted, and two villages, Georgetown and Frederickstown, were

destroyed, in consequence of local resistance offered, by which five

British were wounded. Assurance coming from several quarters that no

further armed opposition would be made, and as there was "now neither

public property, vessels, nor warlike stores remaining in the

neighborhood," the expedition returned down the bay, May 7, and

regained the fleet.[153]

The history of the Delaware and its waters during this period was

very much the same as that of the Chesapeake; except that, the water

system of the lower bay being less extensive and practicable, and the

river above narrower, there was not the scope for general marauding,

nor the facility for systematic destruction, which constituted the

peculiar exposure of the Chesapeake and gave Cockburn his opportunity.

Neither was there the same shelter from the sweep of the ocean, nor

any naval establishment to draw attention. For these reasons, the

Chesapeake naturally attracted much more active operations; and

Virginia, which formed so large a part of its coast-line, was the home

of the President. She was also the leading member of the group of

states which, in the internal contests of American politics, was

generally thought to represent hatred to Great Britain and attachment

to France. In both bays the American Government maintained flotillas

of gunboats and small schooners, together with--in the Delaware at

least--a certain number of great rowing barges, or galleys; but,

although creditable energy was displayed, it is impossible to detect

that, even in waters which might be thought suited to their particular

qualities, these small craft exerted any substantial influence upon

the movements of the enemy. Their principal effect appears to have

been to excite among the inhabitants a certain amount of unreasonable

expectation, followed inevitably by similar unreasoning complaint.

It is probable, however, that they to some extent restricted the

movements of small foraging parties beyond the near range of their

ships; and they served also the purpose of watching and reporting the

dispositions of the British fleet. When it returned downwards from

Cockburn's expedition, it was followed by a division of these schooners

and gunboats, under Captain Charles Gordon of the navy, who remained

cruising for nearly a month below the Potomac, constantly sighting the

enemy, but without an opportunity offering for a blow to be struck

under conditions favorable to either party. "The position taken by the

enemy's ships," reported Gordon, "together with the constant protection

given their small cruisers, particularly in the night, rendered any

offensive operations on our part impracticable."[154] In the Delaware,

a British corvette, running upon a shoal with a falling tide, was

attacked in this situation by a division of ten gunboats which was at

hand. Such conditions were unusually favorable to them, and, though a

frigate was within plain sight, she could not get within range on

account of the shoalness of water; yet the two hours' action which

followed did no serious injury to the grounded ship. Meantime one of

the gunboats drifted from its position, and was swept by the tide out

of supporting distance from its fellows. The frigate and sloop then

manned boats, seven in number, pulled towards her, and despite a plucky

resistance carried her; their largely superior numbers easily climbing

on board her low-lying deck. Although the record of gunboats in all

parts of the world is mostly unfruitful, some surprise cannot but be

felt at the immunity experienced by a vessel aground under such

circumstances.[155]

On May 13 Captain Stewart of the "Constellation" reported from Norfolk

that the enemy's fleet had returned down the bay; fifteen sail being

at anchor in a line stretching from Cape Henry to near Hampton Roads.

Little had yet been done by the authorities to remedy the defenceless

condition of the port, which he had deplored in his letter of March

17; and he apprehended a speedy attack either upon Hampton, on the

north shore of the James River, important as commanding communications

between Norfolk and the country above, or upon Craney Island,

covering the entrance to the Elizabeth River, through the narrow

channel of which the navy yard must be approached. There was a party

now at work throwing up a battery on the island, on which five hundred

troops were stationed, but he feared these preparations were begun too

late. He had assigned seven gunboats to assist the defence. It was

clear to his mind that, if Norfolk was their object, active operations

would begin at one of these approaches, and not immediately about the

place itself. Meanwhile, he would await developments, and postpone his

departure to Boston, whither he had been ordered to command the

"Constitution."

Much to Stewart's surprise, considering the force of the enemy, which

he, as a seaman, could estimate accurately and compare with what he

knew to be the conditions confronting them, most of the British fleet

soon after put to sea with the commander-in-chief, leaving Cockburn

with one seventy-four and four frigates to hold the bay. This apparent

abandonment, or at best concession of further time to Craney Island,

aroused in him contempt as well as wonder. He had commented a month

before on their extremely circumspect management; "they act

cautiously, and never separate so far from one another that they

cannot in the course of a few hours give to each other support, by

dropping down or running up, as the wind or tide serve."[156] Such

precaution, however, was not out of place when confronted with the

presence of gunboats capable of utilizing calms and local conditions.

To avoid exposure to useless injury is not to pass the bounds of

military prudence. It was another matter to have brought so large a

force, and to depart with no greater results than those of Frenchtown

and Havre de Grace. "They do not appear disposed to put anything to

risk, or to make an attack where they are likely to meet with

opposition. Their conduct while in these waters has been highly

disgraceful to their arms, and evinces the respect and dread they have

for their opponents."[157] He added a circumstance which throws

further light upon the well-known discontent of the British crews and

their deterioration in quality, under a prolonged war and the

confinement attending the impressment system. "Their loss in prisoners

and deserters has been very considerable; the latter are coming up to

Norfolk almost daily, and their naked bodies are frequently fished up

on the bay shore, where they must have been drowned in attempting to

swim. They all give the same account of the dissatisfaction of their

crews, and their detestation of the service they are engaged in."[158]

Deserters, however, usually have tales acceptable to those to whom

they come.

Whether Warren was judicious in postponing attack may be doubted, but

he had not lost sight of the Admiralty's hint about American frigates.

There were just two in the waters of the Chesapeake; the

"Constellation," 36, at Norfolk, and the "Adams," 24, Captain Charles

Morris, in the Potomac. The British admiral had been notified that a

division of troops would be sent to Bermuda, to be under his command

for operations on shore, and he was now gone to fetch them. Early in

June he returned, bringing these soldiers, two thousand six hundred

and fifty in number.[159] From his Gazette letters he evidently had in

view the capture of Norfolk with the "Constellation"; for when he

designates Hampton and Craney Island as points of attack, it is

because of their relations to Norfolk.[160] This justified the

forecast of Stewart, who had now departed; the command of the

"Constellation" devolving soon after upon Captain Gordon. In

connection with the military detachment intrusted to Warren, the

Admiralty, while declining to give particular directions as to its

employment, wrote him: "Against a maritime country like America, the

chief towns and establishments of which are situated upon navigable

rivers, a force of the kind under your orders must necessarily be

peculiarly formidable.... In the choice of objects of attack, it will

naturally occur to you that on every account any attempt which should

have the effect of crippling the enemy's naval force should have a

preference."[161] Except for the accidental presence of Decatur's

frigates in New London, as yet scarcely known to the British

commander-in-chief, Norfolk, more than any other place, met this

prescription of his Government. His next movements, therefore, may be

considered as resulting directly from his instructions.

The first occurrence was a somewhat prolonged engagement between a

division of fifteen gunboats and the frigate "Junon," which, having

been sent to destroy vessels at the mouth of the James River, was

caught becalmed and alone in the upper part of Hampton Roads; no other

British vessel being nearer than three miles. The cannonade continued

for three quarters of an hour, when a breeze springing up brought two

of her consorts to the "Junon's" aid. The gunboats, incapable of close

action with a single frigate in a working breeze, necessarily now

retreated. They had suffered but slightly, one killed and two wounded;

but retired with the confidence, always found in the accounts of such

affairs, that they had inflicted great damage upon the enemy. The

commander of a United States revenue cutter, lately captured, who was

on board the frigate at the time, brought back word subsequently that

she had lost one man killed and two or three wounded.[162] The British

official reports do not allude to the affair. As regards positive

results, however, it may be affirmed with considerable assurance that

the military value of gunboats in their day, as a measure of coast

defence, was not what they effected, but the caution imposed upon the

enemy by the apprehension of what they might effect, did this or that

combination of circumstances occur. That the circumstances actually

almost never arose detracted little from this moral influence. The

making to one's self a picture of possible consequences is a powerful

factor in most military operations; and the gunboat is not without its

representative to-day in the sphere of imaginative warfare.

The "Junon" business was a casual episode. Warren was already

preparing for his attack on Craney Island. This little strip of

ground, a half-mile long by two hundred yards across, lies within easy

gunshot to the west of the Elizabeth River, a narrow channel-way,

three hundred yards from edge to edge, which from Hampton Roads leads

due south, through extensive flats, to Norfolk and Portsmouth. The

navy yard is four miles above the island, on the west side of the

river, the banks of which there have risen above the water. Up to and

beyond Craney Island the river-bed proper, though fairly clear, is

submerged and hidden amid the surrounding expanse of shoal water. Good

pilotage, therefore, is necessary, and incidental thereto the

reduction beforehand of an enemy's positions commanding the approach.

Of these Craney Island was the first. From it the flats which

constitute the under-water banks of the Elizabeth extend north towards

Hampton Roads, for a distance of two miles, and are not traversable by

vessels powerful enough to act against batteries. For nearly half a

mile the depth is less than four feet, while the sand immediately

round the island was bare when the tide was out.[163] Attack here was

possible only by boats armed with light cannon and carrying troops. On

the west the island was separated from the mainland by a narrow strip

of water, fordable by infantry at low tide. It was therefore

determined to make a double assault,--one on the north, by fifteen

boats, carrying, besides their crews, five hundred soldiers; the other

on the west, by a division eight hundred strong,[164] to be landed

four miles away, at the mouth of the Nansemond River. The garrison of

the island numbered five hundred and eighty, and one hundred and fifty

seamen were landed from the "Constellation" to man one of the

principal batteries.

The British plan labored under the difficulty that opposite conditions

of tide were desirable for the two parties which were to act in

concert. The front attack demanded high water, in order that under the

impulse of the oars the boats might get as near as possible before

they took the ground, whence the advance to the assault must be by

wading. The flanking movement required low water, to facilitate

passing the ford. Between the two, the hour was fixed for an ebbing

tide, probably to allow for delays, and to assure the arrival of the

infantry so as to profit by the least depth. At 11 A.M. of June 22 the

boat division arrived off the northwest point of the island, opposite

the battery manned by the seamen, in that day notoriously among the

best of artillerists. A difference of opinion as to the propriety of

advancing at all here showed itself among the senior naval officers;

for there will always be among seamen a dislike to operating over

unknown ground with a falling tide. The captain in command, however,

overruled hesitations; doubtless feeling that in a combined movement

the particular interest of one division must yield to the

requirements of mutual support. A spirited forward dash was therefore

made; but the guiding boat, sixty yards ahead of the others, grounded

a hundred yards from the battery. One or two others, disregarding her

signal, shared her mishap; and two were sunk by the American fire.

Under these circumstances a seaman, sounding with a boat hook,

declared that he found along side three or four feet of slimy mud.

This was considered decisive, and the attack was abandoned.

The shore division had already retreated, having encountered

obstacles, the precise character of which is not stated. Warren's

report simply said, "In consequence of the representation of the

officer commanding the troops, of the difficulty of their passing over

from the land, I considered that the persevering in the attempt would

cost more men than the number with us would permit, as the other forts

must have been stormed before the frigate and dockyard could be

destroyed." The enterprise was therefore abandoned at the threshold,

because of probable ulterior difficulties, the degree of which it

would require to-day unprofitable labor even to conjecture; but

reduced as the affair in its upshot was to an abortive demonstration,

followed by no serious effort, it probably was not reckoned at home to

have fulfilled the Admiralty's injunctions, that the character as well

as the interest of the country required certain results. The loss was

trifling,--three killed, sixteen wounded, sixty-two missing.[165]

Having relinquished his purpose against Craney Island, and with it,

apparently, all serious thought of the navy yard and the

"Constellation", Warren next turned his attention to Hampton. On the

early morning of June 26 two thousand troops were landed to take

possession of the place, which they did with slight resistance. Three

stand of colors were captured and seven field guns, with their

equipment and ammunition. The defences of the town were destroyed; but

as no further use was made of the advantage gained, the affair

amounted to nothing more than an illustration on a larger scale of the

guerilla depredation carried on on all sides of the Chesapeake. With

it ended Warren's attempts against Norfolk. His force may have been

really inadequate to more; certainly it was far smaller than was

despatched to the same quarter the following year; but the Admiralty

probably was satisfied by this time that he had not the enterprise

necessary for his position, and a successor was appointed during the

following winter.

For two months longer the British fleet as a whole remained in the

bay, engaged in desultory operations, which had at least the effect of

greatly increasing their local knowledge, and in so far facilitating

the more serious undertakings of the next season. The Chesapeake was

not so much blockaded as occupied. On June 29 Captain Cassin of the

navy yard reported that six sail of the line, with four frigates, were

at the mouth of the Elizabeth, and that the day before a squadron of

thirteen--frigates, brigs, and schooners--had gone ten miles up the

James, causing the inhabitants of Smithfield and the surroundings to

fly from their homes, terrified by the transactions at Hampton. The

lighter vessels continued some distance farther towards Richmond. A

renewal of the attack was naturally expected; but on July 11 the fleet

quitted Hampton Roads, and again ascended the Chesapeake, leaving a

division of ten sail in Lynnhaven Bay, under Cape Henry. Two days

later the main body entered the Potomac, in which, as has before been

mentioned, was the frigate "Adams"; but she lay above the Narrows, out

of reach of such efforts as Warren was willing to risk. He went as

high as Blakiston Island, twenty-five to thirty miles from the river's

mouth, and from there Cockburn, with a couple of frigates and two

smaller vessels, tried to get beyond the Kettle Bottom Shoals, an

intricate bit of navigation ten miles higher up, but still below the

Narrows.[166] Two of his detachment, however, took the ground; and the

enterprise of approaching Washington by this route was for that time

abandoned. A year afterwards it was accomplished by Captain Gordon, of

the British Navy, who carried two frigates and a division of bomb

vessels as far as Alexandria.

Two United States gunboats, "The Scorpion" and "Asp", lying in

Yeocomico River, a shallow tributary of the Potomac ten miles from the

Chesapeake, were surprised there July 14 by the entrance of the enemy.

Getting under way hastily, the "Scorpion" succeeded in reaching the

main stream and retreating up it; but the "Asp", being a bad sailer,

and the wind contrary, had to go back. She was pursued by boats; and

although an attack by three was beaten off, she was subsequently

carried when they were re-enforced to five. Her commander, Midshipman

Sigourney, was killed, and of the twenty-one in her crew nine were

either killed or wounded. The assailants were considerably superior in

numbers, as they need to be in such undertakings. They lost eight.

This was the second United States vessel thus captured in the

Chesapeake this year; the revenue cutter "Surveyor" having been taken

in York River, by the boats of the frigate "Narcissus", on the night

of June 12. In the latter instance, the sword of the commander, who

survived, was returned to him the next day by the captor, with a

letter testifying "an admiration on the part of your opponents, such

as I have seldom witnessed, for your gallant and desperate attempt to

defend your vessel against more than double your numbers."[167]

Trivial in themselves as these affairs were, it is satisfactory to

notice that in both the honor of the flag was upheld with a spirit

which is worth even more than victory. Sigourney had before received

the commendation of Captain Morris, no mean judge of an officer's

merits.

The British fleet left the Potomac July 21, and went on up the bay,

spreading alarm on every side. Morris, with a body of seamen and

marines, was ordered from the "Adams" to Annapolis, the capital of

Maryland, on the River Severn, to command the defences. These he

reported, on August 13, to be in the "miserable condition"

characteristic of all the national preparations to meet hostilities.

With a view to entering, the enemy was sounding the bar, an operation

which frequently must be carried on beyond protection by ships' guns;

"but we have no floating force to molest them." The bulk of the fleet

was above the Severn, as were both admirals, and Morris found their

movements "contradictory, as usual."[168] As many as twenty sail had

at one time been visible from the state-house dome in the city. On

August 8, fifteen, three of which were seventy-fours, were counted

from North Point, at the mouth of the Patapsco, on which Baltimore

lies. Kent Island, on the eastern shore of the bay abreast Annapolis,

was taken possession of, and occupied for some days. At the same

period attacks were reported in other quarters on that side of the

Chesapeake, as elsewhere in the extensive basin penetrated by its

tributaries. The prosecution of these various enterprises was attended

with the usual amount of scuffling encounter, which associates itself

naturally with coastwise warfare of a guerilla character. The fortune

of war inclined now to one side, now to the other, in the particular

cases; but in the general there could be no doubt as to which party

was getting the worst, undergoing besides almost all the suffering and

quite all the harassment. This is the necessary penalty of the

defensive, when inadequate.

Throughout most of this summer of conflict there went on, singularly

enough, a certain amount of trade by licensed vessels, neutral and

American, which passed down Chesapeake Bay and went to sea. Doubtless

the aggregate amount of traffic thus maintained was inconsiderable, as

compared with normal conditions, but its allowance by either party to

the war is noticeable,--by the British, because of the blockade

declared by them; by the Americans, because of the evident

inexpediency of permitting to depart vessels having full knowledge of

conditions, and almost certain to be boarded by the enemy. Sailing

from blockaded ports is of course promoted in most instances by the

nation blockaded, for it is in support of trade; and with the sea

close at hand, although there is risk, there is also chance of safe

passage through a belt of danger, relatively narrow and entered at

will. The case is quite different where a hazardous navigation of

sixty to a hundred miles, increasing in intricacy at its further end,

and lined throughout with enemy's cruisers, interposes before the sea

is reached. The difficulty here is demonstrated by the fact that the

"Adams," a ship by no means large or exceptionally fettered by

navigational difficulties, under a young captain burning to exercise

his first command in war, waited four months, even after the bulk of

the enemy's fleet had gone, before she was able to get through; and

finally did so only under such conditions of weather as caused her to

miss her way and strike bottom.

The motive of the British for collusion is clear. The Chesapeake was

the heart of the wheat and flour production of the United States, and

while some provision had been made for meeting the wants of the West

Indies, and of the armies in Canada and Spain, by refraining from

commercial blockade of Boston and other eastern ports, these

necessary food supplies reached those places only after an expensive

transport which materially increased their price; the more as they

were carried by land to the point of exportation, it not suiting the

British policy to connive at coasting trade even for that purpose. A

neutral or licensed vessel, sailing from the Chesapeake with flour for

a port friendly to the United States, could be seized under cover of

the commercial blockade, which she was violating, sent to Halifax, and

condemned for her technical offence. The cargo then was available for

transport whither required, the whole transaction being covered by a

veil of legality; but it is plain that the risks to a merchant, in

attempting _bonâ fide_ to run a blockade like that of Chesapeake Bay,

exceeded too far any probable gain to have been undertaken without

some assurance of compensation, which did not appear on the surface.

Taken in connection with intelligence obtained by this means, the

British motive is apparent; but why did the United States

administration tolerate procedures which betrayed its counsels, and

directly helped to sustain the enemy's war? Something perhaps is due

to executive weakness in a government constituted by popular vote;

more, probably, at least during the period when immediate military

danger did not threaten, to a wish to frustrate the particular

advantage reaped by New England, through its exemption from the

restrictions of the commercial blockade. When breadstuffs were pouring

out of the country through the coast-line of a section which gloried

in its opposition to the war,[169] and lost no opportunity to renew

the declaration of its disapproval and its criticism of the

Government, it was at least natural, perhaps even expedient, to wink

at proceedings which transferred elsewhere some of the profits, and

did not materially increase the advantage of the enemy. But

circumstances became very different when a fleet appeared in the bay,

the numbers and action of which showed a determination to carry

hostile operations wherever conditions permitted. Then, betrayal of

such conditions by passing vessels became an unbearable evil; and at

the same time the Administration had forced upon its attention the

unpleasant but notorious fact that, by the active complicity of many

of its own citizens, not only the flour trade continued, but the wants

of the blockading squadrons along the coast were being supplied.

Neutrals, real or pretended, and coasting vessels, assuming a lawful

destination, took on board cattle, fresh vegetables, and other stores

acceptable to ships confined to salt provisions, and either went

direct to enemy's ports or were captured by collusion. News was

received of contracts made by the British admiral at Bermuda for fresh

beef to be supplied from American ports, by American dealers, in

American vessels; while Halifax teemed with similar transactions,

without serious attempt at concealment.

Such aid and comfort to an enemy is by no means unexampled in the

history of war, particularly where one of the belligerents is shrewdly

commercial; but it is scarcely too much to say that it attained

unusual proportions at this time in the United States, and was

countenanced by a public opinion which was more than tolerant,

particularly in New England, where the attitude of the majority

towards the Government approached hostility. As a manifestation of

contemporary national character, of unwillingness to subordinate

personal gain to public welfare, to loyalty to country, it was

pitiable and shameful, particularly as it affected large communities;

but its instructive significance at this time is the evidence it

gives that forty years of confederation, nearly twenty-five being of

the closer union under the present Constitution, had not yet welded

the people into a whole, or created a consciousness truly national.

The capacity for patriotism was there, and readiness to suffer for

patriotic cause had been demonstrated by the War of Independence; but

the mass of Americans had not yet risen sufficiently above local

traditions and interests to discern clearly the noble ideal of

national unity, and vagueness of apprehension resulted inevitably in

lukewarmness of sentiment. This condition goes far to palliate actions

which it cannot excuse; the reproach of helping the enemies of one's

country is somewhat less when the nation itself has scarcely emerged

to recognition, as it afterwards did under the inspiring watchword,

"The Union."

The necessity to control these conditions of clandestine intercourse

found official expression in a message of the President to Congress,

July 20, 1813,[170] recommending "an immediate and effectual

prohibition of all exports" for a limited time; subject to removal by

executive order, in case the commercial blockade were raised. A

summary of the conditions above related was given, as a cause for

action. The President's further comment revealed the continuity of

thought and policy which dictated his recommendation, and connected

the proposed measure with the old series of commercial restrictions,

associated with his occupancy of the State Department under

Jefferson's administration. "The system of the enemy, combining with

the blockade of our ports special licenses to neutral vessels, and

insidious discrimination between different ports of the United States,

if not counteracted, will have the effect of diminishing very

materially the pressure of the war on the enemy, and encourage

perseverance in it, and at the same time will leave the general

commerce of the United States under all the pressure the enemy can

impose, thus subjecting the whole to British regulation, in

subserviency to British monopoly."

The House passed a bill meeting the President's suggestions, but it

was rejected by the Senate on July 28. The Executive then fell back on

its own war powers; and on July 29 the Secretary of the Navy, by

direction of the President, issued a general order to all naval

officers in command, calling attention to "the palpable and criminal

intercourse held with the enemy's forces blockading and invading the

waters of the United States." "This intercourse," he explicitly added,

"is not only carried on by foreigners, under the specious garb of

friendly flags, who convey provisions, water, and succors of all kinds

(ostensibly destined for friendly ports, in the face, too, of a

declared and rigorous blockade),[171] direct to the fleets and

stations of the enemy, with constant intelligence of our naval and

military force and preparation, ... but the same traffic, intercourse,

and intelligence is carried on with great subtlety and treachery by

profligate citizens, who, in vessels ostensibly navigating our own

waters, from port to port [coasters], find means to convey succors or

intelligence to the enemy, and elude the penalty of law."[172]

Officers were therefore instructed to arrest all vessels, the

movements or situation of which indicated an intention to effect any

of the purposes indicated.