"The signal to engage shall be
A whistle and a hollo;
Be one and all but firm, like me,
And conquest soon will follow!
You, Gunnel, keep the helm in hand--
Thus, thus, boys! steady, steady,
Till right ahead you see the land--
Then soon as you are ready,
The signal to engage shall be
A whistle and a hollo;
Be one and all but firm, like me,
And conquest soon will follow!"
--C. DIBDIN.
On the early morning of June 1, 1813, a solitary British frigate,
H.M.S. _Shannon_, was cruising within sight of Boston lighthouse. She
was a ship of about 1000 tons, and bore every mark of long and hard
service. No gleam of colour sparkled about her. Her sides were rusty,
her sails weather-stained; a solitary flag flew from her mizzen-peak,
and even its blue had been bleached by sun and rain and wind to a dingy
grey. A less romantic and more severely practical ship did not float,
and her captain was of the same type as the ship.
Captain Philip Bowes Vere Broke was an Englishman _pur sang_, and of a
type happily not uncommon. His fame will live as long as the British
flag flies, yet a more sober and prosaic figure can hardly be imagined.
He was not, like Nelson, a quarter-deck Napoleon; he had no gleam of
Dundonald's matchless _ruse de guerre_. He was as deeply religious as
Havelock or one of Cromwell's major-generals; he had the frugality of a
Scotchman, and the heavy-footed common-sense of a Hollander. He was as
nautical as a web-footed bird, and had no more "nerves" than a fish. A
domestic Englishman, whose heart was always with the little girls at
Brokehall, in Suffolk, but for whom the service of his country was a
piety, and who might have competed with Lawrence for his self-chosen
epitaph, "Here lies one who tried to do his duty."
A sober-suited, half-melancholy common-sense was Broke's
characteristic, and he had applied it to the working of his ship, till
he had made the vessel, perhaps, the most formidable fighting machine
of her size afloat. He drilled his gunners until, from the swaying
platform of their decks, they shot with a deadly coolness and accuracy
nothing floating could resist. Broke, as a matter of fact, owed his
famous victory over the _Chesapeake_ to one of his matter-of-fact
precautions. The first broadside fired by the _Chesapeake_ sent a
32-pound shot through one of the gun-room cabins into the magazine
passage of the _Shannon_, where it might easily have ignited some
grains of loose powder and blown the ship up, if Broke had not taken
the precaution of elaborately _damping_ that passage before the action
began. The prosaic side of Broke's character is very amusing. In his
diary he records his world-famous victory thus:--
"June 1st.--Off Boston. Moderate."
"N.W.--W(rote) Laurence."
"P.M.--Took _Chesapeake_."
Was ever a shining victory packed into fewer or duller words? Broke's
scorn of the histrionic is shown by his reply to one of his own men
who, when the _Chesapeake_, one blaze of fluttering colours, was
bearing down upon her drab-coloured opponent, said to his commander,
eyeing the bleached and solitary flag at the _Shannon's_ peak, "Mayn't
we have three ensigns, sir, like she has?" "No," said Broke, "we have
always been an _unassuming_ ship!"
And yet, this unromantic English sailor had a gleam of Don Quixote in
him. On this pleasant summer morning he was waiting alone, under easy
sail, outside a hostile port, strongly fortified and full of armed
vessels, waiting for an enemy's ship bigger than himself to come out
and fight him. He had sent in the previous day, by way of challenge, a
letter that recalls the days of chivalry. "As the _Chesapeake_," he
wrote to Laurence, its captain, "appears now ready for sea, I request
that you will do me the favour to meet the _Shannon_ with her, ship to
ship." He proceeds to explain the exact armament of the _Shannon_, the
number of her crew, the interesting circumstance that he is short of
provisions and water, and that he has sent away his consort so that the
terms of the duel may be fair. "If you will favour me," he says, "with
any plan of signals or telegraph, I will warn you should any of my
friends be too nigh, while you are in sight, until I can detach them
out of the way. Or," he suggests coaxingly, "I would sail under a flag
of truce to any place you think safest from our cruisers, hauling it
down when fair, to begin hostilities. . . . Choose your terms," he
concludes, "but let us meet." Having sent in this amazing letter, this
middle-aged, unromantic, but hard-fighting captain climbs at daybreak
to his own maintop, and sits there till half-past eleven, watching the
challenged ship, to see if her foretopsail is unloosed and she is
coming out to fight.
It is easy to understand the causes which kindled a British sailor of
even Broke's unimaginative temperament into flame. On June 18, 1812,
the United States, with magnificent audacity, declared war against
Great Britain. England at that moment had 621 efficient cruisers at
sea, 102 being line-of-battle ships. The American navy consisted of 8
frigates and 12 corvettes. It is true that England was at war at the
same moment with half the civilised world; but what reasonable chance
had the tiny naval power of the United States against the mighty fleets
of England, commanded by men trained in the school of Nelson, and rich
with the traditions of the Nile and Trafalgar? As a matter of fact, in
the war which followed, the commerce of the United States was swept out
of existence. But the Americans were of the same fighting stock as the
English; to the Viking blood, indeed, they added Yankee ingenuity and
resource, making a very formidable combination; and up to the June
morning when the _Shannon_ was waiting outside Boston Harbour for the
_Chesapeake_, the naval honours of the war belonged to the Americans.
The Americans had no fleet, and the campaign was one of single ship
against single ship, but in these combats the Americans had scored more
successes in twelve months than French seamen had gained in twelve
years. The _Guerrière_, the _Java_, and the _Macedonian_ had each been
captured in single combat, and every British post-captain betwixt
Portsmouth and Halifax was swearing with mere fury.
The Americans were shrewd enough to invent a new type of frigate which,
in strength of frame, weight of metal, and general fighting power, was
to a British frigate of the same class almost what an ironclad would be
to a wooden ship. The _Constitution_, for example, was in size to the
average British frigate as 15.3 to 10.9; in weight of metal as 76 to
51; and in crew as 46 to 25. Broke, however, had a well-founded belief
in his ship and his men, and he proposed, in his sober fashion, to
restore the tarnished honour of his flag by capturing single-handed the
best American frigate afloat.
The _Chesapeake_ was a fine ship, perfectly equipped, under a daring
and popular commander. Laurence was a man of brilliant ingenuity and
courage, and had won fame four months before by capturing in the
_Hornet_, after a hard fight, the British brig-of-war _Peacock_. For
this feat he had been promoted to the _Chesapeake_, and in his brief
speech from the quarterdeck just before the fight with the _Shannon_
began, he called up the memory of the fight which made him a popular
hero by exhorting his crew to "_Peacock_ her, my lads! _Peacock_ her!"
The _Chesapeake_ was larger than the _Shannon_, its crew was nearly a
hundred men stronger, its weight of fire 598 lbs. as against the
_Shannon's_ 538 lbs. Her guns fired double-headed shot, and bars of
wrought iron connected by links and loosely tied by a few rope yarns,
which, when discharged from the gun, spread out and formed a flying
iron chain six feet long. Its canister shot contained jagged pieces of
iron, broken bolts, and nails. As the British had a reputation for
boarding, a large barrel of unslacked lime was provided to fling in the
faces of the boarders. An early shot from the _Shannon_, by the way,
struck this cask of lime and scattered its contents in the faces of the
Americans themselves. Part of the equipment of the _Chesapeake_
consisted of several hundred pairs of handcuffs, intended for the
wrists of English prisoners. Boston citizens prepared a banquet in
honour of the victors for the same evening, and a small fleet of
pleasure-boats followed the _Chesapeake_ as she came gallantly out to
the fight.
Never was a braver, shorter, or more murderous fight. Laurence, the
most gallant of men, bore steadily down, without firing a shot, to the
starboard quarter of the _Shannon_. When within fifty yards he luffed;
his men sprang into the shrouds and gave three cheers. Broke fought
with characteristic silence and composure. He forbade his men to
cheer, enforced the sternest silence along his deck, and ordered the
captain of each gun to fire as his piece bore on the enemy. "Fire into
her quarters," he said, "main-deck into main-deck, quarter-deck into
quarter-deck. Kill the men, and the ship is yours."
The sails of the _Chesapeake_ swept betwixt the slanting rays of the
evening sun and the _Shannon_, the drifting shadow darkened the English
main-deck ports, the rush of the enemy's cut-water could be heard
through the grim silence of the _Shannon's_ decks. Suddenly there
broke out the first gun from the _Shannon_; then her whole side leaped
into flame. Never was a more fatal broadside discharged. A tempest of
shot, splinters, torn hammocks, cut rigging, and wreck of every kind
was hurled like a cloud across the deck of the _Chesapeake_, and of one
hundred and fifty men at stations there, more than a hundred were
killed or wounded. A more fatal loss to the Americans instantly
followed, as Captain Laurence, the fiery soul of his ship, was shot
through the abdomen by an English marine, and fell mortally wounded.
The answering thunder of the _Chesapeake's_ guns, of course, rolled
out, and then, following quick, the overwhelming blast of the
_Shannon's_ broadside once more. Each ship, indeed, fired two full
broadsides, and, as the guns fell quickly out of range, part of another
broadside. The firing of the _Chesapeake_ was furious and deadly
enough to have disabled an ordinary ship. It is computed that forty
effective shots would be enough to disable a frigate; the _Shannon_
during the six minutes of the firing was struck by no less than 158
shot, a fact which proves the steadiness and power of the American
fire. But the fire of the _Shannon_ was overwhelming. In those same
six fatal minutes she smote the _Chesapeake_ with no less than 362
shots, an average of 60 shots of all sizes every minute, as against the
_Chesapeake's_ 28 shots. The _Chesapeake_ was fir-built, and the
British shot riddled her. One _Shannon_ broadside partly raked the
_Chesapeake_ and literally smashed the stern cabins and battery to mere
splinters, as completely as though a procession of aerolites had torn
through it.
The swift, deadly, concentrated fire of the British in two
quick-following broadsides practically decided the combat. The
partially disabled vessels drifted together, and the _Chesapeake_ fell
on board the _Shannon_, her quarter striking the starboard main-chains.
Broke, as the ships ground together, looked over the blood-splashed
decks of the American and saw the men deserting the quarter-deck guns,
under the terror of another broadside at so short a distance. "Follow
me who can," he shouted, and with characteristic coolness "stepped"--in
his own phrase--across the _Chesapeake's_ bulwark. He was followed by
some 32 seamen and 18 marines--50 British boarders leaping upon a ship
with a crew of 400 men, a force which, even after the dreadful
broadsides of the _Shannon_, still numbered 270 unwounded men in its
ranks.
It is absurd to deny to the Americans courage of the very finest
quality, but the amazing and unexpected severity of the _Shannon's_
fire had destroyed for the moment their _morale_, and the British were
in a mood of victory. The boatswain of the _Shannon_, an old _Rodney_
man, lashed the two ships together, and in the act had his left arm
literally hacked off by repeated strokes of a cutlass and was killed.
One British midshipman, followed by five topmen, crept along the
_Shannon's_ foreyard and stormed the _Chesapeake's_ foretop, killing
the men stationed there, and then swarmed down by a back-stay to join
the fighting on the deck. Another middy tried to attack the
_Chesapeake's_ mizzentop from the starboard mainyard arm, but being
hindered by the foot of the topsail, stretched himself out on the
mainyard arm, and from that post shot three of the enemy in succession.
Meanwhile the fight on the deck had been short and sharp; some of the
Americans leaped overboard and others rushed below; and Laurence, lying
wounded in his steerage, saw the wild reflux of his own men down the
after ladders. On asking what it meant, he was told, "The ship is
boarded, and those are the _Chesapeake's_ men driven from the upper
decks by the English." This so exasperated the dying man that he
called out repeatedly, "Then blow her up; blow her up."
The fight lasted exactly thirteen minutes--the broadsides occupied six
minutes, the boarding seven--and in thirteen minutes after the first
shot the British flag was flying over the American ship. The _Shannon_
and _Chesapeake_ were bearing up, side by side, for Halifax. The
spectators in the pleasure-boats were left ruefully staring at the
spectacle; those American handcuffs, so thoughtfully provided, were on
American wrists; and the Boston citizens had to consume, with what
appetite they might, their own banquet. The carnage on the two ships
was dreadful. In thirteen minutes 252 men were either killed or
wounded, an average of nearly twenty men for every minute the fight
lasted. In the combat betwixt these two frigates, in fact, nearly as
many men were struck down as in the whole battle of Navarino! The
_Shannon_ itself lost as many men as any 74-gun ship ever lost in
battle.
Judge Haliburton, famous as "Sam Slick," when a youth of seventeen,
boarded the Chesapeake as the two battered ships sailed into Halifax.
"The deck," he wrote, "had not been cleaned, and the coils and folds of
rope were steeped in gore as if in a slaughter-house. Pieces of skin
with pendent hair were adhering to the sides of the ship; and in one
place I noticed portions of fingers protruding, as if thrust through
the outer walls of the frigate."
Watts, the first lieutenant of the _Shannon_, was killed by the fire of
his own ship in a very remarkable manner. He boarded with his captain,
with his own hands pulled down the _Chesapeake's_ flag, and hastily
bent on the halliards the English ensign, as he thought, above the
Stars and Stripes, and then rehoisted it. In the hurry he had bent the
English flag under the Stars and Stripes instead of above it, and the
gunners of the _Shannon_, seeing the American stripes going up first,
opened fire instantly on the group at the foot of the mizzen-mast, blew
the top of their own unfortunate lieutenant's head off with a grape
shot, and killed three or four of their own men.
Captain Broke was desperately wounded in a curious fashion. A group of
Americans, who had laid down their arms, saw the British captain
standing for a moment alone on the break of the forecastle. It seemed
a golden chance. They snatched up weapons lying on the deck, and
leaped upon him. Warned by the shout of the sentry. Broke turned
round to find three of the enemy with uplifted weapons rushing on him.
He parried the middle fellow's pike and wounded him in the face, but
was instantly struck down with a blow from the butt-end of a musket,
which laid bare his skull. He also received a slash from the cutlass
of the third man, which clove a portion of skull completely away and
left the brain bare. He fell, and was grappled on the deck by the man
he had first wounded, a powerful fellow, who got uppermost and raised a
bayonet to thrust through Broke. At this moment a British marine came
running up, and concluding that the man underneath _must_ be an
American, also raised his bayonet to give the _coup de grace_. "Pooh,
pooh, you fool," said Broke in the most matter-of-fact fashion, "don't
you know your captain?" whereupon the marine changed the direction of
his thrust and slew the American.
The news reached London on July 7, and was carried straight to the
House of Commons, where Lord Cochrane was just concluding a fierce
denunciation of the Admiralty on the ground of the disasters suffered
from the Americans, and Croker, the Secretary to the Admiralty, was
able to tell the story of the fight off Boston to the wildly cheering
House, as a complete defence of his department. Broke was at once
created a Baronet and a Knight of the Bath. In America, on the other
hand, the story of the fight was received with mingled wrath and
incredulity. "I remember," says Rush, afterwards U.S. Minister at the
Court of St. James, "at the first rumour of it, the universal
incredulity. I remember how the post-offices were thronged for
successive days with anxious thousands; how collections of citizens
rode out for miles on the highway to get the earliest news the mail
brought. At last, when the certainty was known, I remember the public
gloom, the universal badges of mourning. 'Don't give up the ship,' the
dying words of Laurence, were on every tongue."
It was a great fight, the most memorable and dramatic sea-duel in naval
history. The combatants were men of the same stock, and fought with
equal bravery. Both nations, in fact, may be proud of a fight so
frank, so fair, so gallant. The world, we may hope, will never witness
another _Shannon_ engaged in the fierce wrestle of battle with another
_Chesapeake_, for the Union Jack and the Stars and Stripes are knitted
together by a bond woven of common blood and speech and political
ideals that grows stronger every year.
For years the _Shannon_ and the _Chesapeake_ lay peacefully side by
side in the Medway, and the two famous ships might well have been
preserved as trophies. The _Chesapeake_ was bought by the Admiralty
after the fight for exactly L21,314, 11s. 11 1/4d., and six years
afterwards she was sold as mere old timber for 500 pounds, was broken
up, and to-day stands as a Hampshire flour-mill, peacefully grinding
English corn; but still on the mill-timbers can be seen the marks of
the grape and round shot of the _Shannon_.