A MIDSHIPMAN’S TRAINING UNDER COMMODORE RODGERS.
THE schooner _Revenge_, commanded by his brother Oliver, to which
Matthew Perry was ordered for his first cruise, had been purchased in
1807. She mounted twelve guns, had a crew of ninety men, and was
attached to the squadron under Commodore John Rodgers, which numbered
four frigates, five sloops, and some smaller vessels. His duty was to
guard our coasts from the Chesapeake to Passamaquoddy Bay, to prevent
impressment of American sailors by British cruisers. The _Revenge_ was
to cruise between Montauk Point and Nantucket Shoals.
Boy as he was, Matthew Perry seems not to have relished the idea of
serving in a coasting schooner. Having an opportunity to make a voyage
to the East Indies, the idea of visiting Asia fascinated his
imagination. It seemed to offer a fine field for obtaining nautical
knowledge. Bombay was at this time the seat of British naval excellence
in ship building, and an eighty-gun vessel, built of teak or India oak,
was launched every three years. A petition for furlough was not,
however, granted and the voyage to Asia was postponed nearly half a
century.
Under such a commander, and with his brother Oliver, the boy Matthew was
initiated into active service. The _Revenge_ kept look-out during summer
and winter, and in April went southward to Washington and the Carolinas.
As there was as yet nothing to do but to be vigilant and to prepare for
the war which was—unless Great Britain changed her impressment
policy—sure to come, daily attention was given to drill. The sailors
were especially taught to keep cool and bide their time to fire. All the
Perrys, father and sons, were diligent students of ordnance and gunnery.
They were masters of both theory and practice. Among the list of
subscribers to Toussard’s Artillerist, written at the request of
Washington, and published in 1809, is the name of Oliver H. Perry.
On the 12th of October, 1810, Midshipman M. C. Perry was ordered from
the _Revenge_ (which was wrecked off Watch Hill, R. I., January 8, 1811)
to the frigate _President_. This brought him on the flag-ship, the
finest of the heavy frigates of 1797, and directly under the eye of
Commodore Rodgers. On the 16th of October she went on a short cruise of
ten days and returned to her port for the winter, where Raymond Perry
joined him. News of the whereabouts of the British ships _Shannon_ and
_Guerriere_ was regularly received, and the crew kept alert and ready
for work with the press-gang. This was the beginning of three years
service by the two Perry brothers on this famous ship.
From March 19, 1811, until July 25, 1813, Matthew kept a diary in which
he made observations relating chiefly to the weather and matters of
technical interest, with occasional items of historical value. The
boyish ambition for ample proportions in the book is offset by the
accuracy studied in the entries, and the excessive modesty of all
statements relating to himself, even to his wound received by the
bursting of a gun. It contains frequent reference to personages whose
congenial home was the quarter-deck, the lustre of whose names still
glitters in history like the fresh sand which they sprinkled on their
letters—now entombed in the naval archives at Washington.
From the first, the bluff disciplinarian, Commodore Rodgers, took a
kindly interest in his midshipman. He was especially exacting of his
juniors whom he liked, or in whom he saw promise. His dignity,
discipline and spirit, were models constantly imitated by his pupils.
One day, while on duty on that part of the deck which roofed the
commodore’s cabin, Matthew Perry paced up and down his beat with, what
seemed to the occupant below, an unnecessarily noisy stride. Irate at
being disturbed while writing, the commodore rushed out on deck,
demanded the spy glass and bade Perry to put himself in his superior’s
place in the cabin, and sit there to learn how the iniquity of his heels
sounded. Then with ponderous tread, exaggerated stride, and mock
dignity, the commodore of the whole fleet gave a dramatic object-lesson.
It profited the lad no less than it amused the spectators.
Soon after this, Perry was made commodore’s aide.
The diary shows that constant exercise at the “great guns and small
arms” was practiced. Rodgers knew that his men were to meet the heroes
of Trafalgar, and he believed that American gunnery would quickly settle
questions over which diplomacy had become impotent.
The _President_, leaving New London for New York, set sail April 22 for
Annapolis, casting anchor opposite Fort Severn, May 2. Here the vessel
lay for ten days. As everything was quiet along the coast, Commodore
Rodgers went to his home at Havre de Grace, seventy miles distant, to
visit his family. The purser and chaplain took a trip to Washington, and
on board all was as quiet as a city church aisle in summer.
Late at night, May 6, there came dispatches from the Navy Department.
Two men had been taken from the merchant brig, _Spitfire_, within
eighteen miles of New York. One of the young men impressed, John Deguys,
was known to the captain to be a native of Maine. The _Guerriere_,
Captain Dacres, was, as usual, suspected.
The news created great excitement, for the constant search of American
ships and the impressment of such men, as the arrogant English captains
chose to call British “subjects,” had roused our sailors’ ire. They
burned to change this disgraceful state of things and to avenge the
_Chesapeake_ affair. The officers of the _Guerriere_, painting the name
of their frigate on her topsails, in large white letters, had been
conspicuous for their bravado in insulting American merchant captains.
This was the age of British boasting on the sea, of huge canvas and
enormous flags. For during nigh two score years, the British sailors,
“lords of the main,” had ruled the waves, rarely losing a ship, and
never a squadron, in their numerous battles. Uninterrupted success had
bred many bullies. The trade of New York had been injured by these
annoying searches and delays. The orders to Commodore Rodgers were to
proceed at once to stop the outrageous proceedings. The vexed question
of impressment had, since 1790, caused an incredible amount of
negotiation. It was now to pass out of the hands of secretaries into the
control of our naval captains, with power to solve the problem.
To get the dispatches to the commodore was the duty in hand. Neither
steamer nor telegraph could then help to perform it; but hearts and
hands were true, and Matthew Perry was ready to show the stuff of which
he was made. Captain Ludlow at once entrusted the delicate matter to the
commodore’s aide.
Matthew Perry set out before daylight in the commodore’s gig. The pull
of seventy miles was made against a head wind. Taking his seat at the
helm, he cheered on his men, but it was a long and hard day’s work. It
was nearly dark when the lights of the village danced in the distance.
At this moment one of the men dropped his oar, and sank back with the
blood gushing from his mouth and nostrils. In his over-strain he had
burst a blood vessel.
Rodgers at once took the boat, and with the wind in his favor hoisted
sail. At 3 P. M., May 7, as Captain Ludlow was dining on the sloop
_Argus_, near the _President_, the gig was descried five miles distant
bearing the broad pennant. Perry, in his journal, modestly omits, as is
customary with him, all reference to this exploit of bringing back the
commodore. But under the entry of May 10, he writes: “At 10 hoisted out
the launch, carried out a kedge and warped the ship out of the roads.”
The _President_ put to sea with her name boldly blazoned on her three
topsails like the _Guerriere’s_. All on board were ready and eager for
an opportunity to wipe out this last disgrace. Perry writes, on the
13th: “At 3 spoke the brig . . . . from Trinidad—informed us that the
day before she was boarded by an English sloop-of-war.” “At 7 the
_Argus_ hove to alongside of us. Captain Lawrence came on board—at 8
Captain L. left the ship.” Next day “at 3 exercised great guns”; “at
half-past 8 passed New Point Comfort. At 10 opened the magazine and took
out thirty-two twenty-four pound and twenty-four forty-two pound
cartridges.”
At 1 o’clock in the afternoon of the 17th, a strange sail was
noticed—the ensign and pennant were raised, the ship was cleared for
action and the crew beat to quarters. The signals of the strange ship
were not answered. The two ships were at this time but a few leagues
south of Sandy Hook.
The stranger ship was none other than the British sloop-of-war _Little
Belt_, carrying twenty-two guns. As what took place really precipitated
the war of 1812, we give the record from Perry’s diary without
alteration.
“At 7 P. M. the chase took in her studding-sails, distant about eight
miles. At ten or twelve minutes past 7 she rounded to on the
starboard-tack. At half-past 7 shortened sail. At half-past 8 rounded to
on her weather beam, within half a cable’s length of her; hailed and
asked ‘what ship is that’? to which she replied, ‘what ship is that’?
and on the commodore’s asking the second time ‘what ship is that’?
received a shot from her which was immediately returned from our
gun-deck, but was scarcely fired before she fired three other guns
accompanied with musquetry. We then commenced a general fire which
lasted about fifteen minutes, when the order was given to cease firing,
our adversary being silent and apparently in much distress. At 9 hauled
on a wind on the starboard-tack, the strange ship having dropped astern
so far that the commodore did not choose to follow, supposing that he
had sufficiently chastised her for her insolence in firing into an
American frigate. Kept our battle-lanthorns burning. After having
examined the damage, found that the ship had her foremast and mainmast
wounded and some rigging shot away—one boy only wounded—before
daylight the masts were fished, moulded and painted, and everything
taut.
“At 5 A. M. discovered the strange sail and bore down for her. At 8 came
alongside and sent a boat aboard her. She was lying in a very shattered
situation; no sail bent except her maintopsail; her rigging all shot
away; three or four shots through her masts; several between wind and
water; her gaft shot away, etc. At 9 the boat returned; she proved to be
the British ship-of-war _Little Belt_, Captain Bingham; permitted her to
proceed on her course, hoisted the boat up and hauled by the wind on the
larboard tack; ends clear and pleasant.”
In this battle the young midshipman first heard a hostile shot and
received his initial “baptism of fire.” The accounts of this affair
given by the two commanders, Rodgers and Bingham, cannot be reconciled.
Captain Bingham, acquitted of blame, was promoted February 7, 1812, to
post-rank in the British navy. The event widened the breach between the
two nations, and was the foreshadowing of coming events not long to be
postponed. Probably Rodgers’ chief regret was that the punished vessel
had not been the _Guerriere_.
The rest of the year, 1811, was spent by our sailors in constant
readiness and unremitting discipline in order to secure the highest
state of naval efficiency. Exercise at the carronades and long guns was
a daily task. The coming war on the ocean was to be a contest in
gunnery, and to be won by tactical skill, long guns, and superiority in
artillery practice. Nothing was left to chance on the American ships.
Congress had neglected the navy since the Tripolitan war, and with
embargoes, non-intercourse acts, and a puerile gun-boat system,
practically attempted to paralyze this arm of defence. Commodore
Rodgers’ squadron was an exception to the general system, and his was
the sole squadron serviceable when the declaration of hostilities came.
Rodgers hoped by speedy victories to demonstrate the power of the
American heavy frigate to blow to atoms “the gun-boat system,” and
change British insolence into respect. Lack of opportunity caused him
personal disappointment; but his faith and creed were fully justified by
the naval campaign of 1812.