This is the story of some forgotten fights and fighters in a forgotten
war. The governments of the two nations which did the fighting--France
and the United States--refused, indeed, to admit that there was any war
at all, and, in a sense, they were right, for there was never any
declaration of hostilities, and there was never signed a treaty of
peace. But it was a very real war, nevertheless, with some of the
fiercest battles ever fought on deep water, and when it was over we had
laid the foundations of a navy, we had won the respect of the European
powers, and we had humbled the pride of Napoleon as it had been humbled
only once before, when Nelson annihilated the French fleet in the battle
of the Nile.
At the time that this narrative opens Bonaparte had just finished his
wonderful campaign in northern Italy, and the French nation, flushed
with confidence by his remarkable series of victories, was swaggering
about with a chip on its shoulder, and defying the nations of the world
to knock it off. In fact, the leaders of the Reign of Terror, drunk with
unaccustomed power, had lost their heads as completely as the victims
whom they had guillotined on the Place de la Revolution. Thoroughly
typical of this insolent and arrogant attitude was the French
Directory's peremptory demand that we instantly abrogate the treaty
which John Jay, our minister to England, had just concluded with that
country, basing its unwarrantable interference with our affairs on the
ground that the terms of the treaty were injurious to the commercial
interests of France. Upon our curt refusal to accede to this
preposterous demand, Charles C. Pinckney, our minister at Paris, was
notified by the French Government that it would hold no further
intercourse with him, and the very next mail-packet brought the news
that he had been expelled from France. Not content with this
extraordinary and uncalled-for affront to a friendly nation, French
cruisers began seizing our ships under a decree of their government
authorizing the capture of neutral vessels having on board any of the
products of Great Britain or her colonies, for at this time, remember,
France and England were at war, as they were, indeed, throughout nearly
the whole of Napoleon's reign. As the bulk of our trade at this period
was with the British colonies in the West Indies, it was evident that
this decree was aimed directly at us. Every packet that came from West
Indian waters brought news of American ships overhauled and plundered,
of sailors beaten and kidnapped, and of cargoes seized and confiscated
by the French, the authenticated despatches to the State Department
naming nearly a thousand vessels which had been captured. So bold did
the French become that one of their privateers actually had the audacity
to sail into Charleston Roads and, almost under the guns of the
batteries, to burn to the water's edge a British vessel which was lying
in the harbor.
Though it was evident that nothing short of a miracle could avert war,
President Adams, appreciating the ill-preparedness of the United States,
which had only recently emerged from the Revolution in a weakened and
impoverished condition, determined to make one more try for peace by
despatching to France a special mission composed of Minister Pinckney,
Elbridge Gerry, and John Marshall, the last-named later Chief Justice of
the United States. Though in all our diplomatic history we have sent
abroad no more able or distinguished embassy, the reception its members
received at the hands of the French Government was as disgraceful as it
was ludicrous. The French Directory at this time was composed of low
and irresponsible politicians of the ward-heeler type who had climbed to
power during the French Revolution, so that, incredible as such a state
of affairs may seem in these days, the negotiations soon degenerated
into an attempt to fleece the American envoys, who were informed quite
frankly that their success depended entirely upon their agreeing to
bribe--or, as the French politely put it, to give a _douceur_
to--certain avaricious members of the Directory. Not only this, but the
American diplomatists were told that, if the bribes demanded were not
forthcoming, orders would be given to the war-ships on the French West
Indian station to ravage the coasts of the United States. The chronicles
of our foreign relations contain nothing which, for sheer impudence and
insult, even approaches this attempt to levy blackmail on the nation.
Even the astute Talleyrand, at that time French Foreign Minister, so far
misjudged the characters of the men with whom he was dealing as to
insinuate that a gift of money to members of the government was a
necessary preliminary to the negotiations, and that a refusal would
bring on war. Then all the pent-up rage and indignation of Pinckney
burst forth. "War be it, then!" he exclaimed. "Millions for defence,
sir, but not one cent for tribute!"
Upon learning of this crowning insult to his representatives, President
Adams, on March 19, 1798, informed Congress that the mission on which he
had built his hopes of peace had proved a failure. Then the war-fever,
which had temporarily been held in abeyance, swept over the country like
fire in dry grass. Talleyrand's attempt to whip America into a
revocation of Jay's treaty had ignominiously failed. He had made the
inexcusable mistake of underestimating the spirit and resources of his
opponents. Congress promptly abrogated all our treaties with France,
prohibited American vessels from entering French ports, and French
vessels from coming into American waters, and voted a large sum for
national defence. The land forces were increased, the coastwise
fortifications strengthened, ships of war were hurriedly laid down,
volunteers from every walk of life besieged the recruiting stations,
Washington reassumed command of the army. At Portland, Portsmouth,
Salem, Chatham, Norwich, Philadelphia, and Baltimore the shipyards
resounded to the clatter of tools, for those were before the days of big
guns and armor-plate, and a man-of-war could, if necessary, be built and
equipped in ninety days.
Out from behind this war-cloud rose the thrilling strains of "Hail,
Columbia." When the war-fever was at its height, a young actor and
singer named Fox--a vaudeville artist, we should call him nowadays--who
was appearing at a Philadelphia theatre, called one morning on his
friend Joseph Hopkinson, a young and clever lawyer, and a son of that
Francis H. Hopkinson whose signature may be seen at the bottom of the
Declaration of Independence.
"Look here, Joe," said Fox, dropping into a chair, "I need some help and
you're the only man I know who can give it to me. No, no, old man, it's
not money I'm after. To-morrow night I'm to have a benefit at the
theatre, but not a single box has been sold; so, unless something can be
done to attract public attention, I'm afraid I shall have a mighty thin
house. Now it strikes me that, with all this war-fever in the air, if I
could get some patriotic verses, something really fiery and inspiriting,
written to the tune of 'The President's March,' I might draw a crowd.
Several of the people around the theatre have tried it, but they have
all given it up as a bad job, and say that it can't be done. So you're
my last hope, Joe, and I think you could do it."
Shutting himself up in his study, within an hour Hopkinson had completed
the first verse and chorus of what was to prove one of the greatest of
our national songs, and had submitted them to his wife, who sang them
to a harpsichord accompaniment. The tune and the words harmonized. A few
hours later the song was completed and was being memorized by Fox. The
next morning Philadelphia was placarded with announcements that that
evening Mr. Fox would sing, for the first time on any stage, a new
patriotic song. The house was packed to the doors. As the orchestra
broke into the familiar opening bars of "The President's March," and
Fox, slender and debonair, bowed from behind the footlights, the
audience grew hushed with expectancy. When the now familiar words,
"Immortal patriots, rise once more!
Defend your rights, defend your shore!"
went rolling through the theatre from pit to gallery, the audience went
wild. Eight times they made him sing it through, and the ninth time they
rose and joined in the rousing chorus:
"Firm, united let us be,
Rallying round our Liberty.
Like a band of brothers joined,
Peace and safety we shall find."
Night after night the singing of "Hail, Columbia," in the theatres was
applauded by audiences delirious with enthusiasm, and within a few days
it was being sung by boys in the streets of every city from Portland to
Savannah. Never since the days of Bunker Hill had the nation been so
stirred as it was in that summer of 1798.
On July 6, with the red-white-and-blue ensign streaming proudly from her
main truck, the sloop of war _Delaware_, twenty guns, of Baltimore,
under Stephen Decatur, Sr., put to sea to an accompaniment of booming
cannon. Cape Henry had scarcely sunk below the horizon before she was
hailed by a merchantman which had been boarded and plundered by a French
privateer only the day before. Upon hearing this news Decatur set off in
a pursuit as eager as that with which a bloodhound follows the trail of
a fugitive criminal. A few hours later his lookouts reported four
vessels dead ahead. Being unable to determine which was the privateer,
he ran in his guns, closed his ports, and keeping on his course until he
was sure that he had been seen, stood hurriedly off, as though afraid of
being captured. Just as he had anticipated, the Frenchman fell into the
trap, and piling on his canvas, bore down upon him. It was not until the
privateersman drew close enough to make out the gun-ports and the
unusual number of men on the American's decks, that he discovered
Decatur's ruse and attempted to escape. But it was too late. The
_Delaware's_ superior speed enabled her easily to overhaul the
Frenchman, which proved to be _La Incroyable_, fourteen guns and seventy
men. So accurate and deadly was the fire poured into her by the
_Delaware's_ gunners (forerunners, remember, of those bluejackets who
handle the twelve-inch guns on the dreadnaught _Delaware_ to-day) that
within ten minutes after the action had commenced the French tricolor
came fluttering down. We had struck our first blow against the power of
France.
The captured vessel was sent into port under a prize crew, was refitted,
added to the American Navy as the _Retaliation_--fitting name!--went to
sea under command of William Bainbridge (the same who a few years later
was to lose the war-ship _Philadelphia_ to the Barbary pirates in the
harbor of Tripoli), and shortly afterward was recaptured by the French
frigate _l'Insurgente_, being the only vessel of our little navy taken
by the French.
By the beginning of 1799 the West Indian waters were as effectually
patrolled by American war-ships as a great city is patrolled by
policemen. The newly built American frigates were objects of great
amusement and derision to the French and British officers stationed in
the West Indian colonies, for they were far too heavily armed,
according to European ideas, carrying almost double the number of guns
usual to vessels of their class. It is interesting to recall the fact,
however, that sixty-odd years later European officers were equally
derisive and sceptical of another American innovation in war-ships which
was destined to revolutionize naval warfare--the monitor. But before
long the sceptics were compelled to revise their opinions of the
fighting qualities of our infant navy. Our fleet was at this time
divided into two squadrons, both of which made their headquarters at St.
Christopher, or, as it was more commonly called, St. Kitts, on the
island of Antigua; one, under Commodore Barry, running as far south as
the Guianas, while the other, under Commodore Truxtun, cruised northward
to Santo Domingo, thus effectually cutting off from commercial
intercourse with the mother country the rich French colonies in the
Caribbean.
Truxtun was a most picturesque and romantic figure. Short and stout,
red-faced, gray-eyed, loud-voiced, gallant with women and short-tempered
with men, he was as typical a sea fighter as ever trod a quarter-deck
with a brass telescope tucked under his arm. From the time when, as a
boy of twelve, he ran away to sea, until, a national hero, he was laid
to rest in Christ Church graveyard in Philadelphia, his life was as full
of hair-breadth escapes and hair-raising adventures as that of one of
Mr. George A. Henty's heroes. A sailor before the mast when scarcely in
his teens, he was impressed into the British Navy, where his ability
attracted such attention that he was offered a midshipman's warrant,
which he refused. When only twenty years of age he commanded his own
ship, in which he succeeded, though at great personal hazard, in
smuggling large quantities of much-needed powder into the rebellious
colonies. Eventually his ship was captured and he was made a prisoner.
Escaping from the British prison in the West Indies where he was
confined, he made his way to the United States, obtained letters of
marque from the first Continental Congress, and was the first to get to
sea of that long line of privateersmen who, first in the Revolution, and
afterward in the War of 1812, practically drove British commerce from
the Atlantic. At the close of the Revolution Truxtun returned to the
merchant service, in which he rose to wealth and position. When the
American Navy was organized under the stimulus of French aggression, he
was offered and accepted the command of the thirty-eight-gun frigate
_Constellation_, a new and very beautiful vessel, splendidly officered
and manned, and with heels as fast as her gun-fire was heavy.
While cruising off Antigua, on February 9, 1799, the _Constellation's_
lookout reported a French war-ship, which, upon being overhauled, proved
to be _l'Insurgente_, forty guns, which had the reputation of being one
of the fastest ships in the world, and was commanded by Captain
Barreault, an officer celebrated in the French Navy as a desperate
fighter and a resourceful sailor. As the _Constellation_, with her crew
at quarters and her decks cleared for action, came booming down upon
him, Captain Barreault broke out the French tricolor at his masthead and
fired a gun to windward, which signified, in the language of the seas,
that he was ready for a yard-arm to yard-arm combat. Truxtun's reply was
to range alongside his adversary, a flag of stripes and stars at every
masthead, and pour in a broadside which raked _l'Insurgente's_ decks
from stem to stern. The first great naval action in which the American
Navy ever bore a part had begun.
Waiting until the _Constellation_ was well abreast of her, at a distance
of perhaps thirty feet (modern war-ships seldom fight at a range of less
than three miles), _l'Insurgente_ replied, firing high in an attempt to
disable the American by bringing down her rigging. Midshipman David
Porter, a youngster barely in his teens, was stationed in the foretop.
Seeing that the top-mast, which had been seriously damaged by the French
fire, was tottering and about to fall, but being unable to make himself
heard on deck above the din of battle, he himself assumed the
responsibility of lowering the foretopsail yard, thus relieving the
strain on the mast and preventing a mishap which would probably have
changed the result of the battle. That midshipman rose, in after years,
to be an admiral and the commander-in-chief of the American Navy.
Barreault, who had a much larger crew than his adversary, soon saw that
his vessel was in danger of being pounded to pieces by the American
gunners who were making every shot tell, and that his only hope of
victory lay in getting alongside and boarding, depending upon his
superior numbers to take the American vessel with the cutlass. With this
in view, he ordered the boarding parties to their stations, sent men
into the rigging with grappling-irons with which to hold the ships
together when they touched, directed the guns to be loaded with small
shot that they might cause greater execution at close quarters, and
then, putting his helm hard down, attempted to run alongside the
_Constellation_. But Truxtun had anticipated this very manoeuvre, and
was prepared for it. Seizing his opportunity--and in sea-battles
opportunities do not last long or come often--he whirled his ship about
as a polo player whirls his pony, and ran squarely across the enemy's
bows, pouring in a rain of lead as he passed, which all but annihilated
the boarding parties drawn up on the deck of _l'Insurgente_.
Foiled in his attempt to get to hand-grips with his enemy, the Frenchman
sheered off and the duel at short range continued, the _Constellation_,
magnificently handled, sailing first along _l'Insurgente's_ port side,
firing as she went, and then, crossing her bows, repeating the manoeuvre
on her starboard quarter. Nothing is more typical of the iron discipline
enforced by the American naval commanders in those early days than an
incident that occurred when this duel between the two frigates was at
its height. As a storm of shot from the Frenchman's batteries came
crashing and smashing into the _Constellation_, a gunner, seeing his
mate decapitated by a solid shot, became so demoralized that he
retreated from his gun, whereupon an officer drew his pistol and shot
the man dead.
Time after time Truxtun repeated his evolution of literally sailing
around _l'Insurgente_, until every gun in her main batteries had been
dismounted, her crew being left only the small guns with which to
continue the action. It speaks volumes for Barreault's bravery that,
with half his crew dead or wounded, and with a terribly battered and
almost defenceless ship, he did continue the action, his weary,
blood-stained, powder-blackened men loading and firing their few
remaining guns dauntlessly. Seeing the weakened condition of his enemy,
Truxtun now prepared to end the battle. Before the French had time to
grasp the full significance of his manoeuvre, he had put his helm hard
down, and the _Constellation_, suddenly looming out of the battle smoke,
bore down upon _l'Insurgente_ with the evident intention of crossing her
stern and raking her with a broadside to which she would be unable to
reply. Though no braver man than Barreault ever fought a ship, he
instantly appreciated that this would mean an unnecessary slaughter of
his men; so, with the tears streaming down his cheeks, he ordered his
colors to be struck, and in token of surrender the flag of France
slipped slowly and mournfully down. The young republic of the West had
avenged the insult of Talleyrand.
It is a remarkable fact that, notwithstanding the desperate fighting
which characterized this battle, the _Constellation_ had only two of her
crew killed and three wounded, while the French loss was nearly twenty
times that number. Lieutenant Rodgers and Midshipman Porter were
immediately sent aboard the captured vessel with a prize crew of only
eleven men. After the dead had been buried at sea, the wounded cared for
by the American surgeons, and about half of the prisoners transferred to
the _Constellation_, Rodgers set such sails on _l'Insurgente_ as the
wrecked rigging would permit, and laid his course for St. Christopher,
it being understood that Truxtun would keep within hail in case his
assistance was needed. During the night a heavy gale set in, however,
and when day broke upon the heaving ocean the _Constellation_ was
nowhere to be seen. It was a ticklish situation in which the thirteen
Americans found themselves, for they had their work cut out for them to
navigate a leaking, shattered, and dismasted ship, while below decks,
awaiting the first opportunity which offered to rise and overpower their
captors, were nearly two hundred desperate and determined prisoners.
There were neither shackles nor handcuffs on board, and the hatchcovers
had been destroyed in the action, so that the prisoners were perfectly
aware that, could they once force their way on deck by a sudden rush,
the ship would again be theirs. But they reckoned without Rodgers, for
the first men who put their heads above the hatchway found themselves
looking into the muzzles of a pair of pistols held by the American
lieutenant, whose fingers were twitching on the triggers. During the
three days and two nights which the voyage to St. Christopher lasted, a
guard of American bluejackets stood constantly around the open hatchway,
a pile of loaded small arms close at hand, and a cannon loaded with
grape-shot trained menacingly into the prisoner-filled hold. On the
evening of the third day, after Truxtun had given her up for lost,
_l'Insurgente_ limped into port with the flag of the United States
flaunting victoriously above that of France.
The 1st of February of the following year found the _Constellation_,
still under the command of Commodore Truxtun, cruising off Guadaloupe in
the hope of picking up some of the French privateers which were using
that colony as a base from which to prey on our West Indian commerce.
While loitering off the port of Basse Terre, and praying that something
would turn up to pay him for his patience, Truxtun sighted a vessel
coming up from the southeast, which from her size and build was
evidently a French frigate of the first class. As she approached, the
keen-eyed American naval officers, scanning her through their glasses,
recognized her as the fifty-two-gun frigate _La Vengeance_, one of the
most formidable vessels in the French Navy. It was evident from the
first, however, that she would much rather run than fight, this anxiety
to avoid an encounter being due to the fact that she had on board a
large number of officials, high in the colonial service, whom she was
bringing out to the colonies from the mother country. No sooner did she
perceive the character of the _Constellation_, therefore, than she piled
on every yard of canvas and headed for Basse Terre and the protecting
guns of its forts. Never had the _Constellation_ a better opportunity to
display her remarkable sailing qualities, and never did she display them
to better advantage. It was well after nightfall, however, before she
was able to overhaul the flying Frenchman, so that it was by the light
of a full moon, which illumined the scene almost as well as though it
were day, that the preparations were completed for the combat. The sea,
which was glasslike in its smoothness, as is so often the case in
Caribbean waters, seemed to be covered with a veil of shimmering silver,
while the battle-lanterns which had been lighted on both vessels swung
like giant fireflies across the purple sky.
Seeing that escape was hopeless, the French commander hove to and
prepared for a desperate resistance. Now, Truxtun had made up his mind
that this was to be no long-range duel, in which the Frenchman's heavier
metal could not fail to give him an advantage, but a fight at close
quarters, in which the smashing broadsides which the _Constellation_ was
specially designed to deliver could not fail to tell. Just before the
beginning of the battle the stout commodore, red-faced, white-wigged,
cock-hatted, clad in the blue tail-coat and buff breeches of the
American Navy, descended to the gun-deck and walked slowly through the
batteries, acknowledging the cheers of the gunners, but emphatically
warning them against firing a shot until he gave the word. No one knew
better than Truxtun the demoralizing effect of a smashing broadside
suddenly delivered at close quarters, and it was this demoralization
which he intended to create aboard the enemy. "Load with solid shot," he
ordered, and added, speaking to his officers so that the men could hear:
"If a man fires a gun before I give the order, shoot him on the spot."
Then with boarding-nettings triced up, decks sanded, magazines opened,
and the tops filled with marines whose duty it was to pick off the
French gunners, the _Constellation_, stripped to her fighting canvas,
swept grandly into action. As she came within range the French commander
opened with his stern-chasers, and in an instant the ordered decks of
the American were turned into a shambles. The wounded were carried
groaning to the cockpit, where the white-aproned surgeons, their arms
bared to the elbow, awaited their grim work, while the dead were hastily
ranged along the unengaged side--rows of stark and staring figures
beneath the placid moon. Again and again the guns of _La Vengeance_
belched smoke and flame, and redder and redder grew the sand with which
the _Constellation's_ decks were spread, but she still kept coming on.
Not until she was squarely abreast of the Frenchman did Truxtun, leaping
into the shrouds, bellow through his speaking-trumpet: "Now, boys, give
'em hell!" The American gunners answered with a broadside which made _La
Vengeance_ reel. The effect was terrible. On the decks of the Frenchman
the dead and dying lay in quivering, bleeding heaps. But not for an
instant did the French sailors flinch from their guns. Broadside
answered broadside, cheer answered cheer, while the men, French and
American alike, toiled and sweated at their work of carnage. So rapidly
were the American guns fired that the men actually had to crawl out of
the ports, in the face of a withering fire, for buckets of water with
which to cool them off.
The different tactics adopted by the two commanders soon began to show
results, for, whereas Truxtun had given orders that his men were to
disregard the upper works and to concentrate their fire on the main-deck
batteries and the hull, the French commander had from the first directed
his fire upon the American's rigging in the hope of crippling her.
Shortly after midnight the French fire, which had grown weaker and
weaker under the terrible punishment of the _Constellation's_ successive
broadsides, ceased altogether, and an officer was seen waving a white
flag in token of surrender. Twice before, in fact, _La Vengeance_ had
struck her colors, but owing to the smoke and darkness the Americans had
not perceived it. And there was good reason for her surrender, for she
had lost one hundred and sixty men out of her crew of three hundred and
thirty, while the _Constellation_ had but thirty-nine casualties out of
a crew of three hundred and ten. Though the French fire had done small
damage to the _Constellation's_ hull, and had killed a comparatively
small number of her crew, it had worked terrible havoc in her rigging,
it being discovered, just as she was preparing to run alongside her
capture and take possession, that every shroud and stay supporting her
mainmast had been shot away, and that the mast was tottering and about
to fall. The men in the top were under the command of a little
midshipman named James Jarvis, who was only thirteen years old. He had
been warned by one of his men that the mast was likely to fall at any
moment, and had been implored to leave the top while there was still
time, which he would have been entirely justified in doing, particularly
as the battle was over. But that thirteen-year-old midshipman had in him
the stuff of which heroes are made, and resolutely refused to leave his
post without orders. The orders never came, for before the crew had time
to secure it the great mast crashed over the side, carrying with it to
instant death little Jarvis and all of his men save one. Though his name
and deed have long since been forgotten by the nation for which he died,
he was no whit less a hero than that other boy-sailor, Casabianca, whose
self-sacrifice at the battle of the Nile has been made familiar by song
and story.
The falling of the _Constellation's_ mast reversed conditions in an
instant, for the surrendered frigate, taking prompt advantage of the
victor's temporary helplessness, crowded on all sail and slowly
disappeared into the night. By the time the wreck had been chopped away
any pursuit of her was hopeless. A few days later she put into the Dutch
port of Curacao in a sinking condition.
Thus continued until February, 1801, an unbroken series of American
successes, French war-ships, French privateers, and French merchantmen
alike being sunk, captured, or driven from the seas. France's trade with
her West Indian colonies was paralyzed, and the prestige of her navy was
enormously diminished. Napoleon, as First Consul, had abolished the
Directory, and was now the virtual ruler of France, having entire
command of all administrative affairs, both civil and military. Forced
to admit that from first to last his ships had been out-sailed,
out-fought, and out-manoeuvred by the despised Americans, and that a
continuance of the war could only result in further disaster and loss of
prestige, he began negotiations which led, about the time that the
nineteenth century passed its first birthday, to a suspension of
hostilities.
During the two and a half years of this unofficial war with the most
powerful military nation in the world our infant navy had captured
eighty-four armed French vessels, mounting over five hundred guns--a
success all the more remarkable when it is remembered that our entire
naval establishment at the outbreak of hostilities comprised but
twenty-two vessels, with four hundred and fifty-six guns. In other
words, we had captured almost four times as many ships as we possessed.
Not only had we practically destroyed French commerce on this side of
the Atlantic, but our own commerce had risen, under the protection of
our guns, from fifty-seven million dollars in 1797 to more than
seventy-eight million dollars in 1799. Most important of all, however,
we had shown to France and to Europe that, when occasion demanded, we
both would and could, in the words of our national song, defend our
rights and defend our shore.