SAMUEL C. REID OF THE _GENERAL ARMSTRONG_
STORY OF THE DESPERATE DEFENCE OF AMERICA’S MOST FAMOUS
PRIVATEER--SHE WAS LYING IN NEUTRAL WATER WHEN FOUR HUNDRED PICKED
BRITISH SEAMEN IN BOATS THAT WERE ARMED WITH CANNON CAME TO TAKE
HER BY NIGHT--ALTHOUGH SHE HAD BUT NINETY MEN, AND THERE WAS TIME
TO FIRE BUT ONE ROUND FROM HER GUNS, THE ATTACK WAS REPELLED WITH
FRIGHTFUL SLAUGHTER--SCUTTLED WHEN A BRITISH SHIP CAME TO ATTACK
HER--THE CUNNING OMISSIONS AND DELIBERATE MISSTATEMENTS OF THE
BRITISH HISTORIANS EXAMINED IN DETAIL--THE HONORABLE CAREER OF
CAPTAIN REID IN AFTER LIFE--A PICKED CREW OF BRITISH SEAMEN AFTER
THE _NEUFCHÂTEL_--A THREE-TO-ONE FIGHT WHERE THE YANKEES WON--OTHER
BRAVE MILITIAMEN OF THE SEA.
In the foremost rank of the most desperate and valorous conflicts
recorded in the annals of the sea stands that made by Captain Samuel
C. Reid, of the privateer schooner _General Armstrong_, in the harbor
of Fayal, in the Azore islands, beginning early in the evening of
September 26, 1814, and lasting, with intervals of peace, all night.
The _Armstrong_ was a New York privateer. She was owned by Renselaer
Havens, Thomas Formar, and Thomas Jenkins. In the early part of the
war she carried nineteen guns, of which one was a long twelve-pounder
and the others long nines. Manned by one hundred and fifty men under
Captain Tim Barnard, she took nineteen prizes. Later twelve of the long
nines were removed for use in a fort and a forty-two pounder placed
amidship for a “long tom.”
In this style, under Captain Samuel C. Reid, she sailed from New York
Harbor on September 9, 1814. The letter of instruction from her owners
to her captain suggested that he cruise near the Madeiras to intercept
the Brazil fleet. To this was added a paragraph worth quoting. It said,
“Be particular in strictly prohibiting any plunder or depredations.”
With a fair wind and the Gulf Stream to help him along, Captain Reid
arrived at Fayal Roads on September 26th and anchored there for the
purpose of getting water and such fresh provisions as the port afforded.
The American consul, Mr. John B. Dabney, informed him that no British
cruisers had been among the Azores for several weeks, but at about dusk
that afternoon, while the captain, the consul, and some friends were
standing on the deck of the _Armstrong_, the British brig _Carnation_
suddenly came into view under the northeast head of the harbor within
range of long guns.
Consul Dabney was quite certain that the British would respect the
neutrality of the port, but as soon as a pilot had arrived alongside
of the _Carnation_ “she hauled close in and let go her anchor within
pistol-shot of us.” And then as her anchor splashed into the water the
big British liner _Plantagenet_ and the frigate _Rota_ came in sight.
Thereafter for some time there was a rapid exchange of signals between
the _Carnation_ and the big ship. All of the boats of the _Carnation_
were dropped into the water. One boat was sent off from her to the
_Plantagenet_ and there was, in short, no end of bustle about her decks.
A full moon was shining that night, and in the clear air of the Azores
every move of the enemy was distinctly seen from the _Armstrong_
and from the shore as well. The significance of the bustle on the
_Carnation_ was unmistakable, and Captain Reid, after clearing for
action, got up his anchor, and with the aid of long oars began to sweep
the _Armstrong_ away from the enemy and close inshore. There was only a
faint air blowing and no sails were set on the _Armstrong_. But as soon
as the crew of the _Carnation_ saw the Yankee leaving them they cut
cable and made sail in pursuit while four boats were manned with armed
men and sent after her.
It was now about eight o’clock. Seeing the boats coming Captain Reid
dropped his anchor, got springs on his cable and then triced up a stout
rope net all around the vessel above the rail--a net that the boarders
could not quickly cut out of the way nor easily climb over. Then
Captain Reid hailed them repeatedly but they made no reply, unless,
indeed, the quickening of their stroke, which was manifest, was a reply.
That the four boats were making a dash to capture the _Armstrong_ was
not to be doubted and is not doubted now by any fair mind. In defence
of his vessel attacked in a neutral harbor Captain Reid opened fire.
The enemy returned the fire instantly and came on at their best stroke,
but before they had reached the rail of the schooner they had had
enough, and while some of them begged for quarter, they all turned
about and rowed back to the _Carnation_.
The loss of the enemy in this preliminary skirmish was never printed,
but the _Armstrong_ lost one man killed and the First Lieutenant,
Frederick A. Worth, wounded.
When the enemy had retired, the _Armstrong_ was hauled in until within
pistol shot of the Portuguese Castle on shore, and there she was
moored, head and stern to the beach, after which the arms were all
prepared for action and the crew, to a man, awaited the next assault
with the hearty good-will characteristic of the American seamen when
resisting insolent aggression. And meantime the whole population of the
port, roused by the fire in the first attack, gathered on every height
overlooking the Yankee’s berth to watch the issue. The Portuguese
Governor was among those who saw it all.
Neither spectator nor sailorman had long to wait for the first
manœuvre. By 9 o’clock the _Carnation_ was seen drifting in with a
large fleet of boats. Pretty soon the boats left the _Carnation_ and
gathered under shelter of a reef of rocks at long musket range from the
_Armstrong_. Here they lay until midnight, when, after being divided
into three divisions, of four boats each--the number of boats was
easily counted by every spectator of the scene--they headed for the
desperate Yankees.
[Illustration: The _General Armstrong_ at Fayal.]
Waiting until within close range Captain Reid opened on them. “The
discharge from our long tom rather staggered them,” but they instantly
recovered and, returning the fire with carronades, boat-howitzers,
and muskets, they gave three cheers and bravely dashed in at the
schooner. One round was all that Captain Reid could give them from
his four cannon, for they were at the schooner’s low rail before he
could reload. There was nothing for it then but to fight, man to man,
man-fashion. With their sharpened cutlasses the British seamen strove
to cut their way to the schooner’s deck, while the marines with muskets
and bayonets strove to clear the Yankees away from the schooner’s
rail. But the Yankees with muskets and pistols for a few rounds and
with pikes and cutlasses and axes stood to their post and stabbed and
slashed and chopped back. The British came on with fierce cheers and
cries; the Yankees with close-shut mouths and bared arms split open
the British heads down to the yelling mouths, and cut the throats and
broke in the backs of those that twisted and turned to find a way on
board. The enemy had come in three divisions; they swarmed at the
stern and the waist and the bow. There were more than three hundred of
them to the eighty-eight Americans, and for forty minutes the British
fought with a vigor born of hatred, contempt, and mortified pride. But
they were beating their heads and arms against a granite rock. Not
once did an armed enemy stand for three seconds on the _Armstrong’s_
deck. Because Second Lieutenant Alexander O. Williams was killed on
the forecastle, and Third Lieutenant Robert Johnson was shot through
the knee and unable to stand erect, the defence on the forecastle
almost failed. But Captain Reid rallied his victorious shipmates from
the quarter-deck and charging forward drove the last boat from the
schooner’s bow.
Two of the enemy’s boats “which belonged to the _Rota_” were captured,
“literally loaded with their own dead. Seventeen only had escaped
from them both”--escaped by swimming ashore. The others, not less
than fifty in number, were killed. Several boats were destroyed. “In
another boat under our quarter, commanded by one of the lieutenants
of the _Plantagenet_, all were killed save four. This I have from
the lieutenant himself.” So says Captain Reid. The British officers
admitted to Consul Dabney “that they have lost in killed, and who have
died since the engagement, upward of one hundred and twenty of the
flower of their officers and men. The captain of the _Rota_ told me he
lost seventy men from his ship.” So wrote the consul in his official
report. Afterward “the British, mortified at this signal and unexpected
defeat, endeavored to conceal the extent of their loss.”
In order to show American readers in what fashion British historians
have handled the stories of the actions in which British seamen were
badly defeated by the Yankees, the entire report which Allen wrote of
this affair is here given _verbatim_:
“On the 26th of September, a squadron, consisting of the 74-gun ship
_Plantagenet_, Captain Robert Lloyd; 38-gun frigate _Rota_, Captain
Philip Somerville; and 18-gun brig _Carnation_, Commander George
Bentham, cruising off the Western Islands, discovered at anchor in
Fayal Roads the American schooner privateer _General Armstrong_,
Captain Camplin, of seven guns and ninety men. The neutrality of the
port having been violated by the American captain in firing on a boat
from the _Plantagenet_, by which two men were killed and two wounded,
Captain Lloyd determined to attempt the capture of the privateer by
the boats of the squadron. At 8 h. P.M. the _Plantagenet_ and _Rota_
anchored off Fayal Road, and at 9 h. seven boats from the two ships,
containing one hundred and eighty men, under the orders of Lieutenant
William Matterface of the _Rota_, departed on this service. At
midnight, after a fatiguing pull, the boats arrived within hail, when
they received from the schooner, and from a battery erected with some
of her guns on a point of land, a heavy fire of cannon and musketry.
Two of the boats were sunk, and more than half the men that had been
sent away in them killed or wounded. The remainder returned, and about
2 h. A.M. on the 27th reached the _Rota_. The _Rota’s_ first and third
lieutenants (Matterface and Charles R. Norman), one midshipman, and
thirty-one seamen and marines were killed; and her second lieutenant,
Richard Rawle, Lieutenant of Marines Thomas Park, ---- Bridgeman
(acting) purser, two midshipmen, and eighty-one men wounded. Soon after
daylight the _Carnation_ stood into the roads to attack the privateer;
but the Americans set fire to and destroyed her.”
A careful examination of this report will be found most interesting.
First of all let the reader observe that the American consul in his
official report says that the captain of the _Rota_ admitted a loss
of seventy from that one ship. But Allen says that the _Rota’s_ loss
was thirty-four killed and eighty-five wounded--in all one hundred and
nineteen.
This is important because it proves that Consul Dabney in his report
of the British losses understated at least the loss of the _Rota_;
it proves that he was entirely candid and fair in his report. He
truthfully reported what the British officers told him. It is therefore
reasonable to suppose that when he says the British officers admitted
to him that they had lost one hundred and twenty of their best men, he
also tells the truth. It is not unreasonable to suppose further that
these British officers understated the facts, as did the captain of the
_Rota_ when talking to him.
Let us now consider the number of boats attacking the little schooner.
Dabney says that twelve large boats “crowded with men” came at the
schooner. Observe that this is a statement by a spectator whose candor
is proved by the enemy’s historian, and then read Allen’s report which
says that “the _Plantagenet_ and _Rota_ anchored off Fayal Road, and at
9 h. seven boats from the two ships, containing one hundred and eighty
men,” were sent. He says “Captain Lloyd determined to attempt the
capture of the privateer by the _boats of the squadron_,” and then he
omits saying whether boats were sent from the _Carnation_, and leaves
the reader to infer that none was sent from her. Will a fair-minded
student accept Consul Dabney’s count of twelve boats or will he do as
Allen would have him do--will he believe that after Lloyd determined
to attack with “the boats of the squadron” only the seven boats from
the two ships and no more were sent? Is this unfairly accusing Allen
of lack of candor? If anyone thinks it is unfair, let him note further
that Allen gives in detail the losses among the _Rota’s_ crew and
does not say a word--not one word--about losses on the boats from the
_Plantagenet_.
There were “seven boats from the two ships.” The one was a
line-of-battle-ship and the other a frigate. Would not the larger
ship send more boats than the smaller one? But grant that the larger
ship sent three and the smaller one four, what was the loss on the
_Plantagenet_? Were the _Plantagenet’s_ men cowards that they did not
fight and get hurt? Certainly the loss on the _Plantagenet_ was as
great in proportion to the number of men engaged as on the _Rota_.
Captain Reid of the _Armstrong_ says that he learned from a lieutenant
belonging to the _Plantagenet_, that all but four men were killed in
one of the _Plantagenet’s_ boats under the _Armstrong’s_ quarter. Shall
we believe this explicit statement or must we infer, because Allen says
nothing about any loss on the _Plantagenet_, that there really was no
loss there? And in connection with this let the reader note once more
that no boat from the _Carnation_ is mentioned by Allen and that no
loss among her crew is recorded by him.
And then consider once more that one hundred and nineteen were killed
and wounded on the _Rota’s_ boats. How many men were there in each of
her boats that she should have lost that number of killed and wounded
in four? These boats carried carronades. By referring to the accounts
of other battles of the kind (that at Craney’s Island, for instance,
where James himself admits that there were seven hundred men in fifteen
boats, or forty-six to the boat) we learn that an ordinary ship’s
cutter would carry at least twenty-five men, and a long-boat or launch
anywhere from forty men up to sixty or more. Recalling now that the
Americans credit two of the _Rota’s_ boats with seventeen men escaping
ashore by swimming, it is fair to suppose that part of them were
unhurt. And if she had four boats to the _Plantagenet’s_ three, part of
each of her other two also escaped. In short, if she lost one hundred
and nineteen it is fair to suppose that twenty-one escaped unhurt--it
is fair to suppose that she averaged at the very least thirty-five
men to the boat. The candid Dabney says the boats were crowded with
men. We are at liberty, in view of these facts, to doubt Allen’s
statement that only one hundred and eighty men were in the seven boats.
Because he omits to tell the loss of the _Plantagenet_, and because
he deliberately omits to tell how many men the _Carnation_ had in the
fight as well as how many she lost, we are compelled to believe that
Allen deliberately understated the number of men in the boats he admits
were sent. In short there is every good reason for supposing that when
Consul Dabney wrote that “near four hundred men were in the boats when
the attack commenced,” he was not only entirely sincere but reasonably
accurate. If there were but thirty men to the boat there were three
hundred and sixty in the entire flotilla of twelve, and that is “near
four hundred.” Let any reader look up the stories of boat actions and
then say whether even thirty-five is too large an estimate for the
average number of men in a boat’s crew.
Allen says that the “neutrality of the port having been violated by the
American captain in firing on a boat from the _Plantagenet_,” an attack
was planned. The consul says Reid fired only when four boats dashed at
the Yankee schooner. In view of the omissions in the British account we
would be justified in believing the candid consul rather than Allen,
but here, fortunately, we have the testimony of the enemy to prove that
they were the aggressors, for not only did the British admit to the
Portuguese that the British ships had violated the neutrality of Fayal;
they made an ample apology and _they paid for damages done_.
To complete the story of the _Armstrong_ it must be told that after the
British were beaten off the Americans remained on guard. They had lost
but two killed and seven wounded, and although a few had fled on shore
there were enough left to meet another attack of the kind repelled. At
3 o’clock in the morning of the 27th Captain Reid was called ashore by
Consul Dabney, and there he learned that the Portuguese Governor had
sent a note to Captain Lloyd begging that hostilities cease, but Lloyd
had replied that he was determined to have the privateer at the risk of
knocking down the whole town.
All hope of saving the Yankee schooner was gone, and the wounded were
sent ashore with the effects of the entire crew. The British brig came
in at daylight and began to fire broadsides. The crew of the Yankee
schooner fired back for a time, but eventually scuttled and abandoned
her. Seeing that she was abandoned the British came on board hastily
and set her on fire. The Yankee crew having escaped on shore, Captain
Lloyd addressed an official letter to the Governor stating that in
the American crew were two men who had deserted from his squadron in
America, and as they were guilty of high treason, he required them to
be found and given up. Accordingly the Portuguese soldiers mustered the
entire American crew and compelled them to submit to an examination by
the British officers. No British deserters were found. It is to the
credit of the British historian Allen that he did not mention this act
of Lloyd.
It is worth noting here, that Captain Lloyd’s squadron were bound
to the Mississippi River--they were a part of the force sent on the
land-grabbing expedition which the British Government planned and tried
to execute while the negotiations for peace were under consideration
at Ghent.
Captain Reid returned home by the way of Savannah. He was everywhere
enthusiastically received for his heroic defence of the flag. The State
of New York gave him a vote of thanks and a sword. The merchants of New
York gave him a set of silver plate.
Samuel Chester Reid was a native of Norwich, Connecticut. He had seen
service as a midshipman under Truxton. He was after this fight a
sailing-master in the American navy, where his record for honor was as
high as that of any man. There was absolutely no reason for doubting
his report of his fight; in fact, it was modest and well within the
facts as became a sea hero. Besides, it was fully corroborated by
Consul Dabney and, as shown here, by the unwilling testimony of the
enemy. He was at one time a port warden at New York and afterward
Collector of the Port. It was he who originated the present scheme of
arranging the stars and the stripes in the American flag, whereby the
stripes number thirteen and the stars are of the same number as the
States. Resolutions of thanks to him were passed in both houses on
April 4, 1818, “for having designed and formed the present flag of the
United States.” He died in New York City on April 28, 1861, and was
buried in Greenwood.
When Lieutenant (afterward the famous Captain) Isaac Hull during the
French war cut the schooner _Sandwich_ out of Puerta Plata, a neutral
port, the American Government returned the vessel with apologies. An
American reads this with the greater satisfaction when he recalls the
fact that British historians defend their Government for refusing to
undo the wrong done to the owners of the _Armstrong_.
Of a character like that of the _Armstrong_ was the fight made by the
crew of one other New York privateer, the _Prince de Neufchâtel_,
Captain J. Ordronaux. It was made on October 11, 1814. A famous
privateer was this swift cruiser, and lucky in the extreme. She was
credited with bringing in eighteen prizes all told, and in the cruise
during which she made the fight, she brought in no less than $300,000
worth of goods, besides a large quantity of coin. Moreover she had been
chased by and had escaped from seventeen armed British vessels, when
on October 11th, being off Nantucket at the time, the British frigate
_Endymion_, of which something will be told further on, came in chase
of her. She would have outsailed the _Endymion_ had the wind held, but
a dead flat calm came on and neither ship could move.
At this the _Endymion_ hoisted out five boats, large and small,
and manned them with one hundred and eleven men. This was a most
serious menace to the Yankee, for she had sent in so many prizes that
only forty of her crew, at most (accounts differ--Coggeshall says
thirty-three), including every one, remained. Nevertheless the Yankees
triced up their nettings and prepared to fight it out. It was at about
9 o’clock at night that the boats arrived beside the privateer. They
had spread out so that one came on each bow, one on each beam, and one
astern. But the Yankee crew were ready, and when the British climbed
up they were beaten back, and at the end of twenty minutes the British
begged for quarter. One of their large boats, with forty-three men in
it, had sunk. Another that had contained thirty-six men, surrendered,
while the others drifted off with very few, indeed, to man the oars.
Of the thirty-six originally in the boat that surrendered, eight had
been killed and twenty wounded--twenty-eight out of thirty-six--say
three-fourths. It is not unlikely that more than three-fourths of the
entire attacking party were killed and wounded. Allen admits that
the loss was twenty-eight killed and thirty-seven wounded out of the
crews of the boats that returned to the ship. He makes no statement
regarding the number lost either by wounds or as prisoners in the
launch captured, but admits the capture. The killed and wounded in the
launch should be added to the numbers given by Allen, so that the total
British loss was at least thirty-six killed and fifty-seven wounded.
The privateer lost seven killed and fifteen badly and nine slightly
wounded--all but nine of those on board were hurt. It was a right
desperate fight on both sides. And it shows what a few men can do when
they fight with relentless determination. “The privateersmen gained the
victory by sheer ability to stand punishment.”
Meantime, when the battle began there were almost as many prisoners
on board the privateers as there were Americans; when it was over the
unhurt Americans had six times their number of the enemy to care for,
besides nursing their own wounded. Yet they brought all safely into
port.
The _Lottery_, Captain Southcombe, of Baltimore, fought off for an hour
nine British barges containing two hundred and forty well-armed men
before she was taken, and the loss of the British in killed alone was
many more than the whole crew of the Yankee.
[Illustration: Fight Between the Brig _Chasseur_ and the Schooner _St.
Lawrence_ off Havana, February 26, 1815.
_From a lithograph in Coggeshall’s “Privateers.”_]
And a right brave action was that which Captain Boyle, of the Baltimore
clipper _Chasseur_, made with the British war-schooner, _St. Lawrence_.
Boyle ran down on the _St. Lawrence_ by mistake. He thought her a
merchantman. But when alongside he fought it out, and in just
fifteen minutes from the firing of the first gun the enemy’s flag came
down. This was extraordinary for two reasons. The enemy was a regular
man-o’-war, and she was also of superior force. The enemy carried
twelve short twelves and one long nine. Boyle at this time had six long
twelves and eight short nines, but having no nine-pound shot he used a
four-pound and a six-pound shot together. It was a fight yard-arm to
yard-arm, so that the enemy’s broadside of eighty-one pounds was better
than Boyle’s of seventy-six, even though Boyle could fire three long
twelves. Accounts differ as to the number of men engaged. Boyle had
eighty all told. He said he took out of the _St. Lawrence_ eighty-nine
besides passengers. Since no one but James disputes this there is no
reason for doubting Boyle. James understates the number of the British
crew because they struck when the privateersmen were boarding. The
Yankee lost five killed and eight wounded; the British six killed and
seventeen wounded.
The fights herein recorded were the most famous made by the privateers
of this war. The sea militia were on these occasions well led, and
therefore as brave as regular naval seamen. A careful study of the
fights of this kind shows that in the majority of the cases where a
privateer was attacked by a British man-o’-war crew the privateer
surrendered militia fashion--tamely. But where the officers were men
of sound nerves the fight was as desperate and about as well conducted
as any naval fight involving the same forces. The fact that the Yankee
privateers in this war took and destroyed or sent in about 1,600
British ships, including a considerable number of small war-ships,
while the total number of Yankee ships taken by the British was only
five hundred--this fact is significant. The total number of Yankee
privateers was two hundred and fifty. Their record on the whole was so
good that the fame of their deeds helped to preserve the peace of their
country long after their timbers had rotted away; and it still helps.