_The Bon Homme Richard and the Serapis._
Leith Threatened.—The Summons.—Remarkable Prayer.—Widespread
Alarm.—Continuation of the Cruise.—Insubordination of
Landais.—Successive Captures.—Terrible Battle between the Bon Homme
Richard and the Serapis.—The Great Victory.
Unfortunately so much time had been spent in convincing the captains of
the Pallas and the Vengeance of the feasibility of an attack upon Leith,
that the golden hour of success was lost. As the little fleet of three
vessels was sailing up the wide Frith of Forth, and were abreast of
Inchkeith Island, within ten or twelve miles of Leith, and which island
is at the entrance of the harbor, the success of the enterprise seemed
certain. It was the morning of the seventeenth. In an hour the vessels
would have been within cannon-shot of the town. Everything was ready for
the descent. Every preparation was made for the landing of troops under
Lieutenant-Colonel Chamillard. The summons to the chief magistrate was
written. It was characteristic of the humanity and energy of Captain
Jones.
“I do not wish,” he wrote, “to distress the poor inhabitants. My
intention is only to demand your contribution toward the reimbursement
which Britain owes to the much injured citizens of America. Savages
would blush at the unmanly violation and rapacity that have marked the
tracks of British tyranny in America, from which neither virgin
innocence nor helpless age has been a plea of protection or pity.
“Leith and its port now lay at our mercy. And did not the plea of
humanity stay the just hand of retaliation, I should, without
advertisement, lay it in ashes. Before I proceed to that stern duty as
an officer, my duty as a man induces me to propose to you, by means of a
reasonable ransom, to prevent such a scene of horror and distress. For
this reason I have authorized Lieutenant-Colonel de Chamillard to agree
with you on the terms of ransom, allowing you exactly half an hour’s
reflection before you finally accept or reject the terms which he shall
propose.”
The alarm had reached Leith, and was running along the thronged streets
of Edinburgh. All was hurry and confusion. Crowds were assembled on the
beach, and were rushing to all the commanding heights in the
neighborhood. On the northern shore of the bay was the thriving little
town of Kirkaldy. The three vessels passed within a mile of the town. It
was the morning of the Sabbath. Nearly all of the little community were
at church. Alarmed by the near approach of the squadron, they made a
general rush to the beach, accompanied by their pastor, the Rev. Mr.
Shivra. He was a man of great eccentricity, and particularly remarkable
for the familiarity with which he was accustomed to address the Deity.
Standing upon the beach, with uncovered head and uplifted hands, and
surrounded by his reverent flock, it is said that he offered, in broad
Scotch, the following extraordinary prayer. It was not extraordinary to
them, or irreverent, for they had ever been accustomed to such
utterances.
“Now, dear Lord, dinna ye think it a shame for ye to send this vile
pirate to rob our folk o’ Kirkaldy. Ye ken that they are puir enow
already, and hae naething to spare. The way the wind blaws he’ll be here
in a jiffy. And wha kens what he may do? He’s nae too good for onything.
Mickle’s the mischief he has dune already. He’ll burn their hooses, tak
their very claes, and strip them to the sark. And, waes me, wha kens but
that the bluidy villain might tak their lives! The puir weemen are most
frightened out of their wits, and the bairns screeching after them. I
canna think of it! I canna think of it!
“I have long been a faithful servant to ye, O Lord. But gin ye dinna
turn the wind about and blaw the scoundrel out of our gate I’ll nae stir
a foot; but will just sit here till the tide comes. Sae tak your will
o’t.”
Suddenly a violent gale arose, blowing out from the harbor. The people
of Kirkaldy never doubted that it was in consequence of the powerful
intercession of their pastor. “I prayed,” said the good old man often
afterward, “but the Lord sent the wind.” The gale was so violent that it
was impossible to make any headway against it. The ship which he had
captured, freighted with coal, had her seams so opened by the tornado
that she sank to the bottom. It was with the greatest difficulty that
the crew was rescued. Though Jones was almost within gun-shot of Leith,
after an ineffectual struggle with the gale he was obliged to bear away
and run out of the Frith.
In the morning, the storm abated and the weather fair, Captain Jones was
anxious to return immediately to the attack. But the other captains were
unwilling to run the risk. In conference they said:
“The alarm of our approach has spread throughout the whole country. The
inhabitants of Leith have had several hours to prepare to repel us. The
city of Edinburgh will certainly have sent all its military force into
Leith. British men-of-war are all along the coast. They will be
immediately informed of our presence. Unless we disappear we shall be
overwhelmed by numbers. We dare not remain here. If Captain Jones
decides to do so, we must leave him.”
It may seem very strange that Captain Jones, who was the commodore of
the fleet, should not have had the power to _command_ in such a case.
But he was crippled, and his energies almost paralyzed, by instructions,
which, through the address of Landais, had been given to him by the
French Minister of Marine the evening before he sailed.
By this singular document, called a _concordat_, the five captains,
Jones, Landais, Cottineau, Varage, and Ricot, were bound to act
together. This seemed to make them colleagues, without any supreme head.
This unfortunate order, in a military point of view, was an absurdity—as
absurd as to order the commander-in-chief of an army first to obtain the
approval of all his generals before ordering any important movement. To
this wretched concordat Captain Jones justly attributed nearly all his
troubles. Landais, from the beginning, assumed that he was the
_colleague_ of Jones.
The intrepid Captain Jones could only argue the point with his officers.
He said:
“We know that there are no batteries to oppose us. There is no naval
force in the harbor which we cannot instantly silence. The wind is such
that we can run in and out of the harbor at our pleasure. No matter how
many thousand men stand on the shore with their muskets, they cannot
harm us. From the harbor we can throw our broadsides of shot into the
crowded city, and in a short time lay it in ashes. We can also destroy
all the shipping. Rather than submit to this terrible loss, they will
promptly pay the ransom we demand. Thus, in all probability, we have
only to sail into the harbor, receive the ransom, and go on our way.”
These were strong arguments. They show that Captain Jones was not a
reckless desperado. His plans were maturely considered. Those of his
enterprises which appeared most desperate were sanctioned by the
decisions of sound judgment. His arguments were unavailing; and he was
compelled to yield. In his official account, he says, in mild language,
which commands our respect for the man:
“I am persuaded even now that I should have succeeded. And to the honor
of my young officers, I found them as ardently disposed to the business
as I could desire. Nothing prevented me from pursuing my design, but the
reproach that would have been cast upon my character, as a man of
prudence, had the enterprise miscarried. It would have been said: Was he
not warned by Captain Cottineau, and others?”
The Alliance having disappeared, there were now but two vessels, the
Pallas and the Vengeance, accompanying the Richard. This little fleet
continued its course in a southerly direction along the eastern coast of
Scotland. On the 19th, three vessels were captured, which were of but
little worth. The next day three more were taken. One of them, Captain
Cottineau, contrary to orders, ransomed. The others were either retained
or sunk. On the 21st, when off Flamborough Head, a remarkably bold
English promontory jutting out from the Yorkshire coast, two vessels
appeared in sight, one in the northeast, and the other in the southwest.
The Bon Homme Richard and the Vengeance pursued, the one in the
southwest, while the Pallas was sent in chase of the other. Captain
Jones overtook the one he chased. It was a brig in ballast. As a large
fleet was then discovered between Flamborough Head and Spurn Head,
another remarkable promontory about thirty miles farther south, Captain
Jones sunk the brig, and pressed forward in pursuit of the fleet. While
eagerly engaged in the chase, night came on. He had, however, got so
near one vessel of the fleet as to compel her to run ashore. As the
twilight faded away he overtook and captured a brig. The night was long
and dark. The affrighted vessels improved every moment in running into
such harbors as could be reached.
The dawn of the next day revealed another fleet rounding the point of
Spurn Head. This fleet was convoyed by apparently a single armed ship.
The achievements of Captain Jones’s little fleet had, by this time,
spread alarm everywhere. As soon as the fleet caught sight of the
Richard and the Vengeance, though there was nothing to distinguish these
vessels from others of the innumerable ships which were ever traversing
the Channel, suspicions were aroused, and the whole fleet turned to, and
fled back into the river Humber, as fast as their wings could bear them.
Captain Jones ran the English flag to the masthead of the Bon Homme
Richard, and signalled for a pilot. Soon two pilot-boats came off. The
pilots supposed the Richard to be an English man-of-war. They were
consequently unreserved in their communications. They informed Captain
Jones that the fleet, which had run back into the Humber, was convoyed
only by an armed merchant-ship, and that a king’s frigate was at anchor
within the mouth of the river, waiting to convoy another fleet of
merchant-ships to the north. The pilots also communicated to him the
private signal they were required to make.
With this signal Captain Jones endeavored to decoy the frigate out of
the harbor. The frigate spread its sails, and would soon have been
within the grasp of its foes, had not the wind changed; which, with a
strong, unfavorable tide, compelled the ship to return. The entrance of
the Humber is difficult and dangerous. Captain Jones did not deem it
prudent, with only one assistant, to attempt an attack upon the shipping
there. The Pallas was not in sight. He therefore turned his course
north, to meet the Pallas, by previous agreement, off Flamborough Head.
In the night, Captain Jones saw two ships. It was bright moonlight, and
he gave them chase. Thinking it possible that one might be the Pallas,
he made the private signal of recognizance, which had been communicated
to each captain before the fleet sailed. He was bewildered by having
one-half of the answer only returned from one of the vessels. Thus
embarrassed, he lay to till daylight, when the ships proved to be the
Pallas and the Alliance. It is probable that the Pallas was too far
distant to discern the signal by moonlight; and that the ambiguous
answer returned was one of the mad pranks of Landais.
On the morning of the 23d they gave chase to a brig, which appeared at
some distance to the windward. At noon, while engaged in this chase, a
large ship appeared coming round the Head. Captain Jones had seized both
of the swift-sailing pilot-boats. One of them he armed and sent in
pursuit of the brig. Accompanied by the Vengeance he sailed in chase of
the ship. The ship ran for protection into Burlington Bay. But just then
there hove in sight, far away in the north of Flamborough Head, a fleet
of forty-one merchant-ships. It was very certain that such a fleet would
not be without a strong convoy.
Captain Jones immediately signalled back the pilot-boat, and also hung
out the signal for a general chase. As soon as the fleet discovered the
squadron bearing down upon them, suspecting that it was the terrible
Captain Jones, the merchant-ships, like frightened pigeons, crowded all
sail toward the shore. There were then six vessels composing Captain
Jones’s squadron, the Richard, the Alliance, the Vengeance, the Pallas,
and the two pilot-boats.
It was soon found that there were two ships-of-war protecting the
merchant fleet. These two, the Serapis and the Countess of Scarborough,
two of the most strongly built and best armed of English frigates, came
steadily forward, preparing for battle. Captain Jones made signal for
all his ships to form in line of battle, and crowded all sail to reach
the enemy as soon as possible, for night was at hand. Captain Landais
paid no attention to the signal.
It was seven o’clock in the evening when the Bon Homme Richard and the
Serapis approached within hailing distance of each other. The Alliance
stood sullenly aloof from the conflict. The Vengeance, for some
unexplained reason, remained far to the windward, and did not come into
action. She had been commanded to assist in any way she could in the
battle, or in taking or destroying the merchant-ships. The Pallas, under
Captain Cottineau, bore down bravely upon the Countess of Scarborough,
and after the bloody conflict of an hour compelled the white cross of
St. George to bow to the Stars and the Stripes of the almost nameless
republic. Thus the Richard was left alone to contend with the Serapis.
The Richard had forty guns. Six of these were eighteen-pounders. The
rest were twelve, nine, and six pounders. Three hundred and seventy-five
men served these guns. The whole weight of iron balls she could throw at
one discharge of them all, was four hundred and seventy-four pounds.
The Serapis carried forty-one guns. Twenty of these were
eighteen-pounders. There were three hundred and twenty-five men to work
these guns. The whole weight of metal the Serapis could throw, at one
discharge, was six hundred pounds.
The Serapis was one of the finest of British frigates, agile and very
obedient to her helm. The Richard was an old and clumsy merchantman,
very unwieldy, and poorly fitted for warfare. There was a gentle breeze
which swelled the sails, and an almost unrippled sea. The sun had been
set for more than a hour. But the moon rose in full splendor, and,
shining down from a cloudless sky, shed almost noonday brilliance over
the scene. The vessels were but three miles from the rugged cliffs of
Flamborough, which seems but a short distance when looked upon over the
water. Those cliffs were blackened with the multitudes who had hurried
to witness the strange, sublime, and yet awful spectacle. The coast line
and the piers of Scarborough seemed also to be crowded with spectators.
The breeze was so light that the vessels had approached each other very
slowly. When within pistol-shot, and abreast, with bow to bow, the
Serapis hailed the Richard with the question:
“What ship is that?”
The answer came back, “What is it you say?”
Again the shout came from the Serapis, “What ship is that? Answer
immediately, or I shall fire into you.”
Simultaneously both vessels opened their broadsides. The flash glared
upon the spectators like lightning from the cloud. Then came the thunder
peal. The storm of human passion, more dreadful than any storm which
ever wrecked the skies, had begun. The iron hail tore through both of
the ships, crashing the timbers, scattering death-dealing splinters in
all directions, and strewing the decks with the mangled bodies of the
dying and the dead. At this first discharge two of the eighteen-pounders
of the Richard burst, killing almost every man who served them, and so
blowing up the deck and creating such havoc as to render the remaining
four useless.
Thus Captain Jones’s battery of six eighteen-pounders was rendered
entirely useless, while his adversary had twenty eighteen-pounders to
hurl destruction upon the Richard. The battle was continued with
unremitting fury. Broadside followed broadside in such swift succession
that there was a continuous flash and a continuous roar.
It was a wondrous spectacle presented to the spectators on land. Both
ships were enveloped in such a cloud of smoke as to be quite invisible.
It seemed as though a thunder-cloud, fraught with the most dreadful
tempests, had descended upon the ocean, and that a supernatural strife
was raging there between unseen spirits of darkness, who hurled bolts at
each other which illumined the ocean, and shook the hills. All who
witnessed the terrific scene were overwhelmed with emotions of awe and
dread. This is indeed a fallen world. Through all the ages, on the ocean
and on the land, man has been combining all the energies he could wield
for the destruction of his brother man.
Very slowly this war cloud moved along, the manœuvres of both vessels
being entirely concealed from those on the shore. Each was constantly
endeavoring to cross each other’s track, that thus the ship of its
opponent might be raked by a broadside which would sweep from the bows
to the stern. But several of the braces of the Richard were shot away;
she would not readily mind the helm, and the bowsprit of the Serapis was
thrust across the stern of the Richard, near the mizzen-mast.
Captain Jones grasped the bowsprit with his grappling irons, and made
the ships fast. The stern of the Serapis swung round to the bows of the
Richard. Thus the ships were brought square alongside of each other.
Their yards were all entangled. The muzzles of their guns often touched.
In the meantime the gunners were pouring into each other their awful
broadsides, creating destruction which was truly appalling. Several
eighteen-pound shots had pierced the Richard at the water’s edge, and
the water was rushing in torrents through the openings.
[Illustration]
_8th Position._ The two ships foul fore and aft; the _Serapis’s_
larboard anchor on the bottom, her starboard caught in the _Richard’s_
starboard quarter-port. So both ships remained until the close of the
action.
_7th Position._ The _Richard_ runs athwart hawse of the _Serapis_.
_6th Position._ The _Richard_ fills her topsails, and the _Serapis_
backs hers, which brings the two ships broadside and broadside.
_5th Position._ The _Richard_ backs clear of the _Serapis_.
_4th Position._ The _Serapis_, not having room to cross the _Richard’s_
bow, luffs up, and the _Richard_ runs into her quarter.
_3d Position._ The _Serapis_ rakes the _Richard_ and attempts to cross
her bow.
_2d Position._ The _Serapis_ passes to windward of the _Richard_.
_1st Position._ Battle begins at 7.30 P. M.
A party of twenty soldiers had been placed upon the quarter-deck of the
Richard, to pick off the gunners of the enemy, with their muskets. But
they were assailed by such a murderous storm of grape-shot, that torn
and bleeding, and leaving many dead upon the deck, they ran below. Men
were stationed high up in the rigging of both the ships, who kept up an
incessant fire upon all exposed persons.
The two vessels, sometimes touching each other and again separated by
but a few feet, moved slowly along, side by side, dealing such terrific
blows as to cause each to stagger. They often crossed each other’s
track, now passing the bow and again the stern. Captain Jones’s battery
of twelve-pounders, upon which he had placed his main reliance, was soon
entirely silenced. As in this terrible struggle broadside answered
broadside, Captain Jones saw that the superiority of his enemy in weight
of metal would inevitably give him the victory, if that mode of warfare
were continued; especially as his own vessel was old and easily torn to
pieces by the foe-man’s shot, while the Serapis was new, with solid
timbers almost like ribs of steel. He resolved to board the foe.
In attempting this his vessel became entangled with the jib-boom of the
Serapis and tore it away. The grappling irons were again thrown out, and
the two ships again swung together, broadside to broadside, so that the
muzzles of their guns not unfrequently touched, and the gunners, in
ramming down the charges, often ran their ramrods into the portholes of
their adversary. With his own hand Captain Jones aided in tying the
lashings, that the vessels might not again be separated. Still there was
not a moment’s cessation of the cannonading. The timbers were torn and
rent. Huge gaps were opened in the sides of each ship. The cloud of
smoke which enveloped them was so dense that the combatants, in almost
midnight darkness, fought mainly by the flash of their guns.
A hundred men made a rush over the gunwales into the Serapis with
gleaming swords, exploding pistols, and the loudest outcries which
frenzy could extort. In such hours of blood and terror, shrieks aid to
embolden the heart and nerve the arm. They were met by an equal number
of the foe, with pike, sabre, pistol, and corresponding yells. What
imagination can conceive the scene? In midnight darkness, illumined only
by war’s portentous flashes, enveloped in sulphurous smoke, with the
crash as of ten thousand thunders deafening the ear, more than seven
hundred men, crowded together in closest contact, and wielding the most
powerful weapons modern art could construct, were butchering each other.
Limb was torn from limb. Dead bodies strewed the decks, which were
slippery with blood. Shrieks and groans and prayers and oaths were
blended with the horrid clamor. Can hell itself present a scene more
infernal than this.
And who shall answer for this at God’s bar? If Abraham was right in
arming three hundred and eighteen men to pursue the savages for the
rescue of his nephew Lot, and his family, and if he could look for God’s
blessing upon the enterprise, as he certainly could, then were these
colonies justified in resisting, even to this direful extremity, the
attempts of haughty England to enslave our land. The burglar who breaks
into the peaceful dwelling at midnight, to rob and murder, may be justly
resisted with every weapon which frenzy can grasp. The British
government must answer at the Judgment Seat, for these scenes of blood
and woe. Truly did Captain Jones write to Lady Selkirk.
“Humanity starts back from such scenes of horror, and cannot
sufficiently execrate the vile promoters of the detestable war.
“For _they_; ’twas _they_ unsheathed the ruthless blade,
And Heaven shall ask the havoc it has made.”
The boarders were driven back. Leaving many dead upon the deck of the
Serapis, they were forced, pell-mell, over the gunwales, with many a
gory wound, to the blood-stained decks of the Richard. As they fled, the
two captains, each on his quarter-deck, stood within a few feet of each
other. In the darkness the flags could not be seen. Captain Pearson, of
the Serapis, shouted out:
“Have you struck your flag?”
“No,” responded Captain Jones, “I have not yet begun to fight.” With his
own hands the intrepid captain worked, serving the guns. Though
blackened with powder and smoke, and painfully wounded by a splinter, he
was calm and unagitated, watching every movement, but with a firm
expression on his almost feminine features which indicated that he would
never, never yield. He endeavored to compensate for the superiority of
the guns of his foe by the rapidity of his own fire. His guns thus
became greatly heated, and in their terrible rebound threatened to break
from their fastenings. At every discharge his ship trembled from stem to
stern. In Captain Jones’s extremely modest official account, in which
not one word is said in praise of himself, he writes:
“I directed the fire of one of the three cannon against the main-mast
with double-headed shot, while the other two were exceedingly well
served with grape and canister shot to silence the enemy’s musketry, and
clear her decks, which was at last effected. The enemy were, as I have
since understood, on the instant for calling for quarter, when the
cowardice or treachery of three of my under officers induced them to
call to the enemy. The English commodore asked me if I demanded quarter,
and, I having answered him in the most determined negative, they renewed
the battle with double fury. They were unable to stand the deck, but the
fire of their cannon, especially the lower battery, which was entirely
formed of eighteen-pounders, was incessant. Both ships were set on fire
in various places, and the scene was dreadful beyond the reach of
language. To account for the timidity of my three under officers (I mean
the gunner, the carpenter, and the master-at-arms), I must observe that
the two first were slightly wounded, and as the ship had received
various shots under water, and one of the pumps being shot away, the
carpenter expressed his fear that she would sink, and the other two
concluded that she was sinking, which occasioned the gunner to run aft
on the poop, without my knowledge, to strike the colors; fortunately for
me, a cannon-ball had done that before, by carrying away the ensign
staff; he was, therefore, reduced to the necessity of sinking—as he
supposed—or of calling for quarter, and he preferred the latter.”
There were six feet of water in the hold. The flood, in streams, was
rushing in. The ship was apparently sinking. At that awful moment one of
the officers rushed below and, with humane intentions, released three
hundred prisoners who were in the hold. They came pouring upon deck in a
frenzy of dismay. Water would drown them in the hold. Bullets and
cannon-balls would strike them on the deck. The Richard was on fire in
several places. The rudder was cut off the stern-frame, and the transoms
shot away. Fire had broken out in several places. It was burning within
a few inches of the powder magazine. The timbers on the ship’s side,
from the main-mast to the stern, were entirely shot away, so that the
balls of the Serapis passed directly through, meeting with no
obstruction but the bodies of men. A few blackened posts alone prevented
the upper deck from falling.
The flames were so near the magazine that Captain Jones ordered the
powder kegs to be brought up and thrown into the sea. He compelled the
prisoners to work at the pumps, and in the endeavor to extinguish the
flames. They were indeed ready enough to do this; for the sinking of the
ship would drown them, and they were in imminent peril of being burned
up by the conflagration.
In the midst of this awful confusion, after the battle had raged for two
and a half hours, Captain Pearson thought he heard the cry of some one
on board the Richard calling for quarter. This cry probably came from
the quartermaster.
“Hearing this,” Captain Pearson writes, “I called upon the captain, to
know if he had struck. No answer being made, after repeating my words
two or three times, I called for the boarders and ordered them to board;
which they did. But the moment they were on board the Richard, they
discovered a superior number, lying under cover, with pikes in their
hands ready to receive them; on which our people retreated instantly to
their guns again, till after ten o’clock.”
The powder-boys of the Serapis, whose business it was to bring up the
cartridges for the guns, appalled by the horrible scene, of dismounted
guns, mutilation, and death, scarcely knowing what they did, threw the
cartridges upon the deck, and went back for more. The cartridges were
trampled upon and broken. The deck was soon quite covered with
cartridges and loose powder. A hand grenade, thrown from the Richard,
set fire to this, and produced an awful explosion.
The effect was horrible. More than twenty were instantly blown to
pieces. Many others had every particle of clothing blown from their
bodies, and were thrown down, writhing in agony, blackened, and scorched
almost to cinders, Captain Pearson, in his official report says:
“A hand grenade, being thrown in at one of the lower ports a cartridge
of powder was set on fire; the flames of which, running from cartridge
to cartridge all the way aft, blew up the whole of the people and
officers that were quartered abaft the mainmast; from which unfortunate
circumstances, all those guns were rendered useless for the remainder of
the action, and I fear that the greater part of the people will lose
their lives.”
Just before ten o’clock the Alliance, which had stood aloof during all
these hours, made her appearance; I must give this extraordinary
occurrence in the words of Captain Jones.
“I now thought,” he wrote, “that the battle was at an end. But to my
utter astonishment he discharged a broadside full into the stern of the
Bon Homme Richard. We called to him for God’s sake to forbear. Yet he
passed along the off side of the ship, and continued firing. There was
no possibility of his mistaking the enemy’s ship for the Bon Homme
Richard, there being the most essential difference in their appearance
and construction. Besides it was then full moonlight, and the sides of
the Bon Homme Richard were all black, and the sides of the enemy’s ship
were yellow. Yet for the greater security I showed the signal for our
reconnoisance, by putting out three lanterns, one at the bow, one at the
stern, and one at the middle, in a horizontal line.
“Every tongue cried that he was firing into the wrong ship, but nothing
availed. He passed round firing into the Bon Homme Richard, head, stern,
and broadside, and by one of his volleys killed several of my best men,
and mortally wounded a good officer of the forecastle. My situation was
truly deplorable. The Bon Homme Richard received several shots under the
water from the Alliance. The leak gained on the pumps; and the fire
increased much on board both ships. Some officers entreated me to
strike, of whose courage and sense I entertain a high opinion. I would
not, however, give up the point.”
The fire from the tops of the Richard had struck down every man on the
quarter-deck of the Serapis. Captain Jones’s guns had so cut the
main-mast of the foe that it reeled and fell with a fearful crash,
tearing down with it spars and rigging, and leaving the ship almost a
helpless wreck. Flames were bursting forth in several places. Captain
Pearson saw that all was lost. With his own hands he struck his flag.
Lieutenant Richard Dale immediately, with the consent of Captain Jones,
jumped upon the gunwale, seized the main-brace pendant, and swung
himself upon the quarter-deck of the captured ship. He was followed by
Midshipman Mayrant, with a large party of sailors. The confusion was so
great that it was not known, at that moment, throughout either ship,
that the Serapis had surrendered. One of the enemy, stationed at the
waist, ran his boarding-pike through the thigh of the midshipman.
Lieutenant Dale found Captain Pearson standing aside, the image of
despair, on the leeward of the quarter-deck. Addressing the unfortunate
captain respectfully, he said:
“Sir, I have orders to send you on board the ship alongside.”
The first lieutenant of the Serapis, coming up at this moment, inquired:
“Has the enemy struck her flag?”
“No, sir,” Lieutenant Dale replied. “On the contrary, you have struck to
us.”
The lieutenant of the Serapis, turning anxiously to Captain Pearson,
inquired:
“Have you struck, sir.”
“Yes, I have!” was the sad, laconic reply.
All this occupied scarcely one minute. It was near midnight. Darkness
and suffocating smoke enveloped the combatants. Random firing had not
yet ceased, though on both ships nearly all the cannon had been
dismounted.
The lieutenant of the Serapis replied, “I have nothing more to say.” He
turned about and was going below when Lieutenant Dale courteously
arrested him saying, “It is my duty to request you sir, to accompany
Captain Pearson on board the ship alongside.”
“If you will first permit me,” the lieutenant replied, “to go below, I
will silence the firing of the lower deck guns.”
“This cannot be permitted,” was the reply. The two distinguished
captives passed over to the deck of the Bon Homme Richard. Orders were
sent below to cease firing. Thus terminated this most memorable of naval
conflicts, after a bloody battle, with muzzle to muzzle, of nearly three
hours and a half. Through all time, in all naval chronicles the battle
between the Bon Homme Richard and the Serapis will occupy a conspicuous
position.