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Title: Matthew Calbraith Perry A Typical American Naval Officer Author: William Elliot Griffis Release Date: May 9, 2016 [eBook #52026] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 ***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY*** E-text prepared by Larry Harrison, Cindy Beyer, and the online Distributed Proofreaders Canada team (http://www.pgdpcanada.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (https://archive.org) Note: Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/matthewcalbraith00grifrich COMMODORE MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY. MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY A Typical AMERICAN NAVAL OFFICER BY WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS Author of “The Mikado’s Empire”, “Corea the Hermit Nation” and “Japanese Fairy World” BOSTON CUPPLES AND HURD 94 Boylston Street 1887 Copyright, 1887, By Cupples and Hurd. All Rights Reserved THE HYDE PARK PRESS. IN REVERENT MEMORY OF MY FATHER JOHN L. GRIFFIS AND OF MY GRANDFATHER JOHN GRIFFIS WHO AS MERCHANT NAVIGATORS AND COMMANDERS OF SHIPS AND MEN at the ends of the earth CARRIED THE FLAG AND EXTENDED THE TRADE OF THE YOUNG REPUBLIC THIS BIOGRAPHY OF HER GREATEST SAILOR-DIPLOMATIST IS INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR TABLE OF CONTENTS. OUR EARLY NAVY. Chapter Page I. The Child Calbraith.—A Real Boy 1 II. Boyhood’s Environment.—Under the Flag of Fifteen Stars 10 III. A Midshipman’s Training Under Commodore Rodgers 19 IV. Men, Ships, and Guns in 1812 28 V. Service in the War of 1812.—The Flag kept flying on all Seas 38 AFRICA. SLAVERS AND PIRATES. VI. First Voyage to the Dark Continent.—Lieutenant Perry goes to Guinea 50 VII. Perry locates the Site of Monrovia.—The African Slave Trade 58 VIII. Fighting Pirates in the Spanish Main 65 EUROPE AND DIPLOMACY. OUR FLAG IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. IX. The American Line-of-Battle Ship.—Among Turks and Greeks 72 X. The Concord in the Seas of Russia and Egypt.—Czar and Khedive 81 XI. A Diplomatic Voyage in the Frigate Brandywine.—Andrew Jackson’s stalwart policy.—Perry rehearses for Japan.— Naples pays up 91 SHORE DUTY. TEN YEARS OF SCIENCE AND PROGRESS. XII. The Founder of the Brooklyn Naval Lyceum.—Master- Commandant Perry 99 XIII. The Father of the American Steam Navy.—The Engineer’s status fixed.—The Line and the Staff 110 XIV. Perry discovers the Ram.—The Trireme’s prow restored.—The “Line-of-Battle” changed to “Bows on” 120 XV. Lighthouse Illumination.—Lenses or Reflectors? 129 XVI. Revolutions in Naval Architecture.—The new middle term between Courage and Cannon.—Caloric 138 XVII. The School of Gun Practice at Sandy Hook.—Bomb-guns and the coming Shells 146 XVIII. The Twin Steamers Missouri and Mississippi.—Iron-clads and Armor 156 COMMODORE OF A SQUADRON. AFRICAN WATERS. EXTIRPATING “THE SUM OF ALL VILLIANIES.” XIX. The Broad Pennant.—Our only Foreign Colony.—Powder and Ball at Berribee 167 XX. Science and Religion.—A War of Ink Bottles.—Perry as a Missionary and Civilizer 183 THE MEXICAN WAR. XXI. The Mexican War 197 XXII. Commodore Perry commands the Squadron 216 XXIII. The Naval Battery breaches the walls of Vera Cruz 226 XXIV. The Naval Brigade.—Capture of Tabasco 241 XXV. Fighting the Yellow Fever.—Peace 251 XXVI. Results of the War.—Gold and the Pacific Coast 261 JAPAN. XXVII. American attempts to open trade 270 XXVIII. Origin of the American Expedition to Japan 281 XXIX. Preparations for Japan.—An International Episode 294 XXX. The Fire-Vessels of the Western Barbarians 314 XXXI. Panic in Yedo.—Reception of the President’s Letter 329 XXXII. Japanese preparations for Treaty-Making 343 XXXIII. The Professor and the Sailor make a Treaty 359 XXXIV. Last Labors 375 THE MAN AND HIS WORK. XXXV. Matthew Perry as a Man 395 XXXVI. Works that follow 409 ======== APPENDICES. Chapter Page I. Authorities 427 II. Origin of the Perry Name and Family 429 III. The Name Calbraith 430 IV. The Family of M. C. Perry 431 V. Official Detail of M. C. Perry 433 VI. The Naval Apprenticeship System 435 VII. Duelling 440 VIII. Memorials in Art of M. C. Perry 443 ======== INDEX 447 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry The United States Steam Frigate “Mississippi” Perry at the age of fifty-four Conveyance at Funchal Commodore Perry entering the Treaty-House Signatures and Pen-Seals of the Japanese Treaty Commissioners Silver Salver in possession of Commodore Perry’s Daughter, Mrs. August Belmont Medal Presented by the Merchants of Boston Commodore Perry’s Autograph P R E FA C E. Among the earliest memories of a childhood spent near the now vanished Philadelphia Navy Yard, are the return home of the marines and sailors from the Mexican war, the launch of the noble steam frigate Susquehanna, the salutes from the storeship Princeton, and the exhibit of the art treasures brought home by the United States Expedition to Japan—all associated with the life of Commodore M. C. Perry. Years afterwards, on the shores of that bay made historic by his diplomacy, I heard the name of Perry spoken with reverence and enthusiasm. The younger men of Japan, with faces flushed with new ideas of the Meiji era, called him the moral liberator of their nation. Many and eager were the questions asked concerning his career, and especially his personal history. Yet little could be told, for in American literature and popular imagination, the name of the hero of Lake Erie seemed to overshadow the fame of the younger, and, as I think, greater brother. The dramatic incidents of war impress the popular mind far more profoundly than do the victories of peace. Even American writers confound the two brothers, treating them as the same person, making one the son of the other, or otherwise doing fantastic violence to history. Numerous biographies have been written, and memorials in art, of marble, bronze and canvas, on coin and currency, of Oliver Hazard Perry, have been multiplied. No biography of Matthew Calbraith Perry has, until this writing, appeared. In Japan, popular curiosity fed itself on flamboyant broadside chromo-pictures, “blood-pit” novels, and travesties of history, in which Perry was represented either as a murderous swash-buckler or a consumptive-looking and over-decorated European general. It was to satisfy an earnest desire of the Japanese to know more of the man, who so profoundly influenced their national history, that this biography was at first undertaken. I began the work by a study of the scenes of Perry’s triumphs in Japan, and of his early life in Rhode Island; by interviews in navy yard, hospital and receiving-ship, with the old sailors who had served under him in various crusades; by correspondence and conversation with his children, personal friends, fellow-officers, critics, enemies, and eye-witnesses of his labors and works. I followed up this out-door peripatetic study by long and patient research in the archives of the United States Navy Department in Washington, with collateral reading of American, European, Mexican and Japanese books, manuscripts and translations bearing on the subject; and, most valued of all, documents from the Mikado’s Department of State in Tōkiō. As the career and character of my subject unfolded, I discovered that Matthew Perry was no creature of routine, but a typical American naval officer whose final triumph crowned a long and brilliant career. He had won success in Japanese waters not by a series of happy accidents, but because all his previous life had been a preparation to win it. In this narrative, much condensed from the original draft, no attempt has been made to do either justice or injustice to Perry’s fellow-officers, or to write a history of his times, or of the United States Navy. Many worthy names have been necessarily omitted. For the important facts recorded, reliance has been placed on the written word of documentary evidence. Fortunately, Perry was a master of the pen and of his native language. As he wrote almost all of his own letters and official reports, his papers, both public and private, are not only voluminous and valuable but bear witness to his scrupulous regard for personal mastery of details, as well as for style and grammar, fact and truth. Unable to thank all who have so kindly aided me, I must especially mention with gratitude the Hon. Wm. E. Chandler and W. C. Whitney, Secretaries of the United States Navy Department, Prof. J. R. Soley, chief clerk T. W. Hogg and clerk J. Cassin, for facilities in consulting the rich archives of the United States Navy; Admiral D. D. Porter and Rear- Admirals John Almy, D. Ammen, C. R. P. Rodgers, T. A. Jenkins, J. H. Upshur, and Captain Arthur Yates; the retired officers, pay director J. G. Harris, Lieut. T. S. Bassett and Lieut. Silas Bent formerly of the United States Navy, for light on many points and for reminiscences; Messrs. P. S. P. Conner, John H. Redfield, Joseph Jenks, R. B. Forbes, Chas. H. Haswell, Joshua Follansbee, and the Hon. John A. Bingham, for special information; the daughters of Captains H. C. Adams, and Franklin Buchanan, for the use of letters and for personalia; Rev. E. Warren Clark, Miss Orpah Rose, Miss E. B. Carpenter and others in Rhode Island, for anecdotes of Perry’s early life; the Hon. Gideon Nye of Canton; the Rev G. F. Verbeck of Tōkiō; many Japanese friends, especially Mr. Inazo Ota, for documents and notes; and last, but not least, the daughters of Commodore M. C. Perry, Mrs. August Belmont, Mrs. R. S. Rodgers, and especially Mrs. George Tiffany, who loaned letters and scrap-books, and, with Mrs. Elizabeth R. Smith of Hartford, furnished much important personal information. Among the vanished hands and the voices that are now still, that have aided me, are those of Rear- Admirals Joshua R. Sands, George H. Preble, and J. B. F. Sands, Dr. S. Wells Williams, Gen. Horace Capron, and others. A list of Japanese books consulted, and of Perry’s autograph writings and publications, will be found in the Appendix; references are in footnotes. The work now committed to type was written at Schenectady, N. Y., in the interstices of duties imperative to a laborious profession; and with it are linked many pleasant memories of the kindly neighbors and fellow Christians there; as well as of hospitality in Washington. In its completion and publication in Boston, new friends have taken a gratifying interest, among whom I gratefully name Mr. S. T. Snow, and M. F. Dickinson, Esq. In setting in the framework of true history this figure of a fellow-American great in war and in peace, the intention has been not to glorify the profession of arms, to commend war, to show any lack of respect to my English ancestors or their descendants, to criticise any sect or nation, to ventilate any private theories; but, to tell a true story that deserves the telling, to show the attractiveness of manly worth and noble traits wherever found, and to cement the ties of friendship between Japan and the United States. One may help to build up character by pointing to a good model. To the lads of my own country, but especially to Japanese young men, I commend the study of Matthew Perry’s career. The principles, in which he was trained at home by his mother and father, of the religion which anchored him by faith in the eternal realties, and of the Book which he believed and read constantly, lie at the root of what is best in the progress of a nation. No Japanese will make a mistake who follows Perry as he followed the guidance of these principles; while the United States will be Japan’s best exemplar and faithful friend only so far as she illustrates them in her national policy. W. E. G. Shawmut Church Parsonage, Boston, July 1st, 1887. CHAPTER I. THE CHILD CALBRAITH. When in the year 1854, all Christendom was thrilled by the news of the opening of Japan to intercourse with the world, the name of Commodore Matthew Perry was on the lips of nations. In Europe it was acknowledged that the triumph had been achieved by no ordinary naval officer. Consummate mastery of details combined with marked diplomatic talents stamped Matthew Calbraith Perry as a man whose previous history was worth knowing. That history we propose to outline. The life of our subject is interesting for the following among many excellent reasons:— 1. While yet a lad, he was active as a naval officer in the war of 1812. 2. He chose the location of the first free black settlement in Liberia. 3. He was, to the end of his life, one of the leading educators of the United States Navy. 4. He was the father of our steam navy. 5. He first demonstrated the efficiency of the ram as a weapon of offense in naval warfare. 6. He founded the naval-apprenticeship system. 7. He was an active instrument in assisting to extirpate the foreign slave-trade on the west coast of Africa. 8. His methods helped to remove duelling, the grog ration and flogging out of the American navy. 9. He commanded, in 1847, the largest squadron which, up to that date, had ever assembled under the American flag, in the Gulf of Mexico. The naval battery manned by his pupils in gunnery decided the fate of Vera Cruz, and his fleet’s presence enabled Scott’s army to reach the Capital. 10. His final triumph was the opening of Japan to the world,—one of the three single events in American History,—the Declaration of Independence, and the Arbitration of the Alabama claims being the other two,—which have had the greatest influence upon the world at large. Sturdy ancestry, parental and especially a mother’s training, good education, long experience, and persistent self- culture enabled Matthew Perry to earn that “brain-victory” over the Japanese of which none are more proud than themselves. Let us look at his antecedents.[1] Three at least among the early immigrants to Massachusetts bore the name of Perry. Englishmen of England’s heroic age, they were of Puritan and Quaker stock. Their descendants have spread over various parts of the United States. He, with whom our narrative concerns itself, Edmund or Edward Perry, the ancestor, in the sixth degree both of the “Japan,” and the “Lake Erie” Perry, was born in Devonshire in 1630. He was a Friend of decidedly militant turn of mind. He preached the doctrines of peace, with the spirit of war, to the Protector’s troops. Oliver, not wishing this, made it convenient to Edmund Perry to leave England. By settling at Sandwich in 1653, then the headquarters of the Friends in America, he took early and vigorous part in “the Quaker invasion of Massachusetts.” On first day of first month, 1676, he wrote a Railing against the Court of Plymouth, for which he was heavily fined. He married Mary the daughter of Edmund Freeman, the vice-governor of the colony. His son Samuel, born in 1654, emigrated to Rhode Island, and bought the Perry farm, near South Kingston, which still remains in possession of the family. The later Perrys married in the Raymond and Hazard families. Christopher Raymond Perry, the fifth descendant in the male line of Edward Perry, and the son of Freeman Perry, was born December 4th, 1761. His mother was Mercy Hazard, the daughter of Oliver Hazard and Elizabeth Raymond. He 1 2 3 became the father of five American naval officers, of whom Oliver Hazard and Matthew Calbraith are best known. The war of the Revolution broke out when he was but in his 15th year. The militant traits of his ancestor were stronger in him than the pacific tenets of his sect. He enlisted in the Kingston Reds. The service not being exciting, he volunteered in Captain Reed’s Yankee privateer. His second cruise was made in the Mifflin, Captain G. W. Babcock. Like the other ships of the colonies in the Revolution, the Mifflin was a one-decked, uncoppered “bunch of pine boards,” in which patriotism and valor could ill compete with British frigates of seasoned oak. Captured by the cruisers of King George, the crew was sent to the prison ship Jersey. This hulk lay moored where the afternoon shadows of the great bridge-cables are now cast upon the East River. For three months, the boy endured the horrors of imprisonment in this floating coffin. It was with not much besides bones, however, that he escaped. As soon as health permitted, he enlisted on board the U. S. man-of-war Trumbull, commanded by Captain James Nicholson, armed with thirty guns and manned by two-hundred men. On the 2d of June 1780, she fell in with the British letter-of-marque Watt, a ship heavier and larger and with more men and guns than the Trumbull. The conflict was the severest naval duel of the war. It was in the old days of unscientific cannonading; before carronades had revealed their power to smash at short range, or shell-guns to tear ships to pieces, or rifles to penetrate armor. With smooth-bores of twelve and six pound calibre, a battle might last hours or even days, before either ship was sunk, fired or surrendered. The prolonged mutilation of human flesh had little to do with the settlement of the question. The Trumbull and the Watt lay broadside with each other and but one hundred yards apart, exchanging continual volleys. The Trumbull was crippled, but her antagonist withdrew, not attempting capture. By the accidents of war and the overwhelming force of the enemy, our little navy was nearly annihilated by the year 1780. Slight as may seem the value of its services, its presence on the seas helped mightily to finally secure victory. The regular cruisers and the privateers captured British vessels laden with supplies and ammunition of war. Washington’s army owed much of its efficiency to this source, for no fewer than eight-hundred British prizes were brought to port. So keenly did Great Britain feel the privateers’ sting that about the year 1780, she struck a blow designed to annihilate them. Her agents were instructed not to exchange prisoners taken on privateers. This order influenced C. R. Perry’s career. He had enlisted for the third time, daring now to beard the lion in his den. Cruising in the Irish sea, he was captured and carried as a prisoner to Newry, County Down, Ireland. Here, though there was no prospect of release till the war was over, he received very different treatment from that on the Jersey. Allowed to go out on parole, he met a lad named Baillie Wallace, and his cousin, Sarah Alexander. Of her we shall hear later. After eighteen months imprisonment, Perry made his escape. As seaman on a British vessel, he reached St. Thomas in the West Indies. Thence sailing to Charleston, he found the war over and peace declared. Remembering the pretty face which had lighted up his captivity, Perry, the next year, made a voyage as mate of a merchant vessel to Ireland. Providence favored his wishes, for on the return voyage Mr. Calbraith, an old friend of the Alexanders and Wallaces, embarked as a passenger to Philadelphia. With him, to Perry’s delight, went Miss Sarah Alexander on a visit to her uncle, a friend of Dr. Benjamin Rush. Matthew Calbraith, a little boy and the especial pet of Miss Alexander, came also. An ocean voyage a century ago was not measured by days—a sail in a hotel between morning worship at Queenstown and a sermon in New York on the following Sunday night—but consumed weeks. The lovers had ample time. Perry had the suitor’s three elements of success,—propinquity, opportunity and importunity. Before they arrived in this country, they were betrothed. On landing in Philadelphia, the first news received by Miss Alexander at the mouth of Dr. Benjamin Rush was of the death of both uncle and aunt. Her relatives had committed her to the care of Dr. Rush and at his house the young couple were married in October 1784. The bride, though but sixteen years, was rich in beauty, character and spirit. The groom was twenty-three, “A warm- hearted high-spirited man, very handsome, with dashing manners, and very polite. He treated people with distinction but would be quick to resent an insult.” The young couple for their wedding journey traveled to South Kingston, R. I. There they enjoyed an enthusiastic reception. The race-traits of the sturdy British yeomanry and of the Scotch-Irish people were now to blend in forming the parentage of Oliver and Matthew Perry, names known to all Americans. Away from her childhood’s home in a strange land, the message from the 45th Psalm—the Song of Loves—now came home to the young wife with a force that soon conquered homesickness, and with a meaning that deepened with passing years. “Hearken, O daughter, and consider and incline thine ear, forget also thine own people and thy father’s house.” “Instead of thy fathers shall be thy children whom thou mayest make princes in all the earth.” Captain C. R. Perry entered the commercial marine and for thirteen years made voyages as mate, master or supercargo to Europe, South America and the East Indies. Even then, our flag floated in all seas. It had been raised in China, and seen at Nagasaki in Japan. In 1789 and ’90, the U. S. S. Columbus and Washington circumnavigated the globe, the first American war vessels to do so. The cities of Providence and Newport secured a large portion of the trade with Cathay. The future hero of Lake Erie was ten years old, and two other children, a son and a daughter, played in the sea- captain’s home at Newport, when America’s greatest sailor-diplomat was born on the 10th day of April 1794. After her former young friend, at this time a promising young merchant in Philadelphia, the mother named her third son Matthew Calbraith Perry. The boy was destined to outlive his parents and all his brothers. Matthew Perry was an eager, active, and robust child full of life and energy. His early youth was spent in Newport, at courtly Tower Hill, and on the farm at South Kingston. From the first, his mother and his kin called him “Calbraith.” This 4 5 6 7 8 was his name in the family even to adult life. Few anecdotes of his boyhood are remembered, but one is characteristic. When only three years old, the ruddy-faced child was in Kingston. Like a Japanese, he could not say l, as in “lash.” He walked about with a whip in his hand which he called his “rass.” There was a tan yard near by and the bark was ground by a superannuated horse. One of his older brothers called him an “old bark horse.” This displeased the child. He reddened with anger, and his temper exploded in one of those naughty words, which in a baby’s mouth often surprise parents. They wonder where the uncanny things have been picked up; but our baby-boy added, “If I knew more, I would say it.” For this outburst of energy, he suffered maternal arrest. Placed in irons, or apron strings, he was tied up until repentant. That was Matthew Perry—never doing less than his best. Action was limited only by ability—“If I knew more, I would say it.” The Japanese proverb says “The heart of a child of three years remains until he is sixty.” The western poet writes it, “The child is father of the man.” If he had known more, even in Yedo bay in 1854, he would have done even better than his own best; which, like the boast of the Arctic hero, was that he “beat the record.” [1] See Appendix.—Origin of the Perry Name and Family. CHAPTER II. BOYHOOD’S ENVIRONMENT. In the year 1797, war between France and the United States seemed inevitable, and “Hail Columbia” was sung all over the land. The Navy Department of the United States was created May 21, 1798. Captain Perry, having offered his services to the government, was appointed by President Adams, a post-captain in the navy June 9, 1798, and ordered to build and command the frigate General Greene at Warren, R. I. The keels of six sloops and six seventy-four gun ships were also laid. In May, 1799, the General Greene was ready for sea. With his son Oliver as midshipman, Captain Perry sailed for the West Indies to convoy American merchantmen. He left his wife and family at Tower Hill, a courtly village with a history and fine society. Matthew was five years old. He had been taught to read by his mother, and now attended the school-house, an edifice, which, now a century old, has degenerated to a corn-crib. Mrs. Perry lived in “the court end” of the town, and, after school, would tell her little sons of their father and brothers at sea. This element was ever in sight with its ships, its mystery, and its beckoning distances. From Tower Hill may be seen Newport, Conanticut Island, Block Island, Point Judith, and a stretch of inland country diversified by lakes, and what the Coreans call “Ten thousand flashings of blue waves.” After two brilliant cruises in the Spanish Main, and a visit to Louisiana, where the American flag was first displayed by a national ship, Captain Perry returned to Newport in May, 1800. Negotiations with France terminated peacefully, and the first act of President Jefferson was to cut down the navy to a merely nominal existence. Out of forty-two captains only nine were retained in service, and Captain Perry again found himself in private life. The first and logical result of reducing the nation’s police force on the seas, was the outbreak of piracy. Our expanding commerce found itself unprotected, and the Algerian corsairs captured our vessels and threw their crews into slavery. In the war with the Barbary powers, our navy gained its first reputation abroad in the classic waters of the Mediterranean. Meanwhile at Newport the boy, Matthew Calbraith, continued his education under school-teachers, and his still more valuable training in character under his mother. The family lived near “the Point,” and during the long voyages of the father, the training of the sons and daughters fell almost wholly on the mother. It was a good gift of Providence to our nation, this orphan Irish bride so amply fitted to be the mother of heroes. Of a long line of officers in the navy of the United States, most of those bearing the name of Perry, and several of the name of Rodgers, call Sarah Alexander their ancestress. One of the forefathers of the bride, who was of the Craigie-Wallace family, was Sir Richard Wallace of Riccarton, Scotland. He was the elder brother of Malcom Wallace of Ellerslie, the father of Sir William Wallace. Her grandfather was James Wallace, an officer in the Scottish army, who signed the Solemn League and Covenant of 1643, but resigned his commission some years later. With other gentlemen from Ayrshire, he took refuge from religious persecution in North Ireland. Though earnest Protestants, they became involved in the Irish rebellion in Cromwell’s time and were driven to resistance of the English invaders. As a young girl Sarah Alexander had not only listened to oft-repeated accounts of the battles and valor of her ancestors but was familiar with the historic sites in the neighborhood of her childhood’s home. She believed her own people the bravest in the world. Well educated, and surrounded with the atmosphere of liberal culture, of high ideas, of the sacredness of duty and the beauty of religion, she had been morally well equipped for the responsibilities of motherhood and mature life. Add to this, the self-reliance naturally inbred by dwelling as an orphan girl among five young men, her cousins; and last and most important, the priceless advantage of a superb physique, and one sees beforehand to what inheritance her sons were to come. One old lady, who remembers her well, enthusiastically declared that “she was wonderfully calculated to form the manners of children.” Another who knew her in later life writes of her as “a Spartan mother,” “a grand old lady.” Another says “Intelligent, lady-like, well educated;” another that “she was all that is said of her 9 10 11 12 13 in Mackenzie’s Life of O. H. Perry.” Those nearest to her remember her handsome brown eyes, dark hair, rich complexion, fine white teeth, and stately figure. The deeds of the Perry men are matters of history. The province of the women was at home, but it was the mothers, of the Hazard and the Alexander blood who prepared the men for their careers by moulding in them the principles from which noble actions spring. Discipline, sweetened with love, was the system of the mother of the Perry boys, and the foundation of their education. First of all, they must obey. The principles of Christianity, of honor, and of chivalry were instilled in their minds from birth. Noblesse oblige was their motto. It was at home, under their mother’s eye that Oliver learned how to win victory at Lake Erie, and Matthew a treaty with Japan. She fired the minds of her boys with the ineradicable passion of patriotism, the love of duty, and the conquest of self. At the same time, she trained them to the severest virtue, purest motives, faithfulness in details, a love for literature, and a reverence for sacred things. The habit which Matthew C. Perry had of reading his Bible through once during every cruise, his scrupulous regard for the Lord’s day, the American Sunday, his taste for literature, and his love for the English classics were formed at his mother’s knee. The vigor of her mind and force of her character were illustrated in other ways. While personally attractive with womanly graces, gentle and persuasive in her manners, she believed that self-preservation is the first law of nature. Training her sons to kindness and consideration of others, and warning them to avoid quarrels, she yet demanded of them that they should neither provoke nor receive an insult, nor ever act the coward. How well her methods were understood by her neighbors, is shown by an incident which occurred shortly after news of the victory at Lake Erie reached Rhode Island. An old farmer stoutly insisted that it was Mrs. Perry who had “licked the British.” There was much in the social atmosphere and historical associations of Newport at the opening of this century to nourish the ambition and fire the imagination of impressible lads like the Perry boys. Here still lived the French veteran, Count Rochambeau of revolutionary fame. Out in the bay, fringed with fortifications of Indian, Dutch, Colonial and British origin and replete with memories of stirring deeds, lay the hulk of the famous ship in which Captain Cook had observed the transit of Venus and circumnavigated the globe. Here, possibly, the Norsemen had come to dwell centuries before, and fascinating though uncertain tradition pointed to the then naked masonry of the round tower as evidence of it. The African slave-trade was very active at this time, and brought much wealth to Newport and the old manors served by black slaves fresh from heathenism. Among other noted negroes was Phillis Wheatly the famous poetess, then in her renown, who had been brought to Boston in 1781 in a slave-ship. What was afterwards left to Portuguese cut-throats and Soudan Arabs was, until within the memory of old men now living, prosecuted by Yankee merchants and New England deacons whose ship’s cargoes consisted chiefly of rum and manacles. At this iniquity, Matthew Perry was one day to deal a stunning blow. Here, too, had tarried Berkeley, not then a bishop, however, whose prophecy, “Westward the star of empire takes its way” was to be fulfilled by Matthew Perry across new oceans, even to Japan. Once a year the gaily decked packet-boat set out from Newport to Providence to carry the governor from one capital to the other. This was a red-letter day to little Calbraith, in whose memory it remained bright and clear to the day of his death. When he was about ten years old, Mr. Matthew Calbraith now thirty years old and a successful merchant, came from Philadelphia to visit the Perrys. He was delighted with his little namesake, and prophesied that he would make the name of Perry more honorable yet. The affair of the Leopard and Chesapeake in June 1807 thrilled every member of the family. Matthew begged that he might, at once, enter the navy. This, however, was not yet possible to the boy of twelve years, so he remained at school. What Providence meant to teach, when an American man-of-war with her decks littered up and otherwise unfit for action was surprised by a hostile ship, was not lost upon our navy. The humiliating but salutary lesson was learned for all time. Neatness, vigilance and constant preparation for the possibilities of action are now the characteristics of our naval households. So far as we know, no other ship of our country has since been “leopardized.” Even out of their bitter experience, the American sailors took encouragement. The heavy broadsides of a fifty-gun frigate against a silent ship had done surprisingly little damage. British traditions suffered worse than the timbers of the Chesapeake, or the hearts of her sailors. The moral effect was against the offenders, and in favor of the Americans. The mists of rumor and exaggeration were blown away, and henceforth our captains and crews awaited with stern joy their first onset with insolent oppressors. If ever the species bully had developed an abominable variety, it was the average British navy captain of the first decade of this century. Providence was severing the strings which bound the infant nation to her European nurse. If the mere crossing of the Atlantic by the Anglo Saxon or Germanic race has been equivalent to five hundred years of progress, we may, at this day, be thankful for the treacherous broadsides of the Leopard. Having a well-grounded faith in the future of his country, and in the speedy renown of her navy, Captain Perry wished all his sons to be naval officers. He had confidence in American ships and cannon, and believed that, handled by native Americans, they were a match for any in the world. His sons Oliver and Raymond already wore the uniform. Early in 1808, he wrote to the Department concerning an appointment for Matthew. His patience was not long tried. Under date of April 23, 1808, he received word from the secretary, Paul Smith, that nothing stood in the way. The receipt of the warrant as midshipman was eagerly awaited by the lad. On the 18th of January 1809, the paper arrived. He was ordered March 16th to the naval station at New York, where he performed for several weeks such routine duty as a lad of his age could do. He then went aboard the schooner Revenge, his first home afloat. In those days, there being no naval academy, the young midshipmen entered as mere boys, learning the rudiments of seamanship by actual practice on ships at sea. Thus began our typical American naval officer’s long and brilliant career of nearly half a century. Matthew Perry was born when our flag bearing the stars and stripes was so new on the seas as to be regarded with curiosity. It had then but fifteen stars in its cluster. Civilized states disregarded its neutrality, and uncivilized people insulted it with impunity. The Tripolitan war first compelled barbarians to respect the emblem. France, one of the most powerful 14 15 16 17 18 and unscrupulous of belligerents, had not yet learned to honor its right of neutrality. Great Britain, to the insults of spoliation, added the robbery of impressment. Matthew Perry entered the United States navy with a burning desire to make this flag respected in every sea. He lived to command the largest fleet which, in his lifetime ever gathered under its folds, and to bear it to the uttermost parts of the earth in the first steam frigate of the United States which ever circumnavigated the globe. CHAPTER III. 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 19 20 21 22 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. 23 24 25 26 27 CHAPTER IV. MEN, SHIPS AND GUNS IN 1812. Commodore John Rodgers was a man of the time, a typical naval officer of the period. He was minutely careful about the food and habits of his men, and made the President as homelike as a ship could be. He was not precisely a man of science, as was the case with his son in the monitor Weehawken, for this was the pre-scientific age of naval warfare. Indeed, it can scarcely be said with truth that he had either patience with or appreciation of Robert Fulton, the Pennsylvanian whose inventions were destined to revolutionize the methods of naval warfare. This mechanical genius who anticipated steam frigates, iron armor, torpedoes and rams, rather amused than interested Rodgers. To the commodore, who expected no miracles, he seemed to possess “Continuity but not ingenuity.” Fulton had not yet perfected his apparatus, though he had in 1804 blown up a Danish frigate off Copenhagen, and in 1810 had published in New York his “Torpedo War and Submarine Explosion.” This book is full of illustrations so clear, that to look at them now provokes the wonder that his schemes found so little encouragement. Five thousand dollars were appropriated by Congress March 30, 1810, for submarine torpedo experiments. Discouragement evidently followed: for our government in 1811, following the example of France and England rejected his plans for a submarine torpedo boat. “The Battle of th...