The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Boys of 1812 and Other Naval Heroes, by James Russell Soley This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: The Boys of 1812 and Other Naval Heroes Author: James Russell Soley Release Date: November 18, 2012 [EBook #41396] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BOYS OF 1812, OTHER NAVAL HEROES *** Produced by David Edwards, paksenarrion and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) The Boys of 1812 AND OTHER NAVAL HEROES THE BOYS OF '61; Or, Four Years of Fighting. By Charles Carleton Coffin. Fully illustrated. 8vo. Cloth. Gilt. THE BOYS OF 1812, And Other Naval Heroes. By Prof. J. Russell Soley. Illustrated from original drawings. 8vo. Cloth. Gilt. IN PREPARATION. SAILOR BOYS OF '61. By Prof. J. Russell Soley. [Pg 1] [Pg 2] "THE CUTLASS BREAKS AT THE HILT." "THE CUTLASS BREAKS AT THE HILT." The Boys of 1812 AND OTHER NAVAL HEROES BY JAMES RUSSELL SOLEY AUTHOR OF "THE BLOCKADE AND THE CRUISERS" BOSTON PUBLISHED BY ESTES AND LAURIAT Copyright, 1887, By Estes and Lauriat. University Press: John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. CONTENTS. Chapter Page I. The Beginnings of the Navy. 11 II. Biddle and the "Randolph." 28 III. War on the Enemy's Coast. 35 IV. Paul Jones's Cruises. 42 V. Barry and Barney. 60 VI. Hostilities with France. 85 VII. Tripoli. 104 VIII. Impressment. 150 IX. The War of 1812.—The "Constitution" and the "Guerrière." 157 [Pg 5] [Pg 6] [Pg 7] X. The First Sloop Action. 177 XI. Decatur and Bainbridge. 183 XII. Captain James Lawrence. 196 XIII. The Cruise of the "Essex." 210 XIV. Perry and Lake Erie. 246 XV. The Sloop Actions. 263 XVI. Macdonough and Lake Champlain. 280 XVII. Stewart and "Old Ironsides." 292 XVIII. The War with Algiers. 307 XIX. The War with Mexico. 318 ILLUSTRATIONS. Page Brig, head on Titlepage "The cutlass breaks at the hilt." Frontispiece "Bold and hardy men who had followed the sea since they were boys." 16 "He sent Colonel Glover and Mr. Palfrey in hot haste to raise the minute-men." 21 Nicholas Biddle. 30 He touched at a small town in Ireland for supplies. 40 The "Drake" surrenders to the "Ranger." 47 "The sloop was swallowed up in the seething waters." 73 Heaving the lead on board the frigate. 81 "Everywhere the ship-yards were busy." 91 David Porter. 95 "It was twilight before he came up with her." 99 Thomas Truxtun,—from medal voted by Congress. 102 "Crowding on the rail with their scimitars." 109 Commodore Edward Preble. 114 "He cut away the anchors, ... but still the ship hung fast." 117 "The lights could be seen glittering in the houses." 127 "The 'Philadelphia' lights them on their way." 131 Stephen Decatur. 135 "Among these was one sixty-four, the 'Africa.'" 161 "A squall of wind and rain passed over us." 167 Captain Isaac Hull. 171 "She lay a helpless wreck in the trough of the sea." 173 "Jack Lang, a brave American blue-jacket, leaped first." 179 "The ships were steering to the eastward on parallel courses." 189 James Lawrence. 197 "Along the shore, upon every hill-top and headland, people had gathered." 203 "When the 'Essex' arrived off the island she lay to." 213 Approaching the Galapagos Islands. 222 "'We surrender,' and down came the flag." 225 "Mostly carronades." 239 "A squall struck her and carried away her main-topmast." 241 Oliver Hazard Perry. 247 "A single gun boomed from Barclay's ship." 255 "Calling away his boat, he rowed under the enemy's fire." 259 [Pg 9] [Pg 10] "The 'Pelican' was guided to her by the smoke of the burning merchantmen." 265 Captain Lewis Warrington. 270 "One round shot entered her aftermost port." 277 "On the stocks, and nearly finished, the fine frigate 'Confiance.'" 283 Captain Charles Stewart. 296 "Accompanied by Abdallah the dragoman, I left the canal." 313 THE BOYS OF 1812, AND OTHER NAVAL HEROES. CHAPTER I. THE BEGINNINGS OF THE NAVY. Simply to defend themselves against the tyrannical encroachments of the mother country was all that the thirteen colonies had in view when, in 1775, they took up arms against Great Britain. At this time the people hoped, and many of them expected, that by making a determined resistance they would induce the King and Parliament to treat them with fairness, and to give them their rights as English citizens. It was only gradually, during the summer and autumn of the first year,—after the battle had been fought at Bunker Hill, and after Washington had been for some time in command of the army which was laying siege to Boston, that they began to feel that they could make a new nation by themselves, and that independence was a thing that was worth fighting for, even though it cost a long and bloody struggle, in which all of them would pass through bitter suffering and many would give up their very lives. As we look back upon it now, it is wonderful to think what a daring thing it was for this small and scattered people, living in their little towns along the seacoast from Maine to Georgia, or on farms and plantations in the country, without an army or navy, without generals, and above all without money,—for money is needed to carry on war more than almost anything else,—to have thus made up their minds to stand up bravely and manfully against such a power as Great Britain (one of the greatest in the world), with all her troops and ships and immense revenues. That we should have come out successfully from a contest so unequal seems little short of marvellous; and we cannot but think that it was the hand of an overruling Destiny that enabled us to succeed, by giving us a general as skilful and prudent as Washington, statesmen as wise as Franklin and Jefferson and Adams, an enemy as indolent as Sir William Howe, and allies as powerful as our good friends the French. Still, even from the beginning the colonists had some reason to hope for success, at least in the war on land. They had no standing army, it is true, but they were not without experience in the business of fighting. In the Seven Years' War, which had come to an end only twelve years before, they had furnished the soldiers who filled the ranks of the English armies on American soil. These were the men who had fought the bloody battles at Ticonderoga and Crown Point, and whom the gallant Wolfe had led on the Plains of Abraham. The veterans of the old war were as ready to shoulder their muskets to protect themselves against the tyranny of the King as against the incursions of their Canadian and Indian neighbors. They knew something, too, of the soldiers who would be sent to subdue them, and what they had seen did not give them much reason to be afraid. They knew how hard it was for an invading army, thousands of miles away from home, marching through a thinly-settled country that was filled with enemies, to protect itself from those incessant and harassing attacks that wear out its strength and destroy little by little all its confidence and pluck. They knew that these gayly-dressed redcoats, who made war according to rule, would find a new kind of work before them among the wooded hills and valleys of America, where every patriot was fighting for his own homestead, where every farmer was a woodsman, and where every woodsman was a crack shot. When that quiet but observant young Virginian, Major Washington, went out with Braddock on his expedition against Fort Duquesne, and saw how the gallant Colonel of the Guards insisted blindly upon following in the backwoods his Old World tactics, and how easily his regulars were defeated in consequence, he learned something that he never afterward forgot; for neither Howe nor Clinton nor Earl Cornwallis himself was the man to teach him a new lesson. But all this was fighting on land. At sea, the colonists had had no such training. The mother country, with her great fleets, had needed no help from them in her sea-fights, and indeed was rather jealous of any attempts that they might make [Pg 11] S [Pg 12] [Pg 13] [Pg 14] toward a colonial navy. The colonists in the old wars had fitted out a few privateers that harried the enemy's commerce, but real naval warfare was wholly unknown to them. They had had no ships-of-war of their own to serve in, and such of them as had been admitted into the Royal Navy under the King's commission remained in it almost to a man. On the ocean, therefore, the colonists were badly off, for Great Britain was here the worst enemy they could have. Her wooden walls had always been her chief reliance, and from the days when Drake and Howard and Raleigh defeated the Great Armada of Spain, they had asserted and maintained British supremacy at sea. During this long period of two hundred years the names of England's great naval captains had been a terror to all her enemies. There was Robert Blake, who beat off the Dutch, when Tromp sailed across the channel with a broom at his masthead as a sign that he would sweep the English from the seas. There were Sir Cloudesley Shovel and Sir George Rooke, who worsted the French in the great battle of Cape La Hogue; there was the doughty old Benbow, who, deserted by his captains, with his single ship kept at bay the squadron of M. Ducasse in the West Indies; there was Boscawen, who captured the fortress at Louisburg; Hawke and Anson, and finally Rodney and Howe, already famous, and destined to become yet more so in the war that was just begun. The fleets that these famous admirals led into action were composed of line-of-battle ships,—immense structures, with two, three, or even four gun-decks, some of them carrying as many as one hundred guns, and the smallest of them rated at sixty-four. After these came the frigates, which had only one gun-deck, but which carried a battery on the spar-deck also. These were not thought of sufficient strength to be really counted as a part of the fighting force, although the largest size, the 50-gun frigates, were sometimes taken into the line of battle. But generally they served as scouts or outposts for the great fleets, or they cruised by twos and threes in light squadrons, or even singly, to attack privateers or unarmed merchantmen, or to make a raid on unprotected coasts and seaports, or to carry orders to the different stations. For all these uses they were of great service, being generally faster than the line-of-battle ships, and yet carrying guns enough to make them formidable to all the lesser craft. After the frigates came the sloops-of-war, ship-sloops, and brig-sloops, as the English called them; not the little boats with one mast that we are accustomed to call sloops, but square-rigged vessels with three or two masts, as the case might be, and carrying twenty guns or so. With all these three classes of vessels the British were well supplied, and the larger ships carried what at that day were heavy guns, 18-pounders and 24-pounders. In 1775, when the war broke out, the Royal Navy numbered one hundred line-of-battle ships, one hundred and fifty frigates, and three hundred of the smaller vessels, and before the war ended it had two hundred and fifty thousand seamen in its service. The colonies, on the other hand, began the struggle without a single armed vessel afloat. They had merchantmen which they could fit out as privateers to cruise against the British merchantmen, but they had nothing that could stand up against a ship-of-war. Even in guns they were sadly deficient; for though there were scattered here and there in the colonies a few 12-pounders and 9-pounders, they had to depend largely upon sixes and fours, which were not much better than popguns; while of eighteens and twenty-fours they had scarcely any for naval use. Sailors they had, to be sure, all along the coast from New England down; and especially in the northern part there were numbers of bold and hardy men who had followed the sea since they were boys, some in fishing-smacks that made long voyages to the Banks, some in coasters, and some in the large merchant-ships that traded at ports beyond the sea. But of what use are sailors without ships or guns? Besides, as the Continental Navy was slow in forming, many of the best men went into the army, which promised an easier life, or into the privateer service, which held out greater prospects of reward; and when the navy finally got to work, it was very hard to man the vessels. [Pg 14] [Pg 15] [Pg 16] [Pg 17] "BOLD AND HARDY MEN WHO HAD FOLLOWED THE SEA SINCE THEY WERE BOYS." In spite of all these discouragements, the leaders in the country boldly resolved that they would face Great Britain on the sea as well as on the land. They bought or built their little ships, fitted them out with guns and stores that were partly captured from the British, manned them with crews from the sturdy mariners along the coast, and sent them forth to war upon the enemy as best they might,—by capturing his transports and storeships, by fighting his smaller cruisers when they could be found alone, and sometimes even by daring raids upon his very coasts. Their officers were volunteers from the merchant service; and though hardly any had ever served in ships-of-war, there were some among them whose name and fame have lived to our own day, and will live forever,—Biddle and Manley, Paul Jones and Conyngham, Barry and Barney, and Wickes and Dale,—the first men to show that American naval officers can hold their own against any others in the world. The beginnings of the Continental Navy were made by Washington. When on July 3, 1775, he took command of the army under the old elm-tree at Cambridge in Massachusetts, he had a discouraging task before him. Not only was it necessary for him to organize the troops and train them in the art of war, but they had to be supplied with arms and ammunition and all kinds of equipments. Not only was there a scarcity of money to buy these things, but the things themselves were hardly to be got in the colonies either for love or money. At the battle of Bunker Hill the patriots had retired, not because they were beaten, but because their ammunition was exhausted. During the whole summer Washington was writing to the governors of the neighboring colonies, entreating them to send him a little powder and lead. "No quantity," he said, "however small, is beneath notice." All this time the British, securely established in Boston, were receiving supplies of all kinds from England. Though they were three thousand miles away from home, they could get what they needed with more certainty than the colonists, who were fighting in their own country: of such importance is it in war to have the control of the sea. Washington himself saw this, and he determined to dispute the control with the enemy by sending out little vessels, just strong enough to attack the transports and storeships coming to Boston. So he despatched to the north shore, as it is called, to Beverly and Salem and Marblehead, two of his trusted officers, Colonel John Glover of Marblehead, and Stephen Moylan, the Muster-master-general of the army, to procure and fit out the vessels. Late in October the first two schooners got to sea, the "Lynch" and "Franklin," under Captain Broughton, who sailed for the Gulf of St. Lawrence to intercept ships bound for Quebec. Ten days later Moylan and Glover, by dint of hard work, got off two more of these diminutive [Pg 18] cruisers,—the "Lee," under Captain John Manley, and the "Warren," under Captain Adams of the New Hampshire troops. These were also schooners, and carried each four 4-pounders and ten swivels,—little guns throwing a half- pound bullet mounted on pivots on the gunwales, just as gatlings are mounted to-day. Each had fifty men, most of whom were drafted from the army; but there was hardly any ammunition to spare for them, and it went against the grain to give them twenty rounds for each gun, which was all they carried. At Plymouth, also, Washington had his small navy-yard, but it gave him more trouble than it was worth. The schooner "Harrison," under Captain Coit of Connecticut, was here, though she was old and weak; and a larger ship, the "Washington." The "Washington" was a fine brigantine, and she mounted ten carriage guns which had been brought by boats and wagons from Bristol. But her captain, Martindale, was too ambitious, and wished his ship to have all the equipments of a real man-of-war. The general and his aides, Reed and Moylan, who had the work in charge, were sorely tried by all this useless preparation, which delayed the vessel during the precious weeks of autumn, when she should have been at sea. "Shall we ever hear," wrote Moylan in the middle of November, "of Captain Martindale's departure?" For he knew that the captain's business was to seize the English stores, and to let ships-of-war alone. Coit's schooner, also, the "Harrison," was delayed in port, and the sailors were troublesome. "They are soured by the severity of the season," wrote the agent, "and are longing for the leeks and onions of Connecticut." By the third week in November the two ships got out; but the brigantine was presently captured by an enemy's frigate, which showed that the general's apprehensions had been right from the beginning. So the navy, especially the Plymouth fleet, was a source of much anxiety and discouragement to him during the month of November. But suddenly the tide turned, for on the 29th of that month the news came from Cape Ann that the "Lee" was in, and that Manley had captured the brigantine "Nancy," loaded with all kinds of military stores. We can fancy how the general must have felt as he read the invoice of her stores: two thousand muskets and bayonets, thirty-one tons of musket-shot, three thousand round shot for 12-pounders, eight thousand fuzes, one hundred and fifty carcasses,—great frames for combustibles to set buildings on fire,—a 13-inch mortar, two 6-pounders, and several barrels of powder, besides great quantities of other valuable stores. No wonder he sent Colonel Glover and Mr. Palfrey in hot haste to the Cape to raise the minute-men from all the neighboring towns and land the stores, and bring them under escort to headquarters! And the same day he wrote to the President of Congress to tell him of Manley's fine capture, and said: "I sincerely congratulate you, sir, on this great acquisition; it more than repays all that has been spent in fitting out the squadron." Manley was off to sea again in a day or two, and a week later he captured three more vessels, the cargoes of which were sold, some of them bringing a high price. For these services Manley was placed by Congress on the list of Continental captains, and put in command of a frigate. His schooner, the "Lee," was given to Captain Waters, who cruised in her for several months, capturing a number of transports with troops on board. The other vessels also took their share of prizes, even the leaky old "Harrison" bringing in a sloop and a schooner. Broughton's ships, the "Lynch" and the "Franklin," seized several vessels that were supposed to belong to Tories, but most of these were released. After their return the "Franklin" was given to James Mugford, a daring Marblehead captain. This was in the spring after the British had evacuated Boston, but ships laden with supplies were still coming to America. One of these, the "Hope," of six guns, fell in with Mugford near Boston, and he determined to attack her, though an English squadron was in sight not many miles away. He had just boarded her, when the English captain ordered his men to cut the topsail-halliards, so that the ship would be delayed until the squadron could come up. But Mugford roared out that any man who carried out the order would suffer instant death, and no one dared to move. The prize had fifteen hundred barrels of powder in her hold, and it was almost hopeless to try to get her into the harbor by the usual channel in the face of the enemy's fleet. But just then the "Lee" came up, and Captain Waters, who knew every shoal and winding passage in Boston harbor, told Mugford he would carry her in through Shirley Gut, a narrow channel where none of the English ships would dare to follow her. He made good his promise; for though the "Hope" did run ashore on Handkerchief Shoal, he got her off, and brought her with her precious cargo safely into Boston. [Pg 19] [Pg 20] [Pg 23] "HE SENT COLONEL GLOVER AND MR. PALFREY IN HOT HASTE TO RAISE THE MINUTE-MEN." Poor Mugford did not long survive his exploit; for, leaving port a few days later by this same Shirley Gut, he too grounded, and while he was lying hard and fast, the boats from the enemy's fleet put off to capture him. There were three times as many men as Mugford had on board the "Franklin;" but he gave them a warm reception with his muskets and such guns as he could bring to bear. They came alongside and prepared to board; but as soon as any of them put their hands upon the rail, the crew hacked them off with cutlasses. Mugford himself was in the hottest of it, and as he leaned over the gunwale a bullet struck him in the breast. He called his first lieutenant and said to him, "I am a dead man: do not give up the vessel; you will be able to beat them off." And so he died; but the enemy were driven back, with two of their boats lost, and the ship was saved. While General Washington was making his beginning of a Continental navy about Boston, aided by the Massachusetts people, the other colonies were working by themselves in the same direction. In Long Island Sound, on the Hudson River, in the Delaware and Chesapeake bays, and along the inlets of the southern coast, flotillas were fitted out to protect the towns and to prey upon the enemy's commerce. In October, 1775, the Continental Congress, which was then in session at Philadelphia, following the example of Washington, decided to have a navy for the general service of the colonies. With this early movement Stephen Hopkins, a delegate from Rhode Island, had much to do; for Narragansett Bay with its thriving farms and plantations offered a tempting prize to the British raiders, whom the little colony would find it hard to keep off. There were others, too, who took a deep interest in the project,—above all John Adams, and Silas Deane of Connecticut, and Robert Morris of Pennsylvania. Through their efforts a beginning was made by purchasing two brigs, the "Lexington" and "Providence." These were followed by two larger vessels, the "Alfred" and "Columbus," carrying each about twenty 9-pounders. Then two more brigs were bought, the "Andrew Doria" and the "Cabot," which like Washington's schooners carried only 4-pounders, though they had more of them. The "Lexington" went to sea alone, but the others were assembled at Philadelphia in December, ready to start out as the first Continental squadron. It was not an easy thing to select a commander for the new squadron, for there was hardly a man in the colonies who had seen any naval service. Young Nicholas Biddle, of Philadelphia, had been a midshipman in the Royal Navy, and had resigned his post to fight for his country; but he was thought to be too young, though he had seen more real service than his fellow officers. Finally, Hopkins's brother, Esek Hopkins, an old Rhode Island sea-captain who had been made a brigadier-general, was chosen to command the force. His son John was made captain of one of the ships, and his [Pg 24] [Pg 25] cousin Abraham Whipple of another, while Hazard, who was also a Rhode Islander, was assigned to the "Providence." Biddle, who, as it turned out, was the best of them all, was given the little brig "Doria." From an obscure place in Virginia, far away in the country, came a letter from a young Scotchman named Paul Jones, who had followed the sea from his boyhood but had finally settled in America, asking them that he might have a commission. Although no one knew much of him, he was offered one of the smaller brigs; but he preferred to go at first as a lieutenant, and he was placed on board the "Alfred," the commodore's flagship. The squadron was fitted out to cruise upon the southern coast; but it was frozen up for six weeks in Delaware Bay, and when it sailed in February, 1776, it made first for the Bahama Islands. It came to anchor off Abaco, the northernmost of the islands. Here the commodore learned that there was a fort, with many guns and a great quantity of powder, but defended only by a feeble garrison, at New Providence, on the Island of Nassau, the same place which afterward gained such fame during the Rebellion as the refuge of the blockade-runners. Commodore Hopkins resolved to attempt its capture, but advancing incautiously with his whole fleet, gave a timely warning to the inhabitants; and the governor, who till that moment had not dreamed of the near approach of an enemy, succeeded in getting his powder to a place of safety. The marines were landed and marched to the fort, which they captured with little difficulty. The guns were taken, as well as all the stores except the powder, and the governor was carried off a prisoner. The squadron had now accomplished such results that Hopkins thought it best to defer his operations on the southern coast, and made sail for home. He arrived safely in New London, meeting only one of the enemy's ships on the way, with which he had a battle; but neither side could claim the victory. The captured guns were sent off to the points where they were needed most, and Commodore Hopkins went to Philadelphia. But Congress was not very well satisfied with him, especially the Southern delegates, who had been promised protection for their shores. The old commodore, too, was fussy and impatient, and as he stayed on in Philadelphia, everybody began to grow tired of him; and finally Congress passed a resolution in which they announced to him, rather harshly perhaps, that they had no further use for his services. No doubt he had meant well; but he was too old to be the leader of the new Continental Navy, and this is the last we shall hear of him. Before the squadron started on its cruise Congress had undertaken more ambitious measures. Thirteen frigates were ordered to be built, and different places were selected where the work should be done, so that whatever part of the country the British might overrun, some of the new ships might be finished and sent out. Thus the "Raleigh" was built at Portsmouth, the "Hancock" and "Boston" in Massachusetts, the "Warren" and "Providence" in Rhode Island, the "Trumbull" in Connecticut, and the "Virginia" at Baltimore. Of the other six, two were begun at Poughkeepsie, on the Hudson, and four at Philadelphia; but the only one of the six that got to sea was the "Randolph," of Philadelphia, the others being destroyed at one time or another to prevent their falling into the hands of the enemy. More vessels were built later, and a few were bought in Europe; but among them all there were no line-of-battle ships, and even for frigates they were not very large or strong. But they were the best that the colonies could get; there was not money enough to build great fleets, and there were not guns enough to arm them. Few and small as they were, they performed their part, and no small part it was, in showing the King and the Parliament that the colonies were thoroughly in earnest in the struggle upon which they had entered, and that they would spare no labor, and would encounter any danger, in order to secure their independence. CHAPTER II. BIDDLE AND THE "RANDOLPH." There were two men in Hopkins's squadron who far excelled all the others in those qualities of energy, courage, and intelligence that are most required in a naval officer. These were Biddle, the captain of the "Andrew Doria," and Paul Jones, the lieutenant of the "Alfred." Jones was at this time twenty-eight years old; the son of a Scotch gardener, he was born and brought up on the shores of the Solway Frith. Across the Frith lay the prosperous seaport of Whitehaven; and the boy when twelve years old was apprenticed to a merchant of the place, who traded with America, and his first voyage had been to Virginia. At a later time he had served in a slaver; but leaving this distasteful occupation, he became the master of a ship in the West India trade, and finally had drifted to Virginia, where he had made his home two years before the outbreak of the war. After the squadron returned to New London, Jones was given command of the brig "Providence," and in August he set off on a cruise to the eastward. His ship was small, but she was smart and handy, and Jones was the man to make her do her best. Presently he fell in with two frigates of the enemy; but he got away from them after an exciting chase. A few days afterward, while his ship was hove to, and his crew were fishing, another English frigate came up,—the "Milford." Hastily calling his men to their stations, he started off to try his speed with the new-comer, for she was far too strong for him to attack or even to resist. He soon found that he could outsail her, which was just as good; and shortening sail, he allowed the "Milford" to come up a little. Then he started ahead again, and so continued backing and filling, just to tease her, as it were. The frigate turned and gave him a broadside which fell short, and which he answered in derision by ordering a marine to fire a musket. Finally he left the "Milford" and went on his way to the fishing settlements in the eastern provinces, capturing the enemy's merchantmen right and left, wherever he could find them. He raided the harbor [Pg 26] [Pg 27] [Pg 28] T [Pg 29] of Canso, to the great alarm of the inhabitants, and broke up the fishery. Then he crossed over to Île Madame, where he destroyed the shipping. By this time his ship was so loaded down with prisoners that he was obliged to put about for home, where he arrived safely in October, having been out six weeks and taken sixteen prizes. After a month in port Jones started on a second cruise. This time he took with him the "Providence" and also the "Alfred,"—the ship of which he had been first lieutenant on the expedition to Nassau. Another raid was made on Canso, and another batch of prizes was captured. One of these, the "Mellish," had a cargo of clothing which was intended for the enemy's troops, but which was needed even more by our own army, at this time just beginning its winter campaign. When he came home from this second cruise, Jones thought he had shown by what he had done that he deserved a better ship, and Congress thought so too; and after some little delay he was appointed to the new sloop- of-war "Ranger," which was building at Portsmouth, and in which during the following year he entered upon a new and larger field of operations. NICHOLAS BIDDLE. NICHOLAS BIDDLE. About the time that Jones took command of the "Providence," his companion in the squadron, Nicholas Biddle, was sent out in the brig "Doria" on a cruise to the Banks. Biddle was at this time twenty-five years old. He was born in Philadelphia, and had begun life as a sailor before the mast at the age of fourteen. On his second voyage he was wrecked in the West Indies, and narrowly escaped with his life. Afterward he went to London, and in 1770, when a war was threatened between Great Britain and Spain, he obtained an appointment as midshipman in the Royal Navy under Captain Stirling. War did not break out, however, and young Biddle joined the exploring expedition under Commodore Phipps, which sought to reach the North Pole by the way of Spitzbergen. On the same expedition was another youngster, by name Horatio Nelson, who was destined afterward to lead the English fleet to victory at the battles of the Nile and Trafalgar. After the return of Phipps's ships, Biddle left the navy and came home to take his part in the war that was now beginning. His first commission, from the Committee of Safety in Philadelphia, was signed by its president, Benjamin Franklin, and appointed him "Captain of the Provincial Armed Boat called the 'Franklin,' fitted out for the protection of the Province of Pennsylvania, and the Commerce of the River Delaware against all hostile enterprises, and for the defence of American Liberty." But when Congress formed its first squadron, under Commodore Hopkins, he was transferred to the Continental Navy. The "Doria," which Biddle commanded on the expedition to Nassau, and which he was now to take on her first independent cruise, carried an armament of fourteen 4-pounders, which, as I have said, were little better than popguns, and of course unfit for fighting with a ship-of-war. Her crew numbered one hundred men. On her way out, the "Doria" made three prizes. Off Newfoundland she captured two transports, with four hundred troops on board. Any ordinary man would have found it a difficult task to dispose of so many prizes and prisoners; but Biddle had served in the navy, and he knew what discipline meant. Manning the captured ships from his crew, he filled their places on board the "Doria" with prisoners, and started to return home. On the way back, six more vessels were taken. These were manned in the same way, by stripping the brig of her sailors and taking the best of the prisoners to do their work. Finally the "Doria" arrived at Philadelphia, with all her prisoners and with only five men left of her original crew. It would have been hard to find another man in the service, even if it [Pg 30] [Pg 31] [Pg 32] were Paul Jones himself, who could have kept in check such a ship's company as that. One of the prizes was wrecked, and another recaptured, but the rest got safely into port. Congress now began to realize that this young fellow of five-and-twenty was one of the very best officers in its employ; and indeed if he had been made at the start the commander-in-chief of our forces afloat, instead of an old weather- beaten merchant captain like Hopkins, his experience and skill and impetuous bravery would beyond a doubt have raised the navy to the highest point of excellence of which its scanty resources were capable. He was appointed to command the "Randolph," which had lately been launched at Philadelphia. She was one of the best of the new ships, but she had been hurriedly built,—too hurriedly, as was shown on her first cruise; for no sooner had Biddle got out of sight of land than a gale sprang up, and all her masts went by the board. To add to his difficulties, he discovered a mutinous spirit in his crew, several of whom were prisoners who had volunteered for the cruise. This was promptly checked, for the captain, as we have seen, was not a man to allow insubordination; and after rigging jury-masts he carried the ship safely into Charleston. Here she was refitted, and from here she again started on a cruise. She had been out only a few days when she captured the "True Briton," a ship of twenty guns, and three West Indiamen that formed her convoy. The captain of the "True Briton" had been looking for the "Randolph,"—at least so he said,—and as the latter approached him, he received her with a warm fire; but the "Randolph" only waited till she got within pistol-shot, when she fired a single gun, and the English captain incontinently struck his colors. Returning once more to Charleston with her prizes, the "Randolph" remained there for some time blockaded by the enemy's squadron. At last the State of South Carolina fitted out a force of vessels to raise the blockade and cruise with the "Randolph" under Biddle's command. Contrary winds and the want of a high tide detained them for some time in Rebellion Roads, and when they got over the bar the enemy had disappeared; so they set out in quest of adventures. The squadron had cruised for more than a month in the Atlantic with no incident worthy of note, when on the 7th of March, 1778, being then to the eastward of Barbadoes, at one o' clock in the afternoon a large ship was seen in the distance, gradually approaching. By three o'clock she had come near enough for Biddle to make out that she was a ship-of-the-line. Knowing that the stranger must be an Englishman,—she proved to be the "Yarmouth," of sixty-four guns,—and knowing too that the "Randolph," even with the support of the smaller ships, was no match for her powerful battery, he signalled to the fleet to make sail. All the ships obeyed except the "General Moultrie," which obstinately refused to leave her place, and remained hove to, giving no sign of moving. This blundering conduct of the "Moultrie's" captain left Biddle no choice but to abandon his consort or to remain and fight what seemed to be a hopeless battle. He boldly chose the latter course; and as the "Yarmouth" ranged up on his weather quarter, he hoisted the American flag and opened on her with a succession of furious broadsides, giving four to the enemy's one, and inflicting dangerous wounds upon her sails and rigging. A few minutes after the action began, Biddle received a shot in the thigh. As his people, alarmed, gathered around him, he raised himself up, telling them it was only a slight touch, and calling for a chair seated himself on the quarter-deck, where the surgeon came to dress his wound. Here he was vigorously directing the course of the battle, and in spite of the disparity between the two ships he was gradually getting the advantage, when suddenly, without a moment's warning, the magazine of the "Randolph" blew up, scattering spars, hull, guns, officers, and men in a mass of fragments over the waters. None ever knew how the accident happened. The other ships, seeing the disaster, made off as fast as they could; but the "Yarmouth" was too much disabled to follow them, and they made good their escape. Five days after the action the English ship, still cruising about the spot, came upon a floating piece of the "Randolph's" wreck, to which four of her crew were still clinging. They had been drifting in this way for four days with no sustenance except the rain-water which they had managed to collect. These were all the survivors of that fatal battle,—a battle which lost us not only a fine frigate, but, what was far worse, one of our best and most gallant officers. CHAPTER III. WAR ON THE ENEMY'S COAST. We have seen how the beginning of naval enterprise made by Washington in the summer of 1775 was taken up and borne along by the Continental Congress at Philadelphia, until little by little it had obtained a force at sea that was able to inflict serious loss upon the enemy. But a field for operations was now to be found in a new quarter; and happily for America, their direction was in the hands of its wisest and most far-sighted statesman. On the 7th of December, 1776, the United States brig-of-war "Reprisal" arrived at Nantes with Benjamin Franklin on board as a passenger, who had come over with a letter from Congress, naming him a commissioner to treat with France. The "Reprisal" was commanded by Capt. Lambert Wickes, a gallant naval officer who had been cruising during the summer before in the West Indies, where he had shown himself worthy of the people's trust. And indeed it was a heavy responsibility that rested with him on this voyage across the Atlantic; for had his ship with its passenger been captured, it is hard to say what troubles would have come upon the country, or how the Revolution would have held its own during the next five years. But Franklin was carried safely to his destination; and not only that, but two English brigs laden with cargoes of wine were captured by the "Reprisal" on the voyage and came [Pg 33] [Pg 34] [Pg 35] W [Pg 36] with her into port. It was in this way that Franklin's mind was turned to the benefits which his country might reap from ocean warfare,—above all, in the seas which English commerce most frequented,—and after he arrived in Paris he lost no time in putting in practice what he had learned. At this early period, although the King of France was indifferent, if not hostile, to the American cause, the ministers and people warmly favored it. The friendly feeling was strengthened by Franklin's coming, and his winning manners, simple and frank, but full of dignity, made him a favorite with all, both high and low. Persuaded thus by their own desires, and by Franklin's strong but gentle influence, they went just as far in their efforts to aid the Americans as they possibly could without declaring open war against England. Large sums of money were given; the departure of ships laden with arms and munitions of war was winked at; and when Lord Stormont, the English ambassador, complained of the admission of the "Reprisal" and her prizes into French ports, the Frenchmen gave evasive answers, and the vessels under one pretext or another were allowed to stay. Wickes even made a little roving cruise in the Bay of Biscay, from which he brought in as trophies three more prizes. To satisfy the English protests, he was forbidden to sell his prizes in the ports; but he took them just outside the harbor, where he held mock sales, and thus disposed of all of them. These little subterfuges were continued until the conclusion of the treaty, which came about in the following year. In the spring after Wickes arrived, the brig "Lexington" came out, under Captain Johnston. She was the first vessel that had been purchased by the Continental Congress, and she had already done good service on the American coast. Johnston had with him as lieutenant one of the best and bravest of the Revolutionary officers, Richard Dale. Dale was at this time twenty years of age. Eight years before he had first gone to sea from his home in Virginia, and already since the beginning of the war he had been twice a prisoner; but the strangest part of his career was yet to come. Franklin now thought it would be wise to join together the "Reprisal" and the "Lexington" and the little 10-gun cutter "Dolphin" in a squadron under the command of Wickes, who was to make a dash around the coast of Ireland and capture or destroy whatever he might find. The ships sailed from Nantes in June, and in August they came back successful from their perilous enterprise. They had captured fourteen prizes. Approaching the French coast on their return, they were discovered and chased by an English line-of-battle ship of seventy-four guns; but by separating they succeeded in making good their escape, though the "Reprisal" barely managed to get into port in time. This expedition made so great a commotion that the French Government found itself obliged to notice it, and ordered the ships to leave the territory. Accordingly they set sail on the voyage home; but unhappily the "Reprisal," upon reaching the Banks of Newfoundland, foundered in a gale, and only one of the crew was saved. The "Lexington," soon after starting, fell in with the English cutter "Alert" in the Bay of Biscay. Both ships fought gallantly for two hours; but at length the "Lexington," which was short of ammunition, had used up nearly all her powder and shot and made sail to get away from the enemy. The "Alert" had been badly cut up aloft in the fight; but she speedily bent new sails and in a short time overtook her antagonist. Captain Johnston held out as long as there was any hope, firing now and then a gun, and using every scrap of iron he could lay his hands on for a missile; but after he had fired his last charge of powder, and several of his officers had been killed, to prevent the useless slaughter he surrendered. The prisoners were carried off to Plymouth, where they were confined in the Mill Prison. Here the harsh treatment and sufferings they underwent soon prompted them to devise a means of escape. A hole was dug under the wall, the officers and men working upon it with their fingers whenever an opportunity offered, but making slow progress, as they could only hide the dirt from the excavation by carrying it in their pockets when they went out for exercise, and scattering it when the sentry's back was turned. Finally one night, when all was ready, they passed out through the opening and escaped into the country. But their troubles had only just begun. The hue and cry was raised, and parties were sent in pursuit of the fugitives. Separating into twos and threes, they were barely able to elude pursuit. One night Dale was concealed under the hay in a barn, when the officers entered it in search of him. At last he reached London and took passage in a vessel bound to Dunkirk; but before she had left the Thames she was visited by a press-gang, and poor Dale was seized, and when they found out who he was, sent back to prison. The captain, though, got safely off. This was now the fourth time that Dale had been a prisoner. To punish him for trying to escape, he was thrown into the black hole—a dungeon that was only used for the worst offenders—and treated with the utmost rigor. After a time he was put on his old footing as a prisoner of war; but he was a reckless youth, and having roused the wrath of the jailers by singing what they called "rebellious songs," he served another term in the black hole. At length by some means, which to his dying day he never would disclose, he obtained the uniform of a British officer, and in this disguise he walked through the gates in plain sight of the sentinel. Rendered more cautious by what had befallen him after his first escape, he laid his plans with care, and at last succeeded in reaching France, after a year and a half of captivity. He came in good time; for it was just as he arrived that Paul Jones was setting out on his great cruise in the "Bon Homme Richard," and Dale was made his first lieutenant. Here we shall leave him for the present. About the time that the "Lexington" had come out from America, in the spring of 1777, the commissioners at Paris, finding that they could not get more ships in France, because the English made so great an outcry, bethought themselves that they would send a trusty agent across the channel to Dover, to see what he could get there. In this way they purchased secretly a swift English cutter, the "Surprise," and they appointed to command her Gustavus Conyngham, a bold and adventurous officer. He started on a cruise in May from Dunkirk, and in a few days returned with two of the enemy's brigs,—one of them a mail-packet which he had captured off the coast of Holland. The English ambassador [Pg 37] [Pg 38] [Pg 39] [Pg 40] again protested, and the French Government told Franklin that, though much against its will, it would be compelled to restore the prizes. It even went so far as to imprison Conyngham and his crew; but this was only a make-believe, for they were shortly afterward released. HE TOUCHED AT A SMALL TOWN IN IRELAND FOR SUPPLIES. Unmoved by this event, Franklin immediately procured another cutter, the "Revenge," and giving Conyngham a new commission, he sent him off from Dunkirk in charge of her. The second cruise was even more successful than the first. Conyngham roved about with his little ship as he pleased, keeping carefully away from the enemy's cruisers, which vainly sought to catch him, and capturing prizes on all sides. These he destroyed, or sometimes when he saw his chance sent into seaports on the Continent. Once during his cruise, being hard pushed for supplies, he touched at a small town in Ireland and bought them. At another time when off the English coast, finding his vessel unseaworthy and needing some repair, he took her into one of the smaller ports and refitted there, with the help of the inhabitants, without being discovered. Finally, when so many ships were sent out in pursuit of him that his cruising-ground became too hot, he made for Ferrol, in Spain, and after staying there awhile carried his ship safely to America. The cruises of Wickes and of Conyngham, with their tiny craft, were the beginning of the great work that was to be taken up on a larger scale in the next two years by Paul Jones. The enterprise and hardihood of these bold captains, who carried the war, as it were, to the very threshold of the enemy's country, were not without results both in England and on the Continent. They showed foreign nations that the rebels in America were making war in truest earnest, and that they would leave no honorable means unused to help them in asserting independence. In England they spread alarm among the merchants, and the insurers of English ships demanded double rates; while London traders, rather than run the risk of losing their goods by shipping them in their own vessels, were induced to employ their foreign rivals to carry cargoes for them,—a thing which before this time had been almost unheard of. CHAPTER IV. PAUL JONES'S CRUISES. Sometime in the summer of 1777 Paul Jones was ordered to command the sloop-of-war "Ranger," at that time nearly completed at Portsmouth. The officers were detailed for their ships by resolution of Congress; and the same resolution that gave Jones his command, on the 14th day of June, is memorable as the first adoption of the flag of thirteen stars and stripes which was carried by Jones's ship, and which ever since has been the national emblem. The young captain had hard work before him to get his ship ready for sea; but at last everything was in order, and on the 1st of November he set sail for France. He had laid down for himself a clear plan of action. He knew that England's navy was too powerful to be met on the sea, but that all along the English coast were unpro...