CHAPTER XII.
During the month of April, 1813, four American frigates lay in Boston Harbor fitting for sea. The “President” and “Congress” returned to that port Dec. 31, 1812. The “Constitution,” after her battle with the “Java,” arrived at Boston February 27, 1813. The “Chesapeake” entered in safety April 9, after an unprofitable cruise of four months. The presence of these four frigates at Boston offered a chance for great distinction to the British officer stationed off the port, and one of the best captains in the service was there to seize it. In order to tempt the American frigates to come out boldly, only two British frigates, the “Shannon” and “Tenedos,” remained off the harbor. They were commanded by Captain P. B. V. Broke of the “Shannon.” Broke expected Rodgers with his ships, the “President” and “Congress,” to seize the opportunity for a battle with two ships of no greater force than the “Shannon” and “Tenedos;” but either Rodgers did not understand the challenge or did not trust it, or took a different view of his duties, for he went to sea on the night of April 30, leaving Broke greatly chagrined and inclined to be somewhat indignant with him for escaping.[400]
After May 1, Broke on the watch outside, as he ran in toward Nahant, could see the masts of only the “Constitution” and “Chesapeake” at the Charlestown navy-yard, and his anxiety became the greater as he noticed that the “Chesapeake” was apparently ready for sea.[401] May 25 Broke sent away his consort, the “Tenedos,” to cruise from Cape Sable southward, ostensibly because the two frigates cruising separately would have a better chance of intercepting the “Chesapeake” than if they kept together.[402] His stronger reason was to leave a fair field for the “Chesapeake” and “Shannon,” as he had before kept all force at a distance except the “Shannon” and “Tenedos” in order to tempt Rodgers to fight.[403] That there might be no second misunderstanding, he sent several messages to Captain Lawrence commanding the “Chesapeake,” inviting a combat.
Nothing showed so clearly that at least one object of the war had been gained by the Americans as the habit adopted by both navies in 1813 of challenging ship-duels. War took an unusual character when officers like Hardy and Broke countenanced such a practice, discussing and arranging duels between matched ships, on terms which implied that England admitted half-a-dozen American frigates to be equal in value to the whole British navy. The loss of a British frigate mattered little to a government which had more than a hundred such frigates actually at sea, not to speak of heavier ships; but the loss of the “Chesapeake” was equivalent to destroying nearly one fourth of the disposable American navy. Already the “Constellation” was imprisoned at Norfolk; the “United States” and “Macedonian” were blockaded for the war; the “Congress” though at sea was unseaworthy and never cruised again; the “Adams” was shut in the Potomac; the “Essex” was in the Pacific. The United States Navy consisted, for active service on the Atlantic, of only the “President,” 44, at sea; the “Constitution,” 44, replacing her masts at the Charlestown navy-yard; the “Chesapeake,” 38, ready for sea; and a few sloops-of-war. Under such circumstances, British officers who like Broke considered every American frigate bound to offer them equal terms in a duel, seemed to admit that the American service had acquired the credit it claimed.
The first duty of a British officer was to take risks; the first duty of an American officer was to avoid them, and to fight only at his own time, on his own terms. Rodgers properly declined to seek a battle with Broke’s ships. Captain James Lawrence of the “Chesapeake” was less cautious, for his experience in the war led him to think worse of the British navy than it deserved. Lawrence commanded the “Hornet” in Bainbridge’s squadron at the time of the “Java’s” capture. Bainbridge and Lawrence blockaded the “Bonne Citoyenne,” a twenty-gun sloop-of-war at San Salvador in Brazil. Lawrence sent a message to the captain of the “Bonne Citoyenne” inviting him to come out and meet the “Hornet.” The British captain declined, doubtless for proper reasons; but the reason he gave seemed to Lawrence insufficient, for it was merely that Commodore Bainbridge, in spite of his pledged word, might interfere.[404] Bainbridge sailed about Christmas, and was absent till January 3, capturing the “Java” in the interval. January 6 he sailed for Boston, leaving Lawrence in the “Hornet” still blockading the “Bonne Citoyenne,” which showed no more disposition to fight the “Hornet” in Bainbridge’s absence than before, although the British captain’s letter had said that “nothing could give me greater satisfaction than complying with the wishes of Captain Lawrence” if the single alleged objection were removed.
The conduct of the “Bonne Citoyenne”—a vessel at least the equal of the “Hornet”[405]—gave Lawrence a low opinion of the British service, and his respect was not increased by his next experience. A British seventy-four arrived at San Salvador, January 24, and obliged the “Hornet” to abandon the “Bonne Citoyenne.” During the next month the little vessel cruised northward along the Brazil coast, making a few prizes, until February 24 off the mouth of Demerara River, at half-past three o’clock in the afternoon, Captain Lawrence discovered a sail approaching him. Within the bar at the mouth of the river, seven or eight miles distant, he saw another vessel at anchor. Both were British sloops-of-war. The one at anchor was the “Espiègle,” carrying eighteen thirty-two-pound carronades. The other, approaching on the “Hornet’s” weather-quarter, was the “Peacock,” carrying eighteen twenty-four-pound carronades, two long-sixes, and one or two lighter pieces.
The “Peacock,” according to British report,[406] had long been “the admiration of her numerous visitors,” and was remarkable for the elegance of her fittings; but in size she was inferior to the “Hornet.” Lawrence reported his ship to be four feet the longer, but the British believed the “Hornet” to measure one hundred and twelve feet in length, while the “Peacock” measured one hundred.[407] Their breadth was the same. The “Hornet” carried eighteen thirty-two-pounders, while the British captain, thinking his sloop too light for thirty-twos, had exchanged them for twenty-fours, and carried only sixteen. The American crew numbered one hundred and thirty-five men fit for duty; the British numbered one hundred and twenty-two men and boys.
At ten minutes past five, Lawrence tacked and stood for the brig. Fifteen minutes afterward the two vessels, sailing in opposite directions, passed each other and exchanged broadsides within a stone’s-throw. The British fire, even at point-blank range of forty or fifty feet, did no harm, while the “Hornet’s” broadside must have decided the battle; for although both vessels instantly wore, and Lawrence at thirty-five minutes past five ran his enemy close aboard, the “Peacock” almost immediately struck at thirty-nine minutes past five in a sinking condition, and actually went down immediately afterward, carrying with her nine of the “Peacock’s” wounded and three of the “Hornet’s” crew.
The ease of this victory was beyond proportion to the odds. The British captain and four men were killed outright, thirty-three officers and men were wounded, and the brig was sunk in an action of less than fifteen minutes; while the “Hornet” lost one man killed and two wounded, all aloft, and not a shot penetrated her hull. If the facility of this triumph satisfied Lawrence of his easy superiority in battle, the conduct of the “Espiègle” convinced him that the British service was worse than incompetent. Lawrence, expecting every moment to see the “Espiègle” get under weigh, made great exertions to put his ship in readiness for a new battle, but to his astonishment the British brig took no notice of the action.[408] Subsequent investigation showed that the “Espiègle” knew nothing of the battle until the next day; but Lawrence, assuming that the British captain must have seen or heard, or at least ought to have suspected what was happening, conceived that cowardice was a trait of the British navy.
When Lawrence reached New York he became famous for his victory, and received at once promotion. The “Hornet,” given to Captain Biddle, was attached to Decatur’s squadron and blockaded at New London, while Lawrence received command of the “Chesapeake.” Lawrence was then thirty-two years old; he was born in New Jersey in 1781, entered the navy in 1798, and served in the war with Tripoli. He was first lieutenant on the “Constitution,” and passed to the grade of commander in 1810, commanding successively the “Vixen,” the “Wasp,” the “Argus,” and the “Hornet.” His appointment to the “Chesapeake” was an accident, owing to the ill health of Captain Evans, who commanded her on her recent cruise. The “Chesapeake’s” reputation for ill luck clung to her so persistently that neither officers nor men cared greatly to sail in her, and Lawrence would have preferred to remain in the “Hornet;”[409] but his instructions were positive, and he took command of the “Chesapeake” about the middle of May. Most of the officers and crew were new. The old crew on reaching port, April 9, had been discharged, and left the ship, dissatisfied with their share of prize-money, and preferring to try the privateer service. The new crew was unequal in quality and required training; they neither knew their officers nor each other.
Lawrence’s opponent, Captain Broke of the “Shannon,” was an officer whose courage could as little be questioned as his energy or skill. Among all the commanders in the British service Broke had profited most by the lessons of the war. More than seven years’ experience of his ship and crew gave him every advantage of discipline and system. Nearly every day the officers at the Charlestown navy-yard could see the “Shannon” outside, practising her guns at floating targets as she sailed about the bay. Broke’s most anxious wish was to fight the “Chesapeake,” which he considered to be of the same size with the “Shannon.”[410] The two frigates were the same length within a few inches,—between one hundred and fifty, and one hundred and fifty-one feet. Their breadth was forty feet within a few inches. The “Chesapeake” carried eighteen thirty-two-pound carronades on the spar-deck; the “Shannon” carried sixteen. Each carried twenty-eight long eighteen-pounders on the gun-deck. The “Chesapeake” carried also two long twelve-pounders and a long eighteen-pounder, besides a twelve-pound carronade. The “Shannon” carried four long nine-pounders, a long six-pounder, and three twelve-pound carronades. The “Chesapeake’s” only decided advantage was in the number of her crew, which consisted of three hundred and seventy-nine men, while the “Shannon” carried three hundred and thirty all told.
Broke sent the “Tenedos” away May 25, but Lawrence was not aware of it, and wrote, May 27, to Captain Biddle of the “Hornet” a letter, showing that till the last moment he hoped not to sail in the “Chesapeake:”[411]—
“In hopes of being relieved by Captain Stewart, I neglected writing to you according to promise; but as I have given over all hopes of seeing him, and the ‘Chesapeake’ is almost ready, I shall sail on Sunday, provided I have a chance of getting out clear of the ‘Shannon’ and ‘Tenedos,’ who are on the look-out.”
Sunday, May 30, the ship was ready, though the crew was not as good or as well disciplined as it should have been, and showed some discontent owing to difficulties about prize-money. On the morning of June 1 the frigate was lying in President’s Roads, when between eight and nine o’clock the second lieutenant, George Budd, reported a sail in sight. Captain Lawrence went up the main rigging, and having made out the sail to be a large frigate, ordered the crew to be mustered, and told them he meant to fight. At midday he stood down the harbor and out to sea. The “Shannon,” outside, stood off under easy sail, and led the way until five o’clock, when she luffed and waited till the “Chesapeake” came up. As the wind was westerly, Lawrence had the choice of position, but he made no attempt to profit by his advantage, although it might have been decisive. Bringing the “Chesapeake” with a fresh breeze directly down on the “Shannon’s” quarter, at half-past five he luffed, at about fifty yards distance, and ranged up abeam on the “Shannon’s” starboard side.
The “Shannon” opened fire as her guns began to bear, but discharged only her two sternmost guns when the “Chesapeake” replied. The two ships ran on about seven minutes, or about the length of time necessary for two discharges of the first guns fired, when, some of the “Shannon’s” shot having cut away the “Chesapeake’s” foretopsail tie and jib-sheet, the ship came up into the wind and was taken aback. Lying with her larboard quarter toward the “Shannon’s” side, at some forty or fifty yards distance, she began to drift toward her enemy. None of the “Chesapeake’s” guns then bore on the “Shannon,” and the American frigate wholly ceased firing.
From the moment the “Chesapeake” was taken aback she was a beaten ship, and the crew felt it. She could be saved only by giving her headway, or by boarding the “Shannon;” but neither expedient was possible. The effort to make sail forward was tried, and proved futile. The idea of boarding was also in Lawrence’s mind, but the situation made it impracticable. As the “Chesapeake” drifted stern-foremost toward the “Shannon,” every gun in the British broadside swept the American deck diagonally from stern to stem, clearing the quarter-deck and beating in the stern-ports, while the musketry from the “Shannon’s” tops killed the men at the “Chesapeake’s” wheel, and picked off every officer, sailor, or marine in the after-part of the ship. Boarders could not be rallied under a fire which obliged them to seek cover. The men on the spar-deck left their stations, crowding forward or going below.
Chesapeake
Shannon
Nevertheless, Lawrence ordered up his boarders,—he could do nothing else; but the affair hurried with such rapidity to its close that almost at the same instant the “Chesapeake’s” quarter touched the “Shannon” amidships. From the moment when the “Chesapeake” was taken aback until the moment when she fell foul, only four minutes were given for Lawrence to act. Before these four minutes were at an end, he was struck and mortally wounded by a musket-ball from the “Shannon.” His first lieutenant, Ludlow, had already been carried below, wounded. His second lieutenant, Budd, was stationed below. His third lieutenant, Cox, improperly assisted Lawrence to reach the gun-deck. Not an officer remained on the spar-deck, and neither an officer nor a living man was on the quarter-deck when the “Chesapeake’s” quarter came against the “Shannon’s” gangway, as though inviting the British captain to take possession.
As the ships fouled, Broke ran forward and called for boarders. With about twenty men he stepped on the “Chesapeake’s” quarter-deck, and was followed by thirty more before the ships parted. The error should have cost him his life and the lives of all who were with him, for the Americans might easily have killed every man of the boarding-party in spite of the fire from the “Shannon.” For several moments Broke was in the utmost peril, not only from the American crew but from his own. His first lieutenant, Watt, hastening to haul down the American ensign, was killed by the discharge of a cannon from the “Shannon;” and when Broke, leaving the “Chesapeake’s” quarter-deck, went forward to clear the forecastle, enough of the American crew were there to make a sharp resistance. Broke himself was obliged to take part in the scuffle. According to his report, he “received a severe sabre-wound at the first onset, whilst charging a part of the enemy who had rallied on their forecastle.” According to another British account he was first knocked down with the butt-end of a musket, and then was cut by a broadsword. Of his fifty boarders, not less than thirty-seven were killed or wounded.[412]
Had the American crew been in a proper state of discipline, the struggle would have taken an extraordinary character, and the two ships might have renewed the combat, without officers, and in a more or less unmanageable condition. Fortunately for Broke, his fifty men outnumbered the Americans on the spar-deck, while the men below, for the most part, would not come up. About a score of sailors and marines were on the forecastle, and about a dozen more rushed up from below, led by the second lieutenant, George Budd, as soon as he, at his station on the main-deck, learned what was happening above; but so rapidly did the whole affair pass, that in two minutes the scuffle was over, the Americans were killed or thrown down the hatchway, and the ship was helpless, with its spar-deck in the hands of Broke’s boarders. The guns ceased firing, and the crew below surrendered after some musket-shots up and down the hatchways.
The disgrace to the Americans did not consist so much in the loss of a ship to one of equal force, as in the shame of suffering capture by a boarding-party of fifty men. As Lawrence lay wounded in the cockpit, he saw the rush of his men from the spar-deck down the after-ladders, and cried out repeatedly and loudly, “Don’t give up the ship! blow her up!” He was said to have added afterward: “I could have stood the wreck if it had not been for the boarding.”
Doubtless the “Shannon” was the better ship, and deserved to win. Her crew could under no circumstances have behaved like the crew of the “Chesapeake.” In discipline she was admittedly superior; but the question of superiority in other respects was not decided. The accident that cut the “Chesapeake’s” jib-sheet and brought her into the wind was the only decisive part of the battle, and was mere ill luck, such as pursued the “Chesapeake” from the beginning. As far as could be seen, in the favorite American work of gunnery the “Shannon” showed no superiority.
On that point the reports agreed. The action began at half-past five o’clock in the afternoon at close range. In seven minutes the “Chesapeake” forged ahead, came into the wind and ceased firing, as none of her guns could be made to bear. Seven minutes allowed time at the utmost for two discharges of some of her guns. No more guns were fired from the “Chesapeake” till she drifted close to the “Shannon.” Then her two sternmost guns, the thirteenth and fourteenth on the main deck, again bore on the enemy, and were depressed and fired by Lieutenant Cox while the boarders were fighting on the spar-deck.[413] Thus the number of discharges from the “Chesapeake’s” guns could be known within reasonable certainty. She carried in her broadside nine thirty-two-pounders and fourteen or fifteen eighteen-pounders, besides one twelve-pounder,—twenty-five guns. Assuming them to have been all discharged twice, although the forward guns could scarcely have been discharged more than once, the “Chesapeake” could have fired only fifty-two shot, including the two eighteen-pounders fired by Lieutenant Cox at the close.
According to the official report nearly every shot must have taken effect. The “Shannon” was struck by thirteen thirty-two-pound shot; the “Chesapeake” fired only eighteen, if she discharged every gun twice. The “Shannon” was struck by twelve eighteen-pound shot, fourteen bar-shot, and one hundred and nineteen grape-shot; the “Chesapeake’s” fifteen eighteen-pounders could hardly have done more in the space of seven minutes. In truth, every shot that was fired probably took effect.
The casualties showed equal efficiency of fire, and when compared with other battles were severe. When the “Guerriere” struck to the “Constitution” in the previous year, she had lost in half an hour of close action twenty-three killed or mortally wounded and fifty-six more or less injured. The “Shannon” seems to have lost in eleven minutes, before boarding, twenty-seven men killed or mortally wounded and nineteen more or less injured.[414]
The relative efficiency of the “Shannon’s” gunnery was not so clear, because the “Shannon’s” battery continued to fire after the “Chesapeake” ceased. As the “Chesapeake” drifted down on the “Shannon” she was exposed to the broadside of the British frigate, while herself unable to fire a gun.
“The shot from the ‘Shannon’s’ aftermost guns now had a fair range along the ‘Chesapeake’s’ decks,” said the British account,[415] “beating in the stern-ports and sweeping the men from their quarters. The shots from the foremost guns at the same time entering the ports from the mainmast aft did considerable execution.”
Broke’s biographer[416] said that the “Chesapeake” fired but one broadside, and then coming into the wind drifted down, “exposed while making this crippled and helpless movement to the ‘Shannon’s’ second and most deliberate broadside.” The “Chesapeake” was very near, almost touching the British frigate during the four or five minutes of this fire, and every shot must have taken effect. Broke ordered the firing to cease when he boarded, but one gun was afterward discharged, and killed the British first lieutenant as he was lowering the American flag on the “Chesapeake’s” quarter-deck.
The “Shannon’s” fire lasted eleven or twelve minutes. She carried twenty-five guns in broadside.[417] Eight of these were thirty-two-pound carronades, and the official report showed that the “Chesapeake” was struck by twenty-five thirty-two-pound shot, showing that three full broadsides were fired from the “Shannon,” and at least one gun was discharged four times. The “Shannon’s” broadside also carried fourteen eighteen-pounders, which threw twenty-nine shot into the “Chesapeake,” besides much canister and grape. Considering that at least half the “Shannon’s” shot were fired at so close a range that they could not fail to take effect, nothing proved that her guns were better served than those of the “Chesapeake.” The “Shannon,” according to the British account, fired twice as many shot under twice as favorable conditions, but the injury she inflicted was not twice the injury inflicted in return. Setting aside the grape-shot, the “Chesapeake” struck the “Shannon” thirty-nine times; the “Shannon” struck the “Chesapeake” fifty-seven times. Including the grape-shot, which Broke used freely, the “Shannon” probably did better, but even with a liberal allowance for grape and canister, nothing proved her superiority at the guns.
The loss in men corresponded with the injury to the ships. The “Shannon” lost eighty-three killed and wounded; the “Chesapeake” lost one hundred and forty-six. Thirty-three of the “Shannon’s” men were killed or died of their wounds; sixty-one of the “Chesapeake’s” number were killed or mortally wounded.
The injuries suffered by the “Chesapeake” told the same story, for they were chiefly in the stern, and were inflicted by the “Shannon’s” second and third broadsides, after the “Chesapeake” ceased firing. The “Chesapeake’s” bowsprit received no injury, and not a spar of any kind was shot away. The “Shannon” carried her prize into Halifax with all its masts standing, and without anxiety for its safety.
The news of Broke’s victory was received in England and by the British navy with an outburst of pleasure that proved the smart of the wound inflicted by Hull, Decatur, and Bainbridge. The two official expressions of Broke’s naval and civil superiors probably reflected the unexaggerated emotion of the service.
“At this critical moment,” wrote Admiral Warren[418] by a curious coincidence the day before his own somewhat less creditable defeat at Craney Island, “you could not have restored to the British naval service the pre-eminence it has always preserved, or contradicted in a more forcible manner the foul aspersions and calumnies of a conceited, boasting enemy, than by the brilliant act you have performed.”
A few days later he wrote again:[419]—
“The relation of such an event restores the history of ancient times, and will do more good to the service than it is possible to conceive.”
In Parliament, July 8, John Wilson Croker said:[420]
“The action which he [Broke] fought with the ‘Chesapeake’ was in every respect unexampled. It was not—and he knew it was a bold assertion which he made—to be surpassed by any engagement which graced the naval annals of Great Britain.”
The Government made Broke a baronet, but gave him few other rewards, and his wound was too serious to permit future hard service. Lawrence died June 5, before the ships reached Halifax. His first lieutenant, Ludlow, also died. Their bodies were brought to New York and buried September 16, with formal services at Trinity Church.
By the Americans the defeat was received at first with incredulity and boundless anxiety, followed by extreme discouragement. The news came at a dark moment, when every hope had been disappointed and the outlook was gloomy beyond all that had been thought possible.
“I remember,” wrote Richard Rush in later life,—“what American does not!—the first rumor of it. I remember the startling sensation. I remember at first the universal incredulity. I remember how the post-offices were thronged for successive days by anxious thousands; how collections of citizens rode out for miles on the highway, accosting the mail to catch something by anticipation. At last, when the certainty was known, I remember the public gloom; funeral orations and badges of mourning bespoke it. ‘Don’t give up the ship!’—the dying words of Lawrence—were on every tongue.”
Six weeks afterward another American naval captain lost another American vessel-of-war by reason of the same over-confidence which caused Lawrence’s mistakes, and in a manner equally discreditable to the crew. The “Argus” was a small brig, built in 1803, rating sixteen guns. In the summer of 1813 she was commanded by Captain W. H. Allen, of Rhode Island, who had been third officer to Barron when he was attacked in the “Chesapeake” by the “Leopard.” Allen was the officer who snatched a coal from the galley and discharged the only gun that was fired that day. On leaving the “Chesapeake,” Allen was promoted to be first officer in the “United States.” To his exertions in training the men to the guns, Decatur attributed his superiority in gunnery over the “Macedonian.” To him fell one of the most distinguished honors that ever came to the share of an American naval officer,—that of successfully bringing the “Macedonian” to port. Promoted to the rank of captain, he was put in command of the “Argus,” and ordered to take William Henry Crawford to his post as Minister to France.
On that errand the “Argus” sailed, June 18, and after safely landing Crawford, July 11, at Lorient in Brittany, Captain Allen put to sea again, three days afterward, and in pursuance of his instructions cruised off the mouth of the British Channel. During an entire month he remained between the coast of Brittany and the coast of Ireland, destroying a score of vessels and creating a panic among the ship-owners and underwriters of London. Allen performed his task with as much forbearance as the duty permitted, making no attempt to save his prizes for the sake of prize-money, and permitting all passengers to take what they claimed as their own without inspection or restraint. The English whose property he destroyed spoke of him without personal ill-feeling.
The anxiety and labor of such a service falling on a brig of three hundred tons and a crew of a hundred men, and the impunity with which he defied danger, seemed to make Allen reckless. On the night of August 13 he captured a brig laden with wine from Oporto. Within sight of the Welsh coast and within easy reach of Milford Haven, he burned his prize, not before part of his crew got drunk on the wine. The British brig “Pelican,” then cruising in search of the “Argus,” guided by the light of the burning prize, at five o’clock on the morning of August 14 came down on the American brig; and Captain Allen, who had often declared that he would run from no two-masted vessel, waited for his enemy.
According to British measurements, the “Argus” was ninety-five and one-half feet long; the “Pelican,” one hundred. The “Argus” was twenty-seven feet, seven and five-eighths inches in extreme breadth; the “Pelican” was thirty feet, nine inches. The “Argus” carried eighteen twenty-four-pound carronades, and two long twelve-pounders; the “Pelican” carried sixteen thirty-two-pound carronades, four long six-pounders, and a twelve-pound carronade. The number of the “Argus’s” crew was disputed. According to British authority, it was one hundred and twenty-seven,[421] while the “Pelican” carried one hundred and sixteen men and boys.[422]
At six o’clock in the morning, according to American reckoning,[423]—at half-past five according to the British report,—the “Argus” wore, and fired a broadside within grape-distance, which was returned with cannon and musketry. Within five minutes Captain Allen was struck by a shot which carried away his left leg, mortally wounding him; and five minutes afterward the first lieutenant was wounded on the head by a grape-shot. Although the second lieutenant fought the brig well, the guns were surprisingly inefficient. During the first fifteen minutes the “Argus” had the advantage of position, and at eighteen minutes after six raked the “Pelican” at close range, but inflicted no great injury on the enemy’s hull or rigging, and killed at the utmost but one man, wounding only five. According to an English account,[424] “the ‘Argus’ fought well while the cannonading continued, but her guns were not levelled with precision, and many shots passed through the ‘Pelican’s’ royals.” The “Pelican,” at the end of twenty-five minutes, succeeded in cutting up her opponent’s rigging so that the “Argus” lay helpless under her guns. The “Pelican” then took a position on her enemy’s starboard quarter, and raked her with eight thirty-two-pound carronades for nearly twenty minutes at close range, without receiving a shot in return except from musketry. According to the report of the British captain, the action “was kept up with great spirit on both sides forty-three minutes, when we lay her alongside, and were in the act of boarding when she struck her colors.”[425]
The “Argus” repeated the story of the “Chesapeake,” except that the action lasted three quarters of an hour instead of fifteen minutes. During that time, the “Pelican” should have fired all her broadside eight or ten times into the “Argus” at a range so close that no shot should have missed. Sixty thirty-two-pound shot fired into a small brig less than one hundred feet long should have shivered it to atoms. Nine thirty-two-pound shot from the “Hornet” seemed to reduce the “Peacock” to a sinking condition in fifteen minutes; yet the “Argus” was neither sunk nor dismasted. The British account of her condition after the battle showed no more injury than was suffered by the “Peacock,” even in killed and wounded, by one or at the utmost two broadsides of the “Hornet.”
“The ‘Argus’ was tolerably cut up in her hull. Both her lower masts were wounded, although not badly, and her fore-shrouds on one side nearly all destroyed; but like the ‘Chesapeake,’ the ‘Argus’ had no spar shot away. Of her carronades several were disabled. She lost in the action six seamen killed; her commander, two midshipmen, the carpenter, and three seamen mortally, her first lieutenant and five seamen severely, and eight others slightly wounded,—total twenty-four; chiefly, if not wholly by the cannon-shot of the ‘Pelican.’”[426]
The “Pelican” lost seven men killed or wounded, chiefly by musketry. On both sides the battle showed little skill with the guns; but perhaps the “Pelican,” considering her undisputed superiority during half the combat, showed even less than the “Argus.” As in the “Chesapeake’s” battle, the discredit of the defeated ship lay in surrender to boarders.
Two such defeats were calculated to shake confidence in the American navy. That Allen should have been beaten in gunnery was the more strange, because his training with the guns gave him his chief credit with Decatur. Watson, the second lieutenant of the “Argus,” attributed the defeat to the fatigue of his crew. Whatever was the immediate cause, no one could doubt that both the “Chesapeake” and “Argus” were sacrificed to the over-confidence of their commanders.