The American Navy

by French Ensor Chadwick

During 1799 we had twenty-eight vessels in active service. Most of the captains and many of the officers of lesser rank were men who had seen service during the Revolution, which, it must be remembered, had ended but sixteen years before; many of them of course were men with no experience of naval life, which differs from that of the merchant service much as does that of the raw militiaman from that of the seasoned soldier.

There was a squadron of ten ships under Commodore Barry, with his broad-pennant in the United States; a second of five under Captain Truxton in the Constellation; and a third of three under Captain Tingey. A number of French privateers were captured by each, but on February 8, 1799, the Constellation sighted near the island of Nevis the French frigate L’Insurgente, of forty 12-pounders and 409 men, which, after a hot action of an hour, surrendered. The Constellation carried 38 guns, those on her main deck being 24-pounders, and a crew of only 309. She was, however, distinctly superior in weight of gunfire. Among her midshipmen was David Porter of future fame, who was to be the father of an even more famous son. The Insurgente was carried into St. Kitts under very difficult circumstances by Lieutenant Rodgers, later one of the navy’s worthies, and the progenitor of a famous family with now its sixth successive generation in the naval service.

It was now, in 1799, that Preble, promoted to be a captain and in command of the Essex, 32, carried the first American man-of-war east of the Cape of Good Hope. By the beginning of 1800 France was disposed to peace, and on November 3d the United States sailed with the American envoys.

The victory of the Constellation had warmed the American blood, and Congress in 1800 appropriated $2,482,593.90 for the naval service. This strictly naval war had now lasted a year and a half, and during 1800 we had thirty-five ships in the West Indies. Again the Constellation, and under the same captain, was the lucky ship. On February 1, 1800, she sighted off Guadaloupe a French frigate, La Vengeance, of 52 guns, which, deep with valuables which she was transporting to France, tried to avoid action. This, however, after a chase extending into the evening of the next day, was brought on, and lasted until 1:00 A.M. of the 3d, when the French frigate hauled by the wind. In the endeavor to follow, the Constellation’s mainmast, every shroud of which had been shot away, went by the board despite the efforts to repair damages, carrying with it midshipman Jarvis and the topmen aloft, all but one of whom were lost. The Constellation had fourteen men killed and twenty-five wounded, eleven of whom died later of their wounds. Her quarry got into Curaçao dismasted and in a sinking condition with fifty killed and one hundred and ten wounded. The engagement had lasted five hours within pistol shot.

These brilliant actions not only brought Truxton a gold medal from Congress and a great name, but greatly increased the popularity of the navy, service in which was now sought by the best young manhood of the country.

There were many other successes in this year which included the capture of nearly fifty privateers, for the detail of which there is no space; but one of these actions, the cutting out of a French privateer, the Sandwich, in Puerto Plata, Santo Domingo, is notable as being brilliantly carried out by Isaac Hull, the first lieutenant of the Constitution, and who, as captain of the same ship twelve years later, was to capture the Guerrière.

The only other capture of special note was that of the French cruiser Le Berceau, “a singularly fine vessel of her class,” by the Boston, on October 12, 1800, which was returned to France under the treaty of peace which had already been signed on September 30th.

The year involved some sea losses. The Insurgente, which had been taken into the service, sailed in July and was never again heard of; the Pickering sailed in August to a like fate.

CHAPTER XI

The ending of the war with France was but to find, shortly, another on our hands, for which the former, however, was an admirable preparation at a minimum cost; for it had caused provision of the absolute essentials to meet the new emergency: ships, officers, and men. The lesson to be learned was, however, largely to be disregarded by those now to come into political power.