“Ahoy, the frigate!”
Biddle paused a moment to gain time, and then giving a word to his division officers, lifted his speaking-trumpet,—
“What ship is that?”
“His Britannic Majesty’s ship-of-the-line ‘Yarmouth,’ Captain Vincent. Who are you? Answer, or I will be compelled to fire.”
Another pause as Biddle directed the American colors to be run up to the mast, and then said,—
“This is the American Continental ship ‘Randolph,’ Captain Biddle!”
Without the pause of a second a tremendous broadside was poured into the Englishman, and in a moment the battle was on.
Biddle had gained a slight advantage in position by waiting as he did, and the “Randolph’s” broadsides did great execution on the crowded decks of her adversary. But the “Yarmouth” men sprang to their guns, and in a few moments were firing their tremendous broadside of thirty guns as fast as they could be served and run out.
On the “Randolph” Biddle’s men were working well, but the crashing of the shot and the flying splinters were terrific. In fifteen minutes the decks were covered with the bodies of dead and dying men, and the surgeon and his mate below in the cockpit, covered with blood, were laboring to help such of those as could be aided, and the decks, in spite of the sand, were so slippery that as the ship rolled it was difficult to stand upright upon them. Many of the guns of one of the broadsides were disabled, and there was not a gun that had a full crew to man it.
Biddle walked to and fro from one battery to another, lending a word here and a hand there, acting as sponger or tackle or handspikeman, wherever he was most needed. The men fought with the energy of despair—the despair of the dying. If they were to die, they would die hard, and the guns were loaded as though they would fire as many times as they could in the short time left them. The English aimed more deliberately. But when the dreaded broadside came, it dealt a blow that shook the smaller ship from stem to stern.