Pike & Cutlass: Hero Tales of Our Navy

by George Gibbs

Let it not be understood that the handling of the great ocean fortress of to-day may be mastered by any save a craftsman of the art. With plenty of sea-room and a keen watch alow and aloft the trick is a simple one, for the monster is only a speck in the infinity of sea and sky, and there is never a fear save for a blow, or a ship, or a shore. But in close manœuvre, or in harbor, the problem is different. Ten thousand tons of bulk cannot be turned and twisted on the heel with the swish and toss of the wieldy clipper. Observant transpontine voyagers, who have watched the gigantic liner warped out from her pier into a swift tide-way with a leeward ebb, will tell you what a complicated and difficult thing it seems to be.

The captain of the battle-ship must be all that the merchant captain is, and more besides. Mooring and slipping moorings should be an open book to the naval officer, but his higher studies, the deeper intricacies of the science of war, are mysteries for the merchant captain. All of it is seamanship, of course. But to-day it is the seamanship of the bridled elements, where strength is met by strength and steam and iron make wind and wave as nothing.

The perfection of the seamanship of the past was not in strength, but in yielding, and the saltiest sea-captain was he who cajoled both ship and sea to his bidding. The wind and waves, they say, are always on the side of the ablest navigators, but it was rather a mysterious and subtle knowledge of the habits and humors of God’s sea and sky, and a sympathy born of constant communion, which made both ship and captain a part of the elements about them, and turned them into servants, and not masters.

The naval captains of 1812 had learned this freemasonry of sea and sky, and one incident—a typical one—will show it as no mere words can do. Its characteristics are Yankee pluck and old-fashioned Yankee seamanship.

The frigate “Constitution”—of glorious memory—in 1812 gave the British squadron which surrounded her startling proof of the niceties of Yankee seamanship. There never has been a race for such a stake, and never will be. Had “Old Ironsides” been captured, there is no telling what would have been the deadly effect on the American fortunes. It was the race for the life of a nation.

The “Constitution” was the country’s hope and pride, and Captain Hull knew it. He felt that “Old Ironsides” could never fail to do the work required of her. So for four days and nights the old man towed her along, the British frigates just out of range, until he showed clean heels to the entire squadron. The ingenuity and deft manœuvring of the chase has no parallel in the history of this or any other country in the world.

With hardly a catspaw of wind, Hull drifted into sight of the British fleet off the Jersey coast. Before he knew it, they brought the wind up with them, and his position was desperate. There were four frigates and a ship-of-the-line spread out in a way to take advantage of any breath of air. Hull called away his boats, and running lines to them, sent them ahead to tow her as best they might. The British did still better, for they concentrated the boats of the squadron on two ships, and gained rapidly on the American. Hull cut ports over the stern, and ran two 18-pounders out of his cabin windows, where he began a continuous fire on the enemy. The British ships shifted their helms and took up positions on the quarters of the frigate, unable to approach too closely with their boats for fear of the “Constitution’s” stern-guns, which dropped their hurtling shot under their very bows.

The desperate game had only begun. Hull, finding that he had but one hundred and fifty feet of water under him, decided to kedge her along. In a few minutes the largest boat was rowing away ahead with a small anchor on board, stretching out half a mile of cable. The anchor dropped, the men hauled in roundly and walked away with the line at a smart pace. It was heart-breaking work, but the speed of the ship was trebled. By the time the vessel was warped up to the first anchor another one was ready for her, and she clawed still further out of the enemy’s reach. The British did not at first discover the magic headway of the American, and not for some time did they attempt to follow suit.

Then a breeze came up. Hull hauled his yards to it, picked up his boats without slacking sail, and went ahead. But hardly were the sails drawing when the wind died away again. One of the ships came into range, and there was nothing for it but to go back to the kedging. Three times did this occur, the captain, with his eye on the dog-vane, jockeying her along as a skipper would his racing-yacht. The men had now been at their quarters for thirty-six hours without rest or sleep. But at the order they dropped into the boats again, ready for anything.

Another breeze sprang up now and held for two hours. Like logs the sailor-men tumbled over on the decks, nearly dead for lack of sleep. On the afternoon of the third day of the chase the “Constitution” lost the wind and the enemy kept it. Back again to kedging they went, weary and sick at heart.