And what a story it was! We cheered and yelled as our old shipmates spun it off, and nearly went wild with rejoicing.
Here is the yarn boiled down, and that it was true we knew full well, for yonder were the prizes coming to close under the Georgiana stern.
It seems that after leaving us Lieutenant Downes cruised off James's Island, where he fell in with two Britishers. Hoisting the English colors, he soon had the captains of the whalers sitting comfortably in his cabin, and then he told them who he was. Well, the prizes were taken without resistance, as a matter of course, and the United States entered into possession, less what prize money would be coming to us, of the ship Catherine of two hundred and seventy tons burden, carrying eight guns and twenty-nine men, and the Rose, two hundred and twenty tons, eight guns and twenty-one men.
After manning these prizes, Lieutenant Downes had only twenty as a crew all told, and yet that fact did not prevent him from giving chase next day to the whaler Hector, a ship of two hundred and seventy tons, twenty-five men, and carrying eleven guns, although she was pierced for twenty.
This last craft was a Britisher who stood ready to fight, and when Mr. Downes understood that he had an action on his hands, with hardly men enough to work his ship, he put the prisoners in irons so that they might not be able to lend a hand to their countrymen.
When the Hector was ordered to surrender she refused, and Mr. Downes let her have a broadside which brought down her main-topmast. The crew had good pluck, however, and fought their ship until nearly all her standing and running rigging was shot away, when they could do no less than haul down their colors. The Britishers had two men killed and six wounded.
After putting a prize crew on board this last capture, Lieutenant Downes had but ten men left in the Georgiana, and, including the wounded, he held seventy-three prisoners. Now it seems that the Rose was an old tub of a ship which it wouldn't pay to bring into port under the circumstances; therefore he threw her guns overboard, and filled her with the prisoners, on condition that they head direct for St. Helena.
When that had been done he steered for Tumbez, for it appears that he and Captain Porter had agreed to go there when it was necessary to make a port.
Now our fleet consisted of nine sail, and it began to look as if we might take possession of every port in the Pacific Ocean, if we were so minded. The beauty of it was that all our ships and ammunition had come from the Britishers, which was surely an economical way of carrying on a war.
Even Phil and I were puffed up with pride because of what had been accomplished, and we crowed as loud as any man on the gun-deck when we went over and over again the "luck of the Essex."