A few days later Macdonough brought his new ship, the Saratoga, the rebuilt steamer Ticonderoga, and the sloop Preble out of the creek, and with his gun-boats added was, for the time, master of the lake.
Meantime, however, the British Government had determined, as said, on an invasion like that of the defeated Burgoyne, in the Revolutionary war—an invasion that should cut the nation in two on the line of the Hudson. To accomplish this it was necessary to gain complete control of Lake Champlain. The country had been so far improved that an army could find a roadway along the lake and away to the south, where Burgoyne had been obliged to hew his way through a wilderness; but the control of the lake was, nevertheless, essential. To hold the control they supposed they had when they captured the sloops Growler and Eagle, they had built the brig Linnet, a vessel of the exact size of the American schooner Ticonderoga. But when they found that Macdonough had brought out a corvette (she measured about seven hundred and thirty-four tons) they laid down the keel of a frigate, the exact size of which is nowhere given, but it rated, later, in our navy with the frigates of 1,400 tons. The lowest estimate of her size places it at 1,200 tons. She was built at Isle-aux-Noix in the Sorel—the outlet of Lake Champlain—and was launched on August 25, 1814.
Hearing of the work upon her, Macdonough returned to Vergennes, on the Otter Creek, and once more made the air resound with the slash and rasp and click of broadaxe, saw, and maul. The keel of a brig was laid on July 29th, and on August 16th she slid into the water—she had been built in nineteen days! And yet she was about as large as the Lawrence and the Niagara, with which Perry won the victory of Lake Erie—she measured well up toward five hundred tons. She was called the Surprise, at first, but the name was changed to Eagle later on.
Thomas Macdonough.
From an engraving by Forrest of the portrait by Jarvis.
The fleet which Macdonough now commanded was as follows: the Saratoga, manned by a crew of two hundred and forty and carrying eight long twenty-fours, six short forty-twos, and twelve short thirty-twos; the brig Eagle, Captain Robert Henly, manned by a crew of one hundred and fifty, and carrying eight long eighteens and twelve short thirty-twos; the schooner Ticonderoga, Lieutenant Stephen Cassin, manned by a crew of one hundred and twelve, and carrying four long eighteens, eight long twelves, and five short thirty-twos; the sloop Preble, with a crew of thirty and an armament of seven long nines. In addition to these he had the gun-boats Borer, Centipede, Nettle, Allen, Viper, and Burrows, mounting each a long twenty-four and a short eighteen, with the Wilmer, Ludlow, Aylwin, and Ballard, each carrying a long twelve. The larger gun-boats had in all two hundred and forty-six men and the smaller one hundred and four. On the whole, the squadron carried crews that aggregated eight hundred and eighty-two men, and eighty-six guns that threw at a broadside 1,194 pounds of shot, of which four hundred and eighty pounds were from long guns and seven hundred and fourteen from short.
Because so small a weight of shot was thrown from long guns, and because the American force has been so grossly misrepresented by the British historians, it is proper here to remind the reader of the very great superiority of long over short guns. The fact that short guns (carronades) went out of use long ago is sufficient proof of this, but it is just as well to keep in mind that the short thirty-twos such as were used in the battle of Lake Champlain, could bear a charge of but two and a half pounds of powder, at most, while a long twenty-four, the shot of which was four-tenths of an inch less in diameter, used a charge of not less than five pounds, and it could stand a pound and even two pounds more. By the tables of ranges given by Sir Howard Douglas in his famous work on gunnery, Macdonough’s short thirty-twos could carry but two hundred yards with an elevation of one-half of a degree (at point-blank the range was less than one hundred yards) while the long twenty-fours of the British fleet, at an elevation of one-half of a degree, carried five hundred yards. This is the range at which the ball would strike smooth water when fired from a point five feet four inches above the water. It would bound along much farther, of course, but the figures are worth quoting, to show approximately the difference in penetrating power of the long gun and the short gun.
To meet the American squadron came the British with a frigate, a large brig, two sloops, and thirteen gun-boats. The frigate Confiance was manned by a crew of not less than three hundred and twenty-five men, and she was armed with thirty-one long twenty-fours (one on a pivot forward) and in addition carried six short guns that were probably forty-twos, but may have been thirty-twos. She could fire sixteen long twenty-fours in a broadside—her long-gun broadside was but ninety-six pounds short of the long-gun broadside of the whole American fleet. This weight was exactly made up by the British brig Linnet, that was armed with sixteen long twelves—fired ninety-six pounds in a broadside. At the range of this battle these two vessels alone should have been equal to the entire American squadron, for not only was their long gun metal equal to the Americans, but they had the very great advantage of concentrating in these two ships the weight of long metal that was scattered over fourteen vessels on the American side. The advantage of concentration of power into few ships is so well understood in these days of huge battleships that nothing more need be said on that subject.
In addition to these powerfully armed vessels they had the two vessels captured from the Americans the year before, which had been rebuilt and now measured one hundred and twelve and one hundred and ten tons, respectively, and were armed, the Chubb with one long six-pounder and ten short eighteens, the Finch with four long sixes and seven short eighteens. And then there were the gun-boats. The Sir James Yeo, the Sir George Prevost, and the Sir Sidney Beckwith carried a long twenty-four and a short thirty-two each. The Broke carried a long eighteen and a short thirty-two. The Murray carried a long eighteen and a short eighteen. The Wellington, the Tecumseh, and another whose name is not recorded carried a long eighteen each, while the Drummond, the Simcoe, and three others whose names were omitted in Macdonough’s report (from which this list of gun-boats is taken) carried short thirty-twos. The British threw at least six hundred and sixty pounds of metal from long guns where the Americans could throw but four hundred and eighty. The American short guns threw seven hundred and fourteen pounds of metal to five hundred and sixty-four at least from the British.