The Hornet wore around before the wind and came back with a fresh broadside ready, but McDonald hauled down the Penguin’s flag and once more shouted that she had surrendered. The first of the two “actions of a disgraceful character to the Americans” was ended. It had lasted but twenty minutes from the first gun.
The comparison between the ships, their armament and their crews, is exceedingly pleasing to an American. Rarely have two vessels so nearly equal met in deadly conflict. Under the arbitrary rule of measuring ships the Yankee was three tons larger than the Englishman, but the Englishman had “a slightly greater breadth of beam, stouter sides, and higher bulwarks.” That is to say, the British sailors were protected better than the Americans were. The Yankee carried eighteen short thirty-twos and two long twelves, making an actual-weight broadside of two hundred and seventy-nine pounds of metal. The Penguin, according to Captain Biddle, carried sixteen short thirty-twos, one short twelve on the forecastle, and two long twelves arranged so that both could be fired on one side, but James says she had long sixes instead of long twelves. It is certain that before this war the British vessels of the class of the Penguin did usually carry long sixes for bow-chasers, but the Penguin, was a new vessel, built after the effectiveness of the larger guns carried by the Yankees had been abundantly demonstrated. The new British frigates carried long twenty-fours instead of long eighteens, as the older frigates had carried, so it is entirely reasonable to believe that Captain Biddle told the truth when he reported on the size of the Penguin’s guns. Moreover, Biddle was a careful man. He put a tape-line on the Penguin’s hull to get at her dimensions, and no one disputes the measurements he made there.
However, the later American writers have not been disposed to insist on this point. They can afford to be generous. They allow the figures of James to go into their tables of comparison, for even with but one long six on the engaged side, the Penguin threw two hundred and seventy-four pounds of metal to the Yankee’s two hundred and seventy-nine.
Medal Awarded to James Biddle for the Capture of the Penguin by the Hornet.
But to a student of history at the end of the nineteenth century there never was a sea-duel where the comparison of the weights of metal in the two broadsides was more ridiculous than in this one between the Hornet and the Penguin. For not one solid shot from the Penguin struck the Yankee—not one; and what is worse still, not one solid shot struck the Yankee’s spars. Moreover, the storm of British projectiles was hurled so high that the injury to the Yankee’s rigging was worse above the top-sails than below them. On the other hand, the Yankees, in ten minutes’ firing, in spite of the heavy swell, had destroyed the sail-power of the British boat (by Allen’s own account), and in five minutes more (not including the time after the ships drifted apart, when no great guns were fired) the Yankees had riddled her hull until she was not worth saving. It is not the weight of metal carried, nor the weight of metal thrown; it is the weight of metal driven home into the enemy that wins the battle.
This, although not the last encounter, was the last real battle of the War of 1812; like the first of the war (Constitution-Guerrière), and like every other in which the Americans won, and like that between the Shannon and the Chesapeake, where the British were victorious, it proved, beyond dispute, that the most important art known to a naval ship is the art of aiming guns accurately.
The Hornet lost two killed and nine wounded; the British lost fourteen killed and twenty-eight wounded—nearly one-third of her crew.
The numbers of the crews cannot be stated beyond dispute. It is admitted that the Penguin had twelve marines beyond her full complement—she had more men than she needed to work her guns. The Yankees admit that they had enough in spite of the fact that eight had been sent away on a prize, and that nine were too sick to leave their beds. By showing the utmost generosity toward British writers, we find that the Penguin had one hundred and thirty-two in her crew, including “seventeen boys.” The Yankee had at most one hundred and forty-two on board, of whom nine were sick in their hammocks. There were one hundred and thirty-three Yankees at the quarters.
A few days after the battle the Yankee Peacock and the store-ship Tom Bowline arrived. The store-ship was sent to Rio Janeiro with the prisoners, and then, after waiting until April 13th for the President to come, the two sloops sailed away to continue the war in the East Indies. On April 27th a sail was seen and both vessels went in chase, and the next morning the Peacock drew rapidly ahead of her older consort. Eventually, when the Peacock was about six miles ahead, she suddenly hauled her wind and signalled that the stranger was a line-of-battle ship. This was at 2 P.M. of April 28, 1815.