The Story of the American Merchant Marine

by John Randolph Spears

Omitting for want of space any account of many previous attacks upon American shipping, it may be said that the first made in connection with the war upon the French Republic was the order to British warships on June 8, 1793, to "detain all vessels laden wholly or in part with corn, flour or meal" bound to any French port. It was provided that each ship so captured should be restored, but the cargo was to be confiscated for the account of the British government, which was to pay for it the invoice cost with 10 per cent added. This order was issued ostensibly to starve the French republicans into submission to the old monarchy, but it was well known that no such result could follow because France had never depended upon the United States for any part of its bread worth mention. Thus, in 1792, when we exported 546,913 bushels of wheat to Great Britain and her possessions, France took only 54 bushels. The order, therefore, had some other object in view, and the brief story of the ship Neptune, Captain Jeffries, is instructive at this point. When the Neptune was captured under this order, she was restored as soon as convenient to do so, and an order was issued for the payment of the invoice price of her cargo with 10 per cent added. The addition of 10 per cent for profit seemed at first glance to be an effort to act with some degree of fairness, but as a matter of fact the owners were deliberately robbed; the market price of wheat in England, at that time, was very much higher than the invoice price with 10 per cent added, and Captain Jeffries pleaded for permission, not to go on to the port for which he had been sailing (where the price was still higher), but for permission to sell the grain to merchants there in London, who were anxious to give the market price; but the government insisted on taking it at the mere advance of 10 per cent.

We may suppose that Captain Jeffries's failure to be satisfied with a profit of 10 per cent was considered a plain illustration of American avarice.

On November 6, 1793, British cruisers were ordered to capture all neutral ships laden with the produce of the French West Indies. American ships were carrying immense quantities of those goods, and all the larger because they were excluded from the British West Indies. To make certain of a clean sweep of these American ships, the order in council was kept secret for several weeks in order to give the British cruisers time enough to get on the ground and take everything unawares. (H. Adams, II, 322.)

On January 8, 1794, this order was changed so as to permit American ships to carry the French colonial produce to American ports, but the direct trade to Europe was still forbidden. In the meantime more than 200 American vessels had been captured and confiscated under the original order.

While American ships were forbidden to carry French colonial goods from the colonies direct to France, they were, as said, yet allowed to carry the produce to the United States and then reëxport it to Europe, provided it was entered in the American port, landed, and all duties, etc., paid before the voyage was continued. In the case of the Polly, decided April 29, 1800, Sir William Scott (Lord Stowell), confirmed this right of American ships, and the American minister "succeeded in obtaining from Pitt an express acceptance of this rule." One may note that this concession was obtained immediately after our warships had been sent to protect our merchantmen from the aggressions of the French; the guns of the Constellation had been heard in London, so to speak.

When, on April 29, 1803, England declared war upon Napoleon, however, a new administration had been inaugurated in the United States, and all Europe knew that no use would be made of such American war-ships as remained in commission. Accordingly, as a first measure to hamper the American ships in their effort to become carriers for the beleaguered French, two British frigates were sent to Sandy Hook to detain and search all ships for property belonging to the French. American waters were occupied for the purpose of hampering American trade. In the course of the blockade thus established, a British gunner, just for a joke, fired a shot at a coaster, aiming so as to frighten the crew. The man at the coaster's helm was killed.

This invasion of American waters was a fair notice of the British determination to compel the United States to abide by all English laws and orders in council made for the protection of British shipping. By refusing to declare war, the American administration justified the aggressors.

Then the British government, still further to promote British trade and shipping, adopted Phineas Bond's advice, and established free ports in the West Indies, to which small unarmed traders from the colonies of the enemy were invited to come and buy British goods. These free ports were supplied by British ships under convoy.

In the meantime preparations were made to deprive the Americans of the indirect trade from the French colonies by way of the United States to Europe. On July 23, 1805, Sir William Scott, reversing his decision in the case of the Polly, decided that a ship called the Essex was a good prize, although in a voyage from Bordeaux she had called at Salem, discharged cargo, made repairs, and reloaded before heading away for a West India port.

The all-influential British navy had joined in with the British ship-owner to demand that the American ships should be excluded from all trade between the colonies of the enemy and Europe. The ship-owners demanded it because the American ship, in spite of the great expense of the indirect voyage, was yet able to take the trade from the British, even though they were supported by free ports and other aids. The demand made by or for the British naval officers was unique. When voiced by one James Stephens (War in Disguise; or the Frauds of the Neutral Flags), he pictured a British admiral grown old and full of honors in the service, who, in spite of his honors, had been unable "to wrest [from the enemy] the means of comfortably sustaining those honors." As long as American ships were allowed to engage in the indirect trade, the naval officer would have to "look in vain for any subject of safe and uncontested capture." If American ships were excluded, they would still take chances, and they would then be captured without danger and condemned without contest.