“Haul away! Yo ho, boys!”
It was well on toward four o’clock before the Drake weathered the headland, and lay a straight course for the saucy American, that was waiting for her under easy canvas. As the Drake stood for the American ship she set her colors, and at the same moment the Ranger flung out the Stars and Stripes. No more songs and laughter then. Everybody was ready, and grimly expectant. Danny Dixon, beating the drum, walked once around the ship to give warning that the action was about to begin.
The Ranger filled on the starboard tack, and stood off the land so as to engage in mid-channel. Here was indeed an enterprise that would have appalled a less daring spirit than that of Paul Jones. He was alone, in the narrow seas of the greatest naval power on earth, with the land as well as the water crowded with his enemies. The hillsides were full of people, and the shores were alive with boats. The three kingdoms were in plain sight, and he, with one small sloop of war, stood ready to give battle to a hitherto unconquered foe. But literally, the sense of fear seemed unknown to Paul Jones, and great as might be the odds against him, greater was the genius with which he could withstand them.
The Drake, having approached within hail, spoke the Ranger, as a matter of form. The voices echoed clearly over the water in the still, sunny, spring afternoon, and it was plainly seen in the mellow light that Paul Jones, who stood by the sailing master’s side on the Ranger, dictated the reply, which was a cool defiance in these words:
“This is the Continental ship Ranger. We wait for you, and beg you will come on. The sun is but little more than an hour high, and it is time to begin.”
Scarcely were the words spoken, when the Ranger’s helm was ported, and, bringing her broadside to bear on the advancing ship, she roared out the first volley. The Drake answered it promptly, and in another moment the ships were running free, close together, under a light wind, and keeping up a furious cannonade.
On board the Ranger, Paul Jones walked the quarter-deck unharmed, amid a shower of musketry, which the Americans returned with interest. Captain Burden, of the Drake, showed an equal disregard of danger, but within half an hour of the firing of the first broadside he was mortally wounded by a musket shot in the head. The fire of the Ranger was much more effective than the Drake’s, and the damage done by her guns was terrific. The Drake’s fore and main topsail yards were completely shot away, the main topgallant mast and mizzen gaff hanging up and down the mast, her jib hanging over her lee into the water, her sails and rigging in rags, and she had been hulled repeatedly. Twice had her ensign been shot away, and twice the gallant British tars had hoisted it, but just as the sun was sinking, when the captain and first lieutenant of the Drake and forty of her officers and men lay killed or wounded upon her decks, the ensign was dragged down from the shattered spar to which it hung, and a cry for “Quarter! quarter!” resounded. Instantly the Americans ceased firing, and in another minute they had boarded the Drake and hoisted an American ensign upon what was left of the foremast. The sun was now going down, and the long spring twilight was upon them.
Paul Jones had seen Captain Burden fall, and his first inquiry was, “Does the captain still live?” He indeed breathed a few times, but in a little while all was over. The first lieutenant, who was mortally wounded, survived for two days.
Like most men of great imaginative qualities, Paul Jones had a tender heart. The sight of the dead and wounded always affected him, and the spectacle of brave men dying in gallant combat with him touched him peculiarly. In spite of his hazardous position—for he was still in the midst of enormous danger, with a crippled ship to take care of—he ordered the dead removed below, the captain being laid out in the cabin and covered with the tattered ensign he had so well defended, and the wounded promptly attended to. Meanwhile the Ranger, which was comparatively uninjured, and had only lost one officer and one man, gave a tow-line to the Drake, and passed out of the lough and up St. George’s Channel. As soon as a place of comparative safety was reached, about midnight, the Ranger hove to, and preparations were made to bury the dead with suitable honors.
The night sky was clear, and overhead, in the blue-black vault, the cold, bright stars shone steadily. A fair wind slightly ruffled the surface of the ocean, and the two ships looked huge and shadowy in the mysterious half darkness. Few lights were shown, and in the midst of a deep and awful stillness the boatswain’s pipe resounded with the solemn call, “All hands on deck to bury the dead!” The flags on both ships were half-masted out of respect to the dead. On the quarter-deck lay the body of Captain Burden, wrapped in the flag for which he had given his life. Next him lay the body of Lieutenant Wallingford, of the Ranger, covered with the American flag. Then came the bodies of eight British sailors and one American, sewn up in canvas, and on them, too, lay the colors of their country. The gangway was open and the plank lay ready. The British officers were on deck to see the last honors paid their shipmates, while the other prisoners were permitted to watch from the open portholes.