A History, of the War of 1812-15 Between the United States and Great Britain

by Rossiter Johnson

"When this last sea broke on board us, one of the prisoners exclaimed that the ship's broadside was stove in, and that she was sinking. This alarm was greatly calculated to increase the fears of those below, who, from the immense torrent of water that was rushing down the hatchways, had reason to believe the truth of his assertion. Many who were washed from the spar- to the gun-deck, and from their hammocks, and did not know the extent of the injury, were also greatly alarmed; but the men at the wheel, and some others, who were enabled by a good grasp to keep their stations, distinguished themselves by their coolness and activity after the shock."

Porter touched at the island of Mocha, and afterward ran into the harbor of Valparaiso, where he learned that his arrival in the Pacific was most opportune; for there were many American whalers that had left home before the war began, and knew nothing of it, while some English whalers, sailing later, had taken out letters of marque, and carried guns, and were making prizes of the unsuspecting Americans.

Porter soon captured a Peruvian privateer, and two English whalers, and recaptured an American ship that had been taken by the enemy. One of the whalers carried six guns, and the other ten. He placed the entire armament in the faster sailer, cut away her try-works, and with some other alterations converted her into a war-vessel, giving the command of her to John Downes, his first lieutenant. Subsequently a still better ship for the purpose was captured, and the armament was shifted to that, which was then re-christened Essex Junior.

With these two ships Porter scoured the ocean for the next six months, and took numerous prizes, nearly all English whalers, several of which had armed themselves as privateers. One he loaded with oil and sent home. Two or three, as he could spare no more men for prize crews, he disarmed and allowed to go home in charge of their own crews, carrying also the other prisoners, all of whom were paroled. One captain, whom he found cruising as a privateer without a commission as such, he put in irons, to be tried as a pirate when the Essex should return home. In that six months, Porter and Downes had captured four thousand tons of British shipping, taking four hundred prisoners; and as they could now hear of no more in that part of the Pacific, they went in October to the Marquesas Islands, to refit their vessels and let the crews have a rest and a run on shore.

There in the beautiful harbor of Nukahiva they made repairs and wooded and watered at their leisure. Porter formally took possession of the island in the name of the United States, called it Madison's Island, and the harbor Massachusetts Bay, and built a fort on the shore, in which he mounted four guns. Near the fort he constructed a small village, consisting of six houses, a rope-walk, a bakery, and other buildings, which he named Madisonville.

His "Journal" gives an interesting account of their life for four or five weeks among the natives of that romantic and then almost unknown group. One of the most exciting incidents of it was a war between two tribes—the Happahs and the Typees—occupying different parts of the island. All the tribes of the island except the Typees had made a sort of treaty of friendship and alliance with Porter. As he and his men were guests of the Happahs, and the Typees had begun to treat them as enemies, Porter felt obliged to join in the war, when the superiority of the fire-arms over the native weapons ended it in the disastrous defeat of the Typees. But this was not accomplished without severe fighting, in which the Typees exhibited the most determined courage, and a great degree of military skill, making the best of such weapons and advantages as they had. Porter's campaign in the Typee valley is one of the most singular episodes in all the annals of war, and the reader will probably be interested in some passages from his account of it, though it has no necessary connection with the subject to which this volume is devoted.

"We arrived at the Typee landing at sunrise, and were joined by ten war-canoes from the Happahs. The Essex Junior soon after arrived and anchored. The tops of all the neighboring mountains were covered with the Taeeh and Happah warriors, armed with their spears, clubs, and slings. The beach was covered with the warriors who came with the canoes, and who joined us from the hills. Our force did not amount to a less number than five thousand men; but not a Typee or any of their dwellings were to be seen. For the whole length of the beach, extending upward of a quarter of a mile, was a clear level plain which extended back about one hundred yards. A high and almost impenetrable swampy thicket bordered on this plain, and the only trace we could perceive which, we were informed, led to the habitations, was a narrow pathway which winded through the swamp.

"The canoes were all hauled on the beach, the Taeehs on the right, the Happahs on the left, and our four boats in the centre. We only waited for reënforcements from the Essex Junior, our interpreter, our ambassadors, and Gattanewa [chief of the Happahs], I went on board to hasten them on shore, and on my return to the beach I found everyone in arms. The Typees had appeared in the bushes, and had pelted our people with stones while they were quietly eating their breakfast.

"I had a man with me who had intermarried with the Typees, and was privileged to go among them, and I furnished him with a white flag and sent him to tell them I had come to offer peace, but was prepared for war. In a few minutes he came running back, and informed me he had met in the bushes an ambuscade of Typees, who had threatened to put him to death if he again ventured among them. In an instant afterward a shower of stones came from the bushes, and at the same moment one of the Typees darted across the pathway and was shot through the leg, but was carried off by his friends.

"Lieutenant Downes arrived with his men, and I gave the order to march. We entered the bushes, and were at every instant assailed by spears and stones, which came from different parts of the enemy in ambuscade. We could hear the snapping of the slings, the whistling of the stones; the spears came quivering by us, but we could not perceive from whom they came. No enemy was to be seen, not a whisper was to be heard among them.