In about half an hour we came abreast, and not more than fifty fathoms distant, but somehow the Randolph was sent to leeward, giving the stranger the weather-gage. Then we had no difficulty in recognizing the frigate Yarmouth, sixty-four guns, commanded by Captain Vincent of his majesty’s navy.
As we were new and unknown, the British ensign had been run up to deceive the enemy, Captain Biddle hoping to get in close and deliver a crippling broadside before the Yarmouth was aware of our intentions, but I am not certain whether it was seen or not in the darkness.
Every man was at his post, standing silent and motionless in the dim light of the battle-lanterns, and every gun on the starboard broadside was kept trained on the British frigate.
We drew directly abreast, and a hoarse voice hailed us through the gloom.
“Fire!” came the order clear and distinct from the quarter-deck, and our answer to the hail was the deep rolling thunder of twenty heavy guns, fired almost simultaneously.
Then, as we ran clear of the cloud from our guns, the Yarmouth appeared to burst into a spitting line of flame, and the shot from her answering broadside crashed among us while she disappeared in a storm of smoke.
The scene on our spar-deck was frightful. Men struck by the flying shot or splinters were hurled and pitched about and fell in mangled groups upon the sanded planks.
Then the order came to wear ship, and we paid off rapidly to the northward, to bring our port broadside to bear upon the enemy as she crossed our wake, coming after us in full chase.
We were new and light, and probably able to go two knots to her one, if no accident happened to our sailing gear. Our rigging had not been seriously cut and our spars were sound, so it is hard to tell just how the action would have ended had the fight continued as it commenced.
But there were other matters at hand far more dangerous to us than his majesty’s sixty-four-gun frigate Yarmouth.