Captain John Crane, 1800-1815

by Thomas Wallace Knox

I thought I would let him have the last word, and so changed the subject of the conversation. His vessel was a brig of about three hundred tons burden, and loaded with goods for the Canadian market; it was a very fair prize for us, but far from equal in value to the Camperdown.

The crew of the brig was transferred to the Marguerite, and placed in the hold with the prisoners already there. I put Haines in command, with a prize-crew, with orders to make the best possible way to New York; with Haines I sent a young fellow named Jackson, who had shipped as an able seaman, but was capable of filling a higher position, as he had been on the sea some eight or ten years, understood navigation, and could work out a ship's position as well as the next man. I promised him promotion as soon as there was a place for him; and in return he declared he would give a good account of himself on the voyage to New York.

The next morning we overhauled a fishing-schooner. She had just come out of one of the Canadian ports, and had only caught a few barrels of fish before we came upon her. What she had on board was of little account in the way of a prize, and the vessel was old, and not the most seaworthy craft in the world. As we were inconveniently crowded with prisoners, I decided to convert the fishing-schooner into a cartel, and send her into Halifax. She answered the conditions of a cartel, or what the French call a bâtiment parlementaire, as she had no cargo, ammunition, or implement of war on board, and could not possibly do any harm.

As quickly as it could be done I had the prisoners transferred to the fisherman. We were careful not to have many of them on deck at once; and if they had made plans for an uprising during the confusion of the transfer, there was no opportunity to carry them out. We took on board most of the fish we found on the schooner, and left her a fair supply of salt provisions, together with all the fish contained in that part of the ocean. The vessel was a dull sailer; and this was all the better for my purpose, as I didn't want her to reach Halifax in a hurry. The prisoners were glad enough at the prospect of thus being liberated, with the possible exception of some of those who meditated the capture of the Marguerite, and her conversion into a prize for themselves.

After dropping the fishing-schooner we steered away to the East, and were lucky enough the next morning to make prize of another British vessel, a bark of about four hundred tons, and containing a valuable cargo of military and naval stores. She was a chartered transport; that is, she was a private craft, employed by the British authorities for conveying government property, and she carried ten or twelve passengers, all of them officers in his Majesty's service, or their families.

I treated these passengers in the same way I did those of the Camperdown, allowing them to remain on board on condition of giving their parole not to countenance any movement for the recapture of the vessel. The crew was transferred to the Marguerite, and when the prize-crew under my first mate went on board the stranger, I found myself without a commissioned officer on board, and decidedly short-handed. So I decided to accompany the prize to New York, and give up looking for any more of the enemy's ships; if anything fell in my way I would attend to it, but as for continuing on the aggressive, and going farther from port, I was in no condition to do so.

It was arranged that the two vessels were to keep close together, unless separated by bad weather, in which case the prize would steer as straight as possible for port, and I would do likewise.

All went well with us until we sighted the coast of Long Island, forty or fifty miles from New York. We had seen several sail, but too far away to make them out distinctly; they had not sought to make our acquaintance, and we had avoided theirs, as there would have been a loss of time in trying to speak to them, and the chances were that they would be of our own nationality, and therefore valueless as prizes.

Soon after we sighted the coast, which lay like a low cloud on the horizon, a large vessel loomed up ahead of us. I scanned her anxiously, as there was a strong possibility that she was something I didn't want to meet just then.