BY BENSON J. LOSSING.
Chapter VII.
Lieutenant Lawrence had gained great renown by his capture of the Peacock. He was promoted to Captain, and when the Chesapeake returned to Boston, after a long cruise, in May, 1813, he was offered the command of her. He accepted it with reluctance, for she had the reputation of being an "unlucky" ship. In the cruise just ended she had accomplished nothing, and as she entered Boston Harbor a gale carried away a top-mast, and with it several men, who were drowned. This incident confirmed the belief that she was "unlucky," and it was difficult to get a good crew to serve in her.
On the morning of the 1st of June Lawrence received from Captain Broke, of the frigate Shannon, a challenge to come out and fight him. It was promptly accepted, and at noon the Chesapeake sailed out of Boston Harbor. The hostile frigates met not far at sea. At four o'clock they opened their broadsides within pistol-shot distance, and fought desperately. The loss of life on board the Chesapeake was fearful. Lawrence was mortally wounded, and as he was carried below he uttered the famous words, in substance, "Don't give up the ship." The Chesapeake was boarded, captured, and taken to Halifax. Lawrence died on the way. Broke was severely wounded, but recovered.
The American sloop of war Argus, Lieutenant Allen commander, took Mr. Crawford (American Minister) to France in the summer of 1813, and then cruised in British waters, imitating the exploits of Paul Jones. Allen captured and burned twenty merchantmen in the course of a few weeks (valued, with their cargoes, at full $2,000,000), and spread consternation throughout commercial England. Several cruisers were sent out to capture the Argus. This was effected in August by the brig Pelican.
The Americans were partially compensated for these misfortunes by the capture of the British brig Boxer by the brig Enterprise, Lieutenant Burrows. They fought off Portland, at half pistol-shot distance, on the 3d of September, 1813. The commander of the Boxer (Lieutenant Blyth) had boastfully nailed his flag to her mast, and after a sharp, short, and destructive engagement, she was compelled to surrender. Her second officer had to announce the fact through his trumpet, for he could not haul down her flag. Burrows and Blyth were both slain, and were buried side by side in a cemetery in Portland.
THE "ESSEX," "PHŒBE," AND "CHERUB."—Drawn by J. O. Davidson.
One of the most remarkable cruises made during the war of 1812-15 was by Commander Porter in the frigate Essex. She sailed from the Delaware in October, 1812; went toward the equator to join the Constitution and Hornet, under Bainbridge; missed them; swept around Cape Horn into the Pacific Ocean, and went into the harbor of Valparaiso, on the western coast of South America. Then she cruised northward in search of British armed whaling vessels, capturing several. Porter converted them into war vessels, and created for himself an active little squadron, with which he sailed for the Marquesas Islands. After remaining there awhile, he returned to Valparaiso, and at that sea-port had a fierce battle with two British vessels which had been sent to oppose his destructive career in the waters of the Pacific. These were the frigates Phœbe and Cherub.
These vessels cruised off the harbor of Valparaiso, waiting for re-enforcements. The Essex, with her consort, Essex Junior, in attempting to get to sea, became crippled by a squall, when the Phœbe and Cherub attacked, in violation of the rights of a neutral port. Then occurred one of the most sanguinary sea-fights of the war, and it was only when her officers and men were nearly all slain or wounded, and she was on fire, that the Essex was surrendered. "We have been unfortunate, but not disgraced," wrote Porter to the Secretary of the Navy. That was in February, 1814. Porter had carried the first American flag on a vessel of war ever seen in the Pacific Ocean.