After having been twelve days and nights in an open boat, I was not sorry to return to my ship, but the moment the troops were re-embarked, a difficult navigation down the river precluded all idea of rest.
The fag to officers and men of every description, during the whole of the operations in the Patuxent, was very harassing, and the labour of getting up to Baltimore without pilots, feeling our way with the lead, whilst boats on each bow and one a-head were sounding also, gave little time for respite. The heat of the weather too was very great, the thermometer varying only from 79° to 82° in the shade, during most of our severest services, which added much to the exhaustion.
On the 8th of September we again landed the troops, now reduced to four thousand men, at a place called North Point, on the right hand side of the Patapsco river, leading to Baltimore. It was unfortunate that we ever attempted it, for most of the enemy’s army beaten at Washington had been sent to strengthen the works, and the whole population were in arms against us. The Americans seeing us approach, very wisely brought out several large ships and sunk them in the channel, under the guns of Fort Mac-Henry, which prevented the naval part of the expedition from acting near enough to be of any use with their guns.
The only chance perhaps that might have given any hope of success was the offer of the gallant Rear-Admiral Cockburn to make a dash with all the boats of the fleet, and try and storm Fort Mac-Henry, keeping the troops on board until the issue of this measure was decided. Could we have once got possession of it, the little army might have been landed with ease, and the place been our own in a few hours. But the higher powers decided against his plan. Poor General Ross was killed, having been shot by a rifleman from a tree. He was brought down, wrapped up in a union jack, attended by his aide-de-camp; I placed the body in my boat, and sent it on board. He was beloved and universally respected by both the army and navy. By his untimely fall the little hope we had of succeeding vanished, and although the gallant Brook did all that a man could do, yet the strength of the enemy’s field-works that they had thrown up was so great,—and there being ten to one against us, intrenched as they were behind breast-works bristling with cannon,—caused the admiral to request the army to fall back, and we re-embarked them.
Just before Sir Alexander Cochrane left the Chesapeake some Americans came on board of Sir Pultney Malcolm’s ship to treat for the exchange of prisoners. Colonel Brook, and Captain Dix, who commanded the Menalaus, frigate, were on board at the time. Boasting of their good marksmen, Jonathan thought to be very witty by telling Captain Dix, who was fat and broad made, “I guess, captain, you cover a deal of ground. You had better not come on shore, for our riflemen can shoot a duck through the head with a single ball at two hundred yards: therefore you will stand no chance.” “Very probably they are good shots,” replied Colonel Brook, “but you forget one thing—the poor duck was not a soldier with a red jacket on his back, and a musket, with a bayonet at the end of it, in his hand, ready to return the fire and use the steel. That makes a deal of difference with regard to steady shooting.”
I was placed under the orders of Captain Robert Barrie, of the Dragon (74), and left with him in the Chesapeake, having on board part of Colonel Malcolm’s battalion of marines, commanded by Captain Coles of that corps, a good and clever officer; the remainder were embarked in other ships, while the fleet and transports, under Sir Alexander Cochrane, proceeded out of the Chesapeake to the southward.
No sooner did our senior officer, Captain Robert Barrie, find himself free to act according to his own able judgment, than, with a mind capable of planning, and a heart as bold as a lion to execute, he undertook all kinds of expeditions, or, as our commodore used to call them, “shooting parties.” “Come,” he used to say, “we have not had a shooting party this some time: I have just had information that a body of Yankee militia, with a field-piece or two, are in such a place—we must go and take it from them.” Boats were manned and armed—the marine battalion, under Lieutenant-Colonel Malcolm, about 400 strong, the commodore always at their head, were put into them, and away we used to go. Bang, bang from the field-pieces—a tiraillade from the American musketry—three cheers and a dash from us, and the guns were ours: the militia taking themselves off to the woods, and we dragging the guns to our boats, frequently five, six, and seven miles, with an enemy’s force, double and treble our numbers, looking at us. In short, during the time we continued in the Chesapeake the American militia had no sinecure, for they never knew where we intended to land, and we had too much sense to go twice to the same place without an object in view.
At this period provisions of all kinds began to run short; it was therefore necessary to put all hands on half allowance, and make frequent excursions to try and procure flour and cattle.
On one of these foraging parties, the late Captain Tom Alexander, at the head of 200 seamen and marines, did a very gallant thing: he was attacked by 1,100 American troops,—with two squadrons of cavalry and five field pieces,—while he was busy getting cattle; the enemy’s horse made a charge, but not knowing that a swamp was between them and Alexander’s party, the horses sank up to their chests in mud, and began floundering about; he immediately commenced his fire upon them, which put them to the right-about, leaving half-a-dozen dragoons, who had been thrown from their horses, sticking with their heads in the mud; some of the sailors mounted these fellows in a moment, and shoving their heads deeper into the mire, there left them. After this, he embarked his men with the exception of three, who were made prisoners, and returned on board, leaving the cattle for a more convenient opportunity.
The commodore, on the 1st of November, gave the following order to his squadron in the Chesapeake:—