Cochrane’s blockade made getting in and out of port more difficult. Commerce was brought to a standstill. American exports fell to seven million from forty-five million in 1811, even with the trade restrictions in force during that year. The president’s embargo, which was not repealed until April, had helped the British blockade. Not wanting to risk their ships, merchants kept them in port. International and coastal trade dwindled. At the same time, however, privateers were managing to get to sea—even those sailing from Baltimore—and they were harassing Britain’s commerce everywhere, particularly in the West Indies and around the British Isles. Merchants, whose fleets were sitting idle in port, often invested in privateering enterprises, which sometimes were profitable, but sometimes not.
A FEW AMERICAN warships did manage to get to sea, and the successes they had enhanced the reputation of the American navy, which would be of signal importance during the peace talks and after the war. On December 4, 1813, in cold, dirty weather, Commodore Rodgers slipped out of Narragansett Bay in the President . Two days later he stopped the schooner Comet, and when he discovered she had been captured by the Ramillies and the Loire and had a British prize crew sailing her to Halifax, he took the British crew prisoner and set the Comet free. He then continued on to the Canaries and, afterward, ran down the fifteenth parallel to the West Indies, where he patrolled to windward of Barbados, and in January captured two armed merchantmen. Beginning on January 16, he cruised along the northern coast of South America. Finding nothing, he shaped a coarse for Puerto Rico and sailed through the Mona Passage. He then passed northeast of the Bahamas and steered toward the northern coast of Florida. Off St. Augustine he captured a British schooner and then continued north, running into the blockading squadron off Charleston, South Carolina. When he attempted to engage one of the warships, the whole fleet came after him, but he managed to escape and continued on northward. He happened on another blockading squadron off Delaware Bay in a heavy fog. The number of signal guns sounding around the President made him give up the idea of engaging one of the enemy ships, and he sailed on.
On February 18 Rodgers was off Sandy Hook when he saw two British warships approaching. One was a small schooner, but the other was a frigate. As he prepared for battle, the frigate unexpectedly fled. She was the 38-gun Loire. Her captain, Thomas Brown, was following Admiralty orders to avoid combat with the heavy American frigates. Rodgers went after her, but an American revenue cutter happened on the scene and told him he was chasing a seventy-four. Whether Rodgers believed that or not, other ships of the blockading squadron were approaching, and he decided to run for port, reaching the safety of New York Harbor, much to London’s annoyance. The Admiralty wanted the President more than any other ship.
It was another disappointing cruise for Rodgers, but it was significant that Captain Brown decided not to challenge the President. When the war started, the captain of a 38-gun frigate who refused to engage even the largest American frigates would have been severely reprimanded. In fact, it is hard to imagine any British captain avoiding such an opportunity. Captain Brown’s flight showed the respect the American navy had attained in the eyes of the Admiralty and the officers of the Royal Navy. The change in British attitudes would serve the U.S. Navy and the country well in the future.
Rodgers was anxious to return to sea as quickly as possible. Secretary Jones offered him a choice of assignments. One was to continue with the President; another was to become skipper of the new 44-gun frigate Guerriere, nearing completion at Philadelphia. Rodgers chose the new frigate. Before taking command, he traveled to Washington to confer with Jones. On the way, he visited his family at Havre de Grace. He had not seen them since the war began. Needless to say, the sight of his half-burned house did not make him enamored of the British.
The Guerriere was launched in Philadelphia on June 20, 1814, amid much ceremony. At the same time that Rodgers took command, he also assumed responsibility for the Delaware flotilla from Commodore Alexander Murray. Secretary Jones had ordered Rodgers to act against the British not only on the Delaware but in Chesapeake Bay as well. Since the Guerriere was blockaded, Rodgers could potentially play an important part in defending Baltimore and perhaps Washington.
While Rodgers was at least able to get the President to sea, the United States, Macedonian, and Hornet remained trapped in the Thames River, much to Commodore Decatur’s dismay. Traitors in New London County reported his every move to Captain Sir Thomas Masterman Hardy, making an escape impossible. Decatur had some hope for action, when in January 1814 the 44-gun heavy frigate Endymion, under Captain Henry Hope, joined Hardy’s squadron. Hope and his colleague Captain Hazzard Stackpole, skipper of the 38-gun Statira, proposed single-ship duels—the United States against the Endymion and the Statira against the Macedonian. Hardy and Decatur liked the idea at first, and they exchanged messages, but in the end Hardy decided against the duel between the larger ships, and Decatur declined a fight between the smaller ones on the ground that he anticipated Hardy putting a crew of his best fighters aboard the Statira, and in order to do the same for the Macedonian, Decatur would have to weaken the crews of his other ships and make their later escapes more precarious. So the duels never came off.
During the winter Decatur remained alert for the possibility of escape, but the occasion never arose. Beginning on March 17 he tended to some unfinished—and especially unpleasant—business, presiding at the court-martial of Lieutenant William Cox of the Chesapeake, four midshipmen, and other men charged with various misdeeds during the fight with the Shannon. Master Commandant Biddle and ten lieutenants made up the rest of the court. The trial ended in May, and all were found guilty.
With the coming of warm spring weather in southern Connecticut, Secretary Jones saw no hope of the United States and Macedonian escaping. He ordered Decatur to secure both ships in the Thames River permanently and repair to New York with most of the crew of the United States. Decatur took the ships upriver fourteen miles, far beyond Gales Ferry, rearranged their guns for better protection, and stationed gunboats and shore batteries to support them. He then left skeleton crews aboard and proceeded to New York with the rest of his men. Captain Jacob Jones and the crew of the Macedonian went to Lake Ontario. Biddle and the Hornet remained to protect the frigates, a duty Biddle hated.
Biddle did not give up trying to escape, however, and on November 18, 1814, he slipped out of the Thames in bad weather and made his way to New York, where he would be serving again under Decatur. “It is a most infamous arrangement that the Hornet . . . should be placed under the orders of Commodore Decatur,” Biddle complained to his brother.
In New York, Decatur had command of the President, which Rodgers had left when he became skipper of the new Guerriere. The President remained trapped by the blockade, but Decatur had plenty to do ashore. As the threat of an invasion increased, Secretary Jones ordered him to help with the city’s defense and also be prepared to move his men to Philadelphia, should an attack come there. At one point in July, Jones ordered Decatur to take over for Chauncey at Sackets Harbor when Chauncey became ill, but he recovered, and Decatur remained in New York.
Captain Charles Gordon and the Constellation continued to be trapped by the blockade as well. He hoped to run the Constellation out to sea during a winter storm. Secretary Jones sent him sailing orders on January 5, cautioning him, as he did every captain, not to give or accept “a challenge ship to ship directly or indirectly.” On February 11, during a stretch of particularly bad weather, Gordon saw his chance. He brought the Constellation from the safety of the Elizabeth River out to Hampton Roads in heavy rain. The wind was fair for running out to sea, and he sent a tender to scout the Chesapeake Capes. When the wind suddenly turned, however, the tender had to scurry back, and Gordon was forced to return to the protection of the river. He did not get another opportunity. Spring came all too soon, and he had to forget about racing out to sea and concentrate on defending Norfolk. In April, Jones directed him not to attempt an escape, f
or fear he’d lose the ship and endanger Norfolk and Gosport. It was a bitter pill for Gordon. He remained trapped for the rest of the war.
Secretary Jones expected more from the six sloops of war authorized by Congress on March 3, 1813, than he did from the President, the Constitution, or the United States. To be sure, the sloops were few in number, but Jones thought they would perform better as commerce raiders than either frigates or brigs, and certainly better than seventy-fours. Naval constructor William Doughty designed three of the sloops, Argus, Ontario, and Erie. Argus was built at the Washington Navy Yard under Doughty’s supervision. Ontario and Erie were built in Baltimore under the supervision of Thomas Kemp.
When the Erie was ready for her first cruise, her skipper, Master Commandant Charles G. Ridgely, found that he could not get past the blockade. When spring came, Jones gave up on Ridgely ever getting to sea and on April 4 ordered him to lay up the ship in Baltimore and proceed with his officers and crew to reinforce Chauncey at Sackets Harbor.
The Ontario was ready to sail by the end of January, but Master Commandant Robert T. Spence could not get her past the blockade either. When spring came, Jones also ordered him to Sackets Harbor with his officers. The petty officers and the rest of the crew went to Joshua Barney’s Flotilla Service in Baltimore. Spence became ill, however, and could not go to Lake Ontario. He remained in Baltimore and participated in its defense.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The Essex
ON JULY 6, 1814, at five o’clock in the afternoon, seamen from the 32-gun frigate Essex rowed Captain David Porter in a whaleboat onto the beach at Babylon, New York, looking as if they had been through a great ordeal. New York militiamen were soon on the scene, and alert to the possibility of an enemy invasion, they took all the strangers into custody, assuming they were British spies. When Porter convinced them who he actually was, they treated him like a hero, providing him with a wagon so that he could bring his boat and men to Brooklyn and from there cross the East River to New York City to tell his story to the world. It was an amazing one.
Porter’s odyssey began on October 27, 1812, when he stood out beyond the Delaware Capes in the Essex with orders to rendezvous with Commodore Bainbridge in the Constitution and Master Commandant Lawrence in the Hornet for a commerce-destroying mission in the South Atlantic. Porter’s first place of rendezvous was the Cape Verde Islands, off the west coast of Africa. He arrived at Porto Praya on November 27, but not finding Bainbridge, he quickly moved on, sailing for the northeast coast of Brazil. On the way, on December 11, he captured the British packet Nocton. She had £11,000 sterling in specie aboard (approximately $55,000). He took the money and sent the packet to the United States in charge of Lieutenant William B. Finch, but on January 5, 1813, the ubiquitous Captain Richard Byron in the Belvidera captured her.
Porter continued to the second place of rendezvous, the wretched Portuguese penal colony at Fernando de Noronha, three hundred miles off the Brazilian coast, reaching it on December 13. He just missed Bainbridge, who had been there and left a message written in invisible ink, advising Porter to meet him at the next place of rendezvous, Cape Frio off Rio de Janeiro. Porter dutifully traveled down the coast of Brazil to Cape Frio, arriving on Christmas day, but Bainbridge wasn’t there either. Porter cruised off the coast until January 12, capturing only one small merchant schooner, the Elizabeth, before turning south for the penultimate rendezvous point, St. Catherine’s Island off the coast of Brazil, five hundred miles south of Rio. Again, Bainbridge was nowhere to be found.
After taking on what supplies were available, Porter decided not to go to the last place of rendezvous—the waters around the important British base at St. Helena. Instead, he chose to fulfill a long-standing dream of sailing into the Pacific. He left St. Catherine’s on January 26, 1813, and steered south, rounded hazardous Cape Horn, and, after nearly foundering, sailed up the coast of Chile to Valparaiso, standing into the harbor on March 15. The Essex was the first American warship to enter the Pacific.
When Porter set his hook in Valparaiso Harbor, he soon discovered that Spanish authority in Chile had collapsed. Instead of a frosty reception from Spanish officials, the revolutionary government of Jose Miguel Carrera greeted him warmly and gave him everything he needed to refurbish the Essex after her long voyage. Anxious to get on with his work, Porter remained in Valparaiso only a week. On March 22 he stood out from the half-moon-shaped harbor and steered north toward Peru, whose government was still loyal to the Spanish king, Ferdinand VII, even though he was Napoleon’s prisoner in France. Peru’s governor was pro-British and decidedly unfriendly. He was sending out privateers to attack the American whaling fleet in the eastern Pacific; British privateers and armed whalers were working with him.
Porter decided the best use of the Essex would be protecting American whalers by capturing or destroying the British whaling fleet and their privateers. Approximately twenty enemy whalers roamed the eastern Pacific, most of them well armed.
On the trip north, Porter captured the Peruvian privateer Nereyda and retook one of her prizes, the American whaler Barclay. The Nereyda had twenty-four American prisoners aboard from two captures. Porter liberated them, threw the Nereyda’s armament overboard, and sent the ship to Lima with a message for the governor of Peru, demanding the captain of the Nereyda be punished for his piratical conduct. Porter then headed for Lima himself, and after looking into the harbor and recapturing one of the American vessels as she was entering port, he put back to sea in search of Britain’s whaling fleet.
Finding nothing along the Peruvian coast, he sailed five hundred miles west along the equator to the Galapagos Islands, the prime fishing grounds for all whalers. Porter described the islands as “perhaps the most barren and desolate of any known.” He arrived on April 7 and remained, except for a brief trip back to the coast for water, until October 3. During those months he was remarkably successful, capturing twelve British whalers and disrupting their entire fleet. In the process, he acquired a large quantity of spermaceti oil, enough to fill three of the captured whalers. He sent them to the United States at various times. The prize money they would bring was potentially enormous. Unfortunately, enemy warships captured all three before they reached port. Captain Byron’s Belvidera picked up one of them.
Porter turned his finest capture, the whaler Atlantic, into a warship and christened her Essex Junior. He ordered John Downes, the Essex’s first lieutenant, to take command. Needless to say, Downes was delighted. Essex Junior’s armament was ten long sixes and ten eighteen-pound carronades. During the entire time he was in the Pacific, Porter supplied most of his needs, including food, from captured ships—a remarkable feat. Even more amazing was the extraordinary good health of his crew. Thanks to his assiduous efforts, only one case of scurvy appeared aboard the Essex during her odyssey.
Porter’s encounters with British captains and their crews in the desolate islands prompted him to contemplate the differences between the American and British navies. “It seems somewhat extraordinary,” he wrote in his journal,that British seamen should carry with them this propensity to desert even into merchant vessels, sailing under the flag of their nation, and under circumstances so terrifying; but yet I am informed that their desertion while at Charles Island [in the Galapagos] has been very common, even when there was no prospect whatever of obtaining water but from the bowels of the tortoises. This can only be attributed to that tyranny, so prevalent on board their ships of war, which has crept into their merchant vessels, and is there aped by their commanders. Now mark the difference. While the Essex lay at Charles Island, one-fourth of her crew was every day on shore, and all the prisoners who chose to go; and even lent the latter boats, whenever they wished it, to go for their amusement to the other side of the island. No one attempted to desert or to make their escape; whenever a gun was fired, every man repaired to the beach, and no one was ever missing when the signal was made.
During the first week of October, Porter decided he n
eeded a safe place not frequented by British men-of-war to overhaul his ship and refresh himself and his men. He sailed his fleet west for 2,500 miles to the isolated but thickly populated Marquesas Islands, 850 miles northeast of Tahiti. After so many months at sea the frigate needed her leaking seams caulked and her copper bottom repaired, and she was desperately in need of a thorough smoking to kill the army of rats who were eating the food and clothing, even chewing through the water casks. And the crew and officers were in need of the delightful diversions that Porter expected the Polynesians, particularly their young women, to provide.
On October 25, the Essex and her companions arrived off the island of Nuku Hiva, where the women and men greeted them warmly, Polynesian style. Porter remained on the island—the most important among twelve in the archipelago—until December 12, recuperating, enjoying the islanders’ extraordinary hospitality, and refitting the Essex. Although he would have preferred not to, he could not help getting embroiled in the strange tribal wars on the divided island. With his overwhelming firepower, he was able to cow the tribes, and he completed work on his ships.
Despite these battles, during his weeks ashore, Porter formed a strong attachment to the island and its people, coming to regard Nuku Hiva as a paradise. He regretted that the islanders had come in contact with white men at all. Viewing the natives as people in a state of nature, he claimed to be saddened that they could not remain so. The next best thing, he thought, was making them Americans. And without any authorization whatever, he annexed Nuku Hiva in the name of the United States, renaming it Madison Island. When the president heard later of Porter’s “conquest,” however, he was not flattered and rejected the idea. The United States never annexed the South Pacific paradise. That was left for France to do many years later.
1812: The Navy's War Page 37
