The British later excused the wanton destruction of the capital by claiming it was done in retaliation for the burning and plundering that American troops did in Canada. Nothing the United States did in Canada, however, remotely justified the burning of Washington.
WHEN THE BRITISH entered the city, Commodore Tingey, under strict orders from Secretary Jones, destroyed the Washington Navy Yard. Tingey delegated the baleful task to Master Commandant John O. Creighton, and he carried out his duty with a heavy heart, burning the new frigate Columbia and the new sloop of war Argus. When Creighton and his crew were finished, the only building left standing was the marine commandant’s red-brick house.
The British rampage through the city continued into the next day. It only came to an end when a severe hurricane struck, tearing off roofs, destroying buildings, and dousing fires. During the unexpected tempest, flying debris and collapsing houses killed thirty British soldiers. Ross and Cockburn had already decided to retreat to their ships. Since their attack was only a diversion, it seemed prudent to leave as quickly as possible.
When news of Washington’s destruction reached London on September 27, Lord Bathurst, although delighted, was critical of how compassionately General Ross had treated the people of the city. “If . . . you should attack Baltimore, and could . . . make its inhabitants feel a little more of the effects of your visit than what has been experienced at Washington,” he wrote, “you would make that portion of the American people experience the consequences of war who have most contributed to its existence.”
On August 25, under cover of darkness, Ross and Cochrane pulled out of Washington and marched back to Benedict via Upper Marlboro and Nottingham. Ross thought it possible that American militias might turn out in overpowering numbers, bent on revenge. He encountered no opposition, however, and on the evening of August 29 his weary men boarded their transports. Ross was immensely proud of their work. He was particularly delighted with the abundant cannon, powder, and musket cartridges they had hauled away.
General Winder, meanwhile, after the debacle at Bladensburg, gathered what men he could and retreated to Montgomery Court House (Rockville), sixteen miles from Washington, and then moved on to Baltimore, where he thought the next attack would occur.
THE PRESIDENT, AFTER fleeing the capital on August 24 and meeting Dolley the next day, turned around and returned to Washington with some cabinet members on August 27. General Ross had retreated much faster than Madison expected. The president stayed in Washington at the house of his brother-in-law Richard Cutts, which had once been his own home, and Dolley rejoined him there. She had shown remarkable courage throughout the crisis. Later, she and the president took up residence in Colonel John Tayloe’s large residence, known as the Octagon House. (Tayloe was a wealthy Virginia planter, perhaps the richest in the state.)
Madison’s character shone in the aftermath of the debacle. He remained steady and kept firm control of the government, providing essential leadership and demonstrating that Washington may have been burned but the United States was very much intact. And he finally rid himself of Armstrong, replacing him with Monroe for the time being. It was abundantly clear that Armstrong could no longer lead the army, having worn out his welcome with everyone. On September 1, wanting to demonstrate that he was in charge of a functioning government, Madison issued a proclamation urging Americans to expel the invader and accusing the British of “a deliberate disregard of the principles of humanity and the rules of civilized warfare.”
CAPTAIN JAMES GORDON, meanwhile, continued to doggedly lead his squadron up the Potomac. Starting on August 17, he had pushed upriver, encountering no opposition. He kept at it for ten days, overcoming every natural obstacle, including a hurricane on the ninth day—the same storm that hit Washington. He warped his big ships over shallow waters, grounding continuously on shoals while fighting adverse winds. He reported that every one of his larger vessels had gone aground twenty times and were only gotten off by a prodigious effort. Nonetheless, he persevered. He did not reach Fort Washington until the evening of August 27, the same day that Madison returned to the capital.
The fort had a battery of twenty-seven guns, ranging in size from six to fifty-two pounders, and sixty men. Armstrong had not bothered to strengthen it, nor had the president. The pathetic number of men and guns could never withstand Gordon. When he commenced firing from the bomb vessels, he expected a fierce response, but to his utter amazement, none came. The bombardment went on for two hours, before Captain Samuel Dyson and his men fled from the fort and blew it up without firing a shot. Dyson was soon dismissed from the army. The entire blame for the fiasco was placed on him, not on the secretary of war and the president, where it belonged.
Alexandria now lay open to Gordon, and he stood off its wharves on the morning of August 29. The town was defenseless. Its militiamen, who had participated in the fiasco at Bladensburg, were nowhere to be found. Alexandria’s leaders had pleaded with the administration to give them cannon and other munitions, and they were promised them, but none were delivered. There was nothing left to do now but throw themselves on Gordon’s mercy. He made a deal to spare the town in return for supplies and prize ships—twenty-one of them, stuffed with tobacco, wine, sugar, and other goods. Alexandria agreed. It was an abject surrender. The leadership of the country in Washington watched, helpless, as Gordon exacted the humiliating ransom with impunity and then proceeded back down the Potomac on September 2 with his booty.
Secretary Jones tried to obstruct Gordon’s descent. He had already ordered John Rodgers, Oliver Hazard Perry, and David Porter to help with Washington’s defense, but they arrived too late. Jones now hoped that the trio could perform some miracle and stop Gordon as he struggled back to Chesapeake Bay. On August 28 Jones wrote to Rodgers, asking if he would “annoy or destroy the enemy on his return down the river.” The next day, after Jones found out about Gordon’s demands on Alexandria, he angrily ordered Rodgers to bring six hundred fifty men to Bladensburg and await further orders. Rodgers immediately dispatched Porter with a hundred men to march to Washington and then came along himself with additional men, but not the six hundred fifty Jones wanted.
Upon being informed of what Rodgers was doing, Jones wrote Porter on August 31, ordering him to take his detachment of seamen and marines, which had just arrived, and establish batteries with six eighteen-pounders “to effect the destruction of the enemy squadron on its passage down the Potomac.”
On September 2 Acting Secretary of War Monroe, in desperation, suggested to Rodgers that he might reestablish the post at Fort Washington that night. At the time, Rodgers was busy organizing fire ships to attack Gordon as he came down the river, and he ignored Monroe.
The next day, September 3, Gordon’s flagship Seahorse, the 50-gun Euryalus, and the bomb vessel Devastation were two and a half miles below Alexandria when Rodgers attacked them with three small fire vessels, conned by lieutenants Henry Newcomb and Dulany Forrest and Sailing Master James Ramage. Rodgers was in the river, directing them from his gig. The wind did not cooperate, however, and they failed to reach their targets. Gordon’s boats towed the flaming fire ships away. At the same time, Gordon’s men went after Rodgers, firing at him for thirty minutes as he raced away in his gig.
Rodgers tried again the next day, planning to send Lieutenant Newcomb back with a flaming cutter, but the wind again would not cooperate, and when a frigate came after Newcomb, he had to scurry away. That night, Gordon sent some barges to attack Rodgers’s boats, but Rodgers beat them off. At seven o’clock the next morning, Rodgers assembled another fire ship. He hoped to coordinate with Porter, who had established himself farther downriver at the White House, a navigational landmark below Mount Vernon, thirty miles from Washington. But that did not work out either. Rodgers was forced to give up.
As Gordon continued down the Potomac, he encountered Porter with two hundred Virginia militiamen, under Brigadier General John P. Hungerford, at the White House (Belvoir plantation) on Septe
mber 4. Master Commandant Creighton accompanied Porter. They had only three long eighteen-pounders, two twelve-pounders, and two four-pounders to begin with, but more came, and they put up a gallant fight. For the entire day on September 5, Gordon bombarded Porter’s batteries, but with little effect. When Porter continued to fire back, Gordon committed more ships to the assault. As the hours passed, more cannon arrived for Porter. Army Captain Ambrose Spencer of the U. S. Artillery, who had been second in command at Fort Washington when it was blown up, fought alongside Porter with a small contingent. On the morning of September 6, Gordon brought up more of his big ships and commenced a terrific bombardment, which finally forced Porter and the Virginia militiamen to retire. Captain Spencer and his men convinced Porter by their bravery and sacrifice “that it was not want of courage on their part which caused the destruction of the fort.”
Oliver Hazard Perry was the last obstacle Gordon had to face. Perry had hastily thrown up a battery at Indian Head, Maryland, with a single eighteen-pounder in it that arrived thirty minutes before Gordon appeared. Perry had little ammunition and started firing right away. Militiamen working with him had six-pounders, and they kept up a spirited fire. All the ammunition was quickly expended, however, and Perry and the militiamen were forced to retire under heavy fire from Gordon’s ships. The exchange went on for an hour. Perry had one man wounded during the fight.
Before Gordon extricated himself from the Potomac completely, Admiral Cochrane received word that Gordon might be in trouble and began moving his big fleet toward the river on September 7. The next day the fleet was in the Potomac, making its way slowly upstream. Cochrane and his big ships were twenty miles from the mouth of the river on September 9, when Gordon suddenly appeared triumphantly with twenty-one prizes and the bomb ships and rocket vessel that were indispensable for an attack on Baltimore, or another place like Rhode Island, which Cochrane was considering.
In the end, Rodgers, Porter, and Perry put up as spirited a fight as they could with almost no resources, and they made an important contribution to the war by delaying Gordon and Cochrane, which gave other cities that were under the gun, like Baltimore, additional time to prepare their defenses.
Even Boston was finally realizing that the threat of a British invasion was real. Alexandria was known as a Federalist city with pro-English sympathies, but that had not saved it from a thorough looting by Gordon.
WHILE GORDON WAS on his diversionary raid up the Potomac, Captain Sir Peter Parker had been busy with his diversion as well. He wrote to Admiral Cochrane that he had “been continually employed in reconnoitering the harbors and coves and sounding the Bay and acting for the annoyance of the enemy.” He found Annapolis practically defenseless and thought it could be taken easily. He also reconnoitered near Baltimore.
On August 30, after he had written to Cochrane, Parker became engaged in a sharp fight with Maryland militiamen near Chestertown, Maryland. He led a charge against what he thought were 500 militiamen, but were in fact fewer than 100. Whatever their number, he was confident they would run, as militiamen had several times before when he challenged them. This time, however, they stood their ground. Parker had 104 men armed with bayonets, pikes, and pistols. He attacked the militiamen at Caulk’s Field near Chestertown around eleven o’clock during a dark night. Early in the action, Parker was shot and killed. His men fought on, uncertain how big a force they were fighting. Eventually, the Maryland militiamen ran out of ammunition and pulled back, but the British, believing they were up against a much larger force, did as well, retreating to their ship, the Menelaus. During the fracas, no Americans were killed; 3 were wounded. The British had 14 killed and 27 wounded.
AFTER THE WASHINGTON and Alexandria disasters, some Federalists felt vindicated. They had predicted blows of this kind, and they were not reluctant to say, “We told you so.” “The Federalists now have great consolation that they always with all their might opposed this war,” the Salem Gazette wrote. “They supplicated and entreated that it might not be declared, for they foresaw and foretold the ruin and misery and disgrace it would inevitably bring upon the nation.”
Most of the country, however, was appalled and angry at the wanton destruction of the capital, as were Europeans. The French were loud in their condemnation of the desecration of Washington. Even some British newspapers were disgusted by what had happened.
WASHINGTON WASN’T THE only place Cochrane’s squadrons were attacking. On April 7–8, 1814, the British sent a raiding party up the Connecticut River to Essex (then known as Pettipaug Point) and destroyed twenty-seven vessels without suffering any losses.
On May 22, Commodore Sir Thomas Masterman Hardy sailed his flagship Ramillies from its station off the eastern end of Long Island to Narragansett Bay near Boston. Seven days later, he transferred to the frigate Nymph and sailed up the coast to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, to ascertain if an attack on the battleship Washington, under construction there, was feasible. Hardy did not want to use the 74-gun Ramillies to reconnoiter for fear it would alarm the countryside and warn Isaac Hull.
On June 16, Hardy reported back to Cochrane that after a thorough reconnaissance, he believed the Washington could be easily destroyed. Hull had done everything he could to prepare a defense with extremely limited resources. He was getting little support from either the state government or the national government. Armstrong did not think Portsmouth needed help. Cochrane decided to postpone the project, however, even though he knew that destroying the battleship would be popular in England. The Times of London would certainly have loudly applauded.
Cochrane had a more important assignment for Hardy—seizing Moose Island in Passamaquoddy Bay. The important harbor of East port was on the island, and Cochrane had orders from Bathurst to occupy it. Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Pilkington sailed from Halifax in the sloop Martin, and on July 7 he met Hardy in the Ramillies. Hardy was coming from Bermuda accompanied by two troop transports, which carried six hundred men, and the bomb vessel Terror. Pilkington landed at Eastport, in the Maine District of Massachusetts, and took over Moose Island. The eighty-six American defenders at Fort Sullivan, led by Major Perley Putnam, reluctantly surrendered on July 11 without a fight. Putnam had no other choice.
Raids were continuing in Boston Harbor. When the 38-gun Nymph, under Captain Famery P. Epworth, returned from her scouting trip to Portsmouth and was back at her station off Boston, she immediately went on the attack. “On the night of 20–21 June the Nymphe’s sailing master and a small party rowed from the frigate into Boston Harbor to burn a sloop ‘within a mile’ of the Constitution,” Commodore Bainbridge reported. He was commandant of the Boston Navy Yard and had to worry about not only the Constitution but also the 74-gun Independence , which was under construction. The Admiralty wanted both destroyed. Bainbridge also had responsibility for protecting Boston Harbor and the city. He got no help from the ultrafederalists in Boston, but most ordinary people supported him. In another daring raid on July 7, armed barges from the Nymphe managed to cut out five more small sloops.
British raids in the summer and fall of 1814 in New England were extensive. They struck in the district of Maine and in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. Both Wareham and Situate in Massachusetts were attacked. No place was safe. The Bulwark raided Saco, Maine, on June 16. Bath and Wiscasset in Maine were attacked the day before, and Rye, New Hampshire, was threatened.
A particularly vicious raid was conducted against Stonington, Connecticut. Rear Admiral Henry Hotham, commander of the blockading squadron off Long Island, was obliged to carry out Cochrane’s order to lay waste to towns, and he set his sights on Stonington. Hotham ordered Captain Hardy, who had just returned from Maine, to do the job. Hardy found the whole business distasteful: he thought that attacking defenseless towns was both cowardly and stupid. Nonetheless, he carried out his instructions and bombarded Stonington—an innocent place that had no strategic value—beginning on the evening of August 9. Hardy employed the 38-gun fri
gate Pactolus, the 20-gun brig Dispatch, the bomb vessel Terror, and barges from the Ramillies. The shelling went on for about four hours, ending at midnight. The townspeople bravely defended Stonington with three cannon. They were helped immeasurably when 3,000 Connecticut militiamen arrived to defend the fort that had been firing fruitlessly at the warships.
The bombardment resumed the next day for several hours. The British ships were joined by the Ramillies and the 18-gun Nimrod. Later, Hardy suspended the attack and did not resume until the afternoon of August 11, when the Terror threw shells into the town sporadically until evening. The following day, the Terror resumed her desultory shelling until noon, when Hardy called off the attack and left, greatly embarrassed.
Of far greater importance, the British initiated a large-scale invasion of eastern Maine. On August 26 Lieutenant General Sir John. C. Sherbrooke, the governor of Nova Scotia, and Rear Admiral Edward Griffith left Halifax with twenty-four ships and 2,500 men for the assault. Griffith’s squadron included the 74-gun Dragon, under Captain Robert Barrie; the 74-gun Bulwark; the frigates Endymion, Bacchante, and Tenedos; the sloop Sylph; and two brigs, Rifleman and Peruvian. Sherbrooke’s men landed unopposed at Castine in Penobscot Bay on September 1. Twelve thousand men suitable for military service were in the northeastern part of Maine, but Madison’s war was not popular there, and the militias were poorly organized. Sherbrooke met no opposition. The tiny American garrison of regulars at Castine destroyed their small fort and withdrew up the Penobscot River. Sherbrooke then sent amphibious forces against Belfast, Hamden, Bangor, and Machias. Soon all of eastern Maine, from the Penobscot River to Passamaquoddy Bay, was in British hands. Federalists in Boston liked to think that the people of eastern Maine welcomed the British, but the general sentiment was more one of neutrality and a wish that the war would be over. Sherbrooke soon annexed the captured territory, and the Times was positively gleeful. “The district we speak of is the most valuable in the United States for fishing establishments,” the editors wrote, “and has a coast of 60 leagues abounding in excellent harbors, from whence much lumber is sent to Europe and the West Indies.”
1812: The Navy's War Page 40
