Naval Actions of the War of 1812

Although the treaty of peace between England and the United States was concluded at Ghent on November 24th, in the year 1814, hostilities continued even after the signing of the document that took place a month later to a day.

This can be well understood when we stop to think that at the best rates of travelling it would take in the neighborhood of three weeks, or possibly four, for the news to reach the United States.

The battle of New Orleans, so disastrous to the English arms, would never have taken place if there had been such a thing as a cable in those days. Nor would there have occurred several smart actions at sea, including, sad to relate, the capture of the U. S. S. President by a British squadron.

There is no excuse, however, for the long detention of American prisoners in the hands of the British, when there was no longer any chance of their serving against her.

On February 17th President Madison ratified the Treaty of Ghent, and hostilities practically ceased, although, of course, not knowing this fact, Captain Stewart, in command of the Constitution, captured the Cyane and the Levant, two British sloops of war. And on the 23d of March, on a foreign station, the gallant Captain Biddle, in command of the Hornet, captured and sank the Penguin.

But even so long past the time when the news might have been expected to be about the world, on April 27th, 1815, off the Island of San Salvador, the sloop of war Hornet had the last hostile experience with the English of that eventful period. The little sloop was sailing in company with the Peacock, and together they made a pair of fighters that were not afraid of anything that carried in the neighborhood of their weight of metal.

In a letter from Biddle, the senior captain, to Stephen Decatur appears the following: “The Peacock and this ship, having continued off Tristan d’Acunha the number of days directed by you in your letter of instruction, proceeded in company to the eastward on the twelfth day of April, bound to the second place of rendezvous. Nothing of any importance occurred until the twenty-second day of April at 7 A.M., in latitude 38° 30´ and longitude 33´ east. The wind was from northeast by north and light through the day, and by sundown we had neared the chase considerably. It was calm during the day, and at daylight on the 28th he [Warrington of the Peacock] was not in sight. A breeze springing from the northwest, we crowded steering sails on both sides, and the chase was made out standing to the northward upon a wind. At 2.45 P.M. the Peacock was about six miles ahead of this ship, and, observing that she appeared to be suspicious of the chase, I took in starboard steering-sails and hauled up for the Peacock. I was still, however, of opinion that the chase was an Indiaman, though, indeed, the atmosphere was quite smoky and indistinct, and I concluded she was very large. Captain Warrington was waiting for me to join him, that we might get together alongside of her. At 3.22 P.M. the Peacock made the signal that the chase was a ship of the line and an enemy. I took in immediately all steering-sails and hauled upon the wind, the enemy being then upon our lee quarter, distant about eight miles. By sundown I had perceived that the enemy sailed remarkably fast and was very weatherly.”

This letter was dated from San Salvador, June 10th, 1815.

It had been very calm on the morning of the 28th when the great ship had been sighted which, as Biddle has recorded, every one took to be a large East-Indiaman. As the Peacock was in advance and to the windward of the stranger, it was feared by the crew of the Hornet that she would be first to place herself alongside and secure the rich prize. According to the private journal of one of the officers on the Hornet, they had already begun in their imagination to divide the contents of the vessel they expected to capture among them. If she came from the Indies, the sailors declared that they would carpet the berth-deck with costly rugs; while if she hailed from England and was on an outward voyage, the officers revelled in the idea of what her larder might contain; the probable value of her cargo was estimated carefully.

The Hornet was crowding on all sail in order to draw up before the Peacock should have had the best of the picking. Captain Biddle was on deck with his glass in hand watching the Peacock, when suddenly he saw her swing about (she was well to windward), and fly a signal telling that the big vessel was a ship of the line. The Peacock was a faster sailer than the Hornet, as the latter sat deep in the water, and, owing to the weight of metal she carried, was slow in stays. But it was evident, by six o’clock in the evening, three hours after Warrington had signalled Biddle to beware of approaching nearer, that the big fellow had turned the tables and was evidently the pursuer, with the intention of running down the Hornet. Every minute the sails rose higher and higher above the horizon until the great hull was in plain view. She weathered the little Hornet, and it was seen that at the rate of progress the two were making the seventy-four would be within gunshot sometime during the night.

Immediately the wedges of the lower masts were loosened, and at nine o’clock orders were given to lighten ship as much as possible. The sheet-anchor was cut away and hove overboard, and all of the cable followed it. Then the spare rigging and spars were put over the side, and before ten o’clock they scuttled the wardroom-deck and hove overboard about fifty tons of the kentledge.

It was a bright night, with all the stars shining, and there was no use disguising the matter: the Hornet was continually dropping back. The seventy-four fired a gun and signalled, but Biddle did not respond. Like Hull, who brought the Constitution successfully away from a superior force, by pluck and attention to duty, knowledge and seamanship, he determined to leave nothing untried that would tend to increase the rate of his vessel’s sailing.

At two in the morning the Hornet tacked to the southward and westward, and immediately the enemy astern did likewise. At daylight the line-of-battle ship was within gunshot on the Hornet’s lee quarter. At seven in the morning the English colors were displayed at the peak of the Britisher, and a rear-admiral’s flag was flown at his mizzen-topgallant mast-head. At the same time he began firing from his bow guns—it must be assumed more as an imperious order for the Hornet to show her colors and heave to than with an idea of crippling her, for the shot overreached her about a mile.

Biddle paid no attention at all, but having ascertained that the lightening of his ship made her much faster, he went at it again, cutting away the remaining anchors, and letting every foot of cable go overboard. Then he broke up the launch and left the débris in the wake. Even the provisions were broken into, and barrels of salt-horse and bread thrown out upon the waters. Then more kentledge followed, and, tapping the magazines, he threw over all but a dozen or so of round shot. Then over went the capstan, which was no easy job, and they began on the guns; one after another they plashed overboard. All this time the Cornwallis, the great seventy-four, kept up a continual firing, to which no reply was made. In fact, for four hours the English gunners displayed the worst marksmanship on record, for their shot continually went ahead of and all around the Hornet without once striking her, although several passed between her masts.

At eleven the breeze began to freshen, and the seventy-four commenced to creep up slowly, and then gain all at once in a manner which caused Biddle to believe that the Englishman had made alterations in his trim. By noon the wind had shifted slightly, and was squally, with fresh breezes from the westward. It was Sunday, the 30th, but there was no service held. Gloom was everywhere throughout the American vessel: staring them in the face were apparently inevitable capture and the frightful confinement in an English prison. Many of the crew had already been impressed and had served in the English navy, escaping from time to time, and the idea of being held as deserters—deserters to a country that was not theirs—gave cause for much unhappiness. At 1 P.M. the Cornwallis was so close that her commander began to fire by divisions, and once let go his entire broadside loaded with round and grape. But, as is recorded in the journal, “the former passed between our masts and the latter fell all around us. The enemy fired shells, but they were so ill directed as to be perfectly harmless.” And now began what looked to be a work of destruction, and which was intended as such, no doubt. Biddle determined that if he were taken there would be very little for the enemy to show as trophy. Overboard went all the muskets, cutlasses, and ironwork. The bell was broken up, and the topgallant forecastle was chopped to pieces. All this time only three-quarters of a mile on the lee quarter was the great ship of the line pouring in a constant storm of shot and shell. The Yankee tars trimmed ship by massing themselves against the rail, after the fashion of a yacht’s crew.

At four o’clock a shot from the enemy struck the jib-boom, and another caught the starboard bulwark just forward of the gangway. A third smashed on the deck forward of the main-hatch, and, glancing up, passed through the foresail. It struck immediately over the head of a wounded Yankee sailor who had been hurt in the action with the Penguin; the splinters were scattered all around the invalid, and a small paper flag, the American ensign, that he had hoisted over his cot, was struck down. But immediately he lifted it up and waved it about his head. In fact, to quote again from the entry in the journal, “Destruction stared us in the face if we did not surrender, yet no officer, no man in the ship, showed any disposition to let the enemy have the poor little Hornet.”

Captain Biddle mustered the crew, and told them that, as they might soon be captured, he hoped to perceive that propriety of conduct that had distinguished them, and that he was pleased at being their commander. But now, as if by a miracle, the Hornet began to gain. The wind blew more aft, and by five the enemy’s shot fell short. Biddle had not replied even with his stern-chaser to all this cannonading, for he had noticed that the other’s firing hampered her sailing. At half-past five the crew broke out into a cheer, for the Cornwallis was dropping behind, slowly, but surely. Now Biddle showed his colors, and so fast did the Hornet pick up, with the wind in her favorite quarter for good going, that a few minutes after six the enemy was hull down. All night long the distance between the two increased, and at daylight the Cornwallis was fifteen miles behind. At nine o’clock she shortened sail, hauled upon the wind to the eastward, and gave up, after a chase of forty-two hours.

A remarkable circumstance of this affair is that, owing to the variableness of the wind, the Hornet had made a perfect circle around the battle-ship.

The relief occasioned to all by the escape was vented in cheering, and, extra grog being passed, the men were in extremely good temper, despite the fact of their precarious condition, for they were on the high seas with no guns, no boats, no anchors, and short of provisions. They had packed up all their things, thinking that they would soon have to go on board the enemy as prisoners, but now, joyfully, they returned them to their places.

In the fine writing of the period that every person who touched pen and ink seemed prone to, the author of the journal says: “This was truly a glorious victory over the horrors of banishment and the terrors of a British floating dungeon. Quick as thought, every face was changed from the gloom of despair to the highest smile of delight, and we began once more to breathe the sweets of liberty. The bitter sighs of regret were now changed.”

Biddle asked and obtained a court of inquiry to investigate the matter of his throwing overboard almost everything but the skin of his vessel, and on the 23d of August, 1815, by order of the Secretary of the Navy, court was convened on board the Hornet, and the following opinion was pronounced: “The court, after mature deliberation on the testimony adduced, are of opinion that no blame is imputable to Captain Biddle on account of the return of the Hornet into port with the loss of her armament, stores, etc., and that the greatest applause is due to him for his persevering gallantry and nautical skill, evinced in escaping, under the most disadvantageous circumstance, after a long and arduous chase by a British line-of-battle ship.”

The Cornwallis fired the last gunshot of the war of 1812.