For Honour's Sake (30 page)

W
hile President Madison hastened to send envoys to Russia to take advantage of Tsar Alexander's mediation offer, the war intensified. In Great Britain, the government's attitude toward America had hardened during the winter of 1812–13 as news of Royal Navy losses to the U.S. frigates filtered in. When the presidential election swept Madison back to power, Lord Liverpool's cabinet decided it must commit more resources to the war or risk losing British North America.

On January 9, the Prince Regent issued a declaration that for the first time officially acknowledged that there was no end in sight to the war between the two nations. The message was carefully crafted to further foster the general public feeling that Madison had started this war in collusion with Napoleon Bonaparte and was in fact little more than a puppet dancing on the end of the emperor's strings.
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Speaking from the House of Commons backbenches, George Canning decried Madison as “the arch enemy of this country.”
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In London,
The Times
demanded an end to negotiation with “these blustering democrats; for surely no person in his senses could ever have believed that Mr. Madison would accede to any terms consistent with the honour or safety of this country.” The editors spurned Madison's persistent denials that the United States was in any way aligned with France.
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At No. 14 Downing Street, Lord Bathurst and Undersecretary Henry Goulburn worked feverishly to drum up reinforcements for Canada. It
was a painfully complicated business, requiring gleaning a battalion of infantry in one corner of the empire, a company of artillery in another. As each unit was confirmed a letter was dashed off to Sir George Prevost bearing the news. Finally Bathurst provided Prevost with a complete accounting and the promise that when the ice melted on the St. Lawrence River sufficient to permit navigation, the 19th Light Dragoons regiment, a company of Royal Artillery as well as reinforcements to bring the existing four artillery companies in Canada up to strength, detachments of drivers, sappers, and miners, battalions from seven infantry regiments, and two regiments of Swiss troops would arrive. Bathurst could not, however, promise that many of these troops would reach Canada in time for the 1813 campaign season because they were coming from great distances. One of the Swiss regiments, for example, was being released from the Iberian campaign, where the tide had so turned in Britain's favour that Wellington's army could be slightly reduced.
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It was entirely possible that Prevost would have to meet the inevitable early-spring invasion with what forces were on hand.

Hoping to force the Americans to divert troops away from Canada, the British government instructed Admiral Warren in January to launch a series of raids along America's coastline in addition to maintaining the blockades. Liverpool's cabinet realized that Warren would not be able to fully blockade such a long coast riddled with small bays, coves, and inlets. Instead key ports would be blockaded, while the raids would spread panic throughout the coastal communities and create demands for defensive troops. Warren was also to corral as many U.S. naval ships inside blockaded ports as possible to prevent their putting out to sea where they might threaten British shipping and trade lines.

By early spring Warren had blockaded Chesapeake and Delaware bays, New York City, Charleston, Port Royal, Savannah, and the mouth of the Mississippi. No American ships, naval or merchant, were allowed in or out and were seized if possible. Neutral ships approaching these ports were warned off, while those caught within were denied exit. Attempts to elude the blockade resulted in seizure.

Another stricture the Admiralty imposed on the Royal Navy was that ship captains were to refuse single-ship engagements that they might
lose. To ensure that his blockading forces could defeat any challenge issued by the U.S. Navy, Warren always had a ship of the line supporting every squadron of frigates and smaller ships. This was particularly the case at Boston, a favourite port for American frigate captains.
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While Warren sought to bottle up the American fleet, Secretary of the Navy William Jones struggled to get all his ships out to sea. Knowing the U.S. Navy was too weak to directly challenge the blockades, Jones ordered his captains to slip out to sea one by one and then scatter. His idea was simple. Working singly, each U.S. frigate or schooner would carve out a section of ocean as its personal hunting ground and capture or destroy any British shipping that strayed across its sights. If enough havoc was wreaked, the British blockades would have to be lifted so these squadrons could pursue the American warships or shepherd maritime shipping by convoy through the troubled waters. In this way, Jones was confident America could challenge British domination of the seas “without hazarding the precious gems of our national glory.” Given their scant numbers, Jones was anxious to preserve every ship he had.

Some ships escaped the blockades. Others had already been at sea before the blockades were erected. The 32-gun
Essex
was among the latter. Having put out from Delaware in late October, by spring 1813 it had rounded Cape Horn to spread terror throughout the British whaling fleet operating near the Galapagos Islands.

Loose in the South Atlantic was the 18-gun sloop
Hornet,
under Capt. James Lawrence, which tangled with Capt. William Peake's brig
Peacock
in February. In a thirty-minute action fought at a range of 50 yards, Lawrence managed to swing
Hornet
so as to fire on
Peacock's
starboard quarter with full effect while Peake could only counter with two after-guns. The Americans mauled the British ship. Grapeshot and sniper fire from the sails aloft slaughtered the sailors manning the after-guns. A cannonball tore Peake asunder, while a falling spar swept the ensign overboard, prompting the senior lieutenant to surrender the ship. A prize-crew jumped aboard only to find the ship foundering. Three Americans and eight British drowned trying to abandon her. Lawrence had lost only 1 man killed and 2 wounded during the fight itself, while the British had suffered 9 dead and 28 wounded.
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That the blockades were far from impregnable was effectively demonstrated by Commodore John Rodgers when, taking advantage of late-season heavy seas and a blinding snowstorm that had driven the British ships out of position, he slipped
President
and
Congress
out of Boston on April 23. Once at sea the two ships scattered per Jones's instructions.
Congress
achieved little over its eight-month cruise. But Rodgers took
President
on a great circle of the Atlantic that passed the Azores, the Shetlands, and the Orkneys, looped around Ireland, and then scoured through the Grand Banks off Newfoundland before dodging back into the shelter of Newport, Rhode Island, in September. Rodgers had taken a dozen prizes during his voyage, and every British attempt to intercept him had gone for naught.

Two other ships,
United States
and
Macedonian,
also slipped their tethers, escaping from New York at the end of May. Although these ships had luckless cruises, their elusion of the blockade exposed Warren to much criticism and added to the growing British public opinion that the American naval captains could run circles at will around their Royal Navy counterparts.
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That illusion was somewhat laid to rest when Capt. Philip Broke of the 38-gun
Shannon
met the much-lauded Capt. James Lawrence, who had just taken command of the American frigate
Chesapeake
—star of the 1807 impressment crisis—in a head-to-head contest. Although the ships mounted an equal number of guns and
Chesapeake
had a larger crew, Broke decided to bring the ship to battle despite Admiralty injunctions against single-ship engagements. For weeks he had been relentlessly training his gun crews and felt them ready to match the best of the U.S. Navy. On June 1, standing off Boston harbour, he issued a formal challenge for Lawrence to meet “ship to ship to try the fortunes of our respective flags.” The challenge was issued too late, however, as before it reached the harbour,
Chesapeake
sailed directly toward
Shannon.
Both men were spoiling for a fight, even though Lawrence thought his crew green as grass and
Chesapeake
jinxed. Before leaving his cabin for the bridge, the American captain scratched out a hurried letter to a friend. “Should I be so unfortunate as to be taken off,” he wrote, “I leave my wife and children to your care.”

The two ships passed several hours manoeuvring for position, but at about four in the afternoon opened on each other with a broadside at close range. Broke had his guns loaded with double shot that tore into the American vessel with catastrophic result. Great holes were rent in the bulwarks, the sailing master fell dead, the fourth lieutenant lay dying, Lawrence was struck in the leg by a sniper's musket ball. The two ships veered and then collided,
Shannon's
after-port being caught by
Chesapeake's
anchor. The resulting position left the American upper decks completely exposed to
Shannon's
forward guns, which raked them with grapeshot. A group of British sailors jumped aboard
Chesapeake
but were driven back in a vicious fight, and Lawrence was wounded a second time when a bullet pierced his abdomen.

Before the Americans could clear the British from the deck, Broke jumped over
Chesapeake's
railing with a larger boarding party close behind. Seeing the danger, Lawrence struggled to his feet and shouted: “Don't give up the ship! Don't give up the ship!” Carried below to his cabin, now serving as the surgeon's operating theatre, Lawrence demanded that the surgeon rush up to the deck and order that the crew fight to the last, refusing to strike the colours. “They shall wave while I live,” he gasped.

It was too late. The hand-to-hand melee ended when the senior American officer ordered his men to lay down their arms. A battle that had lasted a mere fifteen minutes had transformed the two ships into slaughterhouses. Broke lay dying, the victim of a sabre wound. 23 other British sailors were dead and another 58 wounded. The Americans had lost 61 killed and 85 wounded. Lawrence lived for four more days, but refused to speak or acknowledge the surrender. When he died the British officer commanding the prize-crew ordered his body wrapped in the ship's colours.
Chesapeake
was taken to Halifax, where the American commander was buried with full honours.
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The capture of
Chesapeake
did much to quell criticism of the Royal Navy at home and marked the end of the U.S. Navy's dominance of the sea that had marked the previous year, while the blockades and raids of its coasts demonstrated that America could do little to safeguard itself from direct naval attack. Repeated amphibious raids sent the clear message that the British could strike where and when they wanted with near impunity.

The first British raid was conducted in Chesapeake Bay by Admiral Sir George Cockburn in April. Intelligence reports showed that the Americans had such weak defences in place that Warren provided only a single frigate to support the landing of about 180 seamen, 200 marines, and a small artillery detachment. On April 28 the raiders struck Frenchtown on the Elk River and burned a large quantity of military stores and several small vessels. They escaped with only one man wounded.

Five days later Cockburn struck again, attacking and destroying an artillery battery at Havre de Grace along with several nearby homes. The raiders then pushed several more miles up the Susquehanna River and spent the ensuing day wrecking a cannon foundry. Again only one man was wounded during this escapade. On May 5, Cockburn went up the Sassafras River to Georgetown and Fredericktown, scattered some local militia and burned any houses from which their owners had fled. Cockburn established a pattern here that subsequent British raiders adopted. Those inhabitants who stayed and cooperated by accepting forced sale of goods the British wanted had their houses spared. Those who either resisted or took flight saw their homes looted and burned.

This early success, against what Warren described as the most vulnerable country to raiding he had ever seen, prompted the Admiralty to commit more resources to amphibious operations against the American coastline. Warren was allocated 2,400 men, consisting mostly of two Royal Marine battalions numbering 1,684. While Lord Bathurst saw these operations as a means to take pressure off Canada, the Admiralty instructed Warren to focus on objectives that would cripple the U.S. Navy.

The larger force's first attempt came on June 22, with an attack against a fort manned by about 700 Americans on Craney Island in Chesapeake Bay. Poor intelligence resulted in the landing boats running aground well offshore, and the attack crumbled. Forty men were dead, wounded, or missing when the attackers withdrew with nothing to show for the attempt. Warren ordered a less ambitious operation three days later against Hampton, where a small artillery battery and a couple of hundred militia were dug in facing the James River. The militia were quickly driven off, the guns captured, and the village pillaged. A company of
French prisoners of war recruited into the army ran amok. Wrote Lt. Col. Charles Napier, who had commanded one element of the raid,
“every
horror was committed with impunity, rape, murder, pillage: and not a man was punished.” Col. Sir Thomas Beckwith reported to Warren that controlling the Frenchmen had proved impossible and that many were liable to desert at the first opportunity. In early July, Warren had them packed off to Halifax and shipped back to Britain.

More raids followed in July, with Cockburn leading a detached force south to attack Ocracoke Island and Portsmouth, North Carolina. Two American vessels were captured and the inhabitants forced to sell cattle and stores. Warren, meanwhile, continued running raids in Chesapeake Bay when and where he liked. In August, with malaria and other fevers running wild through the ranks of his soldiers and sailors, Warren abandoned the bay, sailing north to recoup his strength in Halifax. The success of the British blockades and raids had left no doubt in the minds of either the British or the Americans that the United States could prevail only by succeeding in its campaigns against Canada.
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