The victory would be a ringing success for the fledgling navy, and especially for Decatur and Allen. The commodore was determined to make the most of it; he would bring Macedonian in as a prize! The battle occurred near the Canary Islands; sailing the wounded British ship home across more than a thousand miles of open ocean, possibly teeming with British cruisers, would be a challenge of the first magnitude – and a perfect way for the glory-seeking Decatur to overshadow Hull’s earlier success in Constitution. To ensure success, Decatur assigned his first lieutenant, William Henry Allen, the task of effecting the repairs at sea and then sailing the ship to America with a small prize crew augmented by British tars willing to change sides.
After five days of relentless work jury-rigging masts and yards, patching holes in the hull, and reeving new rigging, Macedonian, commanded by Lieutenant Allen and accompanied by the American frigate United States, headed west under easy sail. Some four weeks later, during which time neither had seen a single British ship, they parted company in the thick of fog off Nantucket Shoals. Decatur ordered Allen to take the prize into Newport, while he would make for New London and thence to New York. It was to be a singular event in the annals of the United States Navy; only once before had an American naval vessel captured and brought in as a prize an enemy warship. And for Henry Allen, it was most likely the gratifying day of his young life, especially coming into Newport, close to his family and friends. He invited them all aboard to see his ship, including the governor of Rhode Island, his maternal uncle, for whom he fired a nine-gun salute, no doubt rejoicing in the fact that it was fired with British powder!
After repairs, celebrations, and enlisting some additional crew, Allen took his ship to New London and thence to New York, where the navy yard took pains to make proper repairs. For the officers and crew of both ships, the welcome and celebrations in New York were seemingly endless; parades, dinners, theater parties, and a host of political speechifying that went on well into the wee hours on what seemed like a daily basis. All of this was sweetened by the distribution of prize money to all hands, but for Allen, the sweetest prize of all would be his promotion to master commandant. He knew it would be coming soon; after all, his was the glory of bringing in the prize and Commodore Decatur had spoken for him with the secretary. Secretly, Allen had confided to several friends that he would not be surprised were he to be jumped – i.e., skip the rank of master commandant entirely and rise directly to captain. It was not without precedent: Decatur had been rewarded in such a manner after the burning of the American frigate, Philadelphia, in Tripoli; and more recently Lieutenant Charles Morris, who had been first lieutenant in Constitution during the victory over Guerrier, was not only promoted directly to captain, he was given command of a small frigate as well. Allen also knew well that the fifteen men Morris jumped were anything but happy for their colleague. Nevertheless, it was a problem he was willing to face. Further, he posited that a jump promotion would be a fine reflection on his mentor, Stephen Decatur, who had already attained the highest rank available – captain. The rank of admiral would not be created for another fifty years.
It was not to be. Word came down from the Navy Department that he would be promoted only to master commandant, but he would get a command. When, however, was somewhat amorphous, as the promotion list sent by the secretary of the navy to the Senate was delayed for some reason, and, while several other lieutenants received official notice of their advancements, Henry did not. The letter granting his promotion would not make it to New York until after Lieutenant Allen was back at sea.
When the brig Argus returned from the same cruise that had proven so successful for United States, her captain, Master Commandant Arthur Sinclair, requested an extended leave. The ship needed a major refit, to be undertaken by the New York Navy Yard. Allen was in the process of turning command of Macedonian over to Jacob Jones and would soon be unemployed; so Decatur, still commodore of the squadron that included Argus, took the opportunity to assign command to his young protégé, simultaneously requesting confirmation of his action by the Navy Department.
Interestingly, another Rhode Island officer, Oliver Hazard Perry, had been promised the same brig by Secretary Paul Hamilton. But when Hamilton departed the office on 31 December 1812, he had done nothing about it and the decision fell to his successor, William Jones. The potentially sticky problem was avoided when Perry put in a request to transfer to the Great Lakes. With that, Allen’s command was confirmed. Perry, of course, went on to achieve immortality on Lake Erie, and Henry Allen sailed Argus across the Atlantic Ocean to fulfill his own destiny.
PART ONE
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
USS ARGUS
CHAPTER ONE
Three days out of Sandy Hook, NJ
“How fares our illustrious passenger, Oliver? I have seen little of him since our weather turned. Taken to his cot again, I collect?” Lieutenant William Henry Allen, commanding the United States brig Argus, stood on his quarterdeck wrapped in a soaked boat cloak and sporting an equally soggy tarpaulin hat, secured to his head with a scarf. He had to raise his voice to be heard over the keening wind and the cacophony of our straining rig. Testament to the boisterous weather we were experiencing was the four men struggling with the big wheel, each grunting expletives in undertones as it kicked first one way, then the other.
“Aye, that he has. I saw him this morning in the gun room struggling to get some breakfast down, but he left right quick after only a few bites of toast. He says the retching is less distressful when he reclines.” I kept my back to the now-horizontal rain which, mixing with the spray blowing over the weather bulwark, had a distinctly salty taste to it. The quartermasters at the wheel had no such luxury; they had to face head on the slashing rain, wind, and salt spray.
We had been suffering gales and off-and-on driving rain for the last two days – at least that was the term used by our passenger, the esteemed William Crawford, newly appointed United States Minister to France (his actual title, he told us as we were getting underway, was ‘minister plenipotentiary to the court of the Emperor of the French and the King of Italy. Clearly we would not be addressing him that way). We’d only enjoyed one day of fair weather since clearing Sandy Hook, New Jersey, on 18 June 1813, but we were all encouraged by the hourly casting of the log, which indicated an excellent rate of advance toward France, our destination. We had had a bit of fog, which we used to our advantage to elude an over-zealous British cruiser. We had seen not a single British ship since. With the current foul weather, it seemed unlikely that, even should a British cruiser spot us, it would be moved to investigate. And the winds – not always favorable but for the moment boisterous – would enable our little brig to outrun nearly anything we might encounter.
I turned from the captain, squinted into the downpour, and cast my gaze aloft at the straining canvas, bar-taut sheets, halyards, and braces; all appeared to be holding. Argus was set with reduced sail: a reefed tops’l and course on the foremast, and a single reef tucked into the gaff-rigged mainsail. Forward, we carried a stays’l and jib. Satisfied with the situation aloft, I shifted my eye to windward and stared into the endless chain of mountainous waves, white-maned dark horses racing toward us from the north. It was a wild ride, with each one deciding, only at the last second, whether it would slam into our side or slide under us, rolling the ship rail to rail as it passed. The bowsprit described drunken circles in the wet air as it plunged and rose, its motion exaggerated by the rakish angle of the spar. Every third or fourth wave would break green across our windward bow, washing down the deck all the way to the quarterdeck. Since Argus was built with a flush weatherdeck – that is to say, she had no raised fo’c’sle or sterncastle, and the quarterdeck was at the same level as the rest of the spardeck – walking around without a firm grip on the safety lines proved nearly impossible.
The yard did a fine job restoring the brig since her last cruise. She’s nearly as sound as when she and I were both setting ourselves on the sea for the firs
t time, so to speak, back in ’03. And a damn good thing into the bargain! This commission is far too important to us and our country to be delayed by sprung spars, blown sails, or shredded rigging.
When I looked again at my friend, long-time shipmate, and captain, he smiled ruefully and raised his voice just enough for me to hear. Clearly, he remained concerned with the envoy’s condition.
“Aye, I am glad he is able to restrain himself from cascading in my cabin. Took Appene half the night to rid my cabin of the aroma from his little mishap yesterday!” Allen was fond of his Chinese man-servant, as were all the denizens of the wardroom, myself included. “Should he feel the urge, perhaps you might suggest to him that the weather deck would be a more favorable place from which to heave out his guts!” Allen had little sympathy for the plight of our guest; his job, according to the secretary of the navy, was to deliver him and his companions to France as quickly as possible; comfort did not signify. If the weather proved disagreeable to Mister Crawford, then so be it. We did not have the luxury of scudding off before the tempest. The faster we sailed, the faster they would reach France and dry, unmoving land!
Sadly for Henry Allen, the lofty status of our senior passenger entitled him to a cot in the captain’s diminutive cabin, which could barely accommodate our six-foot, sturdy-built captain, let alone another soul of even greater dimension; Crawford stretched beyond six feet in his stockings and was built even sturdier than Allen, appearing more like a shorn bear than a man! I pitied my friend the obligation to share his quarters with such a huge personage, but his other choice – move out entirely and give over the whole cabin to our guest – was clearly not an agreeable alternative, though I suspected another night of Crawford’s “cascading” might cause Henry to rethink his position!
The envoy’s retinue, consisting of his secretary, a Doctor Henry Jackson (who was not a medical doctor, but a man of letters, educated in the sciences as well as being a professor of some note), and two servants, had found berthing in other parts of the ship. Our purser, Henry Denison, had been displaced to the midshipmen’s berth from his cabin by Doctor Jackson, while the junior of the mids had been obliged to hang a hammock in the crew’s berthing deck. It was a cascading series of moves about which none of us was pleased. As if this were not sufficient, a Frenchman, a Monsieur Loremy, had somehow obtained permission from the secretary – or possibly, Commodore Decatur – to make the passage with us. Another midshipman will berth with the men, and be damned!
We were already crowded with an overly large crew and extra midshipmen. Our regular complement of some one hundred twenty-five sailors, marines, and officers had swelled to one hundred fifty-two; to say that conditions below were a trifle cramped would be understatement at its finest. Without question, we all looked forward to putting Mister Crawford and his party ashore, and then quickly taking a prize, which would thin our ranks considerably. But none of that would happen until we reached France, as the secretary’s orders were quite clear about getting to France “with the utmost timeliness and without deviation.” That meant no prizes along the way – even the plum ones, ripe for the picking.
I acknowledged Henry’s request with a nod and turned my face into the rain again to focus on the men working the chain pump forward, under the direction of Colin McLeod, our bosun. I could make out his gravelly Scottish brogue exhorting the men to greater efforts, as the wind carried his words aft. They should be finishing their stint on the pump soon, I knew, having been told by our carpenter, James White, that something on the order of thirty minutes per watch would keep the water in the bilges sufficiently low. With the weather deck awash more often than not, it was only expected that, in addition to the normal amount of seawater coming in through the seams, the sea would find its way below, into the hold and bilge. We would be fine, as long as it grew no worse. Part of my responsibilities as first lieutenant included keeping the ship afloat. As I started to make my way forward to speak to the bosun, the officer of the deck called out to me.
“Mister Baldwin? Mister Inderwick asks that you attend him at your convenience, sir.” Our second lieutenant, Bill Watson, had cupped his hands ’round his mouth so as to be heard above wind. Rather than turn and shout back, I simply waved a hand, perhaps dismissively in his eyes, but simply acknowledging the request.
Watson had the watch and had not been below, so I assumed a messenger had been dispatched by the surgeon to find me. Something urgent, I presumed. I curtailed my excursion forward, and altered course. As I stepped over the coaming and onto the companionway ladder, a figure emerged, brushing past me in great haste. It was none other than our guest, Mister Crawford, staggering up from below. I stepped aside to let him pass. Immediately astern of him was young Midshipman Pottenger, assigned as Crawford’s escort on board and looking none too happy about it!
The American minister to France, looking decidedly green around the gills, lurched toward the nearest bulwark, in all likelihood, the first one he saw – which happened to be the one to weather. He clutched a main shroud with one hand while the other clapped onto the cap rail, each necessary, as it was clear that his legs alone would not support him. Pottenger saw me – he could not have missed me! – and mumbled, “We’re getting’ some air.” His tone fairly dripped with sarcasm; it seemed a bit out of place for so young a fellow, I thought.
He continued the two steps to his charge, perhaps to offer a steadying hand. As he reached out to the envoy, Crawford’s body bucked and he unceremoniously offered what little breakfast he had consumed directly into the wind. Given the paucity of what I had earlier observed him eating, the quantity that spewed forth was surprising. Of course, the gale carried all of it right back onto him and young Pottenger, not quick enough to seek cover. From my position by the hatch, I escaped his noxious emission. I shook my head and resumed my course below to see what our surgeon might need. Clearly, our guest was not at his finest!
On the gundeck below, the sounds that had earlier assaulted my senses abated, leaving a ringing in my ears. I shucked my tarpaulin coat and hat, shaking myself like a dog, and took the three steps to the door of the wardroom. Looking in, I glimpsed Inderwick sitting at our table, flanked by Doctor Jackson and Uriah Philips Levy. I held up one finger to indicate I would be right back and took the few steps aft to my cabin where I deposited my sodden coat and hat. I made a note to remind my servant, Bladen, a landsman I’d recently selected from the latest round of recruits, to hang both near the camboose to dry them. Naturally, he was not in sight.
I returned to the wardroom and took my seat at the head of the table, traditionally the first lieutenant’s chair and thus left unoccupied unless my aft end was in it. The conversation stopped abruptly when I entered the room, but I had overheard mention of the melancholy loss off Boston several weeks before Argus had sailed from New York.
“Good morning, gentlemen. I trust you are not finding the passage too arduous, so far?” While I did pose it as a question, it mattered little to me what the answer, should there be one, might be.
I shot a glance at Levy, whose voice I had thought I heard discussing Lawrence’s debacle. “And yes, Lawrence’s defeat and, more importantly, the loss of the frigate Chesapeake were indeed most disheartening. In light of the brilliant victories we enjoyed during the year previous, that loss seems even more appalling. But we in Argus have every intention of poking our finger right back in the British eye!”
Inderwick smiled slightly and nodded. Doctor Jackson seemed about to offer a comment, but apparently thought better of it and said nothing. Uriah Levy filled the silence.
“Yes, sir, that was indeed an unfortunate happenstance and one that is partially responsible for my desire to join the navy. As to our voyage so far, it is not arduous, not a bit. Why, when I was commanding a merchant vessel – ship-rigged, I might add – we reveled in these kinds of conditions. Made for a fast passage, which made the owners happy. Time is money, gentlemen, in the merchant trade.”
Levy had come aboard mom
ents before we won our anchor from the shallows inside Sandy Hook after a favorable breeze had finally filled in. Having heard about our upcoming cruise, he wanted to volunteer and felt his experience in command of a merchant ship qualified him for naval service. Henry Allen apparently agreed but was not authorized to grant him a commission, or even a warrant. Nonetheless, he signed him as a supernumerary and gave him the honorific of lieutenant for the duration of the voyage. We already had a sailing master, John Hudson, and a master’s mate, Richard Groves; lieutenant was the only option left. He figured, rightly so, that another capable officer of the deck would ease the burden on Watson and me.
Levy was tall and lean, and was favored with dark good looks. He put me in mind of the Tripolitan corsairs I had encountered in this very ship as a midshipman under Captain Decatur. He was one of the very few Jewish officers in the navy (and the first I had come across) and proved a pleasant addition to the wardroom, in spite of an occasional hot temper. He was, according to his own account, a superb pistol shot. I reserved judgment on how that skill might mesh with his hot temper! At twenty-three years of age, he was just a year younger than I, a trifle older than Watson and the same age as Inderwick, and so fit into our group quite nicely as a contemporary.
In Hostile Waters: The Cruise of USS Argus (Oliver Baldwin Novel Book 3) Page 2