by D P Prouty
After about three hours, Charlie replaced Frank, and I replaced Charlie three hours after that as we continued to sail without cause for concern. As darkness approached, we set full sail and closed with the convoy for the night. Since there was only about eleven hours between sunrise and sunset during that time of the year, we began to close up with the convoy after my watch.
We continued this pattern without interruption until the fourth day when Charlie reported seeing a mast over the horizon. The unknown vessel was approaching the convoy from the port side, our side! The captain ordered the crew to action stations and set full sail on an intercept course with the intruder. All the men scattered about preparing for the engagement. I helped Mr. Duffy get the cutlasses distributed on deck as the marines prepared their muskets. After about forty-five minutes, the captain spotted the corsair through his glass. “She’s a sloop flying British colors,” he said. “I’ll be dammed, Bainbridge was right! I think we can engage her before they reach the merchantman!”
Mr. Freeman said, “Sir, shall we hoist the French colors?” The captain thought about it for a moment, then replied, “No, leave our own colors up, by the time they make out our colors, it will be too late for them. They’re overly fixated on their prize to notice us yet, let’s see how close we can get before they run!” A few minutes passed as the captain studied the movements of the corsair. Then he assembled the officers on the quarterdeck and said, “Lieutenant Potts, I want round shot off the portside as soon as is feasible. Disable as many cannons as you possibly can. She can’t have but about three or four cannons on her starboard.” Then he said, “They can’t outrun us, so their only option will be to board us, so make your follow on fires with grapeshot at her deck.”
Lieutenant Potts nodded and quickly began barking orders. “Lieutenant Baker, get your marines dispersed and get musket fire on those gun crews as soon as practical.” Lieutenant Baker was so excited he could hardly contain himself as he hurried to get his marines ready.
Midshipman Talbert was looking through the spyglass as the captain was giving instructions and said, “Sir, they’re raising the French colors, two of the merchantman are turning to starboard to flee, they still haven’t seen us!”
“That’s a colossal mistake on his part, and very unusual,” the captain replied. Then he leaned down on the gunwale, pressed his eyebrows together as his forehead creased up, and said calmly, “Mr. Freeman, have Mr. Best look out over the horizon in all directions, I want to make sure this corsair is not reinforced by a French warship.” The instructions were passed up to Charlie and he scanned the horizon in all directions. He passed down that only the Retaliation, the corsair and the merchantman were visible.
The corsair spotted us bearing down on them and broke off their attack, turning hard to port in an attempt to escape the trap. The captain adjusted course and we quickly closed in with the corsair. I put the cotton in my ears that Lieutenant Baker had given me and got down next to the gunwale. As we maneuvered alongside, the marines began to fire muskets at the enemy cannoneers and the captain gave the order to fire our cannon. The sloop had four small cannons, maybe three-pounders I thought, on her port and were able to fire two of the guns as we poured our fire into her side. Before the smoke totally filled the void between the two ships it looked as though the round shot destroyed one of the enemy cannons and disabled another with a devastating volley. The marines focused on the remaining cannon crews as the cannoneers loaded grapeshot. The deafening noise made me dizzy, even with the cotton stuffed in my ears.
The captain ordered Lieutenant Gross to have our boarders stand by. The grapeshot was fired at the enemy ship, now about ten or fifteen feet away. The high-pitched screams of men and the additional smoke billowing up contributed to the chaos. Lieutenant Gross came near the captain and was yelling, but nothing was understandable through the noise. He grabbed the captain by the shoulder, and yelled. I could barely hear him as he screamed, “They’ve struck their colors!” The captain pulled me by the arm and yelled, “Tell Potts and Baker to cease-fire!”
I ran down the port and found Lieutenant Potts and gave him the captain’s orders. Lieutenant Baker and the marines were throwing lines with grappling hooks to the sloop, preparing to support our boarding party. I passed on the captain’s orders and the noise began to fade. Soon all that was heard was the faint cries of the wounded. The French captain had surrendered his vessel. As the smoke cleared the extent of the damage to the sloop was incredible. Bodies littered their deck, it was later reported that they had twenty-six dead and ten wounded in the action. The grapeshot and musket fire were overwhelming at close range. The captain ordered Bat and his mates aboard to assist with the wounded and the French survivors began preparing the bodies for burial. In contrast, our casualties consisted of only two wounded with minor abrasions.
The French vessel was the Alesia, still afloat and able to sail, the captain put a prize crew on board the sloop with Lieutenant Gross in command. The convoy continued to sail, so Bat remained on the Alesia working on wounded while some of his loblolly boys remained on the Eagle.
The French buried their crewmen at sea while sailing. We rejoined the convoy and slipped back into our overwatch position with Lieutenant Gross following us. The battle was short and intense. I was still shaking several hours after the action as I found it difficult to calm myself.
The intensity of the engagement now transitioned to the anxiety of waiting. A couple of days had passed without incident and it seemed as though the privateers would not again attack the convoy. But that was hopeful thinking, at least on my part. Lieutenant Baker would be greatly disappointed if no further action was required. One evening, Mr. Duffy, Frank, and I were on deck and I expressed that I was having difficulty sleeping, the worry over the next engagement kept me awake. Mr. Duffy said, “Waiting boys, that’s the worst time because the what ifs attack your mind. Try to clear your mind of anything that might happen and focus on what is. Concentrate on how you can make yourself better, not on what might happen to you. This will help you relax and know that what has happened cannot be changed and what will happen is not something to worry over since it will occur whether or not you worry about it or not.” Neither Frank, nor I said anything, I don’t think he was sleeping well either, although he didn’t say anything. I fought to keep the thought of those dead men on the corsair out of my mind. Every time I thought of them I felt nauseous. I thought of Charlene and Charleston and that calmed my unsettled spirit.
Frank, Charlie, and I resumed our rotation on the top of the foremast. The next day late in the afternoon, it was Retaliation’s turn in the cat and mouse game. Another corsair, this time from the starboard side of the convoy attempted to sneak in and take a merchantman. It happened on my watch as I saw Retaliation begin to set full sail, they had seen something on the horizon but I couldn’t make it out. The captain ordered all to action stations and men began to climb the rigging to set full sail. Once the sails were set, the captain ordered a parallel course to the convoy. A few minutes later I could see the top of a two masted ship off the starboard bow. We slowly pulled away from the Alesia commanded by Lieutenant Gross and sailed toward the merchantman.
A sailor remained about halfway up the ladder and stood on the port side rigging to relay information to the captain. I told the man, “I can see the sails of Retaliation, she is closing on the corsair. The enemy ship has two masts with gaffs on the foremast and mainmast. Looks like a schooner,” I said. He relayed the information to another man standing on the deck who provided the information to the captain. A few minutes later, the man said to me, “The captain says to keep giving him direction to the enemy vessel, keep an eye out for other ships that might appear in any direction.” The view was spectacular, the corsair was a schooner, bigger than the Alesia we had taken as a prize. The merchant vessels spotted the corsair and began to make a slow turn to port in our path. I informed the captain and just like our previous attack, the corsair spotted the Retaliation and t
ried to escape.
From far above the water, hanging on to the rigging atop the foremast, the circumstance was surreal. Two ships full of men prepared for battle, one tracking the other in the slow movements powered only by the wind. Like a hawk gracefully attacking its prey. As they drew close, I could see the flashes as their cannons fired, followed by the rumble a few seconds later. The two vessels disappeared in the smoke that billowed up as they grappled with each other. The smoke began to clear, then another flash and more thunder as they again disappeared in a blanket of smoke. The crew below me was eerily quiet as they watched the battle unfold. Almost as if they too were on the Retaliation in the heat of the engagement. The smoke again dispelled and it looked as though the two had suspended the exchange, but then more cannon fire broke the momentary silence.
The ship began to turn to starboard toward the two ships contending on the surface of a calm ocean. The captain must have ordered an intercept course and intended to engage the privateer, I thought as we got closer to the Retaliation. The man on the shroud halfway up the rigging told me to get down, but I was fixated on the two vessels and couldn’t move. I began to worry and held on to Simon and hoped we would not engage the corsair. There was no time to get down now. I thought of the man I’d first seen die, he was in the rigging. I was trapped with no way to hide from cannon fire directed at the sails or musket fire aimed at me. What if they fired chain shot or angels into the rigging? I began to sweat profusely and my leg began to shake uncontrollably. I began to tell myself to be calm, capture my discouraging thoughts, and concentrate on the task at hand. I convinced myself enough that I stopped shaking, but I also knew that I had no power to influence anything in the upcoming fight. I asked God to deliver me from this circumstance. Then as if God had heard my plea, the firing stopped. Was it God? I grabbed Simon’s bone around my neck. Maybe Simon was watching out for me. But who had won? The smoke began to clear as we approached the corsair, the American flag was still flying over the Retaliation, the corsair had surrendered. I felt an immediate relief and a great peace come over me. I almost fell from the top mast as I relaxed my tight grip on the ropes.
We sailed up alongside the French vessel. The name on the stern was the Louisa. The carnage on both ships appeared to be severe. The captain hailed the Retaliation and volunteered additional medical support. Captain Bainbridge asked that we send assistance to the Louisa as his own doctor could manage the casualties on the Retaliation. We lowered the ship’s boat, sending some of our loblolly boys over to the Louisa which had lost part of her mainmast but looked to have enough sails remaining to get her into a port so long as she didn’t run into a storm. The Retaliation put a prize crew aboard to sail her.
13
Lure of the Lesser Antilles
We sailed into port at Puerto Plata on the island of Hispaniola a few days later. In neutral waters, the captain kept half the guns manned as a precaution since privateers could come and go freely. The captain went ashore with Mr. Freeman to make coordination for picking up Lieutenant Gross, Dr. Batterton, and the prize crew. He also provided the report recording the actions of the ship during the capture of the corsair for the prize court. Retaliation anchored nearby, she took a thrashing on her port side. We did not know the casualties but assumed we would know soon enough.
It had only been about a month since we departed Charleston, but I was weary of the cruise. Maybe it was seeing the dead or maybe it was the strain of anticipation. The gale of excitement and fear had left me tired, but at the same time, wide awake. I tried to follow Mr. Duffy’s advice, but it was still difficult to relax and sleep at night as the recollection of the past few weeks was burned into my memory.
Mr. Freeman brought the ship’s boat back several hours later with Lieutenant Gross, Dr. Batterton, and the prize crew. Lieutenant Potts called for all the officers to join him on the quarterdeck to meet with Lieutenant Gross. Lieutenant Gross began to explain the current situation. The Retaliation required some repairs; the ship suffered twelve casualties in the engagement with the Louisa. Four of her crew lay dead and eight wounded. Of the eight, three were serious and required that they stay at Puerto Plata until well enough to sail home with one of the merchant ships. “Captain Murray is entertaining the captains of the Retaliation and Norfolk as well as Captain Campbell, aboard the Montezuma,” he said.
The rest of the loblolly boys returned to the ship later that afternoon and told how the French vessel had fared far worse in the encounter than the Retaliation. They had at least thirty casualties, many of them dead. The rest of the afternoon was somber. I thought of the crew on the Retaliation. Did I know some of those that perished? What if we had engaged the Louisa, would I have been a casualty? The Eagle had not lost anyone to death or serious injury as long as I’ve been on this ship. Was our due time coming?
The captain returned to the Eagle in the morning, dropped off by a ship’s boat from the Montezuma. Lieutenants Baker and Potts were eagerly awaiting him.
“How did your meeting go, sir?” Lieutenant Baker asked. “As well as could be expected,” he paused and sighed, then continued, “Captain Murray was bewildered by the fact that we engaged two enemy vessels. He was also not just a little upset that he was not made aware of our course of action.” He walked over to the wheel, popped his knuckles, then turned back and said, “Since we had taken two prizes he could not argue that it was not an effective technique.”
Lieutenant Potts looked as though he was about ready to burst as he blurted out, “So we are approved to continue to engage?”
The captain looked out at the Retaliation, rubbed the back of his neck and said, “For now.” Then he added, “Commodore Barry may see it differently, but we will continue to engage these corsairs before we reach Dominica.”
A few days later we continued our voyage, the number of vessels decreased as some merchantman dropped off to other destinations along the way. Picking up our previous tactic, Frank, Charlie, and I climbed to the topmast and reported any sightings. A week had passed before anything was spotted. The Retaliation had closed on a corsair sailing alongside a merchantman flying French colors. The corsair was able to turn and escape capture, but the merchantmen struck her colors and relented to the Retaliation. We sailed close by and the captain hailed the Retaliation. “It’s an American vessel captured by a corsair with a prize crew aboard,” replied Captain Bainbridge. The merchant crew was released and the privateers taken prisoner as the ship joined the convoy eastward.
It was late autumn 1797, as we sailed past St. Thomas and into the Lesser Antilles southeast. Another corsair relented to the temptation of the merchantmen lure and fell into the snare. Larger than the sloop we had encountered the previous month, this corsair was sure to have many boarders, able to overwhelm us with numbers should we get close enough for her to grab onto us. The captain ordered a round shot, he said, “Get those guns out of action first, gentlemen, or there will be hell to pay!” As we got closer, I could see the vessel had six guns on her side. Our gunners got pretty good at anticipating the pitch of the vessel, the burn of the match, and the distance. Mr. Freeman yelled up at Frank to get down out of the rigging, we knew the French liked to shoot at the rigging first to decrease the mobility of their opponent. Both ships were sailing toward one another as our starboard guns fired almost simultaneous with the enemy vessel’s fire. Smoke filled the space between our ships as we passed one another. The captain turned to starboard as the privateer slowed. We again pulled alongside and fired a broadside. The enemy vessel fired several shots at our rigging as we slowed and discharged another broadside. As the smoke cleared a bit, I looked up to see if we had any damage to the sails and was surprised to see Frank holding tightly to the rope ladder about halfway up the mast. He wasn’t moving at all and I thought maybe he was injured.
The rival crew began to throw grappling hooks to secure our ship as the marines fired into them. The two ships pulled ever closer together and it became difficult to see more than a few feet. Our
projectiles had hit their mark as the enemy vessel struck her colors and conceded a few minutes later.
As the smoke dissipated, Mr. Freeman yelled up at Frank to get down. He did not reply or move at all. I looked at the captain and he told me to go get him—so I climbed up the rigging to where he was. “Frank,” I said, “Are you all right?” He was clutching the ropes so tight that his fingers were white. His eyes open, staring at nothing. I touched his shoulder and he convulsed, then slapped my hand away, turned his head and looked at me baffled and said, “Clyde?”
“Aye,” I replied.
He uttered, “Is it over?”
“Aye, come on down now,” I told him. Frank looked as though he was awaking from a deep sleep. His eyes slowly came to life and he looked around as did I. The mainsail near him as well as the gaff had holes and tears from the projectiles yet as far as I could see, nothing had hit Frank. I asked him if he had any injuries and he said he did not think so. I said, “Let’s get down, Frank.” He nodded and slowly moved his foot down and then his hand until he was moving down the ladder. Out of the corner of my eye I could see the damage to the corsair from above. They had two cannons damaged, one rolled back away from the gun port and the other on its side. Several men were strewn about the deck in varies degrees of injury. I looked down to see Dr. Batterton and his mates working on some of the men and thought about how they have to wait for the battle to end and then their battle begins. We managed to get down on deck and one of the loblolly boys checked out Frank for injuries. Frank stated, “Clyde, the projectiles flew all around me like hornets, I heard them buzzing about! I just couldn’t move.” He sat down and the loblolly boy said he had no injuries and gave him a swig of rum to calm himself. He was faintly trembling although it was not cold. Bat came over to check on Frank as he passed by and Mr. Edwards rapidly approached him, out of breath and unable to speak, he held out his arms to reveal Green Gato wrapped in a blanket. Bat looked at the cat, then back at Edwards, raised his eyebrows, and said, “What do you want me to do, Edwards? I’m not a veterinarian!” The cat was groaning strangely and trying to get out of the blood-soaked blanket he was wrapped in. Mr. Edwards bowed his head and looked as though he’d been shot by an arrow. Bat turned and began to leave, then hesitated, turned around, and said, “All right damn it! Go wait over there until I’m done mending the crew, then I’ll look at your cat.” He gave instructions to one of his mates for attending to the casualties aboard the corsair and several men quickly departed. Bat worked fervently as he operated on the casualties. Fortunately, the crew did not sustain any deaths, but had several wounded. I watched Mr. Edwards sitting patiently with Green Gato. He was sitting on the deck near the port side second cannon with the cat on his lap. About an hour and a half later, Bat approached him and said, “All right, Edwards, let‘s see Green Gato.” Mr. Edwards stood up and opened the blanket. Green Gato began to hiss and took a swipe at the doctor with a paw he worked free. “You better secure him tighter than that if you want me to fix him!” Some of the sailors gathered around a cask and blocked my view as Mr. Edwards held down the cat so the doctor could see him. Then I heard Bat bawl out a laugh, “He’ll be all right, I’ll fix him fine.” He explained to Mr. Edwards that he was speared by a projectile in the tail. Bat had to remove half his tail and bandaged it up as he was held down. “He will be sore and angry for a while, but will recover,” he said when he completed the procedure. A white bandage was visible on his shortened tail as Green Gato jumped off the cask and hurriedly disappeared below decks. The captain put a prize crew aboard the corsair and we continued to sail without further incident into Dominica. Frank had returned to his normal nature, but Charlie kept to himself in those days following our encounter with the corsair. I asked him what was bothering him and he told me he was fine, but I knew something was amiss. I too felt a little out of sorts. I had a dream the previous night in which I was on the deck of the ship during a raging storm. I heard the familiar cracking as a merchantman nearby began to sink beneath the waves. The water was black as coal and I saw a man in the water screaming for help. As the ship passed by him, I reached down into the water to grasp him. He looked at me with a face in agony as he reached up and seized my arm. I held him tight but was unable to bring him up on the ship. I looked at our arms clasped together and his fingernails suddenly changed into claws and ripped at my arm as he slid away into the blackness of the sea, leaving my arm with an open wound. At that instant I awoke with an apprehension that remained with me throughout the day.