The Boys of 1812 and Other Naval Heroes

Simply to defend themselves against the tyrannical encroachments of the mother country was all that the thirteen colonies had in view when, in 1775, they took up arms against Gr...

There were two men in Hopkins's squadron who far excelled all the others in those qualities of energy, courage, and intelligence that are most required in a naval officer. These...

We have seen how the beginning of naval enterprise made by Washington in the summer of 1775 was taken up and borne along by the Continental Congress at Philadelphia, until littl...

Sometime in the summer of 1777 Paul Jones was ordered to command the sloop-of-war "Ranger," at that time nearly completed at Portsmouth. The officers were detailed for their shi...

During the time that Wickes and Conyngham and Paul Jones were carrying on the war with such success in the enemy's waters under the guidance of Franklin, the Continental Navy wa...

Just at the close of the Revolution the country found itself independent, but laboring under a heavy burden of debt, and with a government that had hardly enough authority to be...

The truth of President Adams's words was shown the very next year after they were uttered, when new difficulties arose with the Barbary Powers. We have seen how the old difficul...

Europe, at the period which we have now reached, was engaged in a general war. This had begun with the French Revolution, when France bade defiance to the rest of the world; and...

Difficulties which finally led to the outbreak of war had been growing for several years; and the Government, as I have said, had all this time done little or nothing in the way...

What American ships could do in battle, Captain Hull had now shown; and the hopes of the country were aroused, and it began with reason to look for fresh successes. Nor was it d...

Just before the "Wasp" had set out on her short but eventful cruise, Commodore Rodgers had put to sea again with his squadron. Soon after leaving New York, the "United States,"...

The two earliest actions of importance in the year 1813, though nearly six months apart in time, belong together, for they form the two great events in the career of one of our...

Of the vessels in commission at the opening of the war, a fine frigate of the third class was the "Essex," very fast, but poorly armed with carronades. She had been for some mon...

Returning now, we take up the story of a young officer who, although he had passed fifteen years in the service, had never been so fortunate as to take part in any of its more s...

So far most of the engagements which had taken place on the ocean were fought by frigates. Only two of them,--the first between the "Wasp" and "Frolic," and the second between t...

Once more our story goes back to the northern waters, this time to Lake Champlain. Little had been done here by either side during the first two years of the war. There was hard...

During the latter part of the war, as might have been foreseen, there was little opportunity for American frigates to show that they could keep up the fame they had so gloriousl...

When the war with Great Britain broke out in 1812, it was no longer possible to keep ships cruising in the Mediterranean to overawe the States of Barbary. It was true that the s...

We now come to a long break of thirty years, during which the United States were at peace with all the nations of the earth. But in this period the navy was by no means idle. Th...