CHAPTER V

MERCHANTMEN IN BATTLE ARRAY

Some of the most stirring tales in the history of the American merchant marine are those of the battles of men who, like Captain Jonathan Haraden, of Salem, commanded armed merchantmen during the War of the Revolution. These stories are of special interest here because they portray one side of the character of the American sailors as developed by the peculiar conditions where forest life and sea life met at the surf-line. But before giving any of these tales, it seems necessary to describe briefly the peculiarities of the ships in use in the colonies during the eighteenth century.

While the dictionaries define, fairly well, all sorts of sea terms, it seems worth noting here that a ship, in the earliest days of the colonies, had three masts, two of which were fitted with yards to spread four-sided sails across the hull, while the third carried a long, slender yard that spread a lateen sail fore and aft. Moreover, a square sail was spread by a yard that hung beneath the end of the bowsprit. Because the lateen sail was difficult to handle, and the one on the spritsail-yard dipped into the water, both were soon abolished on the American ships. American sailors were high-priced, economy was necessary, and rigs that reduced the number of men needed were adopted perforce.

The ketch was another rig that did not last long. A ketch had one mast amidships, with yards crossed upon it, and another smaller mast well aft, upon which yards were also crossed, though sometimes a fore-and-aft sail was found there. It was, doubtless, the worst rig ever seen in American waters.

The snow was a modified brig. She had two masts with yards crossed as in a ship, and in addition had a slender mast close abaft the main--a sort of spencer-mast upon which a fore-and-aft sail was set. This style of rig lasted much longer than its name, though that persisted until the nineteenth century.

The most popular rig, during the first hundred years of the colonies, was the sloop, and it can still be seen on oyster boats, brick carriers, and yachts. No other rig will give a hull as great speed, in proportion to the canvas, as this one, and yet the rig can be managed by few men, provided they know their work, and are vigilant. Long coasting voyages were made with sloops carrying forty tons of cargo, and no more than four men. Voyages to the West Indies were made in larger sloops with six men, while oversea voyages were accomplished with one or two more.

In 1713 a contemplation of the advantages of the sloop rig led Captain Andrew Robinson, of Gloucester, Mass., to build a hull, somewhat larger than the ordinary sloop of the day, and place in it two masts, each of which carried the sloop rig. If rigged as a sloop, the one sail would need to be so large that it would be difficult to handle. By dividing the canvas between two sails _of the same form_, a great enough spread for speed would be obtained, and yet neither sail would be larger than the single one on a smaller hull. The sails were probably stretched before this vessel was launched, and one may believe that the novelty of the rig drew a large crowd to the launching. Beyond doubt, too, everybody cheered as the hull took the water, and one enthusiast shouted,--

"Oh, how she scoons!"

"Scoon" referred to the light and swift motion of the hull as it seemed to glide over, rather than plough through, the water, but Captain Robinson, who had been wondering what he would name the curious rig, seized upon the word "scoon" and said, "A scooner let her be!"

Perhaps the most important event in the shipyards of America, previous to the launching of Fulton's steamer, was the invention of the schooner. For under this rig a hull of twice the capacity of an ordinary sloop could be handled with no, or but a small, increase in the number of men. Moreover, the cost of the rig was less than that of any other for a hull of similar size. In short, a schooner gave her owner more ton-miles of work than any other kind of vessel for each dollar of expense. Schooners were soon used almost exclusively in the cod-fishery on the banks. They rapidly made their way into the coasting trade, where they gathered cargoes for the ships used in the export trade, and served to strengthen the slender cords binding one part of the country to the other. They even went on foreign voyages with great success--as they might do now, if only American owners would take what lies before them.

With the growth of American shipping it was inevitable that American sailors should go privateering. The love of adventure was born into the people who lived where salt spray gave a tang to the odors of a pine forest. Armed ships from Boston hunted Dutch merchantmen as long as the Hudson region was called New Amsterdam. American sailors ate broiled rawhide with Morgan on the banks of the Chagres River. Kidd came from London to New York seeking sailors born in the Highlands of the Hudson, because they were, of all men in the world, best fitted by experience and natural inclination for the work he had in hand. Franklin at one time expressed the hope that the American coast would never shelter such hosts as were found in Algiers and Tripoli, and the thought was founded on his knowledge of the eager determination to get on in life, at all hazards, which the conditions of life in America had generated.

The most important era in the apprenticeship of the colonial merchantmen was that passed in fighting the French and Spanish during England's long struggle for commercial supremacy in the eighteenth century, a period during which New York alone commissioned 48 vessels, carrying 675 guns and 5530 men. As affording interesting views of the work done by the American seamen at that time, consider some of the incidents of the siege of Louisburg, for while the siege was a land contest, it was carried on by men the majority of whom, perhaps, were sailors, and the incidents to be recalled were, at any rate, peculiarly characteristic of the New England foremast hand.

The armed ships numbered thirteen, and ninety merchantmen were chartered to carry the men. The number of ships then owned in the colonies at that time is nowhere stated, but it was not difficult to gather this fleet in New England.

Although the heavy masonry forts at Louisburg mounted 42-pounders, the heaviest guns the fleet carried were 22-pounders; but 42-pounder shot were cast for the expedition, and taken along, because every man in the fleet was entirely confident that 42-pounders would soon be captured from the enemy.

Having landed about two miles from the main fortification (April 30, 1745), one William Vaughan, "a youth of restless and impetuous activity," led 400 men "to the hills near the town and saluted it with three cheers." On May 2 this same impetuous youth, while wandering around with a squad of twelve men and boys, reached a number of unguarded storehouses belonging to the enemy. They were so far from the main scene of activity of the colonists that the French, apparently, had not thought it worth while to guard them. Vaughan set them on fire, and the conflagration frightened the soldiers in a large detached fort so much that they fled. A little later Vaughan and his gang took possession of the abandoned fort, and while a boy of eighteen years climbed the flagstaff and spread a red coat to the breeze in place of a flag, another one ran to the colonial general (Pepperrell) with this message from Vaughan:--

"May it please your Honour to be informed that by the grace of God and the courage of thirteen men, I entered the Royal Battery about 9 o'clock, and am waiting for a reinforcement and a flag."

The 42-pounders for which shot had been cast in Boston were secured--twenty-eight of them, besides two 18-pounders.

When the siege guns were landed from the transports, and an effort was made to take them forward across a wide swamp, in order to mount them where they would reach the town, they sank out of sight in the mud. Thereupon the men made a broad-runner sled for each gun, harnessed themselves to the sleds, and waded across the swamp, dragging the guns after them. That feat has excited the admiration of all historians who have written about it. But these men had built ships a mile from the water--back in the woods--and, when each was ready for the sea had dragged it to the beach with many yoke of oxen; dragging cannon across the swamp was a small matter in their estimation.

A trained engineer wanted them to advance upon the big fort of the enemy in the usual scientific manner--by digging parallels, one after another, and covering every step of the advance with earthworks. The proposal made them laugh. Taking advantage of a foggy night, they went forward, rolling sugar hogsheads, brought for the purpose, before them, until they arrived at the most advanced point desirable, and there they up-ended the hogsheads, filled them with dirt, mounted their siege guns (including 42-pounders taken from the royal fort), and opened fire.

Meanwhile they were without tents; their clothing and shoes wore out under the excessive abrading of their work; they were soaked by cold rains, but shelters of evergreen boughs were erected, and "while the cannon bellowed in front ... the men raced, wrestled, pitched quoits, fired at marks," and "ran after the French cannon balls that sometimes fell in the camp" where "frolic and confusion reigned" perpetually.

The capture of Louisburg had small effect upon the country, but the work of the besiegers, rightly seen, was of the most important ever done in the colonies. Throughout the siege they were inspired by the idea that "the All of Things is an infinite conjugation of the verb _To Do_"; they took hold of each task with hearty good-will, and were irrepressible; their rude disregard for convention gave opportunity to their resourcefulness, and contributed to the evolution of military science. And lessons learned before Louisburg were applied at Bunker Hill, and elsewhere, during the Revolution.

Among the heroes of the privateer ships of the Revolution we may well recall Captain Jonathan Haraden, as a type. In 1780 he sailed from Salem in the 180-ton ship _Pickering_, armed with fourteen 6-pounders, manned by about fifty men, all told, bound to Bilboa with a cargo of sugar. At this period of the war the British, taught by experience, had sent out fleets of frigates and sloops of war, besides many brigs, cutters, and privateers of large size in order to suppress the armed ships of the "rebels." On the way across, Haraden met a heavy cutter and beat her off. While reaching across the Bay of Biscay, one night, he overhauled a ship the lookouts of which appeared to be asleep; for there was no stir upon her deck until Haraden hailed and ordered her to surrender, saying that his ship was an American frigate and he intended firing a broadside immediately. The sleepy captain obeyed the order. It was then learned that she was a privateer much superior to the _Pickering_ in the number of guns and of men. On arriving off Bilboa a big armed ship was seen coming out, and the captured captain told Haraden she was the privateer _Achilles_, mounting forty-two guns and manned by 140 men.

"I shan't run from her," said Haraden, quietly.

The _Achilles_ took possession of the privateer captured in the Bay of Biscay, but because it was a calm night, and the _Pickering_ would be unable to escape, the captain of the _Achilles_ determined to wait until morning before attacking. On seeing this, Haraden arranged a proper lookout and then went to sleep.

At dawn, when the _Achilles_ came down ready for battle, the _Pickering_ was lying so far inshore that a throng of people, supposed to number 100,000, gathered on the hills to watch the contest, and they found the spectacle worth the trouble taken. Calling his men to the mast, Haraden assured them that they would win in spite of the greater force of the enemy, and then ordered them to "Take particular aim at the white boot top."

Inspired by the air of confidence with which the captain had addressed them, the men returned to quarters. Their ship was loaded down so far in the water that she "appeared little larger than a long boat" when the _Achilles_ ranged alongside, but, as _Captain Haraden had foreseen_, the difference in height gave him a decisive advantage.

The _Achilles_, with her great battery and numerous crew, opened a fire that seemed overwhelming. But at that time (and for years afterward) English sailors relied upon speed of fire only to win their battles; the guns of the _Achilles_ were discharged without aiming, and because the gun deck was far above the water, nearly every shot passed over the _Pickering_. But the American gunners were half sailor, half backwoodsmen; they took particular aim at the white boot top of the _Achilles_, and drove so many shot through her side near the water-line that, after about three hours of fighting, the British captain found that he would have to haul off or sink. He decided to fly. Then, on seeing the British sailors running to the braces to swing the yards, Haraden ordered his gunners to load with crowbars, hoping to cut the rigging of the _Achilles_ with these curious projectiles, and thus keep her from running away; but "she had a mainsail as large as a ship of the line," and when that sail began to draw she escaped.

As the _Pickering_ and her recaptured prize came to anchor in the bay, the enthusiastic spectators of the battle flocked off in such numbers that at one time it would have been possible to build with the boats around her a pontoon bridge reaching from ship to shore.

When Captain William Gray was a lieutenant on the privateer _Jack_, she was attacked by one of the enemy of such superior force that she was soon disabled. Thereupon the enemy came alongside and tried to board. In heading his men in repelling the attack, Gray was struck by a bayoneted musket which had been pitchpoled at him. The bayonet pinned him fast to a gun carriage so that he was unable to get away, but after one of his men had withdrawn the bayonet, he again attacked the boarders and they were repelled.

When Captain John Manly commanded the privateer _Jason_, of Boston, he was chased by a British frigate into a roadstead near the Isle of Shoals. He would have been captured there but for a friendly squall which, while it dismasted him, drove away the frigate. At this, however, Manly's troubles began. He had previously lost the privateer _Cumberland_, and his crew decided that the dismasting was clear proof that he was unlucky. A mutiny followed, but Manly, snatching a cutlass from one of the crew, attacked the mutineers single-handed, and after cutting down two of them, set the remainder at work rerigging the ship; and he kept them at it until she was ready for sea thirty-six hours later. Finally, he went to Sandy Hook and captured two big privateers fresh from that port and very valuable.

As noted in the _Story of the New England Whalers_, there is abundant reason for saying that "out of the 1700 men who had manned Nantucket whalers before the war, some hundreds shipped on the privateers. They took kindly to a calling in which there was such a strong element of chance. The hope of good luck was strong within them." When an American privateer was captured by the enemy, they separated the Nantucket men from the remainder of the crew, and then by bribery on the one hand, and starvation and other kinds of ill treatment, on the other, they forced as many as possible into the English whaleships.

Many more tales might be related, but the facts here given show well enough that the men who were at once woodsmen, ship-builders, fishermen, and sailors could also fight. It is especially notable that they could usually think calmly and decide swiftly, as Haraden did. The conditions under which the American seamen of the period had been reared had made them, as so frequently pointed out herein, at once resourceful, enterprising, persistent, and unafraid.

The records of the privateers are so few in number that only imperfect estimates can be made of the number and force of the fleet. The Continental Congress bonded 1699 privateers during the war, but since many ships were bonded more than once, some under different names, it is not possible to say how many individual ships were thus represented. Further than that the colonies commissioned many vessels that had no commission from the Congress. Hale, in Winsor's _History of America_, says that Massachusetts owned 600 privateers. Salem alone owned 158. More than 200 were owned in Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire. The fleets of the Delaware, the Chesapeake, and of Charleston were considerable. Certainly more than 1000 armed ships were sent to sea by American owners to seize the merchantmen of the enemy. The fishing smack _Wasp_, carrying 9 men and no cannon, was, perhaps, the weakest;[3] the _Deane_, carrying 30 cannon and 210 men, was the most powerful. There were 40 American privateers of the force of 20 guns and 100 men or larger.

American histories have, almost without exception, glorified these privateers. They note that Dodsley's _Register_ for 1778 recorded the capture of 733 British ships by American cruisers, of which 559 were brought into port. What these prizes sold for is not recorded, but it appears that the British loss was estimated at £2,600,000. Gomer Williams, in his history of the Liverpool privateers, says that the War of the Revolution put an entire stop to the commercial progress of that port. It was the venturesome American privateer who haunted the Irish channel until the Dublin linen fleet sailed under convoy to Chester, that thus injured Liverpool. According to Troughton, another Liverpool historian, "the manners of the common people" of the town "made a retrogression towards barbarism." Mr. Hale estimates that 3000 British ships were captured, and that the losses crippled the commercial prosperity of England severely.

On the other hand, however, while the American cruisers were capturing the 773 British ships, the British cruisers captured and sent into port 904 American ships, which brought the captors £2000 each on the average. The losses of the American owners were, of course, much larger. Worse yet, the American ships were all eventually driven from the seas, save only as a few of the largest and most powerful were able to dodge and outsail the frigates and sloops-of-war which the British sent in pursuit of them. Haraden himself, though he captured more than a thousand guns from the enemy, was at last caught at St. Eustatia by Admiral Rodney's fleet.

If the accounts of gains and losses could be posted ledger fashion, the struck balance would show that while the captured goods[4] were at times almost the only resource of the colonists needing goods of foreign manufacture, and while, too, a few individuals were enriched, the losses of the ship merchants as a class, and of the country, far outweighed the gains. American independence was not won, as so often claimed, by the privateers; it was not even forwarded.

There was a further loss, which, though it cannot be measured, was real. There is abundant evidence to show that the successes of the few made gamblers, and even thieves, of many merchants. While two frigates were on the stocks in Rhode Island, the timber belonging to the government was stolen for use in privateers. Still another evil influence is found in the fact that the magnified stories of privateer work made the people believe that the greed of the merchants would serve to defend the new-born nation from foreign aggression better than a navy could do it. And not until after the War of 1812 was brought upon us was the miserable delusion dispelled.

In two respects only did the privateers serve the American merchant marine well: they gave some thousands of individual seamen increased ability to handle ships under difficult conditions, and they improved the speed of the whole fleet.

Captain Elias Hasket Derby, of Salem, was perhaps the first American to make a systematic study of ship models with a view of increasing speed. He established a shipyard near his wharf at Salem; with untrammelled mind he made experiments, and eventually he built 4 ships of from 300 to 360 tons' burden, each of which became noted for strength and speed. One of them (the _Astræ_, a vessel less than 100 feet long), while on her way to the Baltic, made the run from Salem to the Irish coast in eleven days. In 1783 this vessel crossed from Salem to France in 18 days, and she made the passage home in 19.

Only a few ships remained in commission to float the flag of the "new constellation" at the end of the War of the Revolution, but it was a matter of no small significance that these ships were, on the average, far superior to those that had formed the American merchant marine in colonial days. Indeed, they were literally the best merchantmen in the world. And the conditions under which they were to sail, though harrowing to the owners and to all patriotic Americans, were to maintain the standard of the fleet for many years to come.