Читать книгу The Naval War of 1812 - Cecil Louis Troughton Smith - Страница 8

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CAPTAIN HULL had to make decisions as well, the moment Broke’s royals disappeared below the horizon astern of the Constitution. He might have considered himself free to strike with his powerful ship against any British trade route in the world, except for one annoying factor. He had pumped out ten tons of his drinking-water. He had been eight days at sea. One-fifth or one-sixth of his available supply, then, was already consumed or wasted, and his ship’s endurance was diminished in that proportion. He had just sighted every ship of Broke’s squadron, and he knew just where they were, but that certainty would grow smaller with every passing minute. England would undoubtedly make every effort to blockade the American coast, but the war was yet young, and it was unlikely that reinforcements had even been dispatched, far less likely that they had arrived. He could count with whatever certainty there is in war on an unopposed entrance to Boston, and thither he took his way, arriving a week after losing sight of Broke’s squadron. His surmise that no British ship-of-war would be present off the port proved correct. American ships were returning in large numbers, and—without neglecting his duty to his own ship—he did what he could to spread the news that Boston was at present a safe home port.

But he had no certainty that this state of affairs would endure for long. Broke might at any moment detach vessels to watch the port; there might be new arrivals from across the sea. Even Hull, with his sturdy common sense, fell into the almost inevitable wartime error of over-estimating the enemy’s strength, ingenuity, and speed of movement. In this case the error had only the effect of stimulating him to greater exertions, not of paralysing his movements as might have been the case with a more timid man. He completed his ship’s stores, wrote his dispatches to Washington, and got away again with the first fair wind. It is worth noting that he had to borrow the necessary money from private sources, and that the last orders he had received enjoined him, if he had not met Rodgers, to await further orders in New York.

He had to determine where he would strike his blow. From the moment of leaving port the endurance of his ship would begin to diminish with the consumption of his stores; his blow must not waste itself in the air nor permit of being parried by the enemy. The nearest focal point of the enemy’s trade routes was, on the face of it, the one to be aimed at. Broke had been left behind off New York and had not shown up off the New England coast. It did not appear likely, then, that he was coming northward and eastward—this was the moment, as a matter of fact, that Broke was going off to cover the West Indian convoy—and it appeared likely that the enemy’s communications with his base at Halifax were unguarded. From Halifax it would be an easy move to the St Lawrence, whither would be flowing the stream of material and reinforcements that Hull could not doubt was being directed to Canada for an attack on the United States. A campaign that would be of direct assistance to America—and that would not be playing Bonaparte’s game as much as it played America’s—was naturally attractive to an American officer.

To Halifax he went—it is worth noting that he was off Halifax fifteen days after being in sight of Broke—and there he discovered once more the emptiness of the ocean even when all the ships in the world are at sea. He captured nothing, and moved on to the St Lawrence. The harvest was better here. He ravaged the unguarded shipping until the moment of the next coincidence of the chain which led to the great denouement. He overhauled and captured an American brig with a British prize crew on board. The Americans on board, freed from captivity, could give the information that the British refused to give. Broke was in the vicinity. To Hull it was a natural assumption that the Constitution’s presence off Halifax had been reported to Broke and that Broke was in pursuit of him. Hull decided at once on a fresh move. It was the strategy employed by raiders since naval war began, to strike in one area until the strength of the enemy was directed thither, and then to slip away and start again in a fresh unguarded area. The next nearest focal point was Bermuda, and towards Bermuda he directed his course.

Then came the final coincidence. A month after running the Guerrière’s topsails over the horizon at the end of the historic chase, Hull saw them coming up over the horizon again as she was making her way to Halifax in obedience to Broke’s orders. Hull had made the rounds of Boston and Halifax and the St Lawrence; Dacres had been far out into the Atlantic with Broke and the convoy. Both Broke and Hull had made the incorrect deductions, usual in wartime, from imperfect premises; both had acted on the soundest military principles, and this was the result, this entirely accidental meeting hundreds of miles from land.

There was a fresh breeze blowing when the ships sighted each other, in the early afternoon, the Constitution to windward, the Guerrière to leeward. Hull could bear down towards the stranger in the comforting certainty that although any sail sighted was likely to be hostile he was in command of a ship that could fight any frigate afloat; if by some small chance he was approaching an isolated British ship-of-the-line, or if the stranger were part of a powerful force, he could keep clear of danger as he had done from Broke and the Africa. Dacres’ business, as captain of a British frigate, was to investigate any strange sail he might sight, and he was sustained by the knowledge that for years British frigates had fought successfully against any vessel inferior to the ships-of-the-line which frigates could count on evading.

Dacres was a man of twenty-eight; he was the son of an admiral who had captured Curaçao in 1807 and a nephew of a captain who had been Sidney Smith’s flag-captain at the forcing of the Dardanelles the same year, which helped to account for his promotion to post rank at the age of twenty-two, only two years older than was Nelson at the time when he reached the same rank. He had commanded ships for six years; he had seen much service; he could be expected to know his business. With the ship closing fast he soon recognized the stranger to be a ship-of-war, and promptly cleared for action. He saw that the ship was American immediately after, and he must have known her to be the Constitution—although it is hard to determine the exact moment of recognition—at nearly the same moment; only a month earlier he had had her in sight for three days. The realization made no difference to his determination except to strengthen it. He had no doubt whatever that the enemy was of nominally superior force: seeing that he was to leeward an attempt at escape was easily open to him. It might have been barely possible for a cool-headed man, well-informed, and of sound judgment, to be certain that the Guerrière—in the absence of great good fortune—was facing defeat at the hands of the Constitution, but Dacres did not expect defeat; even the recent encounter had not convinced him of the quality of the American Navy. Nor could he have run away in any case without facing the gravest risk, the positive certainty, of a court martial. At that moment the captain of any British 38-gun frigate who refused battle with the Constitution would have been promptly condemned, not merely by legal process, but by the whole of the professional opinion of the Royal Navy. Dacres’ judgment was no more unsound than that of any of his colleagues.

He did not handle his ship unskilfully. He reduced his canvas to ‘fighting sails’ (and observed that his opponent was doing the same), and as the Constitution came rushing down on him he did his best to cut her up during the important minutes of the approach. But he was opposed to a man whose judgment of time and distance was superior to his. Dacres awaited his coming, with his ship hove-to, fired a broadside when he judged the ships were within range, and then put his ship before the wind on roughly the same course as the Constitution’s, in order to prolong as far as possible the period of the approach, and he yawed first to port and then to starboard so as to present his broadside to the advancing enemy and rake him as he came down. Dacres’ eye was not keen enough, or excitement may have clouded his judgment, or his gunners were not well enough trained, or the gunnery control—there was an elementary system practised at that time in all ships—was inefficient. The first invaluable broadside missed clean; either Dacres under-estimated the range or the guns were fired at the wrong moment of the roll. After the first broadside, with the Guerrière before the wind, her gunners were under the additional handicap that every yaw gave notice to Hull watching carefully on his quarter-deck that a broadside was imminent. A small application of helm was sufficient to swing the Constitution away, so as to avoid being raked and to bring about an abrupt alteration in the rate of change of range that baffled the British gunners. A shot or two went home, but so few that Hull, his attention concentrated on the enemy’s movements, did not notice them. The occasional shots fired by such of the Constitution’s guns as bore during the approach did no particular damage.

For three-quarters of an hour the two ships ran before the wind, the Constitution steadily gaining on the Guerrière, until the range had closed sufficiently to be decisive. It was no time now for the Constitution to delay, when one of those broadsides might perhaps shoot away a spar. Hull gave the order to set more sail. Experience had long proved that in action usually it was best to have the ship under ‘fighting sails’—topsails and jib, with the royal yards sent down—but there were many occasions when ships went into action with all sail set; the Victory did so at Trafalgar for a similar reason to the Constitution’s now, in order to reduce the time of the approach. The Constitution was fully manned; her present crew and officers had been on board for the past two months, and her organization—as the escape from Broke’s squadron had already proved—was perfect. Even with the guns’ crews standing by there were plenty of men available. The main-topgallant sail was set with all the rapidity to be expected of well-trained men, and the Constitution closed the gap between the two ships in five minutes.

It might be expected that the Guerrière would counter the move by setting more sail also, but Dacres did not attempt to do so. Most probably he was taken by surprise by the rapid action and had not time for anything further; possibly, discontented with the results of the action at long cannon-shot, he was willing to allow the enemy to close. The Constitution came up alongside, and the traditional action, broadside to broadside, began at once and endured for fifteen minutes. The Constitution’s broadside was far heavier than the Guerrière’s—the respective weights have been calculated at 684 pounds to 556—and the disproportion was accentuated by the fact that the Constitution’s far heavier shots were being directed against the far lighter scantlings of the Guerrière, while from the moment that losses began the disproportion increased still more with the greater losses of the Guerrière. It seems likely that the Guerrière’s guns were served faster than the Constitution’s; it also seems likely that they were not as well pointed. The Constitution was badly cut up in her rigging, but the Guerrière lost her mizzen-mast, which fell over the disengaged side, and, as it dragged in the sea by its uncut standing rigging, both slowed her down and swung her round. Dacres, both in his report and in his defence at his court martial ascribed his defeat to this incident, but, judging by the small losses the Constitution had suffered by that time the argument appears unsatisfactory. Dacres might have done better service to his country if he had frankly stated that he had been beaten by a bigger ship manned by an efficient crew. As it was, the Guerrière slowed and turned; Hull, who had already been counting on his greater speed to cross her bows, turned with her and raked her crushingly as she lay disabled. With that broadside delivered he wore round, his ship being still manageable, to cross the Guerrière’s bows again and rake her with his port-side guns, which so far had hardly been in action. Those two broadsides reduced the Guerrière from a fighting ship to a beaten wreck; there was that much truth in Dacres’ plea.

Hull’s judgment of speed and distance was not so accurate at this instant. He had shaved across Guerrière’s bows so closely that her bowsprit reached over the Constitution’s quarter-deck and then caught in her mizzen-rigging. The two ships swung, counter-clockwise, as the way that the Constitution carried bore her on, dragging the Guerrière round with her. There was contact between the two ships; there was the Guerrière’s bowsprit as a boarding-bridge if either side chose to take advantage of it. But it would be a perilous passage at best, in that tossing sea, with the ships plunging and the bowsprit slowly working its way round as they turned. It would be the more perilous because in both ships the boarding-parties rushed to the point of contact, forward in the British ship, and aft in the American, and faced each other across the gap.

They were only a few feet apart, close enough for musketry to be accurate even with a high sea running. Losses were heavy on both sides, particularly among the officers who started forward to lead their men on. The marines of both countries claimed their victims. Charles Morris, the Constitution’s first lieutenant, whose suggestions regarding kedging had been so effective a month before, was shot down as he leaped upon the taffrail, but his wound was not mortal and he lived to receive his promotion to captain for the victory. Dacres had run forward and climbed upon the hammocks in their nettings on the forecastle the better to view the situation, and his conspicuous position brought him a wound from a marksman in the Constitution’s mizzen-top.

Down under his feet, on the fore part of the main-deck which had been so thoroughly swept by the Constitution’s last two broadsides of grape and round shot, a few disciplined survivors shook themselves out of their dazed condition, and, in the dark of the smoke and timber-dust, manned such guns as would bear and were not dismounted, and fired into the Constitution’s stern—into Hull’s cabin. So close were the ships that the flame of the explosions, or burning wads, started a fire here, but disciplined men in the American ship, although ignorant of when the next discharge would come to destroy them, extinguished the fire.

There was not time for much firing, nor was there much time for the boarding-parties to face each other. The ships swung; they rose and plunged on a following sea, and the Guerrière’s bowsprit tore free from the Constitution’s mizzen-rigging. The Constitution went on ahead, leaving the Guerrière behind, still held back by her trailing mizzen-mast. Dacres could count now on a few minutes’ grace in which to clear away the wreck and to reorganize his defence, but at that moment both his other masts went over the side, they and their rigging having been badly wounded during the action. The loss of her masts, and of their steadying effect on her roll, made the Guerrière helpless. She lay in the trough of the sea, rolling frantically and fast, dipping her open gun-ports below the surface first on one side and then on the other; the guns could hardly be loaded or run out. There was just a chance that by setting sail on the surviving bowsprit Dacres could get his ship before the wind so that she could pitch instead of roll, and he actually set about the task; but the sprit-sail yard was damaged too, and gave way under the strain, and the Guerrière continued her frightful rolling in the trough of the sea; it is not pleasant to think of the condition of her sixty wounded as the surgeon and his mates endeavoured to work upon them as she rolled. The sea was pouring in through a score of shot-holes below the water-line; the fallen masts, overside, were pounding against the ship’s sides.

The Constitution ran before the wind until her crew could reeve new running rigging to replace what had been shot away. The work was done quickly and well. New braces allowed the yards to be trimmed; the fore—and main—courses were set; and, once more under command, the Constitution wore round and her men stood to their guns while the wind brought the dismasted hulk down within range of them again in the gathering darkness. There was still a British flag to be seen, which seamen had hoisted on the stump of the mizzen-mast, but it would be simple slaughter to fire into the helpless wreck. There was nothing dishonourable about surrendering a ship that had fought to the last gasp. Wooden ships, especially ships-of-the-line, could be beaten into helplessness long before they sank, and to continue action in those circumstances meant the killing of unresisting men; it was not until 1914 that a new convention arose—partly as a result of the vastly greater ranges at which naval battles were fought—under which it was deemed disgraceful to haul down one’s colours when in a helpless situation.

Hull sent a boat to demand the surrender which he fully expected, and Dacres surrendered, with the approval of his surviving officers. Later one of those latter wrote to a friend, ‘It was extremely fortunate that the Americans returned to us after we were dismasted.’ The Guerrière was sinking; the fact was so obvious that all hands in both ships set to work at once to transfer the wounded to the Constitution; and it is an interesting commentary on the standard of seamanship in the two ships that the work was accomplished, in the dark, with a considerable sea running, and with the Guerrière rolling wildly, and yet without mishap. Seventy-eight of the Guerrière’s crew of two hundred and seventy-two were killed or wounded, nearly thirty per cent; more nearly still with allowance for the ten Americans on board whom Dacres permitted to remain out of the fight. In 1806, when the Guerrière had been captured off The Faeroes by the Blanche, her French crew of over three hundred and twenty men had suffered a loss of fifty casualties before surrendering. The Constitution had lost less than three per cent of her four hundred and fifty-six men and it would have been less still if Hull had anticipated that lunge of the Guerrière’s bowsprit. She was ready to fight another battle; the Guerrière, set on fire by her captors in view of the impossibility of salving her, blew up and went to the bottom.

Yet Hull did not contemplate the possibility of seeking another battle, nor of continuing his cruise. He had been out less than three weeks, but he had two hundred prisoners on board as well as wounded. A ruthless man determined to stay at sea might perhaps have risked taking a prize or two, or meeting one or two American merchant ships, into which he could have put his prisoners. In the twenty-five minutes of firing he had not consumed a third of his ammunition, and his ship had suffered no serious material damage. The arguments in favour of getting to sea from Boston when he sailed had more force still, seventeen days later. Nevertheless, Hull thought of nothing except returning there, and for a very obvious and excellent reason. He wanted America to have the earliest news of his victory.

He turned back, contended for ten days against baffling and unfavourable winds, and entered Boston on August 30, 1812. He could announce himself as the victor in the most important single-ship engagement in the history of his country, and ironically he was never again to hold a fighting command.