The American Revolution Part 31

[Sidenote: Henry Lee's exploit at Paulus Hook.]

To give the British general a wholesome sense of his adversary's vigilance, a blow was struck in an unexpected quarter. At Paulus Hook, on the site of the present Jersey City, the British had a very strong fort. The "Hook" was a long low neck of land reaching out into the Hudson. A sandy isthmus, severed by a barely fordable creek, connected it with the mainland. Within the line of the creek, a deep ditch had been dug across the whole isthmus, and this could only be crossed by means of a drawbridge. Within the ditch were two lines of intrenchments. The place was garrisoned by 500 men, but, relying on the strength of their works and their distance from the American lines, the garrison had grown somewhat careless. This fact was made known to Was.h.i.+ngton by Major Henry Lee, who volunteered to surprise the fort. On the night of the 18th of August, at the head of 300 picked men, Lee crossed the creek which divided Paulus Hook from the mainland. A foraging expedition had been sent out in the course of the day, and as the Americans approached they were at first mistaken by the sentinels for the foragers returning. Favoured by this mistake, they surmounted all the obstacles and got possession of the fort in a twinkling. Alarm guns, quickly answered by the s.h.i.+ps in the river and the forts on the New York side, warned them to retreat as fast as they had come, but not until Lee had secured 159 prisoners, whom he carried off safely to the Highlands, losing of his own men only two killed and three wounded. This exploit, worthy of the good Lord James Douglas, has no military significance save for its example of skill and boldness; but it deserves mention for the personal interest which must ever attach to its author.

In the youthful correspondence of Was.h.i.+ngton, mention is made of a "Lowland Beauty" for whom he entertained an unrequited pa.s.sion. This lady married a member of the ill.u.s.trious Virginian family to which Richard Henry Lee belonged. Her son, the hero of Paulus Hook, was always a favourite with Was.h.i.+ngton, and for his das.h.i.+ng exploits in the later years of the revolutionary war became endeared to the American people as "Light Horse Harry." His n.o.ble son, Robert Edward Lee, has taken rank among the foremost generals of modern times.

FOOTNOTES:

[21] He has been sometimes described incorrectly as a half-breed, and even as a son of Sir William Johnson. His father was a Mohawk, of the Wolf clan, and son of one of the five chiefs who visited the court of Queen Anne in 1710. The name is sometimes wrongly written "Brandt." The Indian name is p.r.o.nounced as if written "Thayendanauga," with accent on penult. Brant was not a sachem. His eminence was personal, not official. See Morgan, _League of the Iroquois_, p. 103.

[22] It has been shown that on this occasion Thayendanegea did what he could to restrain the ferocity of his savage followers. See Stone's _Life of Brant_, i. 379-381. It has more lately been proved that Thayendanegea commanded only his own Mohawks at Cherry Valley, and the atrocities were committed chiefly by Senecas under the command of Sayenqueraghta. See Molly Brant's letter in Hayden's _The Ma.s.sacre of Wyoming_, Wilkes-Barre, 1895, p. xxiv.

[23] Cannon were wheeled on the solid ice from Staten Island to the city. See Stone's _Life of Brant_, ii. 54.

[24] In a paper read before the Maryland Historical Society. See, also, his _Logan and Cresap_, Albany, 1867. The story is well told by Mr. Theodore Roosevelt, in his admirable book, _The Winning of the West_, New York, 1889. Though I leave the present chapter mainly as it was written in 1883, I have, in revising it for publication, derived one or two valuable hints from Mr. Roosevelt's work.

[25] This point has been well elucidated by Mr. Roosevelt in his _Winning of the West_, vol. i. pp. 240, 306.

[26] See my _Critical Period of American History_, chap. i.

[27] "The conduct of the Americans upon this occasion was highly meritorious: for they would have been fully justified in putting the garrison to the sword: not one man of which was put to death but in fair combat." Stedman's _History of the American War_, London, 1794, vol. ii. p. 145. This remark seems to bear unconscious testimony to the somewhat higher degree of humanity which American civilization had reached as compared with civilization in Europe. According to the usage inherited from the so-called ages of chivalry, it was deemed proper to ma.s.sacre a captured garrison as a "punishment" calculated to deter commanders from wasting lives in trying to defend indefensible places. In the thirteenth article of the international agreement proposed in the Brussels Conference of 1874, such slaughter is called "murder," and is strictly prohibited; it would not now be tolerated by public opinion anywhere in Europe outside of Turkey. In our Revolutionary War the garrison of Fort Was.h.i.+ngton was threatened with slaughter by General Howe, but the threat was not carried out. (See above, vol. i. p. 230.) At the capture of Fort Griswold, Sept.

6, 1781, the ma.s.sacre of the surrendered garrison has always been rightly regarded as a foul blot upon the British record.

Mr. Lecky more than once recognizes the humanity of the Americans, and p.r.o.nounces them superior in this respect to the British. (_History of England in the Eighteenth Century_, iv.

145, and elsewhere.) Care must be taken, however, in the interests of historic truth, not to press this opinion too far.

A great deal of fustian has been written about the "barbarities" of the British soldiers in the Revolutionary War.

John Adams compared those honourable and kindly gentlemen, the brothers Howe, with such wretches as Borgia and Alva, and suggested that "medals in gold, silver, and copper ought to be struck in commemoration of the shocking cruelties, the brutal barbarities, and the diabolical impieties of this war; and these should be contrasted with the kindness, tenderness, humanity, and philanthropy which have marked the conduct of Americans toward their prisoners." (_Familiar Letters of John Adams and his Wife_, p. 266.) The spirit of this quotation pervades the late George Bancroft's narrative of the Revolution, and fills it with a carping animosity that is simply silly. In point of fact there was no strongly marked difference between British and Americans in respect of humanity. Much has been said about the horrors of the British prison-s.h.i.+ps in New York harbour and elsewhere (see Greene's _Historical View_, p. 351); but the horrors of the old Newgate prison near Granby, in my native state of Connecticut, were even worse (see _Phelps's History of the Newgate Prison_), and the prisons of Ma.s.sachusetts were not much better. Honest men unable to pay their debts were thrown into these frightful dungeons and treated as brutally as ever the British treated their prisoners of war.

Blame has been deservedly bestowed upon the British for their employment of Indian auxiliaries; but Americans must to some extent share the blame, for early in 1775, before the bloodshed at Lexington, the Provincial Congress of Ma.s.sachusetts enlisted Stockbridge Indians as minute-men, and tried to prevail upon the Six Nations "to take an active part in this glorious cause." Indians served on the American side at the battles of Long Island and White Plains (_New York Colonial Doc.u.ments_, viii. 740; Jones's _Annals of Oneida County_, p. 854; Winsor, _Narr. and Crit. Hist._ vi. 612-618). In a well-known pa.s.sage of the Declaration of Independence the king is arraigned because "he has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, s.e.xes, and conditions." The taint of hypocrisy here is revealed by the fact that Congress had on June 3 authorized Was.h.i.+ngton to employ 2,000 Indians in Canada; and on July 8 it further empowered him to enlist the tribes in eastern Maine and Nova Scotia. These orders were in pursuance of a resolve of May 25, that "it is highly expedient to engage the Indians in the service of the United Colonies." (_Secret Journals of Congress_, p. 44; cf. Was.h.i.+ngton's _Writings_, ed. Ford, iv.

140, 154, 168.) Was.h.i.+ngton approved of this hiring of Indians.

On the whole, as so often happens, we held up our hands in holy horror at other people for doing what we did not scruple to do ourselves.

Among the articles adopted at the Brussels Conference of 1874 was one to the effect that "the population of an occupied territory cannot be compelled to take part in military operations against their own country, nor to swear allegiance to the enemy's power." (Farrer, _Military Manners and Customs_, p. 12.) No such rule was recognized a century ago. In South Carolina the British commanders shot as deserters persons captured in fight after having once accepted British protection. The execution of Col. Isaac Hayne, an eminent citizen, under peculiarly aggravating circ.u.mstances, by order of Lord Rawdon, called forth intense indignation. But it should not be forgotten that Greene also, on several occasions, shot as deserters persons found in the enemy's ranks after serving in his own. Such was the military usage at that time.

A good many of the charges of cruelty, alleged on either side, must be taken with allowances for gross exaggeration. For example, at Concord, April 19, 1775, a farmer's boy, in combat with a wounded soldier, struck him on the head with a hatchet and killed him. This incident, as magnified by the British, gave rise to the statement that the Americans mutilated and scalped the wounded soldiers lying on the road; a statement which is still sometimes repeated, although it was long ago proved to be false.

On the whole, while I agree with Mr. Lecky that the Americans behaved with more humanity than their antagonists, it does not appear that the difference was a wide one. To the credit of both sides it may be said that there was less barbarity than was usual in European wars before the nineteenth century.

CHAPTER XII

WAR ON THE OCEAN

[Sidenote: Importance of the control of the water]

Until the war of independence the Americans had no navy of their own, such maritime expeditions as that against Louisburg having been undertaken with the aid of British s.h.i.+ps. When the war broke out, one of the chief advantages possessed by the British, in their offensive operations, was their entire control of the American waters. Not only were all the coast towns exposed to their sudden attack, but on the broad deep rivers they were sometimes able to penetrate to a considerable distance inland, and by means of their s.h.i.+ps they could safely transport men and stores from point to point. Their armies always rested upon the fleets as bases of operations, and soon lost their efficiency when severed from these bases. General Howe was not safe in Philadelphia until his brother had gained control of the Delaware river, and Burgoyne's army invited capture as soon as its connection with the lakes was cut off. From first to last, the events of the war ill.u.s.trated this dependence of the army upon the fleet. On the retreat from Lexington, it was only the s.h.i.+ps that finally saved Lord Percy's weary troops from capture; at Yorktown, it was only the momentary loss of naval superiority that made escape impossible for Cornwallis. For want of a navy, General Was.h.i.+ngton could not hold the island of New York in 1776; and for a like reason, in 1778, after the enemy had been reduced to the defensive, he could not prudently undertake its recapture. It was through lack of effective naval aid that the Newport expedition failed; and the events of 1779, in Virginia and Connecticut, bore sad testimony to the defenceless condition of our coasts.

[Portrait: John Barry]

[Sidenote: Feeble action of Congress]

Early in the war this crying want was earnestly considered by Congress, and efforts were made to repair it by the construction of a navy and the equipment of private cruisers. But the construction of a regular navy, which alone could serve the purpose, was beset with even greater difficulties than those which attended the organization of a permanent army. There was, indeed, no lack of good material, whether for s.h.i.+ps or for seamen. New England, in particular, with its great length of seacoast and its extensive fisheries, had always possessed a considerable merchant marine, and nourished a hardy race of seafaring people. How formidable they could become in naval warfare, Great Britain was destined, nearly forty years afterward, to find out, to her astonishment and chagrin. But the absence of a central government was even more seriously felt in naval than in military affairs. The action of Congress was feeble, unintelligent, and vacillating. The "marine committees," "navy boards," and "boards of admiralty," to which the work of creating a navy was entrusted, were so often changed in their composition and in their functions that it was difficult for any piece of work to be carried out in accordance with its original design. As there was a total absence of system in the department of admiralty, so there was utter looseness of discipline in the service. There were the same wranglings about rank as in the army, and the consequences were even more pernicious. It was difficult to enlist good crews, because of the uncertainty arising from the general want of system. The risks encountered were excessive, because of the overwhelming preponderance of the enemy from the outset. Of thirteen new cruisers laid down in the autumn of 1775, only six ever succeeded in getting out to sea. During the war one s.h.i.+p-of-the-line was built,--the America 74, first commanded by Captain John Barry;[28] but she was launched too late for active service. Between 1775 and 1783, there were twenty small frigates and twenty-one sloops-of-war in the service. Most of these were either captured by the enemy, or destroyed to prevent their falling into the enemy's hands.[29] The armaments of these s.h.i.+ps were very light; the largest of them, the Bon Homme Richard, was constructed for a thirty-eight, but her heaviest guns were only twelve-pounders.

[Ill.u.s.tration: AUGUSTATUS KUNINGAM]

[Sidenote: American and British cruisers]

Yet in spite of this light force, weak discipline, and unsteady management, the little American navy did some very good work in the course of the war, and it was efficiently helped by a mult.i.tude of private cruisers, just as the Continental army often got valuable aid from the militia. Before the French alliance more than six hundred British vessels had fallen prey to the American cruisers, and so venturesome were these swift little craft that they even hovered around the coast of England, and merchant vessels going from one British port to another needed the protection of a convoy. During the same period, about nine hundred American vessels were taken by British cruisers; so that the damaging power of the American marine seems to have amounted to about two thirds that of such part of the British marine as could be devoted to the injury of American s.h.i.+pping. The damage inflicted upon the Americans was the more serious, for it well-nigh ruined the New England fisheries and the coasting trade. On the other hand, the American cruisers caused marine insurance in England to rise to a far higher point than had ever before been known; and we learn from a letter of Silas Deane to Robert Morris that, shortly before the alliance between France and the United States, the docks on the Thames were crowded with French vessels loading with British goods that sought the shelter of a neutral flag.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CONYNGHAM CAPTURING A BRITISH PACKET]

[Sidenote: Wickes and Conyngham]

[Sidenote: Paul Jones]

[Sidenote: Franklin's supervision of maritime affairs]

In one respect the value of this work of the American cruisers was incalculable. It familiarized Europe with the sight of the American flag in European waters. It was of great importance that Europe should think of the new republic not as merely the theme of distant rumours, but as a maritime power, able to defend itself within sight of the British coasts; and in this respect it would be difficult to overrate the services rendered by the heroic captains who first carried the flag of the United States across the ocean, and bearded the lion in his native lair. Of these gallant fellows, Lambert Wickes was the first, and his s.h.i.+p, the Reprisal 16, which carried Benjamin Franklin to France in the autumn of 1776, was the first American war vessel to visit the eastern sh.o.r.es of the Atlantic. After a brilliant cruise in the summer of 1777, she foundered off the banks of Newfoundland, with the loss of all on board. Next came Gustavus Conyngham, with the Surprise and the Revenge, which in the same summer took so many prizes in the North Sea and the British Channel that insurance rose as high as twenty-five per cent., and in some instances ten per cent. was demanded for the short pa.s.sage between Dover and Calais. But the fame of both these captains was soon eclipsed by that of John Paul Jones, a Scotch sailor, who from boyhood had been engaged in the Virginia trade, and in 1773 had gone to Virginia to live. When war broke out Jones offered his services to Congress, and in October, 1776, his name appears as eighteenth in the list of captains in the new navy. From the outset he was distinguished for skill and bravery, and in 1778, being then thirty years old, he was sent, with the Ranger 18, to prowl about the British coasts. In this little s.h.i.+p he made a successful cruise in the Irish Channel, burned some of the s.h.i.+pping in the port of Whitehaven, in c.u.mberland, and in a fierce fight off Carrickfergus captured the British sloop-of-war Drake 20; losing only eight men in killed and wounded, while the Drake lost forty-two.

With the Drake and several merchant prizes, Jones made his way to Brest, and sent the Ranger home to America, while he remained to take command of a more considerable expedition that was fitting out for the following year. Along with the other duties of Franklin, as minister of the United States at the French court, was joined a general superintendence of maritime affairs. He was a sort of agent plenipotentiary of Congress in all matters relating to the navy. He had authority from Congress to issue letters of marque, and exercised it freely, while imposing restrictions that were characteristic of his magnanimous spirit. In 1779, he issued instructions to all American cruisers that, in whatsoever part of the sea they might happen to meet the great discoverer Captain Cook, they were to forget the temporary quarrel in which they were fighting, and not merely suffer him to pa.s.s unmolested, but offer him every aid and service in their power; since it would ill beseem Americans to lift their hands against one who had earned the reverence and grat.i.tude of all mankind. So in the instructions given to Paul Jones, he ordered him not to burn defenceless towns on the British coast except in case of military necessity, and in such case he was to give notice, so that the women and children, with the sick and aged inhabitants, might be removed betimes.

[Portrait: J. Landais]

[Sidenote: Jones's squadron]

The expedition of which Paul Jones took command in the summer of 1779 was designed for a signal "demonstration" upon the coasts of Great Britain. The object of the British raids in Virginia and Connecticut was partly to terrify the Americans by a bold and savage a.s.sertion of the ubiquity of British power. The expedition of Paul Jones was to serve as a sort of counter-irritant. The confused and indefinite character of the American naval service at that time could not have a better ill.u.s.tration than is to be found in the details of the little squadron with which he was called upon to undertake his perilous task. The flags.h.i.+p was an old Indiaman named the Duras, purchased by the French government and fitted up for the occasion. In compliment to the author of Poor Richard's maxims, her name was changed to "Bon Homme Richard." She was an exceedingly clumsy affair, with swelling bows and a tower-like p.o.o.p such as characterized the s.h.i.+ps of the seventeenth century. She was now pierced for a thirty-eight-gun frigate, but as there was delay in procuring the eighteen-pounders suited for such a craft, her main deck was armed with twelve-pounders instead. In the gun-room below, Captain Jones had twelve portholes cut, in which he mounted six old eighteens, that could be s.h.i.+fted from side to side as occasion required. Leaving these eighteens out of the account, the force of the Bon Homme Richard was about equal to that of a thirty-two-gun frigate. This singular vessel was manned by a crew as nondescript as herself,--a motley gang of sailors and marines from nearly every country in Europe, with half a dozen Malays into the bargain. To these a hundred New England men were afterwards added, bringing up the whole number to 380. For this flags.h.i.+p three consorts were supplied, under the direction of the French government. The Pallas, a merchant vessel pierced for the occasion, was thus transformed into a thirty-two-gun frigate; the Vengeance and Cerf were of smaller calibre. All these s.h.i.+ps were French built. To these Franklin added the Alliance 32, which happened to be in a French port at the time. The Alliance, lately built at Salisbury, in Ma.s.sachusetts, and named in honour of the treaty between France and the United States, was a swift and beautiful s.h.i.+p, one of the finest in the American navy.

Unfortunately, it was thought desirable to pay a further compliment to our new allies by appointing a French captain to command her, and this step gave rise to so much discontent and insubordination as well-nigh to destroy her efficiency. Nor had Captain Landais done anything to merit such distinction; he was simply an adventurer, seeking notoriety in the American service.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Paul Jones's Commission]

[Sidenote: Jones's cruise on the British coast]

[Sidenote: He meets a British fleet off Flamborough Head]

The s.h.i.+ps in this motley squadron were not privateers. The Alliance was a regular member of our navy. The French-built s.h.i.+ps were regarded as loaned to the United States, and were to resume their French nationality after the termination of the cruise; but they were all duly commissioned by Franklin, under the powers delegated to him by Congress. For the time being, they were part of the American navy and subject to its regulations. Their commodore, Paul Jones, has often been spoken of as a privateer, sometimes as a pirate, but he was as much a regular captain in our navy as Greene was a regular general in our army. Though, however, there could be no doubt as to the legitimate naval character of the expedition, a more ill-a.s.sorted or disorderly squadron was perhaps never sent to sea. The summer was spent in cruising about the British coasts, and many prizes were taken; but the insubordination of the French commanders was so gross that during a large part of the time the s.h.i.+ps were scattered in all directions, and Jones was left to cruise alone. On the 17th of September, having got his fleet together, he entered the Frith of Forth, and came within gunshot of Leith, which he intended to attack and capture. Sir Walter Scott, then a schoolboy at Edinburgh, has given, in the introduction to "Waverley," a graphic description of the excitement which was felt upon that occasion. But, as Scott says, "a steady and powerful west wind settled the matter by sweeping Paul Jones and his vessels out of the Frith of Forth." Four days later, the Bon Homme Richard and the Vengeance entered the river Humber, and destroyed several vessels. On the 23d, the Alliance and Pallas having come up, a British fleet of forty sail was descried off Flamborough Head. They were merchant vessels bound for the Baltic, under convoy of the Serapis 44, Captain Richard Pearson, and the Countess of Scarborough 20, Captain Piercy. Jones instantly gave chase, ordering his consorts to follow and form in line of battle; but the Alliance disobeyed and ran off to some distance, for a time disconcerting the Pallas, which could not understand the discrepancy between the signals and the movements. The British merchant s.h.i.+ps crowded all sail to get out of the way, but the two frigates accepted Jones's challenge, and came up to fight. The Countess of Scarborough was very inferior in size and armament to the Pallas, while on the other hand the Serapis was much more powerful than the Bon Homme Richard. She was a two-decker, mounting twenty eighteen-pounders below, and twenty nine-pounders above, with ten six-pounders on her quarter-deck and forecastle; so that she could throw 300 pounds of metal on a broadside.

The Bon Homme Richard, with her six eighteens, could indeed throw 312 pounds on a broadside, but her weight of metal was very badly distributed among light guns. Without her eighteens, she could throw only 204 pounds on a broadside, being thus inferior to her opponent by one third. The Serapis had a crew of 320 well-trained British sailors, and she was a new and fast s.h.i.+p, perfect in all her appointments.

[Portrait: CAPTAIN PEARSON]

[Sidenote: Terrific fight between the Serapis and the Bon Homme Richard, Sept. 23, 1779]

The fight began at half past seven o'clock, a little before moonrise, on a cloudy evening, in smooth water. The two princ.i.p.al opponents delivered their entire broadsides at the same moment. At this first fire, two of the old eighteens in the American frigate burst, killing a dozen men.

After this disaster, no one had confidence enough in such guns to fire them again, so that the Bon Homme Richard was at once reduced to two thirds the force of her antagonist, and in ordinary fight must soon have been overcome. A brisk cannonade was kept up for an hour, while the two s.h.i.+ps manoeuvred for a raking position. The Serapis, being much the better sailer, was pa.s.sing across her adversary's bows, with very little elbow-room, when Jones succeeded in running his vessel into her just aft of her weather beam. For a moment all firing ceased on both s.h.i.+ps, and Captain Pearson called out, "Have you struck your colours?" "I have not yet begun to fight," replied Captain Jones. For a moment the s.h.i.+ps separated, the Serapis running ahead almost in a line with the Bon Homme Richard. The Serapis now put her helm hard down and was boxhauled, in order to luff up athwart her adversary's bow, and thus regain her raking position; but the Bon Homme Richard changed her tack, and presently, in a dense cloud of smoke, the two s.h.i.+ps came together again, the British bowsprit pa.s.sing over the high old-fas.h.i.+oned p.o.o.p of the American vessel. This was just what Jones desired, and as he stood there on his quarter-deck he seized a stout rope, and lashed the enemy's jib-boom to his mizzen-mast. Thus tied fast, the pressure of the light wind brought the s.h.i.+ps alongside, the head of the one lying opposite the stern of the other. Grappling-hooks were now thrown into the quarter of the Serapis, and with repeated las.h.i.+ngs fore and aft the two monsters were held together in deadly embrace. So close did they lie that their yards were interlocked, and some of the guns of the Serapis became useless for want of room to use the rammers. The advantage of her superior armament was thus in some measure lost, while her advantage in quickness of movement was entirely neutralized. Still her heavy guns at this short range did frightful execution, and the main deck of the Bon Homme Richard was soon covered with mangled and dying men, while her timbers were badly s.h.i.+vered and many cannon were knocked from their carriages. Unable to bear this terrible fire, the Americans crowded upon the upper deck in such numbers as easily to defeat the British attempts to board. Parties of marksmen, climbing into the rigging, cleared the enemy's tops, and shot down every man upon the Serapis who ventured from under cover.

Hand-grenades were thrown into her portholes to slay the gunners; and presently one bold fellow, crawling out to the very end of the Bon Homme Richard's main-yard, just over the main hatchway of the Serapis, dropped one of these mischievous missiles through the hatchway, where it ignited a row of cartridges that were lying upon the main deck. The explosion ran swiftly along the line, as through a pack of gigantic fire-crackers.

More than twenty men were blown into fragments, their heads, arms, and legs flying in every direction, while forty others were disabled. With the havoc already wrought by the guns, the Serapis had now lost two fifths of her crew, and her fire perceptibly slackened; so that the Americans were able to go below and work their guns again, pouring into the British portholes a storm of grape and canister which made an awful carnage.

It was now ten o'clock. All this time the Alliance had kept out of the fight, but the Pallas had attacked the Countess of Scarborough, and after a brisk cannonade compelled her to surrender. The Alliance now came down, and stupidly poured a raking volley along the decks of the two chief combatants, doing impartial damage to friend and foe. Warning shouts went up from the Bon Homme Richard, and her commander called out to Captain Landais to fall upon the farther side of the Serapis and board her. The Frenchman replied that he would do so, but instead he ran his s.h.i.+p off a couple of miles to leeward, and comfortably awaited the end of the battle. By this time the Serapis was on fire in several places, so that part of her crew had to leave their guns, and bend all their energies to extinguis.h.i.+ng the flames. The American s.h.i.+p was in still worse plight; she had not only been burning for half an hour, but so many holes had been shot in her hull that she began to sink. She had more than a hundred British prisoners below decks, and these men were now set free and marshalled at the pumps. Few guns were worked on either s.h.i.+p, and the rest of the fight between the two exhausted combatants was a mere question of dogged tenacity. At last Captain Jones, with his own hands, directed a couple of guns against the enemy's mainmast, and just as it was threatening to fall she surrendered. The gallant British commander stood almost alone on the main deck of his s.h.i.+p, in the midst of an awful scene of death; while of his few men who remained unhurt, most had sunk down, panting and overcome with fatigue.

No sooner were the s.h.i.+ps cut asunder than the tottering mainmast of the Serapis went overboard, carrying with it the mizzen topmast and all the mizzen rigging.[30] The Bon Homme Richard was with difficulty kept afloat till morning, and all night long fresh men from her consorts were hard at work fighting the flames, while the wounded were being carried off. At ten o'clock next morning she sank.