Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812. Volume 1

A month before the United States declared war the perplexities of the British Government were depicted by the same writer, in terms which palpably and graphically reflect the contemporary talk of the counting-house and the dinner-table: "If the Orders in Council are repealed, the trade of the United States will flourish beyond all former periods. They will then have the whole commerce of the Continent in their hands, and the British, though blockading with powerful armaments the hostile ports of Europe, will behold fleets of American merchantmen enter in safety the harbors of the enemy, and carry on a brisk and lucrative trade, whilst Englishmen, who command the ocean and are sole masters of the deep, must quietly suffer two thirds of their shipping to be dismantled and lie useless in little rivers or before empty warehouses. Their seamen, to earn a little salt junk and flinty biscuits, must spread themselves like vagabonds over the face of the earth, and enter the service of any nation. If, on the contrary, the Government continue to enforce the Orders, trade will still remain in its present deplorable state; an American war will follow, and poor Canada will bear the brunt." Cannot one see the fine old fellows of the period shaking their heads over their wine, and hear the words which the lively young provincial takes down almost from their lips? They portray truly, however, the anxious dilemma in which the Government was living, and explain concisely the conflicting considerations which brought on the war with the United States. From this embarrassing situation the current year brought a double relief. The chance of American competition was removed by the declaration of war, and exclusion from the Continent by Napoleon's reverses.

While matters were thus in northern and central Europe, in the far southwest the Spanish peninsula had for the same four dreary years been the scene of desolating strife, in which from the beginning Great Britain had taken a most active part, supporting the insurgent people with armies and money against the French legions. The weakening effect of this conflict upon the Emperor, and the tremendous additional strain upon his resources now occasioned by the break with Russia, were well understood, and hopes rose high; but heavy in the other scale were his unbroken record of success, and the fact that the War in the Peninsula, the sustenance of which was now doubly imperative in order to maintain the fatal dissemination of his forces between the two extremities of Europe, depended upon intercourse with the United States. The corn of America fed the British and their allies in the Peninsula, and so abundantly, that flour was cheaper in Lisbon than in Liverpool. In 1811, 802 American vessels entered the Tagus to 860 British; and from all the rest of the outside world there came only 75. The Peninsula itself, Spain and Portugal together, sent but 452.⁴⁸³ The merchants of Baltimore, petitioning against the Non-Intercourse Act, said that $100,000,000 were owing by British merchants to Americans, which could only be repaid by importations from England; and that this debt was chiefly for shipments to Spain and Portugal.⁴⁸⁴ The yearly export thither, mainly for the armies, was 700,000 barrels of flour, besides grain in other forms.⁴⁸⁵ The maintenance of this supply would be endangered by war.

Upon the continuance of peace depended also the enjoyment of the relatively tranquil conditions which Great Britain, after years of vexation, had succeeded at last in establishing in the western basin of the Atlantic, and especially in the Caribbean Sea. In 1808 the revolt of the Spanish people turned the Spanish West Indies once more to her side; and in 1809 and 1810 the conquest of the last of the French islands gave her control of the whole region, depriving French privateers of every base for local operations against British commerce. In 1812, by returns to September 1, the Royal Navy had at sea one hundred and twenty ships of the line and one hundred and forty-five frigates, besides four hundred and twenty-one other cruisers, sixteen of which were larger and the rest smaller than the frigate class—a total of six hundred and eighty-six.⁴⁸⁶ Of these there were on the North American and West India stations only three of the line, fifteen frigates, and sixty-one smaller—a total of seventy-nine.⁴⁸⁷ The huge remainder of over six hundred ships of war were detained elsewhere by the exigencies of the contest, the naval range of which stretched from the Levant to the shores of Denmark and Norway, then one kingdom under Napoleon's control; and in the far Eastern seas extended to the Straits of Sunda, and beyond. From Antwerp to Venice, in various ports, when the Empire fell, Napoleon had over a hundred ships of the line and half a hundred frigates. To hold these in check was in itself a heavy task for the British sea power, even though most of the colonial ports which might serve as bases for their external action had been wrested from France. A hostile America would open to the French navy a number of harbors which it now needed; and at the will of the Emperor the United States might receive a division of ships of a class she lacked entirely, but could both officer and man. One of Napoleon's great wants was seamen, and it was perfectly understood by intelligent naval officers, and by appreciative statesmen like John Adams and Gouverneur Morris, that a fleet of ships of the line, based upon American resources, would constitute for Great Britain a more difficult problem than a vastly larger number in Europe. The probability was contemplated by both the British Commander-in-Chief and the Admiralty, and was doubtless a chief reason for the comparatively large number of ships of the line—eleven—assigned on the outbreak of hostilities to a station where otherwise there was no similar force to encounter.⁴⁸⁸ To bring the French ships and this coast-line together was a combination correct in conception, and not impracticable. It was spoken of at the time—rumored as a design; and had not the attention and the means of the Emperor been otherwise preoccupied, probably would have been attempted, and not impossibly effected.

To avert such a conjuncture by the restoration of peace was necessarily an object of British policy. More than that, however, was at stake. The Orders in Council had served their turn. In conjunction with Napoleon's Continental System, by the misery inflicted upon all the countries under his control, they had brought about the desperation of Russia and the resistance of the Czar, who at first had engaged in the Emperor's policy. Russia and France were at war, and it was imperative at once to redouble the pressure in the Peninsula, and to recuperate the financial strength of Great Britain, by opening every possible avenue of supply and of market to British trade, in order to bring the whole national power, economical and military, to bear effectively upon what promised to be a death struggle. The repeal of the Orders, with the consequent admission of American merchant ships to every hostile port, except such, few as might be effectively blockaded in accordance with the accepted principles of International Law, was the price offered for the preservation of peace, and for readmission to the American market, closed to British manufacturers and merchants by the Non-Importation Acts. This extension of British commerce, now loudly demanded by the British people, was an object to be accomplished by the same means that should prevent the American people from constituting themselves virtually the allies of Napoleon by going to war. Should this dreaded alternative, however, come to pass, not only would British trade again miss the market, the loss of which had already caused widespread suffering, but, in common with it, British navigation, British shipping, the chief handmaid of commerce, would be exposed in a remote quarter, most difficult to guard, to the privateering activity of a people whose aptitude for such occupation had been demonstrated in the fight for independence and the old French wars. Half a century before, in the years 1756-58, there had been fitted out in the single port of New York, for war against the French, forty-eight privateers, carrying six hundred and ninety-five guns and manned by over five thousand men.⁴⁸⁹

The conditions enumerated constituted the principal important military possibilities of the sea frontier of the United States, regarded as an element in the general international situation when the year 1812 opened. Its importance to France was simply that of an additional weight thrown into the scale against Great Britain. France, being excluded from the sea, could not be aided or injured by the United States directly, but only indirectly, through their common enemy; and the same was substantially true of the Continent at large. But to Great Britain a hostile seaboard in America meant the possibility of all that has been stated; and therefore, slowly and unwillingly, but surely, the apprehension of war with its added burden forced the Government to a concession which years of intermittent commercial restrictions by the United States, and of Opposition denunciation at home, had not been able to extort. The sudden death of Spencer Perceval, the prime minister identified with the Orders in Council, possibly facilitated the issue, but it had become inevitable by sheer pressure of circumstances as they developed. It came to pass, by a conjuncture most fortunate for Great Britain, and most unfavorable to the United States, that the moment of war, vainly sought to be avoided by both parties, coincided with the first rude jar to Napoleon's empire and its speedy final collapse; leaving the Union, weakened by internal dissension, exposed single-handed to the full force of the British power. At the beginning, however, and till toward the end of 1812, it seemed possible that for an indefinite period the efforts of the Americans would receive the support derived from the inevitable preoccupation of their enemy with European affairs; nor did many doubt Napoleon's success against Russia, or that it would be followed by Great Britain's abandoning the European struggle as hopeless.

For such maritime and political contingencies the British Admiralty had to prepare, when the near prospect of war with America threatened to add to the extensive responsibilities entailed by the long strife with Napoleon. Its measures reflected the double purpose of the Government: to secure peace, if possible, yet not to surrender policies considered imperative. On May 9, 1812, identical instructions were issued to each of the admirals commanding the four transatlantic stations,—Newfoundland, Halifax, Jamaica, and Barbados,—warning them of the imminent probability of hostilities, in the event of which, by aggressive action or formal declaration on the part of the United States, they were authorized to resort at once to all customary procedures of war; "to attack, take or sink, burn or destroy, all ships or vessels belonging to the United States or to the citizens thereof." At the same time, however, special stress was laid upon the urgent wish of the Government to avoid occasions which might induce a collision. "You are to direct the commanders of his Majesty's ships to exercise, except in the events hereinbefore specified, all possible forbearance toward the United States, and to contribute, as far as may depend upon them, to that good understanding which it is his Royal Highness's⁴⁹⁰ most earnest wish to maintain."⁴⁹¹ The spirit of these orders, together with caution not to be attacked unawares, accounts for the absence of British ships of war from the neighborhood of the American coast noted by Rodgers' cruising squadron in the spring of 1812. Decatur, indeed, was informed by a British naval agent that the admiral at Bermuda did not permit more than two vessels to cruise at a time, and these were instructed not to approach the American coast.⁴⁹² The temper of the controlling element in the Administration, and the disposition of American naval officers since the "Chesapeake" affair, were but too likely to afford causes of misunderstanding in case of a meeting.

CHAPTER VIII
OCEAN WARFARE AGAINST COMMERCE—PRIVATEERING—BRITISH LICENSES—NAVAL ACTIONS: "WASP" AND "FROLIC"; "UNITED STATES" AND "MACEDONIAN"

In anticipation of war the British Admiralty took the military measure of consolidating their transatlantic stations, with the exception of Newfoundland. The Jamaica, Leeward Islands, and Halifax squadrons, while retaining their present local organizations, were subordinated to a single chief; for which position was designated Admiral Sir John Borlase Warren, an officer of good fighting record, but from his previous career esteemed less a seaman than a gallant man. This was apparently his first extensive command, although he was now approaching sixty; but it was foreseen that the British minister might have left Washington in consequence of a rupture of relations, and that there might thus devolve upon the naval commander-in-chief certain diplomatic overtures, which the Government had determined to make before definitely accepting war as an irreversible issue. Warren, a man of courtly manners, had some slight diplomatic antecedents, having represented Great Britain at St. Petersburg on one occasion. There were also other negotiations anticipated, dependent upon political conditions within the Union; where bitter oppositions of opinion, sectional in character, were known to exist concerning the course of the Administration in resorting to hostilities. Warren was instructed on these several points.

It was not until July 25, 1812, that a despatch vessel from Halifax brought word to England of the attack upon the "Belvidera" by Rodgers' squadron on June 24. By the same mail Admiral Sawyer wrote that he had sent a flag of truce to New York to ask an explanation, and besides had directed all his cruisers to assemble at Halifax.⁴⁹³ The Government recognized the gravity of the news, but expressed the opinion that there was no evidence that war had been decided upon, and that the action of the American commodore had been in conformity with previous orders not to permit foreign cruisers within the waters of the United States. Some color was lent to this view by the circumstance that the "Belvidera" was reported to have been off Sandy Hook, though not in sight of land.⁴⁹⁴ In short, the British Cabinet officially assumed that facts were as they wished them to continue; the course best adapted to insure the maintenance of peace, if perchance not yet broken.

On July 29, however, definite information was received that the United States Government had declared that war existed between the two countries. On the 31st the Cabinet took its first measures in consequence.⁴⁹⁵ One order was issued forbidding British merchant vessels to sail without convoy for any part of North America or the West Indies; while another laid an embargo on all American merchant ships in British ports, and directed the capture of any met at sea, unless sailing under British licenses, as many then did to Continental ports. No other hostile steps, such as general reprisals or commercial blockade, were at this time authorized; it was decided to await the effect in the United States of the repeal of the obnoxious Orders in Council. This having taken place only on June 23, intelligence of its reception and results could not well reach England before the middle of September. When Parliament was prorogued on July 30, the speech from the throne expressed a willingness still "to hope that the accustomed relations of peace and amity between the two countries may yet be restored."

It is a coincidence, accidental, yet noteworthy for its significance, that the date of the first hostile action against the United States, July 31, was also that of the official promulgation of treaties of peace between Great Britain, Russia, and Sweden.⁴⁹⁶ Accompanied as these were with clauses embodying what was virtually a defensive alliance of the three Powers against Napoleon, they marked that turn of the tide in European affairs which overthrew one of the most important factors in the political and military anticipations of the United States Administration. "Can it be doubted," wrote Madison on September 6, "that if, under the pressure added by our war to that previously felt by Great Britain, her Government declines an accommodation, it will be owing to calculations drawn from our internal divisions?"⁴⁹⁷ Of the approaching change, however, no sign yet appeared. The reverses of the French were still in the far future. Not until September 14 did they enter Moscow, and news of this event was received in the United States only at the end of November. A contemporary weekly, under date of December 5, remarked: "Peace before this time has been dictated by Bonaparte, as ought to have been calculated upon by the dealers (sic) at St. Petersburg, before they, influenced by the British, prevailed upon Alexander to embark in the War.... All Europe, the British Islands excepted, will soon be at the feet of Bonaparte."⁴⁹⁸ This expectation, generally shared during the summer of 1812, is an element in the American situation not to be overlooked. As late as December 4, Henry Clay, addressing the House of Representatives, of which he then was Speaker, said: "The British trade shut out from the Baltic—excluded from the Continent of Europe—possibly expelled the Black Sea—perishing in South America; its illicit avenue to the United States, through Canada, closed—was this the period for throwing open our own market by abandoning our restrictive system? Perhaps at this moment the fate of the north of Europe is decided, and the French Emperor may be dictating the law from Moscow."⁴⁹⁹ The following night Napoleon finally abandoned his routed army and started on his return to Paris.

War having been foreseen, the British Government took its first step without hesitation. On August 6 the Foreign Office issued Warren's secret instructions, which were substantially the repetition of those already addressed on July 8 to its representative in Washington. It being probable that before they could be received he would have departed in consequence of the rupture, Warren was to submit the proposition contained in them, that the United States Government, in view of the revocation of the Orders in Council, so long demanded by it, should recall the hostile measures taken. In case of acceptance, he was authorized to stop at once all hostilities within his command, and to give assurance of similar action by his Government in every part of the world. If this advance proved fruitless, as it did, no orders instituting a state of war were needed, for it already existed; but for that contingency Warren received further instructions as to the course he was to pursue, in case "a desire should manifest itself in any considerable portion of the American Union, more especially in those States bordering upon his Majesty's North American dominions, to return to their relations of peace and amity with this country." The admiral was to encourage such dispositions, and should they take shape in formal act, making overtures to him for a cessation of hostilities for that part of the country, he was directed to grant it, and to enter into negotiations for commercial intercourse between the section thus acting and the British dominions. In short, if the General Government proved irreconcilable, Great Britain was to profit by any sentiment of disunion found to exist.⁵⁰⁰

Warren sailed from Portsmouth August 14, arriving in Halifax September 26. On the 30th, he despatched to the United States Government the proposal for the cessation of hostilities. Monroe, the Secretary of State, replied on October 27. The President, he said, was at all times anxious to restore peace, and at the very moment of declaring war had instructed the chargé in London to make propositions to that effect to the British Ministry. An indispensable condition, however, was the abandonment of the practice of impressment from American vessels. The President recognized the embarrassment under which Great Britain lay, because of her felt necessity to control the services of her native seamen, and was willing to undertake that hereafter they should be wholly excluded from the naval and merchant ships of the United States. This should be done under regulations to be negotiated between the two countries, in order to obviate the injury alleged by Great Britain; but, meanwhile, impressing from under the American flag must be discontinued during any armistice arranged. "It cannot be presumed, while the parties are engaged in a negotiation to adjust amicably this important difference, that the United States would admit the right, or acquiesce in the practice of the opposite party, or that Great Britain would be unwilling to restrain her cruisers from a practice which would have the strongest tendency to defeat the negotiation." The Orders in Council having been revoked, impressment remained the only outstanding question upon which the United States was absolute in its demand. That conceded, upon the terms indicated, all other differences might be referred to negotiation. Upon this point Warren had no powers, for his Government was determined not to yield. The maritime war therefore went on unabated; but it may be mentioned here that the President's undertaking to exclude British-born seamen from American ships took effect in an Act of Congress, approved by him March 3, 1813. He had thenceforth in hand a pledge which he considered a full guarantee against whatever Great Britain feared to lose by ceasing to take seamen from under the American flag. It was not so regarded in England, and no formal agreement on this interesting subject was ever reached.

The conditions existing upon his arrival, and the occurrences of the past three months, as then first fully known to Warren, deeply impressed him with the largeness of his task in protecting the commerce of Great Britain. He found himself at once in the midst of its most evident perils, which in the beginning were concentrated about Halifax, owing to special circumstances. Although long seemingly imminent, hostilities when they actually came had found the mercantile community of the United States, for the most part, unbelieving and unprepared. The cry of "Wolf!" had been raised so often that they did not credit its coming, even when at the doors. This was especially the case in New England, where the popular feeling against war increased the indisposition to think it near. On May 14, Captain Bainbridge, commanding the Boston navy yard, wrote: "I am sorry to say that the people here do not believe we are going to war, and are too much disposed to treat our national councils with contempt, and to consider their preparations as electioneering."⁵⁰¹ The presidential election was due in the following November. A Baltimore newspaper of the day, criticising the universal rush to evade the embargo of April 4, instituted in order to keep both seamen and property at home in avoidance of capture, added that in justice it must be said that most people believed that the embargo, as on former occasions, did not mean war.⁵⁰²

Under the general sense of unpreparedness, it seemed to many inconceivable that the Administration would venture to expose the coasts to British reprisals. John Randolph, repeating in the House of Representatives in secret session a conversation between the Committee on Foreign Relations and the Secretary of State, said: "He was asked whether any essential changes would be made in the sixty days (of the proposed embargo) in the defence of our maritime frontier and seaports. He replied, pretty considerable preparations would be made. He said New York was in a pretty respectable state, but not such as to resist a formidable fleet; but that it was not to be expected that that kind of war would be carried on." The obvious reply was, "We must expect what commonly happens in wars." "As to the prepared state of the country, the President, in case of a declaration, would not feel bound to take more than his share of the responsibility. The unprepared state of the country was the only reason why ulterior measures should be deferred."⁵⁰³ Randolph's recollections of this interview were challenged by members of the Committee in other points, but not in these. The Administration had then been in office three years, and the causes of war had been accumulating for at least seven; but so notorious was the unreadiness that a great part of the community even now saw only bluster.

For these reasons the first rush to privateering, although feverishly energetic, was of a somewhat extemporized character. In consequence of the attempt to elude the embargo, by a precipitate and extensive export movement, a very large part of the merchant ships and seamen were now abroad. Hence, in the haste to seize upon enemy's shipping, anything that could be sent to sea at quick notice was utilized. Vessels thus equipped were rarely best fitted for a distant voyage, in which dependence must rest upon their own resources, and upon crews both numerous and capable. They were therefore necessarily directed upon commercial highways near at hand, which, though not intrinsically richest, nor followed by the cargoes that would pay best in the United States, could nevertheless adequately reward enterprise. In the near vicinity of Halifax the routes from the British West Indies to New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and the St. Lawrence, met and crossed the equally important lines of travel from the British Islands to the same points. This circumstance contributed to the importance of that place as a naval and commercial centre, and also focussed about it by far the larger part of the effort and excitement of the first privateering outburst from the United States. As Rodgers' bold sortie, and disappearance into the unknown with a strong squadron had forced concentration upon the principal British vessels, the cruisers remaining for dispersion in search of privateers were numerically inadequate to suppress the many and scattered Americans. Before Warren's arrival the prizes reported in the United States were one hundred and ninety, and they probably exceeded two hundred. An analysis of the somewhat imperfect data which accompany these returns indicates that about three fourths were seized in the Bay of Fundy and in the off-lying waters from thence round to Newfoundland. Of the remainder, half, probably, were taken in the West Indies; and the rest out in the deep sea, beyond the Gulf Stream, upon the first part of the track followed by the sugar and coffee traders from the West Indies to England.⁵⁰⁴ There had not yet been time to hear of prizes taken in Europe, to which comparatively few privateers as yet went.

One of the most intelligent and enterprising of the early privateers was Commodore Joshua Barney, a veteran of the American Navy of the Revolution. He commissioned a Baltimore schooner, the "Rossie," at the outbreak of the war; partly, apparently, in order to show a good example of patriotic energy, but doubtless also through the promptings of a love of adventure, not extinguished by advancing years. The double motive kept him an active, useful, and distinguished public servant throughout the war. His cruise on this occasion, as far as can be gathered from the reports,⁵⁰⁵ conformed in direction to the quarters in which the enemy's merchant ships might most surely be expected. Sailing from the Chesapeake July 15, he seems to have stood at once outside the Gulf Stream for the eastern edge of the Banks of Newfoundland. In the ensuing two weeks he was twice chased by an enemy's frigate, and not till July 31 did he take his first prize. From that day, to and including August 9, he captured ten other vessels—eleven in all. Unfortunately, the precise locality of each seizure is not given, but it is inferable from the general tenor of the accounts that they were made between the eastern edge of the Great Banks and the immediate neighborhood of Halifax; in the locality, in fact, to which Hull during those same ten days was directing the "Constitution," partly in pursuit of prizes, equally in search of the enemy's ships of war, which were naturally to be sought at those centres of movement where their national traders accumulated.

On August 30 the "Rossie," having run down the Nova Scotia coast and passed by George's Bank and Nantucket, went into Newport, Rhode Island. It is noticeable that before and after those ten days of success, although she saw no English vessels, except ships of war cruising on the outer approaches of their commerce, she was continually meeting and speaking American vessels returning home. These facts illustrate the considerations governing privateering, and refute the plausible opinion often advanced, that it was a mere matter of gambling adventure. Thus Mr. Gallatin, the Secretary of the Treasury, in a communication to Congress, said: "The occupation of privateers is precisely of the same species as the lottery, with respect to hazard and to the chance of rich prizes."⁵⁰⁶ Gallatin approached the subject from the standpoint of the financier and with the abstract ideas of the political economist. His temporary successor, the Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Jones, had been a merchant in active business life, and he viewed privateering as a practical business undertaking. "The analogy between privateering and lotteries does not appear to me to be so strict as the Secretary seems to consider it. The adventure of a privateer is of the nature of a commercial project or speculation, conducted by commercial men upon principles of mercantile calculation and profit. The vessel and her equipment is a matter of great expense, which is expected to be remunerated by the probable chances of profit, after calculating the outfit, insurance, etc., as in a regular mercantile voyage."⁵⁰⁷ Mr. Jones would doubtless have admitted what Gallatin alleged, that the business was liable to be overdone, as is the case with all promising occupations; and that many would engage in it without adequate understanding or forethought.