Obrazy na stronie
PDF
ePub

300 Canadian militia; and additional forces coming up, he immediately fell back, and evacuated the province. Wilkinson succeeded in effecting a landing near Kingston. But Lieut.Colonel Morrison, who was stationed at that place with a small detachment, immediately followed him, and an action took place near Chrystler's Farm, twenty miles above Cornwall. The American army, six times superior in numbers, was totally routed, with the loss of 1000 men. The enemy preci-, pitately crossed the St Lawrence, and, abandoning his boats, retreated by a difficult country to Plattsburg.

The disasters of the enemy did not stop here. On the 25th December, a British and Indian force having surprised Fort Niagara, destroyed or made prisoners the whole garrison. The British then crossed the river, attacked General Hull, who had collected about 2000 men on the other side, and put him totally to the rout.-The present year, therefore, terminated in a manner as brilliant for the British arms as the preceding.

Thus, amid partial reverses, the campaign by land was, on the whole, glorious and fortunate for Great Britain. At sea, too, she regained that ascendancy which naturally belonged to her. The first instance in which this superiority was established, was at tended with circumstances particularly gratifying. Captain Broke, of the Shannon frigate, with another small vessel attending him, had been cruising for some time near the harbour of Boston, where the Chesapeake frigate then lay. The latter, though much superior, particularly in men, did not venture to come out. Captain Broke, however, was anxious to make a fair trial of the valour of the combatants. On the 1st of June he dismissed the vessel which accompanied him, and, with the Shannon alone, drew up before the harbour of Boston, in a pos

ture of defiance. The Chesapeake accepted the challenge; she came out to decide, as it were, by single combat, this contest between the two nations in maritime prowess. The coast was entirely lined by the inhabitants, t who could observe with ease all the vicissitudes of a combat so interesting. The issue remained not long in suspense. The two vessels came almost immediately in contact, and Captain Broke, observing that the enemy at this critical moment flinched from their guns, gave immediate orders for boarding. In less than ten minutes the whole of the British crew were on the decks of the Chesapeake. In two minutes more, the enemy, after a desperate but disorderly resistance, was driven from every post, and the Americans from the shore beheld the British colours flying over the vessel, which had just left their harbour in full assurance of victory.

The arrival of Admiral Warren at Bermuda had now established the naval superiority of Britain in these seas; and the question was, how the Americans might be best made to feel it? With this view a squadron of light vessels was sent up the Chesapeake, the grand inlet of the North Ameri can States. This squadron made successful descents at various havens along its coasts, and upon the rivers at its head. Wherever the British landed, they took possession of the vessels and all public property, without doing any further injury to the inhabitants. An attempt upon Carney Island did not succeed; but Kent and Swan Islands were taken and fortified, and establishments were thus formed at the very head of the bay. Upon the whole, considerable injury was done to the enemy by these operations, and great alarm excited; but no vital point was reached, nor were any the grand objects of the war materially promoted.. This desultory and

of

coasting warfare, though a favourite with the British public, is never likely to lead to any important result. Its successes are superficial and transient, while, though the suffering and alarm inflicted may tend in some measure to dispose the minds of the people to peace, this effect must be greatly counteracted by the irritation which is excited. No very beneficial effect has ever attended its adoption, either on the old or new continent.

Such is a brief sketch of the military and naval events of the year, connect. ed with the American continent, which it seemed proper to record without interruption. It becomes necessary now to advert to some proceedings which took place in England, and in America, relating to this unhappy contest. On the 14th of May, Lord Darnley made a motion in the House of Lords, for a select committee to enquire into the state of the war with America, and into the naval administration of the country, against which some of the accidental triumphs of the Americans had raised a very general out. cry. In support of the motion, it was maintained, that “ ministers must have been aware that war could not fail, at no distant period, to be the result of their own measures, combined with the hostile feeling of the ruling party in the United States. This being the case, how were they prepared to meet it? With respect to Canada, the events which had happened there had greatly added to the reputation of our arms. But with regard to our naval force, how were we prepared? It appeared, that in the months of April, May, June, and July last year, during a part of which period there must have been every expectation of the near approach of war, and during the latter part of which the war had actually commenced, there were under Admiral Sawyer, on the Halifax station, (exclusive of smaller vessels,)

one ship of the line and five frigates. That so small a force only should have been stationed there, when a timely reinforcement might have a chieved the most important objects, loudly called for enquiry. If a force of five ships of the line, seventeen frigates, and an adequate number of smaller vessels, had been on the Halifax station at the time the war broke out, the whole coast of the United States might have been immediately blockaded. Had this been done, the American frigates in port must have remained there-those which had sailed must have been captured in their return-the American commerce would have been destroyed-their customs, upon which they relied for their revenue, would have failed, and with this succession of disasters, the ruling party in the United States would have been forced out of power, and by this time we should have had peace. It might be said, that the amount of the force on the Halifax station was equal to that of the American navy, and, judging from what had formerly occurred, five of our frigates might be deemed equal to five of our enemy's frigates; but was the quality of our force in this instance equal to that with which it had to contend? Had it not, on the contrary, long since been a matter of notoriety, that the American frigates were greatly superior to ours in size and weight of metal?"War," continued the supporters of the motion," was declared against Great Britain by the United States, on the 18th of June; the official intelligence of this fact reached government on the 30th of July, and notwithstanding the incalculable importance of this event, parliament was prorogued on that very day. War then having been declared on the 18th of June, what was done by way of instant retaliation? Nothing; and it was not until the 13th of October that letters of marque and

reprisal were issued; how the interval was employed the country required an explanation. Still, however, the same dilatory system was pursued, and more than two months elapsed before the Chesapeake and Delaware were declared to be blockaded, the notification being dated the 26th of December. Although ministers were made acquainted with the quality of the American naval force, they took no steps to place our shipping upon an equal footing, by giving them additional guns upon deck; and the vessels upon a new construction, that were built expressly to cope with the American frigates, were not to be launched until October. In pursuance of the feeble and indecisive plan which had been observed since the commencement of hostilities, on the 13th of March, 1813, certain other ports of the United States were declared to be blockaded, but Rhode Island and Newport yet remained open, and in the the latter, the American frigate, after the capture of the Macedonian, actually refitted. Was this the mode in which the affairs of Great Britain, at a crisis like the present, ought to be conducted? Every thing which bravery could accomplish had been done by the officers and seamen; our disasters were solely attributable to the ministers. On a reference to the London Gazette, it would be found that many of the circumstances attending the capture of all our frigates were similar; they were all crippled in their rigging, and dismasted early in the action, disasters arising partly from the commanding height of the ships of the enemy, and partly from their greater weight of metal, while the shot from our smaller guns produced compara tively little effect upon the masts of our antagonists. To ascertain satisfactorily the causes of this superiority, was surely of great importance. If it were urged, that we had not seamen

to man new frigates to contend with America, it might be replied, that many small vessels were now uselessly employed upon various stations, the crews of which might be turned over to our larger vessels, and might thus be rendered useful to their country, instead of wasting their years in inglorious idleness. If proper measures had been adopted at an early period, the enemy's privateers and ships of war would have been confined within their ports, and the list of our captured vessels could not have been swelled to the present enormous and melancholy amount. From the returns, it appeared, that 382 of our valuable merchantmen had been captured, only 80 of which had been retaken. The chief cause of these losses was the deficiency of force on the various stations at Jamaica and the Leeward Islands; for instance, the nation. al flag of the British empire had been lately known to wave upon a vessel of less than forty tons burden. While ministers were thus negligent of our external commerce, they were not more vigilant in the protection and support of our domestic manufactures. American cotton, by a system of policy that could not be too severely reprobated, had, until lately, been allowed to be imported, to the great detriment of our own colonies, and to the great advantage of the territory of our enemies.

"Another part of the subject, of not less importance than those already noticed, and upon which detailed enquiries were absolutely necessary, was the management of our dock-yards, and the general system pursued with regard to the construction of our ships. Several men of war recently built had, after one voyage, been laid up as unfit for further service, in consequence of the badness of the materials.-All these were matters that demanded enquiry, as well indeed as the whole

2

[blocks in formation]

To these charges it was answered, "that it would indeed be a circumstance tending to criminate the administration of the country, if, while they were apprised that war was inevitable, they had not kept a suffici. ent force on the coasts of the American states. For some time before the war, the government of the United States, indeed, indicated any thing but a spirit of friendship towards this country. Such, however, was not the general opinion, and it was at that time confidently asserted, that the revocation of the orders in council would prove sufficient to pacify America. In this hope we had been disappointed, for, although the pretext which was once rested upon as a sufficient ground for hostilities, had been taken away, the Americans still maintained a furious opposition to those naval rights, on the integrity of which our safety as a nation depends. That it was the duty of government to have been always ready with a fleet sufficient to blockade all the ports of America, would hardly be maintained. It was its duty, no doubt, to keep on the American station at all times a sufficient force to check the navy of America, and to protect the trade of his majesty's subjects. But it was at the same time the duty of government, as far as was consistent with the security of the country, to abridge the naval force, and to give all the efficiency possible to another branch of the service, of which the exertions were now of such eminent importance. It had been said, that ships ought to have been taken from other quarters at the commencement of the war, and ap

plied to the stations in question. But this could not be done, unless the force on other stations had been more than sufficient for its object, which never had been the case. At Toulon the enemy had been fitting out 20 ships of the line; and in this as well as many other places the blockading force was less than the force blockaded. The season of the year, it might be also observed, at which the Americans, with a view to their own advantage, had declared war, was such that all our vessels had been previously dispatched to their several stations, whence they could not be speedily recalled. Now, under all these circumstances, had the events of the war been such as to warrant enquiry? It had been said, that the force on the American station at the commencement of the war was in adequate. The Americans did not think it so; for, before declaring war, their vessels escaped from the Chesapeake, which was a port liable to be blockaded. They did not attempt to fight our squadron, but wished to go after the trading vessels; they went after the Jamaica squadron, but found it sufficiently guarded, and were chased by the British ships. They had never dared to attack the British squadron when united, but they took advantage of its dispersion. The Guerriere, one of the frigates alluded to, had but a few days before been in company with the other ships, but being separated by a gale, was, after an action of which no one could speak too highly, taken by a vessel of superior force. This might have happened whatever had been the force of the British vessels. It was absurd to talk of blockading the American ports. What had passed within the last 20 years might have been sufficient to dissuade us from such an attempt, since we had seen, notwithstanding the endeavours of our blockading squadrons, vessels taken on our very

coasts. If the government had before the war sent, as it was now contended they ought to have done, a force sufficient to blockade the ports of America, while they were doing every thing consistent with national honour to accommodate the differences between this country, how eagerly would this circumstance have been laid hold of as the symptom of a hostile spirit? Because the crew of the Java had been composed in a great degree of young men, this circumstance could not be adduced as a proof that there was not among them many experienced seamen. Was it contended, that we should alter the classes of ships in the British navy, merely because there were three American vessels of unu sual dimensions? If there was a subject on which all naval officers were agreed, it was this-that it was improper to multiply the classes of vessels. It was far better to send out 74's on the station, than to set about building ships which would be fit to cope only with the American navy. As to the advice to diminish the number of small vessels, no experienced person could adopt it. At this time small craft were in great demand, to protect our trade from the privateers and other small vessels of the enemy.As to the assertion, that the balance of captures since the declaration of war was in favour of the Americans, the fact was directly the reverse. On this part of the question a most satisfactory argument might be deduced from the rates of insurance. The rate for ships convoyed was but one per cent. higher than it was a year ago. The number of this description of ships captured had been unusually small, and it was not to be wondered at, that of those which ran from their convoy some should be taken, or that when the convoy was dispersed by gales of wind, the enemy should sometimes pick up a few stragglers.-It had been

made a charge against the ministers, that the letters of marque and reprisal were not issued till October, although intelligence of the war was received in July. But by this delay, which was allowed to take place with the view of ascertaining the reception given to propositions of amity from the British government, no detriment had been occasioned; for so soon as the intelligence of the declaration of war had reached this country, orders were issued to detain all American vessels, thus insuring all the advantages which could be obtained by letters of marque.

As to the military force again, it had not indeed conquered the United States; but it was not intended for conquest,-it was intended for the defence of his majesty's dominions there, and this object it had effected.-It was not fair to infer that, because the blockade of the American ports was not notified in the London Gazette, armed vessels could go out and in without danger.-As to the loss of the Java, the court-martial which met in consequence of that event, would, if it had been attended with circumstances of neglect of any kind, have reported to that effect.-In the construction of our vessels we had been represented as very deficient, and the public offices were said to be so wedded to old customs, that no good could ever be effected. The truth is, that in the modelling of vessels the French and other nations were superior to us; but in the execution we were as superior to them. But in pursuance of a report of the commissioners of revision, measures had been taken which would remedy the defect even in the scientific part. To build ships hastily was in ordinary times ruinous, although when the enemy made unusual exertions in this way, we were obliged, in order to meet them, to follow his example. The decay of some of our ships had indeed been very rapid; but a plan

« PoprzedniaDalej »