Commodore Paul Jones 24
Closer scrutiny had satisfied the American that the vessels in sight
were the longed-for Baltic merchant fleet which was convoyed by two
vessels of war, one of which appeared to be a small ship of the line
or a heavy frigate. In spite, therefore, of the suspicious maneuvers
of his consorts, Jones flung out a signal for a general chase, crossed
his light yards and swept toward the enemy. Meanwhile all was
consternation in the English fleet off the headland. A shore boat
which had been noticed pulling hard toward the English convoying
frigate now dashed alongside, and a man ascended to her deck.
Immediately thereafter signals were broken out at the masthead of the
frigate, attention being called to them by a gun fired to windward.
All the ships but one responded by tacking or wearing in different
directions in great apparent confusion, but all finally headed for the
harbor of Scarborough, where, under the guns of the castle, they hoped
to find a secure refuge. As they put about they let fly their
topgallant sheets and fired guns to spread the alarm.
Meanwhile the English ship, which proved to be the frigate Serapis,
also tacked and headed westward, taking a position between her convoy
and the approaching ships. Some distance to leeward of the frigate,
and farther out to sea, to the eastward, a smaller war vessel, in
obedience to orders, also assumed a similar position, and both waited
for the advancing foe. Early that morning Richard Pearson, the captain
of the Serapis, had been informed that Paul Jones was off the coast,
and he had been instructed to look out for him. The information had
been at once communicated to the convoy, to which cautionary orders
had been given, which had been in the main disregarded, as was the
invariable custom with convoys. The shore boat which the men on the
Richard had just observed speaking the Serapis contained the bailiff
of Scarborough Castle, who confirmed the previous rumors and
undoubtedly pointed out the approaching ships as Jones' squadron.
Pearson, as we have seen, had signaled his convoy, and the latter, now
apprised of their danger beyond all reasonable doubt by the sight of
the approaching ships, had at last obeyed his orders. Then he had
cleverly placed his two ships between the oncoming American squadron
to cover the retreat of his charges and to prevent the enemy from
swooping down upon them. His position was not only proper and
seamanlike, but it was in effect a bold challenge to his approaching
antagonist--a challenge he had no wish to disregard, which he eagerly
welcomed, in fact. In obedience to Jones' signal for a general chase,
the Richard and the Pallas were headed for their two enemies. As they
drew nearer the Pallas changed her course in accordance with Jones'
directions, and headed for the smaller English ship, the Countess of
Scarborough, a twenty-four gun, 6-pounder sloop of war, by no means an
equal match for the Pallas. The Vengeance followed at a safe distance
in the rear of the commodore, while Landais disregarded all signals
and pursued an erratic course of his own devising. Sometimes it
appeared that he was about to follow the Richard, sometimes the
Pallas, sometimes the flying merchantmen attracted his attention. It
was evident that the one thing he would not do would be to fight.
In utter disgust, Jones withdrew his attention from him and
concentrated his mind upon the task before him. He was about to engage
with his worn-out old hulk, filled with condemned guns, a splendid
English frigate of the first class. A comparison of force is
interesting. Counting the main battery of the Richard as composed of
twelves and the spar-deck guns as nines, and including the six
18-pounders in the gun room as being all fought on one side, we get a
total of forty guns throwing three hundred and three pounds of shot to
the broadside; this is the extreme estimate. Counting one half of the
main battery as 9-pounders, we get two hundred and eighty-two pounds
to the broadside, and, considering the 18-pounders as being fought
only three on a side, we reduce the weight of the broadside to two
hundred and twenty-eight pounds. As it happened, as we shall see, the
18-pounders were abandoned after the first fire, so that the effective
weight of broadside during the action amounted to either one hundred
and ninety-five or one hundred and seventy-four pounds, depending on
the composition of the main battery. Even the maximum amount is small
enough by comparison.
The crew of the Richard had been reduced to about three hundred
officers and men, as near as can be ascertained. The desertion of the
barge, the loss of the boat under Cutting Lunt off the Irish coast,
the various details by which the several prizes had been manned, and
the absence of the boat sent that morning under the charge of Henry
Lunt, which had not, and did not come back until after the action, had
reduced the original number to these figures. A most serious feature
of the situation was the lack of capable sea officers. There were so
few of the latter on board the Richard originally that the absence of
the two mentioned seriously hampered her work. Dale himself was a
host. Those that remained, who, with the exception of the purser,
sailing master, and the officers of the French contingent, were young
and inexperienced, mostly midshipmen--boys, in fact--made up for their
deficiencies by their zeal and courage. The officers of the French
contingent proved themselves to be men of a high class, who could be
depended upon in desperate emergencies.
The Serapis was a brand-new, double-banked frigate, of about eight
hundred tons burden--that is, she carried guns on two covered and one
uncovered decks. This was an unusual arrangement, not subsequently
considered advantageous or desirable, but it certainly enabled her to
present a formidable battery within a rather short length; her
shortness, it was believed, would greatly enhance her handiness and
mobility, qualities highly desirable in a war vessel, especially in
the narrow seas. On the lower or main deck twenty 18-pounders were
mounted; on the gun deck proper, twenty 9-pounders; and on the spar
deck, ten 6-pounders, making a total of fifty guns, twenty-five in
broadside, throwing three hundred pounds' weight of shot at each
discharge as against the Richard's one hundred and seventy-four. She
was manned by about three hundred trained and disciplined English
seamen, forming a homogeneous, efficient crew, and well they proved
their quality. Richard Pearson, her captain, was a brave, competent,
and successful officer, who had enjoyed a distinguished career,
winning his rank by gallant and daring enterprises; no ordinary man,
indeed, but one from whom much was to be expected.
In making this comparison between the two ships it must not be
forgotten that while the difference in the number of guns--ten--was
not great, yet in their caliber and the consequent weight of broadside
the Richard was completely outclassed. Then, too, the penetrative
power of an 18-pound gun is vastly greater than that of a 12-pound
gun, a thing well understood by naval men, though scarcely appearing
of much moment on paper. Indeed, it was a maxim that a 12-pound
frigate could not successfully engage an 18-pounder, or an 18-pound
frigate cope with a 24-pound ship.[12]
In addition to this vast preponderance in actual fighting force, there
was another great advantage to the Serapis in the original composition
of her crew as compared with the heterogeneous crowd which Jones had
been compelled to hammer into shape. Worthily, indeed, did both bodies
of men demonstrate their courage and show the effect of their
training. There was a further superiority in the English ship in that
she was built for warlike purposes, and was not a converted and
hastily adapted merchant vessel. She was of much heavier construction,
with more massive frames, stouter sides, and heavier scantling. The
last advantage Pearson's ship possessed was in her superior mobility
and speed. She should have been able to choose and maintain her
distance, so that with her longer and heavier guns she could batter
the Richard to pieces at pleasure, herself being immune from the
latter's feebler attack.
In but one consideration was the Richard superior to the Serapis, and
that was in the personality of the man behind the men behind the guns!
Pearson was a very gallant officer. There was no blemish upon his
record, no question as to his capacity. In personal bravery he was not
inferior to any one. As a seaman he worthily upheld the high
reputation of the great navy to which he belonged; but as a man, as a
personality, he was not to be mentioned in the same breath with Jones.
This is no discredit to that particular Englishman, for the same
disadvantageous comparison to Jones would have to be made in the case
of almost any other man that sailed the sea. There was about the
little American such Homeric audacity, such cool-headed heroism, such
unbreakable determination, such unshakable resolution, that so long as
he lived it was impossible to conquer him. They might knock mast after
mast out of the Richard; they might silence gun after gun in her
batteries; man after man might be killed upon her decks; they might
smash the ship to pieces and sink her beneath his feet, but there was
no power on earth which could compel him to strike her flag.
Jones was the very incarnation of the indomitable _Ego_: a soul that
laughed at odds, that despised opposition, that knew but one thing
after the battle was joined--to strike and strike hard, until
opposition was battered down or the soul of the striker had fled. In
action he would be master--or dead. But his fighting was no baresark
fury; no blind, wild rage of struggle; no ungovernable lust for
battle; it was the apotheosis of cool-blooded calculation. He fought
with his head as well as with his heart, and he knew perfectly well
what he was about all the time. Pearson was highly trained matter of
first-rate composition; Jones was mind, and his superiority over
matter was inevitable. The hot-tempered spirit of the man which
involved him in so many difficulties, which made him quarrelsome,
contrary, and captious, gave place to a coolness and calmness as great
as his courage in the presence of danger, in the moment of action. By
his skill, his ability, his address, his persistence, his staying
power, his hardihood, Jones deserved that victory which his
determination absolutely wrested from overwhelming odds, disaster, and
defeat. The chief players in the grim game, therefore, were but ill
matched, and not all the superiority in the pawns upon the chessboard
could overcome the fearful odds under which the unconscious Pearson
labored. We pity Pearson; in Jones' hands he was as helpless as
Pontius Pilate.
The crew of the Richard, having had supper and grog, had long since
gone to their stations to the music of the same grim call of the beat
to quarters which had rolled upon the decks of every warship of every
nation which had joined battle for perhaps two hundred years. Jones
was a great believer in drill and gun practice. His experience on his
first cruise in the Alfred, if nothing else, had taught him that, and
upon this ill-found ship with its motley crew probably a more thorough
regimen of control and discipline existed than could be found in any
other ship afloat. Frequent target practice was had, too, and the
result proved the value of the exercise. Had this not been the case
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