Commodore Paul Jones 27
Now, to go back a little. Shortly after the two ships were lashed
together, the Alliance, apparently having recovered from her
hesitation, came sweeping toward the combatants, and deliberately
poured a broadside into the Richard, which did not a little damage and
killed several men. In spite of all signals, Landais repeated his
treacherous performance, but before the Richard's men could fairly
realize the astonishing situation he sailed away from them and ran
over before the wind toward the Pallas, which had been for some time
hotly engaged with the Countess of Scarborough, where he is said to
have done the same thing.[15] This strange action of the Alliance had
but little effect upon the battle at this time, which was continued
with unremitting fury.
One by one the small guns on the main deck of the Richard were
silenced. The crews were swept away, guns were dismounted, carriages
broken and shattered, and finally the whole side of the Richard from
the mainmast aft was beaten in; so much so, that during the latter
part of the action the shot of the Serapis passed completely through
the Richard, and, meeting no opposition, fell harmlessly into the sea
far on the other side. In the excitement the English never thought of
depressing their guns and tearing the bottom out of the Richard. As it
was, transoms were beaten out, stern frames were cut to pieces, and a
few stanchions alone supported the decks above. Why they did not
collapse and fall into the hull beneath it, with the guns and men on
them, is a mystery. In addition to all this, the ship was on fire
repeatedly, and men were continually called away from their stations
to fight the flames.
Dale and de Weibert had just fired their last shots from the remaining
guns of the main battery which were serviceable when a new
complication was added to the scene. The men guarding the prisoners
had been gradually picked off by the shot of the enemy. The Richard
was leaking rapidly, and when the carpenter sounded the well a little
after nine o'clock, late in the action, he discovered several feet of
water in it. In great alarm he shrieked out that they were sinking.
The few remaining men in the gun room ran for the hatchways. The
master at arms, thinking that all was over, unlocked the hatches and
released the prisoners, crying out at the same time, "On deck,
everybody; the ship is sinking!" The Englishmen in panic terror
scrambled up through the narrow hatchways, and fought desperately with
each other in their wild hurry to reach the deck, where the carpenter
had preceded them, still shouting that the ship was sinking, and now
crying loudly, "Quarter! Quarter!"
As the carpenter ran aft, shouting his message of fear and alarm, he
was followed by some of the forward officers, who, catching the
contagion of his terror, repeated his words. Reaching the poop deck,
the carpenter fumbled in the darkness for the halliards to haul down
the flag, calling out to Jones that all was lost, the ship sinking,
and that he must surrender. Other officers and men joined in the cry.
It was another critical moment. Pearson, hearing the commotion, again
hailed, asking if the Richard had struck. Jones, unable to stop the
outcry of the terrified carpenter, smashed his skull with the butt of
his pistol, and answered the second request of Pearson with, as he
says, a most determined negative. We can imagine it. By his presence
of mind in silencing the carpenter, and a supreme exertion of his
indomitable will power, Jones soon succeeded in checking the incipient
panic on the spar deck. At this period of the fight some accounts say
that Pearson called his boarders from below and attempted to board.
The advance was met by Jones at the head of a few men, pike in hand,
with such firmness that it was not pressed home, and the men returned
to their stations at the guns and resumed the fight.
Meanwhile, Richard Dale, seconded by his midshipmen, with rare and
never-to-be-undervalued presence of mind, had stopped the oncoming
rush of frightened English prisoners, who now greatly outnumbered the
broken crew of the Richard. He sprang among them, beating them down,
driving them back, menacing them with the point of the sword, at the
same time telling them that the English ship was sinking, and that
they were in the same condition, and unless they went to the pumps
immediately all hands would be inevitably lost. The audacity of this
statement was worthy of Jones himself. It was a rare action on the
part of a boy of twenty-three years of age. Such a young man under
present conditions in the United States Navy probably would be filling
the responsible station of a naval cadet afloat![16] Instantly
divining this new peril, the commodore himself sprang to the hatchway
and seconded Dale's effort. Incredible as it seems, the two men
actually forced the panic-stricken, bewildered, and terrified English
prisoners to man the pumps, thus relieving a number of the crew of the
Richard; and the singular spectacle was presented of an American ship
kept afloat by the efforts of Englishmen, and thus enabled to continue
an almost hopeless combat. Dale, with imperturbable audacity, remained
below in command of them.
The Richard was a wreck. She had been fought to a standstill. Her
battery was silenced, her decks were filled with released prisoners,
she was making water fast, she was on fire in two or three places;
numbers of her crew had been killed and wounded, the water had
overflowed the cockpit, and the frightened surgeon had been driven to
the deck, where, in conjunction with some of the French officers, he
counseled surrender.
"What!" cried Paul Jones, smiling at the surgeon, "What, doctor! Would
you have me strike to a drop of water? Help me to get this gun over!"
But the doctor, liking the looks of things on deck even less than
below, ran down the hatchway, and, his station untenable, wandered to
and fro and ministered to the wounded on every side as best he could.
Meanwhile Jones had taken the place of the purser, Mr. Mease,
commanding the upper battery, who had been severely wounded and forced
to leave his station. The commodore was personally directing the fire
of the upper deck guns left serviceable on the Richard, the two
9-pounders on the quarter-deck. With great exertion another gun was
dragged over from the port side, Jones lending a hand with the rest,
and the fire of the three was concentrated upon the mainmast of the
Serapis.
About this time, between half after nine and ten o'clock, a huge black
shadow came darting between the moonlight and the two frigates
grinding against each other. It was the Alliance once more entering
the fray. After running away from the Richard toward the Scarborough
and the Pallas, she hovered about until she found that the former had
capitulated after a gallant defense against the overwhelming
superiority of the French ship. Then Landais headed once more for the
Richard and the Serapis. To reach them, he was forced to make two
tacks. As he approached, a burning anxiety filled the minds of Jones
and the officers who were left on deck with him, as to what Landais
would do. They were soon enlightened.
Sailing across the bow of the Serapis, the Alliance drew past the
stern of the Richard, and when she had reached a position slightly on
the quarter of the latter ship, she poured in a broadside. There could
be no misapprehension on the part of Landais as to which ship he was
firing into. The Richard was a black ship with a high poop, and the
Serapis was painted a creamy white with much lower stern. The moon was
filling the sky with brilliant light. Things were as plain as if it
were daytime. In addition to all this, Jones had caused the private
night signals to be hung upon the port side of the Richard. Shouts and
cries warned the Alliance that she was firing upon her own people.
These were disregarded. It was the opinion of the Americans that the
English had taken the ship and were endeavoring to compass the
destruction of the Richard. They could not otherwise explain the
astonishing action. Sailing slowly along the starboard side of the
Richard, the Alliance poured in another broadside. Then she circled
the bows of the American ship, and from some distance away raked her
with a discharge of grape which killed and wounded many, including
Midshipman Caswell, in charge of the forecastle. It was just before
ten o'clock when this happened. Some of the shot from these several
broadsides may have reached the Serapis and possibly have done some
damage, but the brunt of the severe attack fell upon the Richard. Her
men, in the face of this awful stab in the back from a friend,
naturally flinched from their guns and ran from their stations.
All seemed hopeless; but Jones was still left, and while he was alive
he would fight. He and his officers drove the men back to their guns,
and as the Alliance sailed away, for the time being, they forgot her.
The fight went on!
It is greatly to the credit of the men that under such circumstances
they could be induced to continue the contest. But the men had
actually grown reckless of consequences: filled with the lust of
battle, the brute in them was uppermost. They fought where they stood,
with what they had. When the American guns were silenced, the seamen
struck at their British foes over their silent muzzles with ramrods
and sponges. Some endeavored to subdue the flames which broke out on
every side. Others joined the English prisoners at the pumps. Many ran
to the upper deck to replace the decimated crews of the 9-pounders.
Some seized the muskets of the dead French soldiers and poured in a
small-arm fire. They had grown careless of the fire, indifferent to
the progress of the battle, ignorant of the results of the action.
There was but one spirit among them, one idea possessed them--to fight
and to fight on. Both crews had done their best; both had fought as
men rarely had fought before; the battle was still undecided. The
issue lay between Jones and Pearson. What was it to be?
Things on the Richard were hopeless, but things on the Serapis had not
gone much better. She, too, was on fire--in no less than twelve places
at once. The fearful musketry fire from the quarter-deck and
forecastle of the Richard, and from the tops, had practically cleared
her decks of all but Pearson. By Jones' orders the men in the American
tops had made a free use of their hand grenades. A daring sailor, sent
by Midshipman Fanning from the maintop, ran out upon the main yardarm,
which hung over the after hatch of the Serapis, and began to throw
grenades down the hatchway. On the lower deck of that ship a large
pile of powder cartridges had been allowed to accumulate, for which,
on account of the silencing of a large number of guns, there had been
no demand. With reckless improvidence, in their haste, the powder boys
continued to pile up these unused charges on the deck of the ship
between the batteries. Nobody cautioned them, perhaps nobody noticed
them in the heat of the action. At last a hand grenade struck the
hatch combing, bounded aft, and fell into the midst of the pile of
cartridges. There was a detonating crash, a terrific explosion, which
absolutely silenced the roar of the battle for a moment. The two ships
rolled and rocked from the shock of it. When the smoke cleared away,
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