The Naval War of 1812. Roosevelt Theodore
that of his nearest neighbor."] The small size of our navy was probably to a certain extent effective in keeping it up to a high standard; but this is not the only explanation, as can be seen by Portugal's small and poor navy. On the other hand, the champions or pick of a large navy ought to be better than the champions of a small one. [Footnote: In speaking of tonnage I wish I could have got better authority than James for the British side of the question. He is so bitter that it involuntarily gives one a distrust of his judgment. Thus, in speaking of the Penguin's capture, he, in endeavoring to show that the Hornet's loss was greater than she acknowledged, says, "several of the dangerously wounded were thrown overboard because the surgeon was afraid to amputate, owing to his want of experience" ("Naval Occurrences," 492). Now what could persuade a writer to make such a foolish accusation? No matter how utterly depraved and brutal Captain Biddle might be, he would certainly not throw his wounded over alive because he feared they might die. Again, in vol. vi, p. 546, he says: "Captain Stewart had caused the Cyane to be painted to resemble a 36-gun frigate. The object of this was to aggrandize his exploit in the eyes of the gaping citizens of Boston." No matter how skilful an artist Captain Stewart was, and no matter how great the gaping capacities of the Bostonians, the Cyane (which by the way went to New York and not Boston) could no more be painted to look like a 36-gun frigate than a schooner could be painted to look like a brig. Instances of rancor like these two occur constantly in his work, and make it very difficult to separate what is matter of fact from what is matter of opinion. I always rely on the British official accounts when they can be reached, except in the case of the Java, which seem garbled. That such was sometimes the case with British officials is testified to by both James (vol. iv, p. 17) and Brenton (vol. ii, p. 454, note). From the "Memoir of Admiral Broke" we learn that his public letter was wrong in a number of particulars. See also any one of the numerous biographies of Lord Dundonald, the hero of the little Speedy's fight. It is very unfortunate that the British stopped publishing official accounts of their defeats; it could not well help giving rise to unpleasant suspicions.
It may be as well to mention here, again, that James' accusations do not really detract from the interest attaching to the war, and its value for purposes of study. If, as he says, the American commanders were cowards, and their crews renegades, it is well worth while to learn the lesson that good training will make such men able to beat brave officers with loyal crews. And why did the British have such bad average crews as he makes out? He says, for instance, that the Java's was unusually bad; yet Brenton says (vol. ii, p. 461) it was like "the generality of our crews." It is worth while explaining the reason that such a crew was generally better than a French and worse than an American one.]
Again, the armaments of the American as well as of the British ships were composed of three very different styles of guns. The first, or long gun, was enormously long and thick-barrelled in comparison to its bore, and in consequence very heavy; it possessed a very long range, and varied in calibre from two to forty-two pounds. The ordinary calibres in our navy were 6, 9, 12, 18, and 24. The second style was the carronade, a short, light gun of large bore; compared to a long gun of the same weight it carried a much heavier ball for a much shorter distance. The chief calibres were 9, 12, 18, 24, 32, 42, and 68-pounders, the first and the last being hardly in use in our navy. The third style was the columbiad, of an intermediate grade between the first two. Thus it is seen that a gun of one style by no means corresponds to a gun of another style of the same calibre. As a rough example, a long 12, a columbiad 18, and a 32-pound carronade would be about equivalent to one another. These guns were mounted on two different types of vessel. The first was flush-decked; that is, it had a single straight open deck on which all the guns were mounted. This class included one heavy corvette, (the Adams), the ship-sloops, and the brig-sloops. Through the bow-chase port, on each side, each of these mounted a long gun; the rest of their guns were carronades, except in the case of the Adams, which had all long guns. Above these came the frigates, whose gun-deck was covered above by another deck; on the fore and aft parts (forecastle and quarter-deck) of this upper, open deck were also mounted guns. The main-deck guns were all long, except on the Essex, which had carronades; on the quarter-deck were mounted carronades, and on the forecastle also carronades, with two long bow-chasers.
Where two ships of similar armament fought one another, it is easy to get the comparative force by simply comparing the weight in broadsides, each side presenting very nearly the same proportion of long guns to carronades. For such a broadside we take half the guns mounted in the ordinary way; and all guns mounted on pivots or shifting. Thus Perry's force in guns was 54 to Barclay's 63; yet each presented 34 in broadside. Again, each of the British brig-sloops mounted 19 guns, presenting 10 in broadside. Besides these, some ships mounted bow-chasers run through the bridle-ports, or stern-chasers, neither of which could be used in broadsides. Nevertheless, I include them, both because it works in about an equal number of cases against each navy, and because they were sometimes terribly effective. James excludes the Guerrière's bow-chaser; in reality he ought to have included both it and its fellow, as they worked more damage than all the broadside guns put together. Again, he excludes the Endymion's bow-chasers, though in her action they proved invaluable. Yet he includes those of the Enterprise and Argus, though the former's were probably not fired. So I shall take the half of the fixed, plus all the movable guns aboard, in comparing broadside force.
But the chief difficulty appears when guns of one style are matched against those of another. If a ship armed with long 12's, meets one armed with 32-pound carronades, which is superior in force? At long range the first, and at short range the second; and of course each captain is pretty sure to insist that "circumstances" forced him to fight at a disadvantage. The result would depend largely on the skill or luck of each commander in choosing position.
One thing is certain; long guns are more formidable than carronades of the same calibre. There are exemplifications of this rule on both sides; of course, American writers, as a rule, only pay attention to one set of cases, and British to the others. The Cyane and Levant threw a heavier broadside than the Constitution but were certainly less formidably armed; and the Essex threw a heavier broadside than the Phoebe, yet was also less formidable. On Lake Ontario the American ship General Pike threw less metal at a broadside than either of her two chief antagonists, but neither could be called her equal; while on Lake Champlain a parallel case is afforded by the British ship Confiance. Supposing that two ships throw the same broadside weight of metal, one from long guns, the other from carronades, at short range they are equal; at long, one has it all her own way. Her captain thus certainly has a great superiority of force, and if he does not take advantage of it it is owing to his adversary's skill or his own mismanagement. As a mere approximation, it may be assumed, in comparing the broadsides of two vessels or squadrons, that long guns count for at least twice as much as carronades of the same calibre. Thus on Lake Champlain Captain Downie possessed an immense advantage in his long guns, which Commodore Macdonough's exceedingly good arrangements nullified. Sometimes part of the advantage may be willingly foregone, so as to acquire some other. Had the Constitution kept at long bowls with the Cyane and Levant she could have probably captured one without any loss to herself, while the other would have escaped; she preferred to run down close so as to insure the capture of both, knowing that even at close quarters long guns are somewhat better than short ones (not to mention her other advantages in thick scantling, speed, etc.). The British carronades often upset in action; this was either owing to their having been insufficiently secured, and to this remaining undiscovered because the men were not exercised at the guns, or else it was because the unpractised sailors would greatly overcharge them. Our better-trained sailors on the ocean rarely committed these blunders, but the less-skilled crews on the lakes did so as often as their antagonists.
But while the Americans thus, as a rule, had heavier and better-fitted guns, they labored under one or two disadvantages. Our foundries were generally not as good as those of the British, and our guns, in consequence, more likely to burst; it was an accident of this nature which saved the British Belvidera; and the General Pike, under Commodore Chauncy, and the new American frigate Guerrière suffered in the same way; while often the muzzles of the guns would crack. A more universal disadvantage was in the short weight of our shot. When Captain Blakely sunk the Avon he officially reported that her four shot which came aboard weighed just 32 pounds apiece, a pound and three quarters