A History, of the War of 1812-15 Between the United States and Great BritainJohnson, Rossiter
History
A History, of the War of 1812-15 Between the United States and Great Britain
Johnson, Rossiter
United States -- History -- War of 1812
The _Enterprise_ immediately ceased firing, and took possession of the
prize. The American vessel had suffered very little injury, though her
hull was peppered with grapeshot, a ball had passed through her foremast
and one through her mainmast, and her upper rigging was considerably
cut. She had lost one man killed and thirteen wounded, three of them
mortally. The _Boxer_ had been hulled repeatedly, three balls had passed
through her foremast, some of her guns were dismounted, her top-gallant.
forecastle was cut away, and her rigging badly injured. The number of
her men that were killed {204}has never been ascertained; fourteen were
wounded. The commanders of the two vessels both fell, almost at the same
moment: Blythe cut in two by an eighteen-pound ball, Burrows mortally
wounded by a canister-shot. They were buried side by side in Portland,
with the honors of war.
The poet Longfellow, who at that time was in his seventh year and
lived in Portland, alludes to this battle in his poem entitled "My Lost
Youth."=
```"'I remember the sea-fight far away,
```How it thundered o'er the tide!
```And the dead captains, as they lay
```In their graves, o'erlooking the tranquil bay
````Where they in battle died.
`````And the sound of that mournful song
`````Goes through me with a thrill:
`````'A boy's will is the wind's will,
```And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'"=
On the day when the _Chesapeake_ was captured by the _Shannon_, three
American war-vessels, under Commodore Decatur--the _United States_,
the _Macedonian_, and the _Hornet_--were driven into the harbor of New
London, Conn., by a superior force of British ships, and so rigorously
was the blockade of the port kept up, that not one of the three got to
sea again during the war. At the same time the land defences, manned
by Connecticut militia, pre{205}vented the blockading squadron from
entering the harbor to attack them. Decatur made many attempts to get
out with his fleet, but was always frustrated by the vigilance of the
blockaders, which he believed was assisted by traitors on shore. He
declared that whenever he planned an escape, the enemy were warned of
his intention by blue lights burned at the mouth of the harbor; and from
this circumstance the opprobrious name of "Blue-Lights" was applied to
the Federal party, which had opposed the war. It is not unlikely that
something of this sort was done, either by traitors or by spies in the
employ of the blockaders; but that the Federal party of Connecticut
had anything to do with it is sufficiently refuted by the fact that the
Connecticut militia, largely Federalists, not only protected Decatur's
vessels when they might have permitted them to be captured, but rendered
some distinguished services before the war was over, especially in the
gallant defence of Stonington. Still the Federalists continued to oppose
the war, though in a hopeless minority as to the whole country, and,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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