All of these vessels except the _George Washington_, _Merrimack_, and _Ganges_, the _Montezuma_, _Baltimore_, and _Delaware_, and the _Herald_, _Richmond_, and _Retaliation_ were built by the Government.[20] One of the first affairs of the new navy was a notable case of impressment of British seamen from the _Baltimore_, acting as convoy to a number of merchantmen. Meeting a powerful British squadron off Havana, Captain Phillips of the _Baltimore_ was informed by the British commodore of his intention to remove all British seamen from his ship. Phillips announced his intention of surrendering his ship rather than to submit to the outrage. Unfortunately there was a lawyer on board as passenger, and Phillips asked his judgment as to the legality of the British commander’s procedure. Had Phillips acted as he at first intended, viz.: to resist to the utmost, short of an engagement which would have been folly against three line-of-battle ships, he would have done well, but his legal friend found reasons for yielding, which was done. Five men were taken, and three ships of the convoy seized, for what actual reason Cooper, who gives this case in great detail, does not say. Phillips was handicapped by his inexperience as a naval officer, having been only just appointed into the navy from the merchant service. There were, too, dissentient opinions even among patriotic Americans of standing as to the justice of the British claims, many upholding the, then, British doctrine of inalienable allegiance. Even so considerable a person as Gouverneur Morris, one of the ablest men America has produced and of large diplomatic and political experience, maintained the view. It was the first of many cases which had so large a part in bringing on the War of 1812. In November the _Retaliation_ was captured by a French squadron, and Bainbridge was a prisoner for the first, though not for the last, time in his career. By the good fortune of the release of his schooner as a cartel he was enabled to return home. During 1799 we had twenty-eight vessels in active service. Most of the captains and many of the officers of lesser rank were men who had seen service during the Revolution, which, it must be remembered, had ended but sixteen years before; many of them of course were men with no experience of naval life, which differs from that of the merchant service much as does that of the raw militiaman from that of the seasoned soldier.