As said, the British frigate _Junon_ got around to the Delaware not long after her brush with the gun-boats in the Chesapeake. The sixteen-gun sloop-of-war _Martin_ was with her, and the _Martin_ grounded on Crow’s Shoal. At that the _Junon_ anchored near the _Martin_, and then came Lieutenant Samuel Angus with eight American gun-boats carrying a thirty-two each and two larger vessels (one-masted) to attack the _Martin_. The Americans were able to accomplish nothing of consequence in their great gun attack, because their powder was worthless. The British shot passed over them when their shot fell short. Still, the truth is, the gun-boats were so frail that the crews never had the heart to make a really vigorous attack on a frigate. But when one of this flotilla happened to drift clear of the rest and the British sent their ships’ boats to attack it, the Yankees made a fight that any nation might be proud of. This unfortunate gun-boat did not even have a name. It was “No. 121.” It was commanded by Sailing-master William W. Sheed, and there was a crew of twenty-five all told and one long thirty-two. The British force numbered one hundred and forty men in seven boats, several of which carried howitzers, under Lieutenant Philip Westphal. Sheed anchored his craft, and as the boats approached opened fire with his big gun. The first shot broke the carriage pintle, and the next ruined the carriage; so the gun became useless. Nevertheless Sheed rallied his little crew with small arms and fought the enemy until overpowered by sheer weight of numbers. But before they were overpowered they killed seven of the one hundred and forty British, and wounded thirteen. The Americans had seven men wounded. Of like character was the defence which Sailing-master Paine made with Gun-boat 160 in St. Andrew’s Sound, near Savannah, when a tender and ten boats, loaded with men and small cannon, attacked him. Paine had but sixteen men to resist nearly two hundred, but he fought them off for twenty minutes and only surrendered when the enemy at last thronged his deck. Paine was promoted for his gallantry. Captain Joshua Barney, who made himself famous first by thrashing the British cruiser _General Monk_ with a very inferior force in the Pennsylvania State cruiser _Hyder Ali_, during the war of the Revolution, and who, in the early part of the War of 1812, made a two-million dollar cruise against British commerce in a Baltimore clipper, took command of a fleet of gun-boats in Chesapeake Bay in 1813. But nothing of consequence occurred under his command until June, 1814. Then on June 1st he went in chase of two British schooners, and was fast overhauling them by the aid of long oars when a stiff breeze came up from the south and the sea rose so that the gun-boats were useless and he had to retreat. At that the schooners turned on him, but he made such a good fight in spite of the sea, that the schooners were glad to abandon the fight. [Illustration: Joshua Barney.