Decatur, when in command of the _President_, was ordered to take the little sloop-of-war _Hornet_, Captain James Biddle, and the new Yankee corvette _Peacock_, Captain Lewis Warrington, and go on a cruise to the East Indies, as Captain Bainbridge with the _Constitution_, the _Essex_, and the _Hornet_ had started to do. Accordingly, having appointed the island of Tristan d’Acunha as a rendezvous, Decatur sailed out of New York harbor with a substantial northerly gale to help him, on the night of January 14, 1815. The gale had prevailed long enough to blow the blockading squadron clear of Sandy Hook, and all went well until the ship was crossing the bar, when, by a mistake of the pilots, she struck the sand. There was enough of a sea rolling to lift and drop the big ship on the bar and for an hour and a half she lay there pounding. By that time the tide had raised her and over she went, though very much “hogged and twisted.” That is she had literally broken her back, and her fair shape was warped into an irregular one. Because of the wind Decatur was compelled to go to sea. Skirting the Long Island coast for about fifty miles he concluded he must be clear of the British squadron, and so headed away on his course for Tristan d’Acunha. As it happened, Captain John Hayes, commanding the British blockading squadron, had calculated that any ship leaving New York would try to get to sea by hugging the Long Island coast, on the theory that the British would be blown away down the Jersey beach; so he had kept his squadron “bucking the gale” off the Long Island coast, and thus it happened that when Decatur eased his sheets to run away on his course, he ran right into the British squadron. The British squadron included the razee _Majestic_ (a cut-down liner); the frigate _Endymion_, that had been built to meet the big Yankees and was armed as they were, with long twenty-fours; the ordinary (eighteen-pounder) frigate _Pomone_, and the ordinary frigate _Tenedos_. There was also a brig, but it had no part in the fight. It was just before daylight when the enemy were seen. Decatur hauled up to the wind and headed for the east end of Long Island, but the _President_ was seen by the British and the whole squadron went after her. The good judgment of Captain Hayes was going to win him a ship. As the _President_ stood away, the _Majestic_ and the _Endymion_ were directly astern, with the _Pomone_ on the port and the _Tenedos_ on the starboard quarter. The wind still held strong, and the _Majestic_ led the _Endymion_ and gained on the _President_ enough to warrant an occasional shot. Then the wind slackened and the _Pomone_ outsailed all the rest, until Captain Hayes blundered by supposing the _Tenedos_ was also a Yankee and sent the _Pomone_ after her, thus prolonging the chase of the _President_.