A Sailor's History of the U.S. Navy (43 page)

5. Commerce raiding operations.
Unable to stand up against the powerful Royal Navy in direct conflict except on rare occasions, American Sailors waged a kind of guerrilla war at sea by capturing British merchant ships. Washington sent six schooners to sea on commerce raids in the fall of 1775 to capture thirty-eight British prizes. In the nine years of war, nearly two hundred British ships were captured.

6.
Randolph
versus
Yarmouth
(7 March 1778).
The U.S. frigate
Randolph
engaged the far more powerful British ship of the line
Yarmouth
in a heroic night action that ended when
Randolph
exploded, killing all but 4 of her 315-man crew.

7.
Ranger
versus
Drake
(24 April 1778).
In a “warm, close, and obstinate” action, American Sailors in
Ranger
(commanded by John Paul Jones) captured the British sloop of war
Drake.

8.
Bonhomme Richard
versus
Serapis
(23 September 1779).
American Sailors in
Bonhomme Richard
defeated the more powerful HMS
Serapis
in the most famous sea battle of the war. Captain John Paul Jones is said to have uttered his famous words “I have not yet begun to fight” in response to the British captain asking if he wished to surrender.

9. Other single-ship actions.
Lexington
captured HMS
Edward.
Sloop of war
Providence
captured brig
Diligent. Alliance
simultaneously defeated two enemy brigs (
Atalanta
and
Trepassy
). And the list goes on.

10. Transport and packet operations.
Ships were the single means of transport and communication across the Atlantic, performing such important duties as transporting Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and others to Europe to arrange for a French alliance that proved vital to the American cause.

With independence won, the last ship of the Continental Navy was sold in 1785, and the nation soon thereafter experienced the consequences of neglecting sea power. In 1794, the actions of Mediterranean pirates caused Congress to provide a Navy for the protection of commerce. Subsequently, French privateers began seizing American merchant ships, provoking an undeclared war fought entirely at sea.

In this quasi-war the new U.S. Navy received its baptism of fire. Captain Thomas Truxtun's insistence on the highest standards of crew training paid handsome dividends as Sailors in the frigate
Constellation
won two complete victories over French men-of-war. U.S. naval squadrons, operating principally in West Indian waters, sought out and attacked enemy privateers until France agreed to an honorable settlement.

Stars

Three bronze stars represent the two ship-to-ship engagements and one series of operations during the Quasi-War with France.

 

1.
Constellation
versus
l'Insurgente
(9 February 1799).
The American frigate soundly defeated her French counterpart because of superior ship handling and excellent crew discipline. The captured French ship remained in the U.S. Navy as USS
Insurgent.

2.
Constellation
versus
la Vengeance
(1–2 February 1800).
Although the French ship's broadside was considerably heavier,
Constellation
's crew inflicted heavy damage and casualties, causing the French captain to strike his colors twice before ultimately escaping.

3. Anti-privateering operations.
Nearly eighty French privateers were captured during the Quasi-War. Most notable among the American ships conducting these operations were the schooners
Experiment
and
Enterprise.

The Barbary States of North Africa (Tripoli [current-day Libya], Tunis, Algiers, and Morocco) had plundered seaborne commerce for centuries. They demanded tribute money, seized ships, and held crews for ransom or sold them into slavery. While the more powerful nations of Europe chose to pay the tribute money, the fledgling United States refused and instead sent naval squadrons into the Mediterranean to oppose these piratical practices. Under the leadership of Commodores Richard Dale and Edward Preble, the U.S. Navy blockaded the enemy coast, bombarded its shore fortresses, and engaged in close, bitterly contested gunboat actions.

The relatively small U.S. Navy amazed its European counterparts in these early operations and accomplished far more than could be expected of such a newly formed service. Several incidents, including the burning of the captured
Philadelphia
and the sailing of
Intrepid
alone into the harbor at Tripoli, loaded with explosives to blow up enemy vessels moored there, set valorous examples for the young naval service.

After gradual withdrawal of the U.S. Navy led the Barbary powers to renew their age-old piratical practices, two naval squadrons under Commodores Stephen Decatur and William Bainbridge returned to the Mediterranean in 1815. Diplomacy backed by resolute force soon brought the rulers of Barbary to terms and gained widespread respect for the new American nation.

Stars

Four bronze stars represent the various actions during the Barbary Wars.

 

1. Actions in the harbor at Tripoli.
During the first of several attacks on the port city of Tripoli, U.S. Sailors in boarding parties captured several enemy vessels in fierce hand-to-hand fighting. On 3 September 1804, in an act of great courage and sacrifice, a group of volunteer U.S. Sailors sailed the appropriately named ketch
Intrepid
into Tripoli's harbor. The
Intrepid
was loaded with explosives; the Sailors intended to head the vessel for a
Tripolitan flotilla, detonate the explosives, set the
Intrepid
on fire, and escape into small boats. By great misfortune, the explosives detonated in a huge explosion before they were intended, costing the lives of the entire crew.

2. Blockade of Tripolitan coast.
During blockade operations, U.S. ships not only maintained an effective blockade but also captured or destroyed a number of Tripolitan vessels, including
Meshuda
by frigate
John Adams, Mirboha
by frigate
Philadelphia,
and
Mastico
by schooner
Enterprise.

3. Destruction of the captured USS
Philadelphia
(16 February 1804).
When misfortune caused the U.S. frigate
Philadelphia
to fall into enemy hands, American Sailors, led by the courageous Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, sailed
Intrepid
into the harbor at Tripoli, destroyed the captured ship, and escaped, causing Britain's great naval hero Lord Horatio Nelson to call the exploit “the most daring act of the age.”

4. Operations against Algiers (1815).
When Algerian vessels renewed attacks on American merchant shipping, Congress declared war on Algiers (eight days after peace was signed with Great Britain, concluding the War of 1812) on 4 March. The war was short (four months), with the Algerians suffering all the losses and the dey of Algiers signing a peace treaty dictated “at the mouths of cannons,” in Commodore Stephen Decatur's words.

Interference with the United States' commerce and its rights to sail the seas without hindrance led to war with Great Britain. Surprising the world, Sailors of the U.S. Navy proved their ability to stand up to the powerful Royal Navy, winning several courageous victories in ship-to-ship actions; the most memorable of these was that by Captain Isaac Hull in USS
Constitution
(“Old Ironsides”) over HMS
Guerrière.
Despite the Royal Navy's close blockade of the American coast, a number of U.S. warships were able to slip through the blockaders to take their toll of enemy naval and merchant ships.

Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry's brilliant success in the Battle of Lake Erie placed the Northwest Territory firmly under American control
and sent the nation's morale soaring. Another fleet victory by Commodore Thomas Macdonough on Lake Champlain turned back a British invasion from Canada.

Commodore Joshua Barney and his Sailors and Marines made a heroic stand in the land fighting at the Battle of Bladensburg outside Washington. In the final contest of the war, Commodore Daniel Patterson correctly predicted that an enemy blow would come at New Orleans rather than Mobile. Patterson's small naval squadron so delayed and harassed the advancing British with ship gunfire that General Andrew Jackson was enabled to prepare his defenses and gain the historic New Orleans victory.

Stars