It did not help her that the wreckage masked many of her remaining serviceable guns. On the lower deck, even those still serviceable could fire only on the upward roll. Decatur had reckoned correctly that with her lower deck port sills barely six feet above the water, Africa could not use her lower-deck lee broadside in a fresh breeze.
I saw also that Africa's foremast was swaying ominously, that several of her gunports had been knocked into one, and that from two others blood was trickling. Meanwhile, our spar deck battery played fiercely on Africa's waist with more grapeshot. The Englishmen who survived long enough to work on the mainmast would be a hardy or lucky breed.
We lumbered into a turn to port, closed, and raked Africa with another double-shotted broadside from dead ahead. Her bowsprit and foremast went by the board. After three more broadsides I was summoned below-the messenger threatened to chase me there at the point of a cutlass. We had dead and wounded to record, twenty-two of the first and forty-five of the second, and the surgeon and his mates had much to do, as well as hands too bloody to hold a pen.
So I did my work while the gunners finished theirs. When I came on deck again, Africa had only a stump of her mizzenmast left and was rolling heavily. Our topmen were al could hardly feed five hundred prisoners all the way to Boston, so we contented ourselves with a few tokens-perhaps more than a few-embarked her surviving officers as prisoners, and set her on fire.
She blew up just before dark, and we set all possible sail to be clear of pursuers before dawn. We were no longer a match for more than your common British 38.
It was only when the last glow from Africa died that the cheering began. Was it only then that we realized what we had done? Certainly we'd had enough work for all hands, and a hundred more besides, and weariness slows thought.
The cheering brought Captain Decatur on deck, from where he had been entertaining the surviving British officers at dinner. He stood on the break of the quarterdeck for a moment, then pretended to glare.
"What is this? Are we going to have a riot aboard United States every turn of the watch, from now to Boston?"
That altered the cheering, from plain "Huzza!" to "Huzza for Captain Decatur." The captain did not seem to find this an improvement.
Finally he sprang on to a quarterdeck gun. This drew attention and brought silence. "Comrades, I thank you. I admit, it isn't every day of the week that a frigate sinks a ship of the line. And I promise you-you have permission to cheer every time we sink another one."
We are now three days homeward bound. I will seal and weight this letter, so that it can be posted at once when we land or even if we speak an American ship, or thrown overboard if we are not fortunate to return safely to Boston.
God keep you, and prosper all your endeavours. Your affectionate brother,
Joshua
•
Thomas Parker to Joshua Parker, in camp near Emmetsburg, Tennessee, February 1, 1813
Great God, little Joshua! By now you've no doubt long since read the Boston papers that we found in the same bundle with your letter. It's not every damned century that a frigate sinks a ship of the line, and I don't suppose any foreign frigate has ever done it the British. Serves them right, and I hope your Captain Decatur means what he says about doing it again.
Although we wouldn't mind having a man or two like him, commanding on the Lakes come spring. We've lost Mackinaw and Detroit down south, which means the British hold both the straits. All they need is a decent fleet on Lake Erie and they can carve a trail of tears all the way across the Northwest as far as the Mississippi. They don't have the Prophet anymore, but they still have Tecumseh and General Brock, and that's like fighting one old wise bear and one young wise bear at once. There's no way of being so lucky you don't get clawed.
If they turn every outpost in the Northwest into a Fort Mims, that could be bad enough. Then they could pick up more friends among the Red Sticks and the Choctaws and finish going north everything they didn't finish going south.
They might have that decent fleet, too, if the British get spitting mad over what you Navy boys have been doing on their sacred sea. The Federalist papers weren't even sure you could tweak the lion's whiskers, but you've damned near gone in and yanked out a tooth!
We'll do our best, but that might not be too good. General Harrison has all the regulars, who aren't very many or very good, and General Jackson has most of the militia and thinks he outranks Harrison. I hope they can lead their men separately, because if they ever have to fight in the same battle, they'll likely enough fight each other before they fight the British.
With a really good war to fight against everybody he hates, General Jackson is about as happy as he ever gets. Don't take me wrong-he's brave and stubborn enough to deserve his rank. But you don't have to be an Indian to understand why people are scared of him. I wonder how I looked, a while back when I had a temper and killed Charles Shaxxon. If I looked half as mean as Old Hickory, maybe the people who said I ought to go West knew something I didn't.
Well, not much we can do, except pray the ice on Erie is real slow to go out. The Indians can raid across the ice, but the Redcoats can't, and nobody can haul artillery or a sledge of rations.
If you can get to Philadelphia and find Cynthia Shaxxon McKnight willing to receive anybody by the name of Parker, please be received and give her my humblest respects and apologies. I don't suppose what I wrote her before leaving ever got there.
Keep your feet dry and your gullet wet.
Wishing the best,
Tom
•
Joshua Parker to Thomas Parker, aboard frigate United States, Boston, May 14, 1813
Dearest Brother, I hope there will be a victory to report on the Lakes before this letter reaches you. Certainly we have not been backward in sending everything needed to give Master-Commandant Lawrence a respectable force.
Our victory over Africa seems to have begun a chain of events that bodes well for the American cause, by bringing us all together. Before that victory, I would not have sworn that New England would stand with the rest of our noble Republic. But when we entered Boston, flying Africa's ensign under ours, the spectacle was a wonder. Captain Decatur was given the freedom of the city, a subscription for our dead and wounded raised seventeen thousand dollars in two days, and many other signs of public rejoicing were manifest.
The British replied to our victory by a close blockade of Boston, hitherto left largely free, and Captain Bainbridge, commanding Constitution, took her out to engage the British. Finding only one frigate, Broke's Shannon, he engaged, and after an intensely warm action, took her, Broke being killed and Bainbridge likely enough crippled for life. He has most certainly redeemed himself for the loss of Philadelphia, being the first American and perhaps the first captain of any nation in a long while to take two British frigates, Java and Shannon.