The Chesapeake Affair and the Embargo: Humphreys and Orders

Humphreys, upon the return of his boat with Barron's reply, called through a trumpet, "Commodore Barron must be aware that the orders of the admiral must be obeyed." Barron did not understand, and this was repeated. A cannon-shot across the bows of the Chesapeake followed these ominous words, soon another, and then a whole broadside. While our unfortunate frigate was exposed for twelve minutes to a raking fire, a vain effort was made to discharge its own guns; but neither priming nor match could be found, and appliances for reloading were wanting. At last, after the Chesapeake had received twenty-one round-shot in the hull, three of the crew being killed and eighteen wounded, and Barron himself receiving a slight hurt, the American flag descended, and at the same moment the first and only gun on the American side was touched off by one of the officers by means of a live coal brought from the galley. The crew of the Chesapeake was mustered submissively before two British lieutenants, who, after a protracted search, arrested the three colored men from the Melampus, and one Wilson or Ratford, besides, a deserter from another British vessel, who had hidden in a coal-hole. Having secured these prisoners, Humphreys, with much show of politeness, refused to accept the Chesapeake as his prize, and sailed for Halifax. Here the four deserters were tried by British court-martial and sentenced to be hanged. Wilson, who was an English subject, was executed, but a reprieve was granted to the three colored Americans on condition of their re-entering the British service.

This extreme instance of the exercise of the right of search, claimed by the British authorities, roused an instant storm throughout America. What had been an outrage when applied to merchant-vessels was now converted into a deep insult by this enforced search of a man-of-war.

When, therefore, the drooping, dismantled Chesapeake came back into Norfolk harbor, bearing its dead and dying, no wonder that the smouldering wrath of our sensitive people leaped into flame. Men wore crape upon their arms to mourn for the slain. In all the chief commercial towns were held public meetings, where citizens, without distinction of party, united in execrating the British outrage. Reparation for the past and security for the future was the universal cry of American freemen: - reparation or war. "This country," wrote Jefferson, "has never been in such a state of excitement since the battle of Lexington."

A Cabinet meeting was promptly called at Washington, and measures resolved upon in tone with the public expression,-not, however, to the extent of declaring war, though from the temper of the new British ministry this was expected to follow. American vessels in distant ports were warned of their danger. Recent appropriations for defence were used in strengthening our most exposed ports, New York, New Orleans, and Charleston. Of the gunboats available for service, most were assigned to New York, New Orleans, and the Chesapeake. Military stores were procured, and States were called upon for their quotas of one hundred thousand militia to be organized and ready to march.

A proclamation ordered British cruisers to depart from American waters, and forbade all aid and intercourse with them except in case of extremity. On the return of the Chesapeake to Norfolk, the inhabitants of that town had resolved in public meeting to hold no intercourse with the British squadron in the vicinity until the President's pleasure was known. This decision was received with contemptuous defiance by the British commander Douglas, whose squadron remained within our waters, chasing American merchantmen, until Governor Cabell, of Virginia, ordered militia detachments to the scene. There was no naval force on the coast adequate for compelling obedience to the President's proclamation, a circumstance of which British cruisers took advantage; but so long as they lay quietly outside there was no disposition to molest them.

Orders were at once sent to Minister Monroe, in London, to suspend all negotiations with England, except for a disavowal of and redress for this outrage. The ministry at once disavowed the act, and a conditional reparation was promised. This, however, was never made. Apology and indemnity to the families of the slain could not be given without yielding the claim of the right to search American vessels, and this the ministry continued to insist upon. The fierce struggle between England and Napoleon, indeed, brought fresh measures into vogue, which bore yet more severely on neutral nations. British "Orders in Council," and Napoleon's counter-proclamations, cut off all the commerce of the United States with Europe, and no merchant-vessel could cross the ocean to a European port except under peril of capture and confiscation. By way of reprisal, Congress, at the suggestion of President Jefferson, on December 18, 1807, passed a bill laying an embargo on all foreign-bound vessels, with the expectation that if all American commerce with Europe were thus prevented, the authorities of England and France would be glad to rescind their oppressive decrees. The idea proved erroneous. It quickly appeared that the warring powers could do without America better than America could do without them.