Master Mariner

THE LIFE AND VOYAGES OF

AMASA DELANO

Captain Amasa Delano, 1763-1823



BY
JAMES B. CONNOLLY

1943

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CHAPTER XXIV

Gunfire in a Caribbean Port

AMASA'S FRENCH PRIVATEERING ¹ FRIEND had told Amasa that he was likely to find his country and England at war by the time he arrived home. Amasa did not find it so; but relations were certainly not friendly. English warships and privateersmen were impressing seamen from off American ships, claiming them to be British subjects. Washington sent to London the authenticated records of seven thousand wrongfully taken American seamen with the request that they be looked into.

The seizures continued. Atop of that, American ships bound to France were being seized (ship and cargo) by English warships, and ships bound to England were being seized by French warships. The practice was costing the United States more than one hundred ships a year.

President Jefferson could see no better way out than to pass the Embargo Act and close all American ports to foreign commerce. The embargo was followed by non-intercourse restrictions. There was nothing left ship owners then except to tie their ships to the wharves and wait for the maritime sky to clear. Amasa dismantled his ship, the Perseverance, and put her to anchor in Duxbury Harbor.

(note: Congress passed the Embargo Act to put pressure mainly on Britain and France, which were fighting a war that also involved most other European nations. The act kept the United States out of the war, but it reduced the large profits American merchants had been making by trading with both sides.

Before 1807, Britain and France had been seizing U.S. merchant ships to prevent each other from obtaining American goods. The British also searched these ships for deserters from the British navy and forced them to return. But the British seized Americans as well and made them serve in the British navy.

In 1807, a British ship attacked the Chesapeake, an American naval vessel, after it refused the British ship's request to search for deserters. This act of war greatly angered the American public. But instead of asking Congress to declare war, President Thomas Jefferson recommended a general embargo. Congress enacted the measure in December 1807.

The embargo lasted 14 months. It was unpopular in many parts of the nation because it hurt the economy badly. Merchants began smuggling goods and thus weakened the effectiveness of the embargo. In 1809, Congress passed the Non-Intercourse Act. This act canceled the embargo for all nations except Britain and France. Three years later, the United States went to war against Britain.)

Amasa turned to shipbuilding again; but now he found no good living in it. Merchants in foreign trade were not ordering ships built. A fishing vessel now and then, yes, and an occasional vessel for the coasting trade; but ships for Europe and the China commerce--no.

Staying idle had never agreed with Amasa; and trading might still be carried on in other than the French and English West India ports, if an owner cared to venture it. Most owners preferred not to venture, but there was nothing to prevent a captain's venturing who was also his own owner. Amasa counted what cash he had in hand, re-rigged and reconditioned the Perseverance, took on a cargo of staves and salt codfish, and set sail for the West Indies. At the last moment he included in his cargo a collection of Chinese goods he had brought from Canton and for which he had found no market in Boston. The hard times had drained the people of the New England ports of their spare cash. Fancy Chinese goods were out.

Amasa put in to the island of St. Bartholomew, originally a French possession, but at this time a Swedish port. American captains in the port before him warned Amasa of a variety of new trading tricks that had come into vogue in the port since his early West India days.

"The manner in which those that arrived there transacted business, was to enter and pay duty on a small part of their cargoes, and to fee the different officers and smuggle the greatest part of it. I told the collector and the other officers [of St. Bartholomew] that it was not my intention to smuggle an article, as I did not like to be concerned in any kind of illicit trade whatever."

Amasa traded his cargo of salt fish to Captain Conn, an American from Connecticut, who was doing business there as a merchant. He was to take his pay in St. Croix rum-- good rum, no better--and wait till the rum could be brought from St. Croix. The rum was a month in coming; and, while waiting, Amasa spent several evenings at the home of the customs collector of the port. He there met the governor and the judge of the local court; and on his very first evening with these officials, in case they might like to know it, he told them of his trading salt cod for the St. Croix rum and his waiting for the rum to arrive.

The rum arrived--forty-five hogsheads. One of the conditions imposed by the port customs was that rum brought into the harbor, even though not to be sold there, had to pay a port duty. Amasa could have met the rum ship outside, taken the rum from her, and sailed home without having to pay any duty. He chose not to do that, one reason being that he had his Chinese goods to trade. On the arrival of his rum, he went at once to the collector and requested a permit to transfer the rum to his ship. The collector told Amasa that according to the law of the port the rum must first be landed on the customhouse quay, where he would take an account of it and assess the duties, both import and export, that Captain Delano would have to pay.

Amasa thought it a most unfair law that called for double duty on a cargo that he hadn't purchased in the port and which he wasn't trying to sell there, not even wanting to land there. However, if that was the law, so be it. He ordered the rum taken from the St. Croix droger (a small craft used in the West India Islands to take off sugars, rum, etc., to the merchantmen; also, a vessel for transporting lumber, cotton, etc., coastwise; as, a lumber drogher. [Written also droger.] --Ham. Nar. Encyc.) and carried to the customhouse quay. The collector himself made record of each hogshead as it was landed and then permitted Amasa to load the mm aboard the Perseverance.

Amasa now went scurrying around to secure additional cargo. No cargo was to be had, and so he decided to clear the ship for home. He had hired a man named Shoemaker to act as his broker, he being recommended by Captain Conn as a most knowledgeable agent for a shipmaster strange to the ways of the port. Amasa instructed Shoemaker to make out the ship's clearance papers.

"I particularly charged Shoemaker to be careful not to omit the least article from the manifest, because of advices from Captain Conn and other Americans in the port that inasmuch as I had not given the port officials anything by way of a bribe, they would seize the ship on some pretence if I were not wide awake. The clearances were made out by Shoemaker, and I accepted them without examination and went with Shoemaker to the Collector and paid the assessments levied by him."

After paying the collector his assessment, Amasa asked if he had complied with all the points of law. If he had not the collector must tell him so before he sailed, as he did not wish for any favors not allowed by the laws of the port.

"His answer was that I had done everything the law required, had conducted my business in a fair and honourable manner; had paid more duties than all the vessels that had been in the port during my 30 days' stay there. Several residents of the port were within hearing of my questions and the Collector's answer."

It was the law of the port that a ship wishing to put to sea must hoist a signal flag to half-mast.

"A customs searcher would then come on board, examine the cargo, and so make certain that there was nothing in the cargo not entered in the ship's manifest. Should the searcher find an omitted cargo item, the custom then was to correct the mistake any time before the ship's colours are hoisted up to full mast."

Amasa read as far as there of the port regulations and stopped, thinking he had got all that was needful to himself of the port customs. Stopping there got him in trouble. A further-on clause in the port law blue book said that in the event of a mistake, such as a cargo item omitted from the manifest, if that mistake was not corrected before the colors went to the masthead then the collector of the port could seize the ship.

Amasa's ship being ready to put to sea, his first officer hoisted her colors half-mast. The collector's officer boarded the ship and made his final examination before the ship put to sea. He looked down on some hogsheads, which were in plain sight below and asked what they were.

"Rum," said the first officer.

"Hmm, I don't see them in the manifest, but it is of no consequence, as Captain Delano is now with the collector, and, the collector being his friend, the mistake can be easily corrected. You can run your colors to the masthead."

The colon went up, and the customs officer immediately declared the ship in custody and sent a messenger ashore with a requisition for guards to come and take over the ship.

Amasa had what he thought was a friendly final session with the collector and left for his ship in a happy mood. He would soon be clear of all their vexatious customs and laying his course for home. On his way to the harbor he was met by one of his officers with the word that customs guards had taken over the ship and were preparing to haul her to the customhouse quay.

When Amasa boarded his ship he found the harbormaster in charge, several white soldiers on guard, and seventeen Negroes standing by the ship's windlass. Amasa asked the harbormaster what he meant to do and was told that he meant to hoist the ship's anchor, then warp the ship to the customs quay and unload her.

"But why?" asked Amasa and was told of the hogsheads of rum that were not entered in the ship's manifest.

Said Amasa:

"There is something wrong here. If you will give me time to see your Collector, I can settle this business in five minutes. The omission of the rum is so evidently a mistake of my broker's that the Collector cannot help viewing it as such. If my broker has made an error, and the Collector sees fit to fine me, then I have ten thousand dollars in specie and bills of exchange on board, and can settle the fine without delay. I want to be on my way home."

The harbormaster agreed to hold up, and Amasa hurried back to the collector's office. He picked up two American friends on the way, Captains Sanborn and Crocker, and they were standing by to witness the statement of his case to the collector. All he got from the collector was the word that it was the governor who had ordered the ship seized. Amasa hurried to the governor and told his story. Said the governor: "Shoemaker is a damned rascal! You shouldn't have engaged him as your broker." To that Amasa asked why the governor and the collector hadn't warned him away from Shoemaker in the beginning if they thought him that sort of man. Said the governor: "The collector should have warned you." Amasa then quoted the collector as saying that the ship was seized by his, the governor's, orders. The governor replied that the ship was seized by the order of the judge of the Admiralty Court.

Having met the judge in a social way at the collector's home on several occasions, Amasa hurried to him and told his story once more. And his friend the judge summoned his coldest court voice, informed Amasa that he had violated the law of the port, and he would have to stand trial.

Amasa argued with him, explained how unreasonable it was to suppose he meant to smuggle when the property in dispute had been openly unloaded and inspected at the customhouse quay and the omitted hogsheads placed in plain sight of an open ship's hatch. Also, to take his ship and cargo would make him a beggar.

When that plea got him nowhere, Amasa suggested that he be assessed a reasonable fine and allowed to go his way home. The good judge then asked what Captain Delano would call a reasonable fine plus the duty on the omitted hogsheads.

Amasa thought five hundred dollars would be a reasonable sum.

The judge smiled coldly: "Not for five times five hundred will your case be settled."

Amasa visualized a lawsuit in a foreign court and the months of litigation sure to follow, his ship meantime gathering a fine growth of barnacles and other marine creatures on her bottom. And all the while a grand home market waiting for that cargo of excellent rum. 'What a prospect! He beat his way back to the governor and asked him if there was no way to avoid a lawsuit. "The law," said the governor in his most awesome tone, "should and must have its course, let the consequence be what it may, either to you or any other person."

Amasa came of law-abiding people, and he had always been strong for law and order; but, after the bouncing around of that morning, the suspicion came to him that this wasn't a case of law and order. These smug and smiling officials had laid a trap for him.

Amasa pondered the suspicion, and then, bringing into play his best quarterdeck voice, he informed His Excellency that he and his cohorts had all acted like a crew of thieves and liars, and were doubtless worse if the whole truth were known.

Having thus eased his blood pressure, Amasa departed from the august presence of His Excellency and hurried to the harbor front. Besides his two captain friends he was accompanied by several other indignant souls he had picked up while tacking back and forth from the collector to the judge to the governor's quarters.

To his assembled friends on the quay Amasa said: "I'll be ruined if I have to stand trial in this place."

His indignant friends agreed to that, and Amasa, after a bit of pondering, said: "There is no alternative left me, but to take my ship to sea in defiance of them." His friends, especially the two captains, applauded the idea and assured him they would stand by him for whatever he planned to do, but thoughtfully one added: "You must not forget that your ship lies under the guns of two heavy batteries."

Amasa hadn't forgotten the batteries. He was putting to sea despite the batteries. If they sank his ship, so be it. And now, would they come aboard his ship with him and assist himself and his crew in getting the ship out of the harbor?

That was putting them on the spot; but the two captains and two more true souls said sure they would. The four boarded the ship with Amasa and circulated among the ship's crew and passed them the word of what their captain had in his mind to do.

The harbormaster ordered the anchor weighed, and Amasa ordered his crew into the fo'c'sle as if to keep them from interfering with the customhouse force. Their instructions were to remain out of sight until the anchor would be broken out of the bottom--or, better yet, until the anchor showed out of water. The Negro laborers would then stop heaving, and start warping the ship into the customs quay. At that stage Amasa's men were to sally forth with what useful weapons they could find lying about between decks for'ard and run the customs Negroes overboard.

Amasa's good crewmen and true waited for the proper moment then did their duty as their captain saw it. They grabbed up what useful weapons lay handy for'ard, sallied forth to the foredeck, seized belaying pins from under the fore rail, grabbed capstan bars from out of the Negroes' hands, and laid vigorously about them. They made a good job of it, being careful, as per instructions, to crack no skulls unless necessary. It wasn't necessary. The Negroes dove or jumped overboard early. Meantime, Amasa and his four outside friends secured the harbormaster and his guards.

Amasa now out with a sharp knife and saw to the parting of the warp that held the ship to the customs quay. The ship was now adrift and on the way to piling onto some rocks in the harbor. Amasa took charge and gave the orders that kept the ship clear of the rocks. He then ordered sails loosed and sheeted home. All hands worked so smartly that the ship was on her way to sea and almost abreast of the harbor batteries before the officers in charge of them woke up to what had been going on.

The batteries opened up on Amasa, and solid shot came aboard, splintered spars, and cut up his rigging; but he held the ship to her way past the batteries and so out to sea.

The ship's log of that day, September 10th, 1810, as written by the first officer, reads:

"At 1 P.M. the harbour-master came on board, with a guard of soldiers and seventeen Negroes, in order to haul the ship to the king's wharf for adjudication. At 2 P.M. the harbour-master and crew weighed the anchor, and, while endeavouring to haul the ship up, the warp parted; in consequence of which, through their ignorance and inability to conduct the business, the ship would have been lost on the rocks had not Capt. Delano taken possession in defiance of their numbers, and conducted her out of the harbour, under the continual fire of two strong batteries of twenty-four-pounders, which did us much damage in sails and rigging. At 6 P.M. got out of gunshot, rounded to, and permitted the harbor master and the king's guards to depart. No person hurt on board, except one of the Swedish soldiers, who was badly wounded in defending the ship from being retaken."

The first officer made no mention of the seventeen Negroes who were rushed or batted over side. He may have assumed, of course, that the episode was for the ship's captain to log or not to log.

Amasa chose not to log it. Later, perhaps, he would record it, and he did, though not in the ship's log; but the matter of navigation was not a thing to omit. After inspecting his first officer's log of the day, Amasa added: "Latter part of day, fresh breezes and pleasant weather. At midnight, Dog Island bore N. distant about three leagues." And so on and so on for the instruction of later captains who might be interested.

Before running the batteries, Amasa had put his friends and his port prisoners in a boat and told them to get ashore and out of the way. One of the friends, Daniel Atwell, of Virginia, was hauled before that same high court pal of His Excellency's for aiding Captain Delano in his escape. He was sentenced to twenty-eight days' imprisonment on bread and water, and to pay a fine of fifteen hundred dollars. When he refused to pay the fine he was kept in prison on bread and water until his health gave way. Amasa did not get word of that until long afterward. The only amends Amasa could make then was to pay Atwell a written tribute for the brave, humane, and honorable man he had found him.

An armed government schooner had been acting regularly as station ship in St. Bartholomew Harbor; but the day before Amasa's escape she had sailed on a cruise for smugglers to windward, and so there was no armed vessel of force in the port to give chase to Amasa.

But the customs collector did not let ft go at that. He armed a schooner, put thirty-five men aboard, and gave chase. Amasa's comment on that was: "Either by accident or design, the schooner missed us. This I view as a fortunate circumstance, as had we met, and knowing what re-capture would mean to us, we would not have been taken easily." Amasa might brag of his navigation, as he did on occasions-- lightly--but that comment contains the only hint that he also rated himself a bit of a fighting man.

For a long, long time after Amasa's adventure in St. Bartholomew an American captain in harbor there couldn't so much as spit over the side of his ship without a port official's coming aboard to inquire what he meant by it.

What the port authorities were saying of Captain Delano after that thumbing of his nose at those shore batteries continued to come to Amasa's ears for years afterward. His comment was that they should have given proper consideration to his point of view. If they had so done, said Amasa, who never talked lightly, they would have collected the duties for those omitted hogsheads, and also the fine that he stood ready to pay for his broker's error--if error there was.

Four days after escaping from St. Bartholomew, Amasa ran into one of those tropical hurricanes. He would have passed it over with the usual few lines, but this one had him admitting for his first and only time that he thought he might be lost with a ship's deck under him. This was a tough one, striking him while he was still repairing the damages to the ship from the shore batteries. It was in latitude 24° 30'; the gale came in from the east, increased gradually, hauled to the south, and continued to freshen so that Amasa was down to a two-reefed main-topsail, foresail, and fore-topmast staysail. The ship was thus running before the wind with two good men at the wheel. Later:

"At four P.M. this day, the wind hauled and increased to such a degree that I did not think it safe to start tack, sheet or brace… The ship took a proud yaw and the foretopmast staysail was suddenly filled with wind and split into many pieces."

And so on, with Amasa keeping the ship before the wind throughout. Further:

"This day the head yards were braced two points from square one way, and the after yards two points the other; in order that when one sail should lift the other would keep full, so as to compel the ship to go through the water at such a rate as to mind the helm. The ship was in good ballast trim, and steered remarkably well; had this not been the case, together with the advantages before stated, we should have foundered. This was almost the only time that I ever commanded a vessel at sea, when I had no other resort in my mind, if that which we were pursuing should fail; but in this case there was none, for had the ship broached, that is, come to the wind against the helm, she must inevitably have gone to the bottom."

When the hurricane had blown itself out, and the ship still lived, Amasa offered thanks for those God-given four days between St. Bartholomew and the hurricane for repairs to his shot-up rigging. He also gave thanks for a crew "who performed their duty in everything that was required of them in the best manner that men could do." And again thanks for:

"A circumstance happened in rigging the ship while in Boston, before we sailed on this voyage, and which caused me to find much fault at the time, operated greatly in our favour. The topsails and braces fore and aft were new and they were twice as large as usual; the reason of which was that the rigger having no smaller sized rope to his hand rove such as he had."

That bungling job of ship rigging had Amasa voicing scornful utterances aplenty after he put to sea from Boston; but here was the bungling combining with other unusual circumstances to save his ship and her crew and send him safe home after what even Amasa admitted was an interesting voyage.

On arriving in Boston he had another problem. In lieu of presenting his ship's papers, of which he had none, they being still in the hands of the St. Bartholomew customs officer, he entered a protest in his own customhouse against the conduct of the government officials of St. Bartholomew. The Boston officials, after a survey of the evidence he presented, granted him a new register and other necessary ship's papers.