Bears and Indians on Board a British Flagship

HMS Detroit at the Battle of Lake Erie

An interesting mention of some passengers on board the British flagship, HMS Detroit at the time of the Battle of Lake Erie:

We learned from the prisoners that Commodore Barkley (James Herriot Barclay) had two pet bears on board of his vessel, and took also two Indians, whom he placed in the round tops, with rifles, to shoot Commodore Perry, and other American officers. But the thunder of the first broadside so frightened them that they left their positions and went below decks, and coiled themselves away in the cable tier; and the bears following the example of their brethren of the forest, did the same thing, and the whole four were found there in a heap after the action. I saw the Indians among the prisoners, the pictures of despair; they were delivered over to our Indians. But the bears, I believe, were claimed by the sailors, as belonging to the ship.

--From the memoirs of Rev. Alfred Brunson, published 1872.

Grand Theft Brig

A depiction of the USS Caledonia at the Battle of Lake Erie 

I'm currently researching and writing the rough draft of my book, particularly a chapter dedicated to the naval campaign for Lake Erie. One of the most amazing stories that I came across while working on the book was the story of Jesse Elliot's "cutting out" expedition against two British warships anchored off Fort Erie opposite Buffalo. A simple seaborne hijacking quickly turned into a brawl involving heavy artillery and reinforcements from both sides. Here's my narrative, drawn from eyewitness sources:

Lieutenant Jesse Duncan Elliot was already in charge of the small naval station at Black Rock, near the entrance to the Niagara River. He was trying to scrape up a force with which to oppose the British fleet on Lake Erie by buying up several small trading vessels and arming them. However, the enterprising lieutenant saw an opportunity to increase his little flotilla when the British armed brigs HMS Caledonia (the same ship, formerly of the Northwest Fur Company, that had cornered Daniel Dobbins at Mackinac) and the HMS Detroit (formerly the US Army supply ship Adams, which had been captured at Detroit) arrived from down the lake on October 8. The two vessels anchored under the guns of Fort Erie, on the Canadian shore.

The incomplete stone Fort Erie and several smaller batteries glowered across the waters at Buffalo and Black Rock. Because Lake Erie empties into the Niagara, to spill north down the cataracts of the Horseshoe Falls and into Lake Ontario, the currents were quite strong and any ship wishing to enter Lake Erie from Black Rock had to be towed by teams of oxen, slowly down the shoreline. This would expose them to a brisk fire from the British batteries. Notwithstanding the current and the enemy guns, Lieutenant Elliot saw a chance to use two open boats to row up and board the British ships, and steal them out from under the nose of Fort Erie.

The British ships carried a light crew and armament, although Elliot could not have known this besides what he could glimpse through his spyglass. The Caledonia mounted two 4-pounders and was manned by 12 men, with 10 American prisoners as unwilling passengers.  The more formidable Detroit sported six 6-pounders and was crewed by 56 men, but also carried more prisoners-- 30 Americans. Elliot had two open boats capable of carrying 50 men each, but only 50 warrant officers and sailors to man them with. Worse, his sailors were newly arrived on the station and had only 20 pistols between them, and “neither Cutlasses or Battle Axes.”  He asked the local Army commander, Lt. Colonel Winfield Scott of the 2nd Artillery, for help. Scott and his superior, Brigadier General Alexander Smyth, readily agreed.

Of Colonel Scott's two companies of the 2nd Regiment of Artillery, under Captains Nathan Towson and James Barker, volunteered “to a man”, and the boarding party had to be chosen by lot. Towson led the artillery contingent, armed with muskets. Lieutenant Isaac Roach, a future Mayor of Philadelphia, was his second in command. Some of his Philadelphia recruits begged Roach to join the expedition, saying “can't I go, sir?”, “Don't forget M'Gee,” and “I'm a Philadelphia boy, sir.” General Smyth also sent a secret note to Colonel Winder of the 14th Regiment of Infantry, at Buffalo: “Be pleased to turn out the hardy sailors in your regiment... send also all the pistols, swords and sabres you can borrow at the risk of the lenders, and such public swords as you have.”  The infantrymen were led by Second Lieutenant William Prestman of the 5th Infantry.

Lieutenant Elliot had two large boats fitted out in advance, and hidden during the day up Buffalo Creek, west of the town. He took charge of one, and put the other in charge of Sailing Master George Watts. The sailors and soldiers were about evenly divided between the boats, with Captain Towson and Lieutenant Roach joining Watts' boat. An hour after midnight, the men rowed with muffled oars, out into Lake Erie so as to drift down and surprise the British ships from the opposite direction of the American shore. At 3 am they were alongside. Watts' boat was nearly past the Caledonia, and the sailing master ordered his crew to pass it, thinking they were too far from shore to intercept. Towson disagreed, and ordered the crew to draw near the brig. 

The men had to fight the strong current, and when they threw grappling hooks over the side of the enemy vessel, all but one missed. The boat caught, but fell astern where the British crew began to pour musket fire down from the deck and cabin windows of the brig. Within a few minutes, though, the Americans were able to pull their boat along the side of the vessel and climb aboard, and the small crew quickly surrendered. The raiders lost one man killed and four badly wounded. As the larger crew aboard Detroit were distracted by the staccato reports and fire of muskets on Caledonia, they failed to notice Elliot's boat coming alongside. The brig was captured even more quickly than her consort, with Elliot's crew losing only one enlisted man wounded and a midshipman stabbed through a leg with a bayonet (possibly by one of his boatmates as they scrambled aboard the brig).  The lieutenant ordered his men to fire a single pistol shot, then a crashing musket volley, to signal the American shore than their venture was a success.

“In the space of about ten minutes I had the prisoners all secured, the topsails sheeted home and the vessels under way.”  However, Elliot and the Americans weren't home free. They found the wind too light to make headway against the current, and decided to steer downriver towards Black Rock instead of out into the lake. This brought them past the guns of the British fortifications. Alerted by the commotion just off shore, and the beacon fires and torches now illuminating the Buffalo waterfront by jubilant citizens and soldiers from the garrison, the gunners soon opened up on the two captured ships less than 400 yards away from them.

To the Americans' consternation, both vessels ran aground: the Caledonia onto the American shoreline near a friendly gun battery; the Detroit much closer to the main British guns. As the sun rose, a colossal, three-way shooting match started up between the two shores and the brigs caught between them. Elliot moved the six guns of the Detroit to one side to return fire on the British, but soon he was forced to cut his anchor cable and drift blindly down the Niagara. Soon Detroit ran aground again, this time for good, on Squaw Island in the middle of the river. She was within musket shot of the Canadian shore, which was swarming with enemy troops. Elliot sent his prisoners ashore on his boat, but the current made it difficult for his own men to return, and as he went ashore on a skiff to arrange their return, a boarding party from the British 49th Regiment reached the brig and recaptured her. By this time, the vessel was a shot-up wreck: “she had received twelve shot of large size in her bends, her sails in ribbons and rigging all cut to pieces,” reported Elliot. Colonel Scott and troops from the nearby artillery camp, as well as eager civilian volunteers from Buffalo, swarmed onto the island and peppered the decks of the Detroit with musket fire, while both sides continued to bombard the ship with their heavy guns.

The men of the 49th were forced back over the side after tossing all the cannons overboard. One of their privates who had gotten into the liquor aboard the ship, and an unfortunate American prisoner of war who had been too seriously wounded to remove beforehand, were taken off now as the British prepared to set fire to the ship. Cornet John Pell Major of the Provincial Light Dragoons climbed back aboard to start the fire, only to be hit by a musket ball and stumble back into the boat. This caused its crew to lose hold on the hulk, and they drifted helplessly downriver, leaving behind two privates from the 41st Regiment to be captured.

The Americans burned what was left of the brig. They nearly burned the Caledonia as well, when Captain Towson and his men were called away to prepare for a large-scale British attack. Refusing to give up his prize, the gunner left a trusted sergeant and two men aboard with instructions to fire the ship only if the British actually crossed the river. As a result the prize was saved, as was its cargo of furs valued at 200,000 dollars.  Perhaps a bigger haul had been consigned to the bottom of the Niagara River with Detroit: four 12-pounders, a large shipment of cannon balls, and 200 muskets bound for the British dockyards on Lake Ontario. Incredibly, only one man was killed on either side. As Major General Isaac Brock, the British commander on the Niagara grimly reported, “this event is particularly unfortunate, and may reduce us to incalculable distress.”  Five days later, he would die at the Battle of Queenston Heights, leaving Brigadier General Henry Procter to try to hold back the American advance across land and sea.

Daniel Dobbins and the Escape from Detroit, 1812.

A schooner like Dobbins' in the Battle of Lake Erie, 1813.

This is an excerpt from the chapter of the book I'm currently working on, which made me turn back the clock somewhat on my research in order to understand better the events going on in naval war on the Great Lakes in 1812-15. Sailing Master Daniel Dobbins doesn't get a lot of attention from historians and popular culture, but he was a true American hero, in the adventurous way that many heros were made 200 years ago:

On July 17, 1812 when the British and Indians launched their surprise attack on Fort Mackinac, Captain Dobbins and his schooner were tied up at the wharf on the island. News of the declaration of war, already a month old, had not reached the far-flung settlements. With the nearby British outpost of St. Joseph's having cut off communications with the island, though, the locals feared hostilities had already commenced. The townspeople sent a experienced local man in a boat over to the British side to find out. On his way there he ran into the British strike force, several hundred soldiers, volunteers and Indians led by Captain Charles Roberts of the 10th Royal Veterans Battalion, and wound up having to act as a guide for the enemy.

As the British surrounded the little hilltop stockade of Fort Mackinac, they sent word to the civilian population in the town below to assemble for their own protection. Not trusting the Indians and hoping to offer his services to the American forces at Detroit, Dobbins decided to try to escape. He cast off his lines and, becalmed, began to kedge the Salina out from the island. This laborious operation involved rowing a kedge anchor out several hundred yards from the ship, then hauling it in to move the vessel forward, and repeating. No sooner had Dobbin and his crew began inching towards freedom than they saw “the painted savages crawling along round the bank, to avoid the guns of the fort.”

With his crew ready to “cut and run with the vessel as soon as a breeze sprang up,” Dobbins waited anxiously for wind. It came, but so did the armed brig Caledonia, flying British colors. The enemy ship stood between the Salina and the open lake, and Dobbins had no choice but to strike his colors and surrender. Back at the fort, which by now had surrendered to Captain Roberts, the British commander tried to get Dobbins and his men to sign a pledge not to take up arms against British forces. As a civilian, though, under the terms of the surrender Dobbins was free to go. Not a man to be intimidated, he announced his intentions to join the American military as soon as he reached their lines.

The captain and a few civilian families who had refused to take the oath were ordered to leave on the Salina to be repatriated at the port of Cleveland. They set out in company with the schooner Mary, itself loaded with the paroled soldiers from the American garrison. A few days later, they were stopped by shots fired across their bows by the American batteries at Detroit. General Hull's army still occupied both sides of the Detroit River, and the two ships fell once again into American hands. Captain Dobbins offered his services on land as a guide, and accompanied Lt. Colonel James Miller's force at the Battle of Magaguan on August 9. He soon joined a Detroit volunteer militia company under Captain Solomon Sibley, and volunteered to help place a battery of heavy guns at the village of Spring Wells south of town, in an effort to prevent the British from crossing the river. General Hull refused, and whatever the result of this undertaking would have been for the campaign, he surrendered on August 16 to the British forces surrounding Detroit. The schooners Salina and Mary were once again captured, as well as Dobbins and the other citizens of Mackinac.

The British forces thought that Dobbins had broken a parole by taking up arms at Detroit, and he had to hide under the overturned hull of an old wreck on the waterfront to avoid Indians who were hoping to collect a reward by capturing or killing him. The Quartermaster General of the British forces, Lt. Colonel Robert Nichol of the 2nd Norfolk militia regiment, wrote out a pass guaranteeing Dobbins' safety, apparently because he was a brother Freemason. The captain then managed to secure a berth as a pilot on one of the open boats carrying paroled wounded prisoners to Cleveland. The boats reached the village safely, but the officer in charge was honor bound to scuttle them as part of the terms of parole. Dobbins had to scrounge up another small craft in town, and set out eastward to warn the other settlements along the American side of Lake Erie. The little boat, with its one sail, was enough to panic the residents of Ashtabula and Conneaut as it passed, as they mistook it for  a British cruiser. Finally, Dobbins reached the port of Erie on August 24. The militia commander there, Major General David Mead, had him take a dispatch as well as his own eyewitness report on horseback to Washington.

Dobbins bypassed Colonel Lewis Cass, who was on the same errand after having been paroled, and was the first eyewitness of the fall of Detroit to reach Washington and get a personal audience with President Madison and the members of the cabinet. It became clear to the President and his advisers that naval control of the lakes was necessary to achieve American objectives in the northwest, particularly the liberation of Detroit. For his troubles, and recognizing Dobbin's knowledge of the region, the President gave him a Navy commission as Sailing Master, and sent him back up to Lake Erie with orders to begin building a new flotilla to challenge the British fleet.

Daniel Dobbins, Frontier Erie and a Ghoulish Pair of Boots

Hi everyone, it's been quite a while since I've posted, but rest assured I've been busy gathering research materials for the next few chapters of my War of 1812 book. Since one chapter in particular will deal with the Battle of Lake Erie, I've been doing a lot of reading in the naval aspects of the war on the lake.

A lot has been written about Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry's lake campaign, some of it by such authors as Theodore Roosevelt. My own aim is to focus less on the Battle of Lake Erie itself, and more on the minor actions, logistics and adventures that brought the American fleet into being, as well as to discuss what happened to it after its great day in the sun.

One of the more overlooked heroes of the war in the west was a skipper named Daniel Dobbins. Dobbins was involved somehow in just about every aspect of the war on Lake Erie, except for the actual battle--he and his schooner were at Black Rock picking up supplies for the fleet on September 10, 1813.

Dobbins stayed active in the government service on the lakes throughout his career, and his son used his extensive papers to write an account which was published in the newsletter of the Buffalo Historical Society in 1905. His adventures make for fascinating reading. They also paint a picture of what life was like on the Great Lakes before the War of 1812-15.

Dobbins arrived on the frontier to the settlement of Erie, Pennsylvania in 1796. In those days:

The only occupied houses were a small log cabin on the west side of the mouth of Mill Creek, occupied as a tavern by James Baird; one near the junction of Second and Parade streets, occupied by Rufus Seth Reed as a tavern; one on the present property of James M. Sterret, occupied by Ezekiel Dunning, as a tannery; one on Front Street and French, occupied by Thomas Rees... All the rest was wild, gloomy forest...

When the ailing General Anthony Wayne arrived on the schooner Detroit and died at the blockhouse at Erie on December 15, 1796, Dobbins was there, and later recalled:

He was buried near the flagstaff in the Fort, on the east side of the mouth of Mill Creek. In 1808 or '09 his son (Isaac Wayne) came and disinterred the body and took it to his native place in Chester County. When the body was disinterred it was in such a state of preservation that to detach the flesh from the bones, he employed Dr. J.C. Wallace to boil it in kettles. One of his boots was so well preserved that Mr. Duncan, who kept tavern there, wore it, having a mate made for it.

Dobbins soon started his career as a sailor, being part owner of the schooner Harlequin by 1801. By 1803 he had his own sloop, the Good Intent. Small topsail schooners and sloops were the mainstay of life on the Great Lakes frontier, bringing goods and passengers cheaply from the east, and returning with furs for the booming hat trade. These were the semi-trucks of their day. To give an idea of a typical trip, here's a letter ordering supplies to be shipped to the town of Erie:

Erie Reserve, Aug. 27, 1807.

Sir: The town of Erie is so illy supplied with goods this summer that I will be under the necessity of importing some articles of necessity from some place that they are to be had. I have lately inquired for coffee--none to be had, nor none even in expectation in a short time. Also Powder and shot much the same as with coffee. If you can obtain a supply of any or all of them at Fort Erie or elsewhere in your peregrinations  on the coast of the Lake or its waters please to procure for me each in the following quantity: 4 lb. coffee, 1 do. powder, 3 do. shot, 1 do. lead. My gunlock is in need of some repairs, I will send it along if there is any person in your course of trading that can do it. Please to get it done--if not it will serve as a pattern to choose another if any is to be had...

Other cargo included salt, whiskey, pork, tallow, clothing, and even one "piano forte" bound for Detroit. On the return trips east he carried furs, maple sugar (called "mackock" on invoices of the day), hemp seed, and feathers.

Dobbins seems to have traded up between various ships until he bought the schooner Charlotte in 1809 from the British Northwest Fur Company and renamed it the Salina, since he intended to carry mostly barrels of much-needed salt in it. It was in this vessel that the American sailor was caught at Mackinac Island by the onset of the War of 1812, and where his adventures would begin in earnest.

The Battle of Lake Erie Primer

One of the most talked about events this year to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812 is coming to the Lake Erie islands for the next two weekends. This of course is the Battle of Lake Erie, which was fought 200 years ago near West Sister Island on September 10, 1813. You can see other posts I've made on this battle here.

12-pounder carronade at Port Clinton, OH

Last week I traveled to Fremont, Ohio for the Living History Fair. On the way back to Columbus I decided to take a short detour up to Port Clinton, which lies just west of Sandusky Bay and the Marblehead/ Catawba peninsula. Port Clinton sits at the mouth of the Portage River, which winds lazily southwards to the interior of the state. In the summertime this is the Lake Erie vacationland, a poor man's Riviera. In the winter its largely deserted, save for ice fishermen.

A small carronade (the sawed-off shotgun of 18th century naval artillery) sits near the beach, pointing out to sea. I measured the bore to 4.5 inches, which is the right caliber for a 12-pounder piece. The plaque stated that the gun had been used during the Battle of Lake Erie. According to wikipedia.org's well-researched page, the American vessels at the battle only carried 32-pounder carronades. The only ships bearing 12-pounder carronades were the brig HMS Hunter and the schooner HMS Lady Prevost.

Looking out across the frozen lake. The Port Clinton channel breakwater is to left.

The carronade. Whereas a 12-pounder naval gun would weigh over a ton, the carronade is much smaller and lighter, so it was popular for arming small vessels like the Lady Prevost.

The cascabel, or knob at the breech of the gun with its characteristic loop for the cable to secure it to the side of the ship. The touch hole is still open, so you could load and fire this weapon if you had the notion.

Carronades like this one were commonly used for smaller ships, because they were much lighter than the long gun equivalents. The reduced range was a major drawback, so naval commanders frequently traded between small vessels mounted many carronades, or one or two big guns mounted on pivots (the predecessor of the modern turreted warship). Most of the American schooners and sloops on Lake Erie mounted big pivot guns, which made them into the naval equivalent of sharpshooters.

Bonus picture: the big walleyed pike that Port Clinton drops for New Years Eve. Port Clinton claims to be the walleye capital of the world for the large fishing fleet that congregates there. Maumee, Ohio also claims this distinction, because of the massive walleye run every spring on the Maumee River.

The Americans Strike Back: Amphibious Operations and the Aftermath of the Battle of Lake Erie

Lake Erie's Western Basin, where the amphibious operations waged by Harrison and Perry brought Detroit and Amherstburg (at top) under American control.

The decisive Battle of Lake Erie in 1813 was followed quickly by a short and decisive, if less well-remembered, invasion of the Canadian shores near Fort Malden. Over a hundred years before the United States' major landings during the Second World War, an American army launched a successful seaborne invasion of a foreign shore.
 Major General William Henry Harrison had been waiting and preparing since February for the moment when operational initiative would be restored. As soon as news arrived that Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry's squadron had decisively cleared the British from Lake Erie on September 10, 1813, he ordered his plans into motion.

The Battle of Lake Erie 199 Years Ago

And nothing but engines of destruction in view…
--Captain Stanton Sholes, 2nd Regiment of Artillery.

Today is the 199th anniversary of the Battle of Lake Erie, one of the most decisive naval battles in American history. This engagement decided the War of 1812 in the Northwest Territory, because afterwards General William Henry Harrison’s army was able to go over to the offensive against British forces. With the US Navy’s help, Harrison landed his troops on the Canadian shore of Lake Erie and recaptured Detroit and the Michigan Territory. You can find a  ship’s log of the battle at the website of the reconstructed USS Niagara (link).
There are a lot of different angles to this battle that are well worth exploring, and I’ll try to write a few different posts this week to commemorate it. Today we’ll skip ahead in the diary of Stanton Sholes to witness the aftermath of the engagement.

Looking out towards the battlefield today. A marker buoy is being placed at the spot to commemorate the site—a watery grave for the enlisted men who died and were thrown overboard though there are no wrecks from the battle.
Captain Stanton Sholes, with a company of the 2nd US Artillery then moving by boat from Cleveland, arrived at Master Commandant Oliver Hazard Perry’s base on South Bass Island’s Put-in-Bay a couple days after the battle.

Saturday Sept. the 11th—Nothing material took place through the day, except the conjecture on the cannonading that was heard the day before, nearly in the direction of Malden [Amherstburg, Ontario], which was supposed to be American, and British fleets, which the next day was confirmed by…[two letters follow]
Sunday Sept. 12th—This day an express arrived from Lower Sandusky [Fremont, Ohio] bringing the account that Commodore Perry had captured the whole of the British fleet. This [illegible] great joy in the countenance of every person. See a letter Commodore Perry to General Harrison, after the battle:
United States Brig Niagara off the Western Sister [West Sister Island] head of Lake Erie Sept. 10th 1813 4 p.m.
Dear General
We have met the enemy, and they are ours two ships two brigs one schooner and one sloop—Yours, with great respect and esteem
O.H. Perry
Major General Harrison
Sept. 11th 1813.
Dear Sir,
We have a great number of prisoners, which I wish to land. Will you be so good as to order a guard to receive them, and inform me the place: Considerable numbers have been killed and wounded on both sides. From the best information, we have more prisoners than we have men on board our vessels. In great haste yours very truly,
O. H. Perry

Perry’s flagship, the USS Lawrence, flew his battle flag “Don’t Give Up The Ship”. After he transferred his command to the USS Niagara, the one or two able-bodied survivors struck their colors. The British never got the chance to take the surrender, though.
Several days later, Sholes was ferried over to Put-in-Bay aboard one of Perry’s ships and described what he saw there:

Saturday Sept. 18th—This day fine weather. At six o’clock this morning the artillery corps with several hundreds of the infantry, received orders to embark on board of the boats, & two schooners and one sloop, for the purpose of being transported to base [South Bass] Island, a distance of about six leagues from the Portage River. About 9 o’clock we had embarked on board with all our men of the artillery corps and several hundred infantry, with all our baggage &c we set out the wind being a head we made slow progress. Major [Eleazar Derby] Wood and myself got on board of the Erie [not the Sloop of War USS Erie, probably the Schooner USS Ariel, which Perry often used as his personal vessel] the Commodore’s vessel, and a part of my company. About three o’clock we arrived at Put-in-Bay. By night all the troops that set out in the morning arrived and encamped at this place.
At this place, on harbor I had the pleasure of seeing the remains of the once British fleet. But still there was something shocking to behold. To see two ships (one but a few days of the stocks) cut and mangled to pieces , not a mast or spar standing on board of either ship, except the foremast of the Ship Charlotte, and that a stump. [A severe gale two days after the battle took down the seriously damaged spars aboard the captured British ships before Sholes saw them].

HMS Detroit had been launched and fitted out only days before the battle. She was so poorly equipped that her gunners had to fire their cannons with blank pistol charges rather than port-fires or cannon locks. Along with her crew of Royal Navy, Provincial Marine sailors and men from the 41st Regiment of Foot and Royal Newfoundland Regiments, the Detroit carried three Indians and the surgeon’s mascot bear as passengers—all of whom survived the battle.

On going on board I found that their hulls was cut beyond description, their decks besmeared with blood, and nothing but engines of destruction in view. The Detroit, not less than two hundred shot cannon had entered her larboard side. The Detroit mounted nineteen long 24, 18, and 12 [heavy 24-, 18- and 12-pound cannons], the Queen Charlotte mounted twenty guns, the schooner Lady Prevost thirteen, the brig Hunter, ten, Little Belt three and the Chippeway one—So that two ships one brig two schooners and one sloop and sixty-six pieces of cannon and not less than one thousand stand of arms [sets of muskets, bayonets, and cartridge boxes with belts] has gloriously fell into our hands by the refined skills and bravery of Commodore Perry who has reflected the highest honor on himself, and country. He may now set down in the chair of honor.

Oliver Hazard Perry was indeed showered with laurels by his countrymen, as well as with prize money from the Department of the Navy, but he didn’t have much time to rest on his laurels. Working together, Perry and General Harrison coordinated an amphibious “island hopping” operation that landed two brigades of United States regular infantry, three divisions of Kentucky (dismounted) volunteers, and two companies of artillery on the Canadian beachhead. Afterwards, Perry joined Harrison as a volunteer aide during the land campaign that defeated Major General Henry Procter. He even participated in the horseback charge that broke the British army. In 1814, while waiting for his new ocean-going frigate USS Java to fit out, Perry fought in the defense of Washington and Baltimore.

Put-in-Bay

Sail Tracker

The Niagara after her initial restoration in 1913, at anchor with the USS Wolverine (a civil-war era gunship that for a long time was the only US warship on the Great Lakes) and a steam yacht.
I hate that traditionally rigged sailing vessels (from sloop on up to full-rigged ship) are known as “tall ships”. The term seems so anachronistic, something a lubber would use. But for people interested in seeing a ship under sail (or in port), this tall ship tracking map will be useful.

The Niagara today with a more accurate hull. She is a brig-rigged warship (a brig of war, I think), with two masts.
In the Great Lakes region, we have the brig USS Niagara, which has timbers from the original brig that fought the Battle of Lake Erie in September 1813. Her sister, the flagship USS Lawrence, was also sunk for preservation after the War of 1812 (vessels were sunk in shallow water so that their timbers wouldn’t rot, so they could be raised and refitted if need be). Unfortunately, when her keel was raised for the US International Exposition of 1876, the expo hall burned down, destroying her remains. The Lawrence was first restored in 1913 for the Centennial of the battle, and again restored in 1988.
I think I’ve been aboard the Niagara once before. She’s a small and simple warship, with a single gun deck, and a cramped spar deck below for the crew. Her clean, utilitarian lines are typical of wartime shipbuilding by the Brown brothers (who also built the first steam warship among other designs). During the summer months she usually cruises to different port cities along the Lakes, and her home port is in Erie, PA, where she was laid down long ago.