In the War of 1812, American vessels captured 2,500 British merchant ships; 165 were taken by the navy and more than 2,000 were seized by 500 American privateers. and crew and continued her voyage. If, on the other hand, she proved to be an enemy or a neutral engaged in carrying troops or contraband for the enemy, she was condemned as "good prize" and both ship and cargo were promptly auctioned off to a buyer who obtained a good title and owned her thereafter. Except where the vessel and cargo were clearly enemy property, the proceeds of the sale were held by the court fo r a year and a day to enable neutral shippers time to protest, and the funds were then paid out in acco rdance with the legislature's rules then in force . If the captor was a naval vessel, the proceeds were frequently divided between the nation and the crew; if a privateer, the entire proceeds were paid to the owners and crew of the privateer to be divided in accordance with their private agreements. Privateers generally lacked either the vain glory or blood lust of so many naval officers of two centuries ago. Generally, they were in the game for the money and the high adventure of the chase. Warfare under sail consisted primarily of merchant ships being captured by privateers. T he classic naval historians don't tell
it that way but that's the way it is. And we, as modern maritime scholars, are obligated to acknowledge that truth. Let us look at our own War of 1812, a neat little war that we all know well. It las ted about 1,000 days from June 18 12 to February 181 5. What are we told over and over again about that war at sea? That our frigate USS Constitution captured the British frigates Guerriere and Java and that our frigate United States tookMacedonian. And, oh yes, our Chesapeake was captured by their Shannon. Let's take a different look at the War of 18 12. From beginning to end, we never had more than 22 warships to go to sea. They cap tured, in total, 15 British warships. But during those thousand days, American vessels captured 2,500 British merchant ships. Of these, 165 were taken by the navy and more than 2, 000 were seized by 500 American privateers. Why is this picture so different from that presented by the great 19th-century naval historians James Fenimore Cooper, Alfred T hayer Mahan and T heodore Roosevelt? Perhaps it is well to note that Cooper and Mahan were both naval officers, and
Roosevelt, like his cousin, served as Assistant Secretary of the Navy. W hy have not later scholars, less closely affili ated with the navy and perhaps less biased in its favor, never painted a clearer picture? I have a theory about this. I believe that modern maritime scholars, and writers of naval fiction as well, suffer from a disease which I have named Lexiphobia. Lexiphobia is a fear of the law and an aversion to admitting that one doesn't understand it. The archives of all the great maritime nations are fill ed with court records of prize cases. And what records! There are to be found the sworn statements of the men who stood, or knel t, or fell upon the decks of the thousands of ships capturing or captured during the last hundred years of warfare under sail. These records are, for the most part, carefully preserved in court files and readily accessible. All that is needed to find and understand these documents is a brief layman's introduction to the practice of maritime prize. !. Mr. Petrie has been a merchant seaman, soldier, lawyer, businessman, banker, politician, publisher and small boat sailor.
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SEA HISTORY 90, AUTUMN 1999