For his part, Blyth was expected to continue the reassertion of Britain’s naval mystique. Burrows personally knew and admired Lawrence Blyth (the Boxer’s commander) had volunteered to serve as pallbearer at Lawrence’s funeral in Halifax.īurrows needed to win because America needed a win, but it was also personal. The earlier American victories in the war at sea could now be viewed as anomalies.įor the Americans, the boost these earlier victories had provided was significantly diminished. This victory restored, to a large degree, Britain’s sense of itself as the dominant naval power. Just weeks before, James Lawrence and the Chesapeake had lost a bloody single-ship engagement with Philip Broke’s Shannon. The Enterprise had a slight advantage in both firepower and manpower, and Burrows (the American commander) used it to win a clear victory, though the outcome was in no way assured in advance, and the actual battle was quite fierce.
Sum up the battle between the Boxer and the Enterprise for us. That these men were like brothers, though they’d never met.
What was the most important thing you learned in your research and writing? How did they arrive at that moment in their lives? Why were they trying to kill each other? I wanted to know more about the two commanders who died as a result of the battle. Battleland chatted with Hanna via email about the book: Hanna views much of the story through the Boxer’s captain, Samuel Blyth, and William Burrows, at the helm of the Enterprise. It marked the final round for this kind of maritime warfare, as well as telegraphing the U.S. It pitted the British brig HMS Boxer against the USS Enterprise in a pitched, broadside-blasting battle that lasted less than an hour. In Knights of the Sea, author David Hanna breathes life into the lone major sea battle witnessed from land in that conflict, which took place off Pemaquid Point, Maine. Follow going to be a raft of books on the 200 th anniversary of the War of 1812, and one of the first is a fascinating look at a pivot point in naval warfare.
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