Charles Napier (Royal Navy Officer) - American War and The 'Hundred Days'

American War and The 'Hundred Days'

After the surrender of Napoleon in 1814 Napier and his ship were transferred to the coast of America, where the War of 1812 was still in progress. He took part in the expedition up the Potomac to Alexandria, as second in command to Captain James Alexander Gordon. The British squadron took 10 days to travel 50 miles (80 km) upriver, with many strandings and damage from a tornado, but on 28 August 1814 after bombardment they captured Fort Washington; the town of Alexandria capitulated and the shipping there was seized. The squadron successfully withdrew downriver with their prizes despite American attacks from the shore. During this withdrawal Napier was wounded in the neck.

He next distinguished himself in the attack on the city of Baltimore by a British army and 16 warships, 12–14 September 1814, under Admiral Cochrane. Euryalus was involved in the bombardment of Fort McHenry that began early in the morning of the 13th. The critical period of the attack developed shortly after midnight when a picked British force in longboats under Napier’s command penetrated the branch of the river to the west of the fort with the intention of storming it from the flank. Before they could land, however, they were detected and subjected to a withering fire from the guns of Fort McHenry and two smaller forts. The British fought back strongly with cannon and rockets. (Watching the battle from a safe distance, Francis Scott Key was inspired to compose 'The Star-Spangled Banner’.) Eventually American firepower prevailed; Napier was compelled to retire to the warships, and Cochrane’s fleet withdrew on the morning of the 14th.

Euryalus proceeded to Halifax, Nova Scotia for refit and then took part in the ongoing blockade of the eastern seaboard of the USA. Bored by such duties, Napier issued a challenge to the American frigate Constellation, which was lying at Norfolk, Virginia, to come out and fight a single-ship duel. The challenge was accepted and due arrangements were made ‘in the most gentlemanly fashion’, but Euryalus was made part of the squadron that Admiral Cochrane took to Florida and Louisiana in December 1814 in the operations that climaxed in the Battle of New Orleans on 8 January 1815, and before she could return to fulfil her engagement with Constellation news of the peace treaty of Ghent reached the USA.

With Napoleon's escape from Elba and brief return to power, (the 'Hundred Days'), Euryalus returned to Britain. Napier's last mission of the Napoleonic wars was to land troops at the mouth of the River Scheldt to guard against the French advance into Belgium.