The news of Decatur’s victory had spread rapidly. In New York, the movers and shakers of the city prepared a great welcome for the two ships. Committees headed by men with names like Vanderbilt, Brinkerhoff, and Fish worked out the details of balls, dinners and how long the bells should ring at the ships’ arrival.1 This would take time, and apparently Decatur was to plan his arrival accordingly. All of them—the officers and sailors—looked forward to enjoying the brief pleasures that a hero’s welcome implied—whiskey, women, tobacco, and the cheers of the crowd—as well as the more solid rewards: prize money and promotion.
After a leisurely passage through Long Island Sound, the two frigates anchored off Riker’s Island, outside the Hell Gate, on 16 December 1812. They were not due to move the ten miles down to the city until the day of their formal welcome, still some time off.2 Still, there was plenty of activity. Passing ships gave them three cheers, which had to be returned, and this continued without let-up until everyone was hoarse.3 A constant stream of visitors came to see the Macedonian and the American prize crew, and some of the British prisoners made small fortunes by showing them around and retelling the details of the battle.4
The city’s hospitality was unstinting. Two other heroes of the hour were present in New York at the time: Isaac Hull of the Constitution, acclaimed for the defeat of HMS Guerrière and Master Commandant Jacob Jones of the Wasp, renowned for the capture of H.M. Sloop Frolic—in spite of the loss of the Wasp and the recapture of his prize. But Stephen Decatur’s victory outshone all the rest, and its tangible evidence, the captured Macedonian, was anchored east of the Hell Gate for all to see.
There were honors aplenty for all of them. Hull, Jones, and Decatur were given the Freedom of the City on vellum and in gold boxes, and their officers and crews given the “Thanks of the Common Council.”5 Decatur’s portrait was to be painted by Sully and hung in City Hall.6 The Congress had voted its thanks to Decatur and the officers and crew of the United States, and awarded a gold medal to Decatur and silver medals for the other officers.7 The first lieutenant, Henry Allen, was awarded a sword by the Legislature of Rhode Island—Allen’s home state—and Decatur, Allen, and John Nicholson, the third lieutenant, were all to receive “swords, commemorative of the . . . gallant exploit” from the General Assembly of Virginia.8
The officers of the Constitution, the Wasp, and the United States were guests of honor at a public dinner for 500—all male in the fashion of the time—held in the City Hotel, at the comer of Broad Way and Cedar Street, just south-east of where the World Trade Center stands today. The hall was decorated in naval style, with masts, sails, ship models, flags (all but the British), and scenes of battle painted on back-lighted transparencies. Mayor DeWitt Clinton presided, with Stephen Decatur on his right and Isaac Hull to his left. The guests arrived at 1630 and sat down at 1700, “to a table . . . covered with every solid and every dainty that the season affords ... a dessert of delicacies of every description [and] the best liquors and choicest wines.”9 They ate, drank, sang, and speechified for the next six hours. The program scheduled 13 formal toasts and these were interspersed with songs, band music, and cheers. As the evening wore on and the liquor flowed, 24 “volunteer toasts by the prominent persons present” were made as well. Among these was the one given by Oliver Wolcott, leading Federalist and fiscal conservative, which can be considered only as highly prescient: “A Navy, an Army and Taxation . . .” There is no record indicating that this was followed by wild cheering and songs.10
The greats of New York were nothing if not wise in their social planning, and of course knew that their wives and daughters would never let them get away with just an expensive all-male bash. So they also scheduled a ball honoring all the officers present for New Year’s Eve at the same City Hotel, where the decorations still stood. Three hundred ladies arrived to dance with the dashing and intrepid officers and perhaps, in those simpler times, to be dazzled into matrimony by gold epaulets and bullion- trimmed blue uniforms.
But Henry Allen and the other officers of the United States and the Macedonian were unable to attend: The larger plans called for the two ships to arrive off the city for their official welcome on New Year’s Day, 1813. The wind was fair for their passage of the Hell Gate, so the officers were all on board, waiting for daylight and hoping that the wind would hold.11
In the morning, they had a fresh breeze from the northeast, passed the rapids and rocks of the Hell Gate, and made it down the East River, in spite of the United States accidentally dropping one of her anchors right in the narrows of the Gate: she was forced to cut the cable quickly to avoid being brought up short and then run down by the Macedonian.12 This embarrassment avoided, they anchored off Peck’s Slip, just southwest of where the Brooklyn Bridge crosses today, and were greeted “with great joy.”13 An artillery salute of 21 guns was fired and both ships answered it. All the ships in the harbor flew the Stars and Stripes at their mastheads, and all the bells of the city rang for one hour—an enthusiastic, if deafening, welcome.14
After the greetings were over, Henry Allen took the Macedonian across the East River and into Wallabout Bay near the Navy Yard to begin her repair and refit. All of New York wanted to see this trophy frigate, and even before she was moored, “the Navy Yard and the surrounding hills were covered with spectators” gaping at the shot holes in her sides and the “fifteen or twenty balls partly buried in her planking.”15
A few days before, a cartel vessel had arrived from England under a flag of truce and took aboard the Macedonian’s captain, John S. Carden, his officers, and what remained of the crew. Only about 115 tars remained prisoners; roughly 100 had escaped. After the cartel vessel left for England with the British officers, many of the escaped British crew came out of hiding and gravitated to the waterfront. Some of them socialized with the American crew and came and went aboard the two frigates. The American officers tolerated this activity, apparently in the hope that some of the British sailors would sign on.
The welcome laid out by the City of New York was not quite over. The best—and certainly the liveliest—celebration was left for the last. On 7 January 1813, the city hosted a dinner and theater party for the more than 400 sailors of the United States and the prize crew of the Macedonian. All were able to go; temporary crews from other ships took over shipboard duties for them.16 The officers were included in the invitation but had the good sense to leave early.17
The dinner was scheduled to start at 1400, and boats brought the men in at the “New Slip,” today called the “Old Slip,” where they formed up to parade to the City Hotel. At the head of the procession was Captain Carden’s old band of French prisoner- of-war volunteers. Decatur had purchased their services, along with Carden’s store of wine, for $800. Pragmatists all, just as they had dropped “La Marseillaise” and the “£a Ira” from their repertoire and picked up on “Hearts of Oak” and “Rule Britannia,” they now were ready with “Hail Columbia” and “Yankee Doodle.”
Next came a committee of Aldermen, then Stephen Decatur and his officers, all in full uniform. The crew foh lowed, two-by-two in their best Sunday outfits—blue jackets and trousers, scarlet vests and black glazed hats. Not all these uniforms would be neat and clean the next day. Among the assembled ship’s company, ready to share the victory dinner, were a few of the vanquished, men from the British crew of the Macedonian, friends of the American sailors who had found uniforms for them and brought them along.
So, then, they went all in procession, through Pearl Street to Wall Street, across to Broad Way and then north to the City Hotel, where they trooped into the same hall with the same decorations left over from the other two more upscale affairs. The boatswain piped for silence, and after a mercifully brief address by Alderman Vanderbilt, they all got their dinners. For a considerable time, the only sounds were the clicking of cutlery and the subterranean rumbling of hundreds of jaws. Then the dinner was cleared away, the liquor started to flow, and the toasts began. The officers, as custom of the time required, had eaten in another room, but as the crew’s dinner ended, Decatur and Allen came in. They were toasted, cheered, and then gracefully left. Then the serious drinking got under way. There were several formal toasts, then lots of volunteer toasts from the sailors, most of which were right to the point: “All the pretty girls who like Yankee Tars” and “Success to the Frigate United States and plenty of prize money.”
They were still going strong when the time came to leave for the play, which was to start at 1800 at the Park Theater, a quarter-mile away. There was some attrition at this point, but “many of them” started up Broad Way to the theater, located just inside the diagonal at Chatham Street, now Park Row.20 The streets were lined with New Yorkers waiting to see the sailors, and cheers and cries rang out—“Jack [is] full three sheets to the wind!” or if there was some shoving and someone fell down, “Save the pieces!”
The theater party was a great success. The sailors filled the house and cheered at everything. The play was titled “Fraternal Discord,” but no one paid much attention. The last item on the program was a hornpipe, danced by a Mr. McFarland, a popular comedian, who brought down the house.
The sailors left the play and scattered to be with their friends and continue the festivities or to hunt out other diversions that the city offered. Sailors had never been more popular than these. Their credit was good—it was well-known that they were to receive prize money—and the town was theirs. They were due to be back on board ship the next day, but it was more than a week before the last of them returned, ragged and red-eyed.
Editor’s Note: This article is adapted from Captain Dye’s book Fatal Cruise of the Argus: Two Captains in the War of 1812 (Naval Institute Press, 1994).
1. R. S. Guernsey New York City and Vicinity During the War of 1812-15. New York: Charles L. Woodward, 1889. Vol. I, pp. 143-145.
2. Samuel Leech. Thirty Years From Home, or, A Voice From the Main Deck (15th edition). Boston: Tappan, Whittemore, and Mason. 1843. pp. 153; Guernsey, op. cit., passim. Log of the U.S. Frigate United States, 1812-13. Records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel. Record Group 24. National Archives. 15-30 December 1812.
3. Leech, p. 153.
4. Leech, p. 153-154.
5. The lovely, octagonal gold Box in its red morocco case that was given to Decatur can be seen today in the U.S. Naval Academy Museum.
6. Guernsey, pp. 143 - 144.
7. William James. A Full and Correct Account of the Chief Naval Occurrences of the Late War between Great Britain and the United States of America. London: T. Egerton. 1817. Appendix 20, page xxxi. For a picture of Decatur’s medal, see the United States Naval Institute Proceedings, October 1967, p. 60.
8. The Port Folio, III, page 14; The Newport Mercury, 26 December 1812.
9. The Connecticut Gazette, 6 January 1813, quoting The New York Evening Post; A General View of the Rise, Progress and Achievements of the American Navy. Brooklyn: 1828, pp. 154-156.
10. Guemsey, pp. 150-156. The extract from Oliver Wolcott’s toast was taken out of context for modem effect. The full text is “A Navy, an Army and Taxation, indispensable supporters of Liberty, Property, and Public Virtue.”
11. Guernsey, pp. 158-159.
12. Log of the U.S. Frigate United States, 1813, 1 January- 3 March 1813.
13. Ibid.
14. Guernsey, pp. 160; Leech, p. 159; Log of the U.S. Frigate United States, 1 January 1813.
15. The Rhode Island American, 8 January 1813.
16. Log of the U.S. Frigate United States, 7 January 1813.
17. Guernsey, pp. 160-164; Leech, pp. 160-161.
18. Leech, pp. 160-161.
19. Guernsey, pp. 160-162; Leech, p. 160; A General View of the Rise, Progress and Achievements of the American Navy, pp. 154-155.
20. All New York street information is from Plan of the City of New York, engraved by W. Hooker (1817). The Map Division, New York Public Library. Astor, Lennox and Tilden Foundation.
21. Leech, pp. 160-161.
22. Ibid.
23. Leech, p. 162.