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An extremely rare and important war of 1812 privateer’s log . The journals cover two of the three known voyages of the schooner Mammoth of Baltimore. The first volume covers her first cruise from March - May 1814, and the second volume covers June - October 1814. The Mammoth, taking 24 prizes, was one of the most successful of the Baltimore privateers. Cf., Maclay, History of American Privateers, p. 426. A superlative set of logs. These journals, apart from containing the usual meteorological data and course headings, contain a wealth of information about privateering in its final heyday. Privateers were privately operated vessels of war, generally commerce raiders. What separated them from traditional pirates was that privateers operated with the express consent of a national government. As such, they carried letters of marque, documents enabling them to interdict the shipping of a specified nation. Although most European governments issued letters of marque at one time or another, these same nations also looked unfavorably on captured privateersmen. While the crew of a privately funded ship of war would be spared the noose, they could certainly expect rough treatment if they fell into the hands of the enemy. Witness the privations of Americans held at Melville Island, Halifax, or Dartmoor Prison in England during the War of 1812.

Schooner Mammoth of Baltimore. Journals, Samuel Franklin Master. In the Atlantic Ocean, March - May, June - October 1814. 2 vol, folio, 13 1/8’ x 8 1/16”; 335 x 205 mm. Two printed journal forms with the titles: Journal of a Voyage From ... Towards ..., New York: Edmund M. Blunt, August 1811, and The Seaman's Journal: being an easy and correct Method of Keeping the Daily Reckoning of a Ship, Portland: Arthur Shirley for Stephen Patten, 1812, with 34 pp. and 66 pp. respectively accomplished in several cursive hands, remaining leaves unaccomplished.

Inventory# 20653 On Hold

Historical Background:

Most privateers were smaller ships, suitable for coastal cruising in local waters. They rarely carried many cannon, just enough to subdue a moderately well-armed merchant ship. When confronted with a sizeable opponent, most privateers would run. It was a courageous or foolhardy crew that tested themselves against a ship of the Royal Navy. Four primary hunting grounds emerged for American privateers during the War of 1812: the West Indies, the East Indies, the Canadian seaboard, and the coastal waters of Scotland and Ireland. Most New England ships tried their luck in the nearby northern latitudes. Only the best-equipped vessels and most daring commanders ventured across the Atlantic to the coastal waters of perfidious Albion. The Mammoth was such a ship.

The first journal recounts the Mammoth’s voyage to the Cape Canaveral cruising ground, Havana, Cuba, and finally northward to Portland, Maine. The entries reveal a great deal about the exigencies of a privateersman’s life. On numerous occasions, the schooner is chased by Royal Navy vessels, often of a similar class. In each instance, the Mammoth escapes, due in large measure to her speed. By 1812, Baltimore’s ship-builders had mastered the clipper ship, whose graceful lines gave these vessels the great speed that was a prime requisite for a privateer. Having eluded the British blockade, the Mammoth spent much of the spring interdicting shipping off Cape Canaveral. The vast majority of the ships boarded proved to be carrying Spanish papers and were released. Two of these appear to have been slave ships, given that they were both sailing from Havana (a leading slave market) to the coast of Africa. After nearly a month at sea without a capture, the Mammoth dropped anchor in Havana where she was visited by a doctor, made necessary repairs, and recruited twenty-one sailors, bringing the ship’s complement to one hundred men. A little more than a week later, a British brig of war entered the harbor in company with a merchantman. The brig “came too [sic] under [the Mammoth’s] stern.” One can only imagine the tension on board as the enemy cruiser passed nearby. It is revealing that just half an hour afterward the privateer hoisted anchor and set sail for less crowded waters.

Several days later another merchant ship, the Lagunta, sailing from Boston to Havana, was boarded. Her captain informed the Mammoth’s crew of “the U.S. Frigate Constitution being chased into Boston by the two 74 s, and a Frigate.” The American frigate had returned from a brief and successful cruise to the Windward Isles at the time that this report was made. Although she made good her escape, “Old Ironsides” spent the next nine months trapped in Boston harbor, ample testimony to the increasing effectiveness of the Royal Navy’s blockade.

On 13 May, 1814, the Mammoth captured the brig Camelin, bound for St. John’s New Brunswick from Bermuda. A prize crew was sent aboard, keeping with them the brig’s cook (the remainder of the crew were kept on board the Mammoth as prisoners), and the brig, loaded with molasses and rum, was dispatched to the United States. This proved to be the only capture of the cruise, and soon afterward, on 28 May, 1814, the Mammoth dropped anchor in Portland, Maine.

The privateer did not remain there long, setting sail on 24 June in “tremendous seas breaking over [her].” The decision to set sail in these conditions was, perhaps, an expedient designed to help the privateer break free from the British blockade. This later cruise is covered in the second journal, which interestingly, appears to have been purchased during this sojourn in Portland. Certainly, the journal was printed in that town. Two days out, the Mammoth encountered the wreck of a sloop that had been captured by the Liverpool packet. There was a prize master on board, as well as several civilians, including a woman and children. These lucky souls were taken on board, and their erstwhile conveyance was left in a sinking condition.

By the 4 th of July, the Mammoth had reached northern enough latitudes that ice bergs emerged as a navigational hazard. These “mountains of ice,” tested the crew’s nerve in more ways than one since they had a tendency to burst, making a sound like the report of a gun. Apart from the cold, conditions were increasingly dismal and foggy, elements that the brig used several times to good effect when making her escape from Royal Navy pursuit.

On 11 July, in the early evening, the Mammoth encountered a ship flying English colors, and gave chase. The British ship fought back, and a 35-minute cannonade ensued during which the privateer was struck several times, two of her cannon were damaged, and the prize master was accidentally wounded during the recoil of a ship’s gun. The initial fight was inconclusive, but the Mammoth’s commander was pleased enough with the result that he decided to wait alongside the British ship until the following morning. At daybreak, the privateer ranged within musket shot of the British vessel, whereupon “we perceived him to [be] a transport full of troops.” Discretion proved to be the better part of valor, and not surprisingly, the next entry reads: “thought it best to leave him.” Safely removed from several hundred British line infantrymen, the Mammoth repaired her battle damage the following day. During the privateer’s cruise off the Maritimes, fog proved a curse as well as a blessing, for even as the Mammoth hid within it from pursuit on more than one occasion, prospective captures reacted much the same way, hiding in the mist. Undeterred, the Mammoth pressed onwward. Her perseverance was soon rewarded, an on 19 July, she captured the British brig Britannia, bound to Liverpool. The brig proved to be the first of many captures.

British vessels were seized on nearly a daily basis for the remainder of the month. The frequency of these captures displays privateering tactics in good order. Only the most remunerative vessels were given prize crews and sent back to the United States. Given the slower sailing qualities of the merchant ships and the likelihood of their recapture by British forces, it was most expedient to unload their ordnance, ammunition, cargoes and crew before burning the unmanned vessels to the water-line. Such was the fate of the brig Urania, one of two merchant ships destroyed on 24 July. Increasing success brought its own difficulties, since the Mammoth took on board the crew of every vessel that she carried. When the captives’ numbers became too great, they would be released in turn onto another captured vessel, designated as a cartel. This ship would then make port with the erstwhile prisoners, releasing them on parole. Cartel ships were a necessary evil for the privateers as their arrival in port spread information about the privateer’s whereabouts, increasing the likelihood of capture by the Royal Navy. Far more preferable was to put prisoners on board a neutral carrier if one could be found. Aware that the enemy was certainly appraised of her whereabouts, the Mammoth set sail at month’s end for the lucrative but risky hunting grounds lying off the coast of Great Britain.

As July passed into August, the Mammoth continued to make regular seizures. On 3 August, it appeared that three separate merchants would be taken. An approaching gale enabled the final brig to escape since the Mammoth and her prizes were more concerned with preparing for the inclement weather. The gale proved to be most severe, and a portion of the fore topsail was lost overboard. The privateer weathered the storm by moving her lee guns to windward, and disposing overboard “about 20 barrels of Flour, which eased the laboring of the Schooner very much.” Several other potential captures were lost when heavy seas made it impossible to board them successfully (e.g., the British Transport Brig No. 67, on 15 August). On another, later occasion, rolling waves upset a ship’s boat that was conveying members of a prize crew. The sailors were saved, but the boat was lost.

By 19 August, the Mammoth was just eighteen miles off of Cape Clear, the Southern and most westerly point in Ireland. Once again, she began making captures, necessitating the dispatch of a cartel when one prize was discovered to have several ladies on board. The Mammoth remained in the area for nearly a month, constantly eluding the vigilance of the Royal Navy, and seizing civilian vessels. Only once did she fire her guns in anger when she encountered a packet ship that “cut away his stern boat and knocked away the stern of the vessel to get his stern chasers (cannon mounted in the stern, so as to fire at a pursuing vessel) to bear upon us.”

Beginning 9 September, the privateer charted a westward course toward the American seaboard. Her cruise off British coastal waters had proven a great success, resulting in numerous captures and undoubtedly spreading consternation amid British shipping interests. During the War of 1812, American privateers would seize thousands of British merchants, driving the cost of insurance precipitously high. Guerre de course was proving more effective than its more formal counterpart.

Arriving in the western Atlantic, the Mammoth preyed awhile on shipping off the Grand Banks, taking several more prizes. For the third and final time that year, she fired her guns in anger, exchanging broadsides with the transport Champion. In this instance, the Mammoth lost one man, not to enemy action, but to fatigue. William Hall was accidentally left behind on board the transport when her goods were removed to the privateer. He had, apparently fallen asleep.

Finally, on Halloween Day, 1814, she arrived once more at Portland having eluded three blockading men of war. Her cruise was by all accounts, a great success. Mammoth had been chased on over ten separate occasions by Royal Navy cruisers, and had managed to evade them all. In the process, she had boarded at least ten neutral carrier, and seized another sixteen ships, six of which she destroyed. Only six ships managed to evade the privateer, usually due to heavy seas.

These journals are of great importance and interest. Although the papers of Maryland congressman Samuel Smith (1752-1839) at the New England Historic Genealogical Society in Boston contain documents relating to the disposal of goods taken by the Mammoth, there is no other primary record of this privateer. Apart a single page taken from Maclay’s History, very little is known about this vessel beyond her good fortune. Yet in her time, she was considered one of the most significant privateers engaged in the crippling 1814 campaign waged against British commerce in home waters. Privateering logs are rarely encountered out of institutional collections (e.g., the logbook of the Amelia is in the Navy Department Library in Washington, D.C.), and fewer still have such excellent content as this set. Few cruises were more successful than the second voyage of the Mammoth, and with its extensive detail about privateering operations off the coast of Canada and Ireland, few journals can be considered more valuable today.

Condition: scattered spots and smudges. Contemporary marbled wrappers; corners and edges worn.