Wasp

Any of numerous winged hymenopterus insects possessing smooth, slender bodies, and an abdomen attached by a narrow stalk. They have well developed wings, biting mouthparts, and often administer painful stings

(SlpW: t. 450; lbp. 105'7"; b. 30'l"; dph. 14'1?"; cpl. 140; a. 2 12-pdrs., 16 32-pdr. car.)

The second Wasp, a sloop of war constructed in 1806 at the Washington Navy Yard, was commissioned sometime in 1807, Master Commandant John Smith in command. Wasp's movements in 1807 and 1808 remain unrecorded; but, by 1809, she was cruising the eastern seaboard of the United States. By the close of 1810, she was operating from the ports of Charleston, S.C., and Savannah, Ga., presumably concentrating on the waters along the southern portion of the country's eastern coast. In 1811, she moved to Hampton Roads, Va., where she and brig Nautilus joined frigates United States and Congress in forming a squadron commanded by Commodore Stephen Decatur.

She continued to operate along the coast of the middle states after the United States went to war with Great Britain in June of 1812. Her single action of that war came in October 1812. On the 13th, she exited the mouth of the Delaware River and, two days later, encountered a heavy gale which carried away her jib boom and washed two crewmen overboard. The following evening, Wasp came upon a squadron of ships and, in spite of the fact that two of their number appeared to be large men-of-war, made for them straight away. She finally caught the enemy convoy the following morning and discovered six merchantmen under the protection of a 22-gun sloop-of-war, HBM brig Frolic. At half past eleven in the morning, Wasp and Frolic closed to do battle, commencing fire at a distance of 50 to 60 yards. In a short, but sharp, fight, both ships sustained heavy damage to masts and rigging, but Wasp prevailed over her adversary by boarding her. Unfortunately for the gallant little ship, a British 74-gun ship-of-the-line, Poictiers, appeared on the scene, and Frolic's, captor became the final prize of the action. Wasp's commanding officer, Master Commandant Jacob Jones, had to surrender his small ship to the new adversary because he could neither run nor hope to fight such an overwhelming opponent. Wasp served briefly in the Royal Navy as Peacock but was lost off the Virginia capes in 1813.

USS Wasp engages HBMS Frolic
(British account)

On the 12th of September the British 18-gun brig-sloop Frolic, Captain Thomas Whinyates, quitted the bay of Honduras, with about 14 sail of merchantmen under convoy, for England. On arriving off Havana, the master of a Guernsey ship informed Captain Whinyates of the war with America, and of the Guerrière's capture. Having been five years in the West Indies, and being very sickly in her crew, the Frolic was by no means in a fit state to encounter an enemy's vessel of a similar class to herself. However, there was no alternative ; and the brig proceeded on her voyage along the coast of the United States.

On the night of the 16th of October, in latitude 36° north, longitude 64° west, a violent gale of wind came on, which separated the Frolic from her convoy, carried away her main yard, sprung the main topmast, and tore both topsails to pieces. By dark on the evening of the 17th, six of the missing ships had joined ; and on the 18th, at daybreak, while the Frolic, in a very turbulent sea, was repairing her damages, a sail hove in sight to windward, which was at first taken for one of the convoy. But the near approach of the stranger, and her not answering signals, soon marked her for an enemy : whereupon, removing her main yard from off the casks and lashing it to the deck, the Frolic hauled to the wind under her boom mainsail, and (her fore topmast having been sprung previously to the gale) a close-reefed fore topsail, in order to let her convoy pass sufficiently ahead to be out of danger.

At a few minutes before 11 A. M., apprehensive that the strange ship of war might pursue the merchantmen instead of himself, Captain Whinyates hoisted Spanish colours as a decoy ; having two days before passed a convoy under the protection of a Spanish armed brig, and which convoy, it was imagined that the strange vessel might also have seen. The latter, which was the United States' 18-gun ship-sloop Wasp, Captain Jacob Jones, five days only from the Delaware, immediately hoisted her colours, and bore down for the Frolic, then awaiting her approach on the larboard tack. On arriving within 60 yards of the Frolic, the Wasp hailed : whereupon, quickly exchanging her colours to British, the brig opened a fire of great guns and musketry. This was instantly returned by the Wasp ; and, as the latter dropped nearer to her antagonist, the action became close and spirited. In less than five minutes after she had commenced firing, the Frolic shot away the Wasp's main topmast ; and, in two or three minutes more, the latter's gaff and mizen topgallantmast also came down. The sea was so rough, that the muzzles of the guns of both vessels were frequently under water. Still the cannonade continued, with mutual spirit ; the Americans firing, as the engaged side of their ship was going down, the British, when their engaged side was rising. The consequence was, that almost every shot fired by the Wasp took effect in her opponents hull ; while most of the Frolic's shot passed among the rigging or over the masts of the Wasp. Being in a very light state from a deficiency of stores, and being unable, on account of the sprung state of her topmasts and the want of a main yard, to steady herself by carrying sail, the Frolic laboured much more than the Wasp, and experienced, in consequence, greater difficulty in pointing her guns with precision. In a minute or two after the Wasp's main topmast had come down, the Frolic's gaff head-braces were shot away. Having now no sail whatever upon the mainmast, the brig had lost the means of preventing the Wasp from taking a position on her larboard bow. A ship would not have been so circumstanced, even had she lost her mizenmast by the board ; as she could still have set a trysail upon her mainmast.

Thus, in less than 10 minutes after the action had commenced, chiefly by her previous inability to carry sail, the Frolic lay an unmanageable hulk upon the water, exposed to the whole raking fire of her antagonist, without the possibility of returning it with more than one of her bow guns. The Wasp continued pouring in broadside after broadside, until, believing that he had so thinned the deck of the British brig, that no opposition could be offered, Captain Jones determined to board and end the contest. The Wasp accordingly wore, and, running down upon the Frolic, soon brought the latter's jib-boom between her fore and main rigging, and two of her own carronades in a direction with the bow ports of her defenceless antagonist. Having so fine an opportunity of further diminishing the strength of his opponent, Captain Jones would not board until a raking fire was poured in : it was poured in, and swept the whole range of the Frolic's deck.
A British seaman belonging to the Wasp, named Jack Lang, was now about to spring on the brig's bowsprit and put a stop to the carnage ; but Captain Jones, observing that some one yet lived on the Frolic's deck, pulled him back, and ordered another broadside to be fired. At length, when the action altogether had lasted 43 minutes, and when the American ship had had nearly the whole firing to herself for 33 minutes, the officers and men of the Wasp, led by Lieutenant George William Rodgers, boarded the Frolic. The Americans, according to their account, did not see a single man alive upon the Frolic's deck, except the seaman at the wheel and three officers. Two of those officers were Captain Whinyates and his second lieutenant, Frederick Boughton Wintle; both so severely wounded as to be unable to stand without supporting themselves. Contrary to the American statement, however, 17 of the Frolic's men were also on deck. The remainder of the survivors were below, attending to the wounded, and performing other necessary duties. Lieutenant James Biddle, first of the Wasp, had now the honour of striking the Frolic's colours, as they were lashed to the main rigging.

The Frolic was of course much shattered in her hull ; and her two masts, from the wounds they had received, fell over the side in a few minutes after her surrender. Out of her 92 men (including one passenger, an invalided soldier) and 18 boys, the Frolic had 15 seamen and marines killed, her commander, two lieutenants (Charles M'Kay, mortally, and Mr. Wintle), master (John Stephens, mortally), and 43 seamen and marines wounded. The Wasp received a few shot in her hull, one near her magazine ; and her three lower masts were wounded, but, owing chiefly to the goodness of the sticks, none of them fell. The American sloop began the action with a crew of 138, one of whom was a lad of 17 or 18 years of age, the remainder young and able-bodied seamen, with, as subsequently proved, many British among them; and even the midshipmen, of whom the Wasp had 12 or 13, while the Frolic had but one, and he a boy, were full-grown men, chiefly masters and mates of American merchantmen. Out of this fine crew, the Wasp had eight killed, and about the same number wounded.

The Frolic was armed like every other vessel of her class, with 16 carronades, 32-pounders, and two long sixes. The brig had also the established 12-pounder carronade for her launch, mounted on the usual elevating carriage ; and she had likewise on board a second 12-pounder carronade, taken out of some prize probably, but it was dismounted and lashed upon the forecastle. As the boat carronade, when used at all in action, can only be fired en barbette, we shall not consider it as worthy a place among the broadside-guns. The Wasp mounted 16 carronades, 32-pounders, and two brass long 12-pounders, exclusively of two brass 4-pounders, one of which was usually mounted in the fore, and the other in the main top ; but, in consequence of the gale, they had been brought on deck. Although, strictly speaking, there was not a single boy belonging to the Wasp, we shall allow three, The following, therefore, will be the:

With her masts entire, and a healthy instead of a debilitated crew, the Frolic would have encountered a tolerably equal opponent. As the matter stood, her officers and men deserve great credit for maintaining a resistance so long after their vessel had become unmanageable and defenceless. Surely, there was nothing in the result of this action, that could cast the slightest slur upon the British naval character; and yet, with the wonted exaggerations of American officers, the latter made it, as we shall see presently, a victory over a superior force. Captain Jones, however, was not allowed to carry his trophy, his " 22-gun sloop of war, " into port ; for, in the course of a few hours after the action, the British 74-gun ship Poictiers, Captain John Poer Beresford, heaving in sight, captured one vessel and recaptured the other. With a just appreciation of the merits of Captain Whinyates, Captain Beresford continued him in the command of the Frolic. At the court-martial which was subsequently held upon the captain, officers, and crew of the Frolic, for the loss of their vessel, they were, as a matter of course, most honourably acquitted. Captain Whinyates, although he was unacquainted with the circumstance, had been made a post-captain since the 12th of the preceding August.

A word or two upon the American official account of this action. Captain Jacob Jones describes the vessel he captured, as " the British sloop of war Frolic, of 22 guns, 16 of them 32-pound carronades, and four 12-pounders on the main deck, and two 12 pounders, carronades on the topgallant forecastle; making her," says Captain Jacob Jones, " superior in force to us by four 12-pounders. " Unfortunately for Captain Jacob Jones, Lieutenant Riddle, without his privity, wrote a letter to his father in Philadelphia, in these words: " The Frolic was superior in force to us : she mounted 18 321b. carronades, and two long nines. The Wasp, you know, has only 16 carronades." Mr. Biddle being a man of some note, got his son's letter into the Philadelphia papers as quickly as Mr. Paul Hamilton, the secretary of the American navy, could get the letter of Captain Jacob Jones into the " National Intelligencer." Here was a business ! Comments are unnecessary. Suffice it that neither letter contained a word relative to the disabled state of the Frolic when the action commenced ; and that the Congress of the United States, willing believers in a matter so flattering to their self-love, voted 25,000 dollars, and their thanks, to Captain Jacob Jones, the officers, and crew of the Wasp ; also a gold medal to Captain Jones, and silver medals to each of the officers, in testimony of their high sense of the gallantry displayed by them in the capture of the British sloop of war Frolic, of " superior force."