| | | | |
Sail again with Oliver Baldwin in the US Frigate Chesapeake as she leaves Hampton Roads VA on a routine patrol. Anything but routine, the ship is confronted by the fifty gun HMS Leopard outside the Virginia Capes. The British ship is seeking Royal Navy deserters and, when Commodore James Barron refuses the British captain’s orders to produce them, fires into the ill-prepared American frigate with disastrous results. This lop-sided fight was one of the major contributors to the War of 1812 which started five years later.
Following the ensuing court martial, Stephen Decatur takes command of Chesapeake to enforce the Jeffersonian Embargoes on the Atlantic seaboard with Oliver, Henry Allen, and others from William H. White's The Greater The Honor. Oliver will experience more—though less disastrous—encounters with ships of the Royal Navy, and ultimately, the start of the War of 1812.
