Chesapeake Bay Flotilla
| Chesapeake Bay Flotilla | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of War of 1812 | |||||
|
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| Belligerents | |||||
 United States
|
 United Kingdom
|
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| Commanders and leaders | |||||
| Joshua Barney |
Sir George Cockburn Sir John Warren Alexander Cochrane Robert Ross |
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| Strength | |||||
|
19 Ships: |
96 Ships: |
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| Casualties and losses | |||||
| Scuttling and burning of Flotilla vessels | |||||
19 Ships:
Seven 75-foot (23 m) barges
Six 50-foot (15 m) barges
Two gunboats
One row-galley
One lookout boat and his flagship
One 49-foot (15 m) sloop-rigged
One self-propelled floating battery USS Scorpion,
96 Ships:
11 ships of the line
34 frigates
The Chesapeake Bay Flotilla was a collection of barges and gunboats that the United States assembled under the command of Joshua Barney, an 1812 privateer captain, to stall British attacks in the Chesapeake Bay, during the War of 1812. The Flotilla engaged the Royal Navy in several inconclusive battles before Barney was forced to scuttle the vessels themselves on August 22, 1814. The men of the Flotilla then served onshore in the defense of Washington, DC and Baltimore. It was disbanded on February 15, 1815, after the end of the war.
Joshua Barney submitted a plan for the defense of the Chesapeake Bay to Secretary of the Navy William Jones on 4 July 1813. He estimated that a force consisting of gunboats and barges that could be sailed or rowed, manned by sailors and those in the shipbuilding industries, could engage British landing parties in the shallow waters of the Bay. He set sail in April 1814 with these eighteen ships: seven 75-foot (23 m) barges, six 50-foot (15 m) barges, two gunboats, one row-galley, one lookout boat and his flagship, the 49-foot (15 m) sloop-rigged, self-propelled floating battery USS Scorpion, mounting two long guns and two carronades.
The Flotillamen, totaling 4,370 men at their largest, were motley crews composed mainly of U.S. Navy sailors, merchant seamen, Chesapeake Bay watermen, privateers, free negros, and runaway slaves. Later, when they became shipless and on the march, from Benedict, Maryland, a battalion of 700 marines from the Washington Navy Yard, would join them, as they moved north to defend the Capital and make an abortive stand at Bladensburg, against the rapid British advance.
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Wikipedia