Page 317 - INDIANNAVYV1

HISTORY OF THE INDIAN NAVY. — 285 :

in the Straits of Sunda, with despatches for the Supreme
Government at Calcutta, sighted a vessel, which proved to be
the United States sloop-of-war ' Peacock,' commanded by Cap-
tain Warrington, the same ship which, on the 2yth of April,
1814, had captured H.M.'s brig ' Epervier,' Captain Wales, of
eighteen guns, and one hundred and seventeen men. The
following is an exact account of their respective armaments
' Peacock,' a full-rigged ship of 539 tons, and carrying twenty
32-pounder carronades, and two long 18-pounders, total twenty-
two guns, with a crew of one hundred and eighty-Hve, or, as
some said, two hundred and twenty men; 'Nautilus,' a brig of 180
tons, carrying ten 18-pounder carronades and four long 9-pounders,
and, being much under-handed, having a crew of only thirty-nine
European officers and seamen, and forty marines and Lascars,*
the total on board, including some European invalid soldiers,
being about one hundred. We cannot do better than give the
account of the action that ensued between the 'Nautilus ' and
'Peacock,' in the words of Lieutenant Boyce—a gallant young
officer who had served under Captain Eatwell as First-Lieu-
tenant of the 'Benares' while that ship was employed under
the Bengal Government—in his oflicial despatch, addressed to
the Secretary of the Company's j\Iarine Board :
" Sir,— I beg leave to acquaint you, for the informa-
tion of the Board, that the wounds received on the 30th
of June last, in a short but smart action with an Ame-
rican sloop of war, off Anjier, in the Straits of Sunda, have
hitherto prevented my transmitting an olKcial report of the
circumstances attending that melancholy affair. I am hap])y
to state that my health is now tolerably re-established ; and I
think myself particularly fortunate, considering the nature of the
wounds, that the honour of addressing you on this subject has
been reserved for my pen, although, no doubt, public rinnour
has, ere this, put you in possession of most of the facts which I
now do myself the honour to state, and request that you will do
me the favour to submit them to the Honourable Board. On
the 30th of June last, being off Anjier, in the Straits of Sunda,
on my passage to Bengal, in charge of public despatches from
the Java Government, about four p.m., a strange sail hove in
sight, standing with a fair wind to the north-eastward ; and as
tlie lion. Comjiany's cruiser 'Nautilus,' under my command,
was working to the scMith-westward, the two vessels approached
each other rapidly. When the stranger was distant about three
miles, 1 observed that she had J>ritish colours hoisted, and
* As was customary with such of the Company's cruisers as coukl not make
up their complements with European seamen, Lascars were sliipped in the
'NautiUis' to make up tlie required number. As the ditliculties of reeruiting
scunien for the Service dccreaseii, owing to the great number of merchant sliips
tliat arrived in Bombay Harbour from Enghmd, the crews of the Company's
cruisers were latterly entirely composed of European seamen.