In a paper recently prepared by him on the American Navy, Rear-Admiral French Ensor Chadwick pronounces this “the finest tribute ever paid any navy.” (Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society for November, 1912, Vol. 46, pp. 207-208.)
[9] This incident resulted from what was known as the affair of the _Little Belt_. It occurred May 16, 1811, off Cape Charles, Virginia. The United States frigate _President_, of forty-four guns, and the British corvette, of twenty guns, were concerned in it. The affair was accidental, and the _Little Belt_ escaped being sunk, but, at the time, asserted that after a sharp engagement it had driven off the American frigate of greatly superior force. It was alleged that the commander of the _President_ had mistaken the _Little Belt_ for the _Guerrière_; and consequently the captain of the _Guerrière_, it was said, subsequently had the name of the ship painted as indicated by Mr. Adams, in order that in future there should be no possibility of mistake.
[10] Reference is here made to the engagements between the frigates _Constitution_ and _Guerrière_, August 19, between the frigates _United States_ and _Macedonian_, October 25, and between the _Wasp_ and the _Frolic_, both eighteen-gun sloops of war, October 17--all in 1812. The _Wasp_ was commanded by Captain Jacob Jones of Delaware. The action lasted forty-three minutes, was desperately fought, and resulted in the capture of the _Frolic_.
[11] This statement illustrates the slowness with which news then traveled in Russia, or the degree to which information was suppressed during the campaign of 1812. St. Petersburg is about four hundred and fifty miles from the river Niemen, which constituted the boundary between East Prussia and Russia. Mr. Adams occupied an official position at St. Petersburg. What remained of Napoleon’s army had succeeded in effecting its escape by the crossing of the Beresina during the closing days of November. On the fifth of December Napoleon had left his army at Smorgoni, a town in the Russian province of Vilna, and about one hundred and twenty-five miles east of the river Niemen.
At the time this letter was written he had been thirteen days in Paris, having reached that place on the evening of December 18. Thus tidings of what had occurred on the fifth of December, in Russia, less than four hundred and fifty miles from St. Petersburg, had not reached St. Petersburg and become generally known on the thirty-first of that month.