1812	Light Squadrons and Single Ships	86

circumstance, that, out of those 328 men, Captain Porter himself should have declared (and for which the American government must have been not a little displeased), in his famous " Journal of a Cruise," there were but 11 landsmen. This is a most important fact, and deserves to he held in remembrance by all who desire to judge fairly in those encounters between British and American ships, of which we shall soon have to give some account.

Having the authority of a respectable eye-witness for the accuracy of as much of the following account as relates to the proceedings on shore, we feel bound to give it insertion ; if but to show the importance that was attached to the retention of British seamen on board the American ships of war, as well as the barbarous means to which an American officer could resort, to punish a native of England for refusing to become a traitor to his country. A New-York newspaper, of June 27, 1812, contains the following as the substance of the formal deposition of the victim of Captain Porter's unmanly treatment. "The deposition states, that John Erving was born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England ; that he has resided within the United States since 1800, and has never been naturalized ; that, on the 14th of October, 1811, he entered on board the Essex, and joined her at Norfolk ; that Captain Porter, on the 25th of June, 1812, caused all hands to be piped on deck, to take the oath of allegiance to the United States, and gave them to understand, that any man who did not choose to do so should be discharged ; that, when deponent heard his name called, he told the captain, that being a British subject he must refuse taking the oath ; on which the captain spoke to the petty officers, and told them they must pass sentence upon him ; that they then put him into the petty launch, which lay alongside the frigate, and there poured a bucket of tar over him, and then laid on a quantity of feathers, having first stripped him naked from the waist : that they then rowed him ashore, stern foremost, and landed him. That he wandered about, from street to street, in this condition, until Mr. Ford took him into his shop, to save him from the crowd then beginning to gather ; that he staid there until the police magistrate took him away, and put him into the city prison for protection, where he was cleansed and clothed. None of the citizens molested or insulted him. He says he had a protection, which he bought of a man in Salem, of the same name and description with himself, for four shillings and sixpence, which he got renewed at the custom-house, Norfolk. He says he gave, as an additional reason to the captain, why he did not choose to fight against his country, that, if he should be taken prisoner, he would certainly be hung."

This, having been copied into other papers, met the eye of Captain Sir James Lucas Yeo, of the 12-pounder 32-gun frigate Southampton, then attached to the Jamaica station. Persons,

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