Perry Strikes U.S. Marine
By
David Curtis Skaggs
Navy History, June 2005
Most history enthusiasts are familiar with General George S. Patton Jr.'s famous "slapping incidents" during the Sicilian campaign of World War II. Few know, however, of a similar event involving a senior officer striking a subordinate in the harbor of Messina, Sicily, a century and one quarter earlier.
Like Patton's, U.S. Navy Captain Oliver Hazard Perry's blow in 1816 reverberated in controversy that sullied his reputation as a national hero. This melancholy event constituted the nadir of Perry's career and caused him innumerable problems and much consternation.
Perry achieved national fame as the victorious commander of the U.S. squadron that won the Battle of Lake Erie on 10 September 1813. His after-action report noting, "We have met the enemy and they are ours," and his battle flag emblazoned with "Don't Give Up the Ship" became popular statements of national martial attitudes.
Throughout his career, however, the Hero of Lake Erie exhibited two serious character flaws: a tendency to forgive subordinates of serious faults—and live to regret it later—and a temper that could explode to cause some rash action. Both of these exhibited themselves during a port call in Messina in September 1816.
Commanded by Commodore Isaac Chauncey, the Mediterranean Squadron consisted of the new 74-gun ship-of-the-line and flagship Washington (John O. Creighton, flag captain), the frigates United States (John Shaw), Java (Perry), and Constellation (Charles Gordon), and sloop of war Erie (William Crane). Shaw had been the squadron commodore before Chauncey's arrival in summer 1816.
In the midst of a layover in Naples, Perry's trusted friend, Captain Gordon, died. His death left the Hero of Lake Erie without a confidant just when he needed one. Moreover, the funeral took place on the third anniversary of the Battle of Lake Erie, usually a time of celebration and conviviality among the veterans of that encounter who were in the squadron. Perry was not in a good mood.
The Slapping Incident
Marine Captain John Heath served as commander of the Java 's Marine detachment. Midshipman Alexander Slidell Mackenzie remembered the Marine officer as "a good-natured, rather fat, unmilitary-looking, and exceedingly indolent man, who wore his hands in his pockets on the quarter-deck, and his hat on one side, less with a view apparently of annoying the captain than for the comfort of being at his ease." For some time Heath's inattention to duty bothered Perry. After the ship moored in the Bay of Naples in July, Perry found a Marine guard untidy and distinctly in contrast with the rest of the crew. When Perry brought the matter to his Marine officer's attention, Heath responded with what the ever-sensitive Java captain thought was a disrespectful and contemptuous answer.
In a highly critical officer's efficiency report to Chauncey, Perry wrote: "The general deportment of Captain Heath towards me, so contrary to the usual address of my officers, and, moreover, his marked insolence to me in many instances, induced me to believe that his conduct proceeded from a premeditated determination to insult me." Still, Perry neither publicly nor privately disciplined Heath.
On the evening of 16 September 1816 two Marines jumped ship and began swimming toward shore. Alerted about the incident, Perry bounded to the deck and sent a ship's boat to recover the men and a message for Heath to report on deck. Heath, who should have been most concerned about this incident by men of his detachment, sent a message that he was indisposed in his cabin. Perry repeated the order, and when the delinquent Marine captain finally appeared, the Java 's commander ordered him to muster the Marines. This Heath did in a lackadaisical manner and, in a breach of protocol, he failed to report which men were missing until Perry ordered him to do so.
Up to this point Perry acted in a controlled and legal fashion, and he had a fine case for Heath's relief by the squadron's commodore. But Perry, who demonstrated coolness under fire and in times of danger, lost his temper. He ordered Heath to go below and told him he should do no more duty on the Java . This was Perry's first mistake; Heath's appointment to the Java was from the Secretary of the Navy, and it was the manifest duty of the commodore to judge in such matters, not a ship's captain.
Two days later, with the Java anchored in the harbor at Messina, Perry returned late in the evening and found the following note on his cabin desk:
Sir,
On the evening of the sixteenth instant, I was ordered below by you from the quarter-deck, with these words, or to that effect: "I have no farther use for your services on board this ship." I have waited till this moment to know why I have been thus treated and, being ignorant of the cause, request my arrest and charges.
Very respectfully, &c.,
John Heath
Perry found the language impudent and disrespectful. Perhaps he placed too much emphasis on the "being ignorant of the cause" phrase, because it is hard to imagine Heath did not know the reason for his confinement.
Unable or unwilling to collect his thoughts and to cool his temper, Perry sent for Heath as his passions rose. When the Marine entered his cabin, Perry demanded why he had so addressed him and at such an improper hour. Every answer Heath provided Perry considered insulting and contemptuous. At some point in all this Perry allegedly said Heath was a "damned rascal and scoundrel and had not acted as a gentleman."
Perry requested the Marine Corps detachment's second ranking officer, 2nd Lieutenant Parke G. Howle, to report to his cabin. Howle witnessed the subsequent incidents and noted that Perry contemplated putting Heath in irons.
When Perry told the Marine captain to consider himself under arrest, he replied: "Very well, sir!" Perry heard a slur of insolence in the answer. When ordered to be silent, Heath answered with the same words in the same tone and made what his ship's captain described as "a contemptuous smile." Perry repeated the order for silence; Heath made the same reply. Perry could not control his passions; in what must be considered the most ill-conceived, intemperate act of his career, Perry struck Heath.
The Marine captain controlled his emotions and did nothing; Lieutenant Howle stepped between them. Before the lieutenant left to take the captain to his quarters, he heard Perry call Heath a "puppy." Had Heath replied in kind the incident might have been forgotten as a private quarrel or become mere gossip at the wardroom mess.
Instead, Perry's slap became a cause célèbre . Heath retired from Perry's presence under arrest. Initially, Perry considered placing him in irons and having a guard stand over him. These instructions he cancelled.
At the same time, Heath understood the Java 's captain had disgraced himself, having overstepped the bounds of propriety. The Hero of Lake Erie violated one of the cardinal rules of conduct among gentlemen; he dishonored the seal of state inherent in Captain Heath's commission and the majesty of the office Perry held as a ship's captain.
Now Perry found himself entangled in a web of intrigue that might require him to violate another of his principles—never engage in a duel. He was entrapped and he knew it; he was without Captain Gordon; his closest friend in the Navy, Purser Samuel Hambleton, was in the United States.
Ironically, his fate rested in the hands of Commodore Chauncey, with whom he had quarreled during the Great Lakes campaign and who had shared the Lake Erie prize money as the lakes commodore. (Although most of his contemporaries referred to him as a "commodore" after the victory, Perry was not authorized to fly the broad pendant symbolic of that rank.) Perry had written a few months before he "would see the navy to the ______ before I would ever again be the means of putting money in Chauncey's pocket." Now he was serving again under Chauncey's command.
On board the Washington was former U.S. attorney general and inbound envoy to Naples William Pinkney and his family. Apparently, Pinkney took an additional diplomatic duty upon himself while in Gibraltar—healing the breach between Perry and Chauncey.
Perry's resentment toward Chauncey lingered after the war. On the other hand, Chauncey had every reason to be grateful for the large prize money the Lake Erie victory provided him and that Perry had not opposed his award of 1/20th of the total. 1 Now Perry could only hope the mediation of Ambassador Pinkney had smoothed misunderstandings between the two enough for him to come out of this situation in better shape than he had gone into it.
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