James Tertius De Kay - A Rage for Glory: The Life of Commodore Stephen Decatur, USN

A Rage for Glory

THE LIFE OF COMMODORE STEPHEN DECATUR, USN

THE LIFE OF COMMODORE STEPHEN DECATUR, USN

James Tertius de Kay

FREE PRESS

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Copyright 2004 by James Tertius de Kay

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

De Kay, James T.

A rage for glory: the life of Commodore Stephen Decatur, USN/James Tertius de Kay.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. Decatur, Stephen, 1779-1820. 2. AdmiralsUnited StatesBiography. 3. United States. NavyBiography. 4. United StatesHistoryWar of 1812Naval operations. 5. United StatesHistory, NavalTo 1900. I. Title.

E353.1.D29D15 2004

359.0092dc21

[B]

2003049248

ISBN 0-7432-4245-9
eISBN 13: 978-1-4391-1929-7
ISBN 13: 978-0-7432-4245-5

Again, for Bill Dunne

The desire for glory clings even to the best men longer than any other passion.

TACITUS

The shocking news raced through Washington a little after ten oclock on the morning of March 22, 1820. One of the first to hear of it was Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, who would record in his diary, Before I left my house this morning to go to my office, W.S. Smith came in and told me Commodore Decatur had just been brought in from Bladensburg, mortally wounded in a duel.

The news came as a personal blow to Adams. Stephen Decatur, war hero and member of the Board of Navy Commissioners, was a neighbor and close friend. Only the night before, the commodore and his wife, Susan, had been guests at a grand party in the Adams home, given in honor of the marriage of President James Monroes daughter.

Adams realized immediately that the tragedy was likely to have significant national repercussions. Decatur was a legendary figure throughout the young republic. His many spectacular acts of daring on the high seas were a source of national pride, and had won him every honor his country could bestow. More than simply the nations reigning hero, he was an important political figure as well. Statesmen of every stripe sought him out for his opinions and support. At the age of forty-one he was recognized as a member of the new generation of leaders. There was talk that he might be destined for higher office, perhaps even the presidency.

After relaying the grim news to his wife, Louisa, Adams hurried across Presidents Squarethe present Lafayette Parkto the Decatur residence. Anxious citizens were already gathering in front of the imposing town house that Decatur had built with prize money earned in his victorious naval actions. Pushing his way through the crowd Adams managed to gain the entrance. Smears of blood on the door jamb and along the corridor walls inside showed where, only minutes before, the wounded man had been carried through to the reception room on the ground floor.

The house was already filling with high government officials, most of them well known to Adams. He was able to make his way through the throng to where he could catch a glimpse of the fallen commodore, sprawled awkwardly on a couch, surrounded by anxious retainers. It was an unnerving sight. Doctors, naval officers, and servants moved about anxiously, or huddled in corners, conversing in whispers. Decatur himself was almost unrecognizable. His face was ashen, his familiar features tortured into a rictal grimace as he struggled to deal with the pain. His bright piercing eyes, normally his most notable feature, were dull and listless. His high forehead and long, aquiline nose were smeared with dirt and scratches from the dueling field. The boyish forelock of wavy brown hair that the portraitists so delighted in lay matted and disheveled.

The pistol ball had glanced off his hip bone into the groin, severing vital arteries. The doctors had tried to stanch the flow of blood, but there was no place to apply a tourniquet, and they had been only partially successful. Wads of bloody makeshift bandagestowels, bedsheets, table linenlay about, attesting to their frantic efforts.

Dr. Lowell, the U.S. surgeon-general, who had hurried over to assist the physicians already in attendance, made an optimistic pronouncement concerning Decaturs condition but Adams suspected his diagnosis was more to comfort family members than anything else. An army colonel who had managed to see Decatur at close hand told Adams that the wounded man could not survive the day.

Decaturs distress was obviously extreme. He knew he was a dying man and seemed almost to welcome the prospect. At one point he told the doctors he had not believed it was possible to endure such pain. The surgeons suggested probing the wound to extract the ball, but when Decatur asked whether such a step would ease the discomfort they admitted it would make no difference, so he told them to leave the bullet where it was. It had already done all the injury it could, he said.

The news of the fallen leader spread rapidly across town. The city of Washington was still little more than an overgrown village made up of flimsy rooming houses sandwiched between grandiose half-finished marble public palaces. On muddy street corners and in the halls of power citizens and officeholders gathered together to speak in hushed tones of the distressing event.

What had brought on such a terrible and unexpected catastrophe? It would be months, even years, before all the details of the duel became known, but even in the first hours after the tragedy the broad outlines of the story had already emerged. The duel had taken place at nine oclock that morning just across the District line in Maryland at a place called the Valley of Chance in the village of Bladensburg. Decatur had come there in response to a challenge from Commodore James Barron, another naval officer, who had also been wounded in the encounter, but was expected to recover.

Details of the quarrel between the two men were still sketchy, but it was thought to have had its origin in an 1808 court-martial of Barron in which Decatur had sat as one of the judges. The court had convicted Barron and in the twelve years since the two men had neither met nor spoken until that very morning on the dueling grounds.

Twelve years! How could such a feud fester for so long? There was speculation that the quarrel might have been deliberately kept alive and encouraged by others. But for what dark reasons? Suspicions quickly fell on the duelists two seconds, who were also high-ranking naval officers, Commodore William Bainbridge and Captain Jesse Duncan Elliott. Both men had already fled the city for the safety of Virginia, and there were rumorswhich later proved unfoundedthat the Navy Department had ordered the arrest of both men.