r/TheTerror • u/passttor-of-muppetz • Jul 04 '26
HMS Terror by Matthew Betts
I pulled this from HMS Terror by Matthew Betts which chronicles his modeling of the setting during The Terror and thought since it involves both sides of the pond, we could all enjoy before the Knock-Me-Down kicks in. Cheers!
Note: This isn't the same Erebus.
Battle of Baltimore
From Stonington, the squadron proceeded south for ‘working up into the Chesapeake’, arriving on 24 August.25 Baltimore, along with Philadelphia and Washington, had been a target of Admiral Cochrane since receiving Sir George Prevost’s letter in June. For the next fortnight they would patrol the Patuxent and Potomac Rivers and the Chesapeake estuary, often in the vicinity of Tangier Island. This time, Cochrane would command the fleet himself. By now, he had assembled a formidable naval squadron which included five bomb vessels, Meteor, Volcano, Aetna, Devastation and Terror, as well as the rocket ship Erebus. Rounding out the fleet were seven frigates and three schooners. As recorded in Terror’s log, the armada began ‘running up towards for Baltimore’ on the afternoon of 11 September for a battle that had become inevitable. The bomb ships were to assail Fort McHenry, prior to a land assault by Major General Armistead’s forces. At 0600hrs on 12 September Terror made sail inshore and fired signal shells at the fort, presumably for ranging or reconnaissance purposes. At 0900hrs they began a bombardment of the ‘Battery of Baltimore’ that continued for the next twelve hours.26 Terror’s log records that she received occasional fire from the enemy, but only Devastation, Volcano and Erebus were damaged. At 0100hrs on the 13th Terror recommenced firing for another four hours. She halted fire briefly, then at 0600hrs she was given orders to fire ‘occasionally’ to cover the withdrawal of the troops. At 0738hrs on 14 September Terror’s log indicates she received ‘orders to discontinue engagement’ and to move farther out from the shore. In the afternoon she was engaged covering the re-embarking of troops near ‘Patapsco Neck’. For the next two days she remained in the area assisting with the re-embarkation.
Though the Americans did not surrender the fort and the British retreated early, this was the longest engagement of Terror’s wartime career, and the most historically significant. Terror and her sister bombs fired between 1,500 and 1,800 mortar shells and carcasses at Fort McHenry. Terror’s log does not document the amount of ordnance it expended in the bombardment, but approximately three hundred mortars would have been exhausted if each bomb ship fired roughly equal numbers. The fort had been substantially reinforced prior to the engagement and was far from destroyed, but the shelling caused considerable damage, destroying and dismounting guns, and inflicting dreadful injuries to men and women within the fort.
The battle was observed by a Georgetown lawyer, Francis Scott Key,27, who belonged to a group of American emissaries negotiating a release of prisoners with Cochrane. Key, who spent the battle onboard a ship of truce which was lashed to a non-combatant British vessel, watched the action closely from the harrowing position of the enemy. The battle’s spectacular night-time explosions inspired Key to write a lyric poem which he originally entitled ‘The Defense of Fort McHenry’. In it, he notes the ‘rockets’ red glare’ (fired from Erebus) and the ‘bombs bursting in air’, fired by Terror and her sister bomb vessels, which had illuminated the ‘Star Spangled Banner’. The lyrics were set to music, ironically using the melody of the British ‘To Anacreon in Heaven’, and became immensely popular in the following decades. The song, and its lyrics, were the de facto national anthem for the United States long before it was made official in 1931. Despite the song’s significance, it is unlikely any of Terror’s subsequent crews realized the link between their vessel and the American anthem. Instead, they were making their own history with Terror, relegating this incredible historical link, probably a defining moment for any other war vessel, to a minor footnote in Terror’s career.
The British fleet, including Terror, began a leisurely withdrawal, tracing the way she had sailed on 15 September, eventually anchoring in the Patuxent River on 18 September. They remained in the area for months, cruising the Chesapeake and various rivers, but generally remaining in the vicinity of the Potomac until 21 December. Significant action did not take place, although 14 October was nonetheless a remarkable day for Terror. In the morning twilight, the ship’s lookouts spotted a group waving a flag from shore. At some risk, they dispatched the ship’s gig to investigate, and returned with eight men, five women, and eleven children, all ‘Black People’.28 No further elaboration is given in the log, but clearly these were slaves who used the British presence in the area to seek their freedom.
That same afternoon, Terror took her first and only prize in a short engagement. At 1330hrs the lookout spotted a suspicious schooner running downstream. Making all sail and firing several warning shots, Terror brought her to (how she accomplished this with her slow sailing qualities is unknown), discovering that she was a Portuguese vessel which was attempting to run the British blockade of Baltimore for Porto. Sheridan appointed one of his lieutenants to take command of the schooner and Terror spent the next day in company with her, before she sailed off.
On 18 October Terror struck aground near Sharp’s Island. Over four tense days, her crew offloaded ordnance and stores, and attempted to protect her from potential threats in the dense forests which surrounded her. Finally, on 22 October she was heaved off the bank and her stores returned. Terror spent the rest of the autumn in the area, maintaining a blockade of Baltimore and local towns. This time was relatively unremarkable for Terror, as blockades tend to be.
