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Updated: June 27, 2025
Had Lige Thomas been projected from a huge bow-gun he probably would not have leaped forward with much greater quickness than he did in this instance, bowling over the Professor as he sprang by him, and making for the spring m mighty strides. "Leave him alone!" he roared. The guide had heard and understood. He was hurrying to the rescue.
The lieutenant, however, had made up his mind to have all three, and, disregarding their shots, he pulled away after the first, at the same time firing his bow-gun at her rigging. She was a fast vessel, and was leading the boat out of harbour. The other two dhows, seeing this, began to hoist their sails for the purpose of slipping out astern of her.
He was cut in two by a cannon-shot while in the act of ramming home a cartridge in the bow-gun of the Jolly Bachelor. Standing close to poor Ellis at the fatal moment was a fine promising young middy, Charles Johnson, a nephew of Mr. Brooke's, who fortunately escaped unhurt. This, and two others badly wounded, were the only accidents on our side.
On one occasion a party of congressmen from Washington started down the Potomac for an excursion to Hampton Roads. Their vessel was a small tug, which carried a bow-gun carefully screened from observation by tarpaulin. A short distance down the river, a boat with a howitzer was seen putting out into the stream, and shaping its course directly across the bows of the tug.
Then they saw a steamer crowded with men rushing toward the flagship without firing a shot, and evidently intending to board. Capt. Broome, with a crew of marines, was working a bow-gun on the "Hartford." Carefully he trained the huge piece upon the approaching steamer.
The "Congress" was the first ship in range, and a puff of smoke from the "Merrimac's" bow-gun warned the crew of the frigate that danger was coming. All held their breath an instant, until, with a clatter and whiz, a storm of grape-shot rattled against her sides, and whistled through the rigging. Then came a sigh of relief that it was no worse.
Some o' the stuff in here's worth havin' th' gold mugs an' boxes, an' that old gold bow-gun that you're so busted about but what does th' whole of it amount to, anyway, when you come t' divide it up among four men an' a jackass? I guess even th' jackass ud turn up his nose at it if he knowed what a lot more there was that was t' be had just for grabbin' it an' packin' it along.
"Clear away a bow-gun," cried Mark, to Betts "something dreadful must have happened; that brig is in possession of the savages, who do not know how to handle her!" This announcement produced a stir on board the Rancocus, as may well be imagined. If the savages had the brig, they probably had the group also; and what had become of the colonists?
This time she struck full on the frigate's side. The shock was terrible. Men on the gun-deck of the ram were hurled to the deck, with the blood streaming from their nostrils. The frigate keeled over farther and farther, until all thought that she would be borne beneath the water by the pressure of the ram. All the time the spiteful bow-gun of the iron monster was hurling its bolts into her hull.
The governor could hardly believe it; and, as for Betts, he protested loudly it could not be so. "Is that bow-gun ready?" demanded the governor. "Ay, ay, sir; all ready." "Fire, but elevate well we will only frighten them, at first. We betide them, if they resist." Betts did fire, and to the astonishment of everybody, the brig returned a broadside!
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