Published on the 26th of September in 1814 in the Delaware Gazette & State Journal out of Wilmington, DE
[For the Delaware
Gazette,]
Com. Thomas
Macdonough
The hero of Champlain
was born at the Trap, in New Castle County and state of Delaware, in Dec. 1783.
His father, Dr. Thomas Macdonough, was born at the same place and was practising
Physic there at the beginning of the revolutionary war. At the particular
request of his friend, Col. Haslet, who was killed at Princeton, he took the
command of a battalion of the Delaware regiment. After his tour of duty was
performed, he returned to his native state, where he took the command of a
regiment of militia, and where he was afterwards appointed an associate judge
in the Court of Common Pleas, in which office he continued until his death in
1795. The Doctor’s father, James Macdonough, was a respectable inhabitant of
the county and died at a very advanced age in 1792. Dr. Thomas Macdonough left
four sons, James, Thomas, Samuel, and John – James, the elder, entered as a
Midshipman on board the Constellation with Capt. Truxton; and, after
distinguishing himself under that gallant commander, returned to his native
state, disabled by the loss of a leg, sustained in the capture of the
insurgent. – At his return Thomas was peacefully employed in a store, in
Middletown, in his native state; but catching form James the Soldier’s flame,
he entered as his brother had done, as a Midshipman in the naval service of his
country. He was then about 17 years of age; and in a profession thus
voluntarily and ardently embraced, he was not likely to remain long
undistinguished. A speck of war only was seen in our political horizon, and against
the Tripolitans the opportunities for enterprise, were very rare. – These,
however, when they did occur were embraced by our naval heroes with and
eagerness, and executed with an intrepidity and skill which not only astonished
the world, but even themselves. Sympathy which gave a single force to their
united action, and a generous emulation which stimulated their courage almost
to desperation, gave to Great Britain an ominous presage of their future
greatness, to their country the loudest and proudest hopes, and made their
Barbarian enemy exclaim “ they are more than mortals.” Among such as these
Macdonough was eminently, distinguished, and by his conduct in the destruction
of the Philadelphia, and the subsequent capture of a Tripolitan gun boat, by
the side of Decatur, he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant.
Without the patronage
of friends, our young hero advanced by his courage and conduct form the humble
birth of Midshipman to a command which covered the heart of the nation, a
command by the experience of former wars proved to be of vital importance –
where everything was to be created by his genius and protected by his
vigilance.
In a very gloomy
moment he answered the hopes of his countrymen, and in a radiance of glory
dispelled the menacing storm. But it was not he! It was the Lord of Hosts who
stopped to show to an offending nation, in a moment of despondence, that he
will listen to the prayers and nerve the arm of a Christian Hero. An habitual
respect for the Christian religion is often mistaken for Christianity, and
pressed into service to form the character of the Soldier. – Not such are the
claims of Macdonough. His religion appears to be of the vital nature which
reached the heart, tempers the affections, and regulates the actions. It may be
said in spiritual, as in temporal affairs, that he has fought the good fight
and came off more than conqueror. In a letter to a relative, in Delaware,
written in June last, after expressing his warm regard for the place of his
nativity, and friends of his youth, and promising to visit them if God should
spare his life till the close of the present season, he declares the happiness
he derives from his reliance upon the merits and attunement of Christ, and
earnestly recommends to them a religious life as the only one, which good sense
would point out to those continued that there is another world. To his
Brother’s widow, left in slender circumstances, he tenders liberal pecuniary
aid, and delicately released her from all obligation on that store, by declaring
that it is his religion which makes him the widow’s friend. A victory, obtained
under the command of such a hero, ought to inspire us with the hope, that God
will stay his avenging hand if the people will look up to and acknowledge him
to be their God. Let the example of Macdonough teach those to whom the nation
has confided its sword, that Religion does not unnerve the arm of the brave,
nor lessen the authority of its votary. Before he went into action, he
prostrated himself with his crew, before the most high and confiding he the
Almighty, they fearlessly met the enemy. When he saw hostile fleet approaching
he observed to those around him “they are superiors in force, but by the
blessing of God we can beat them.” And so indeed he did. The world has often been
called upon to witness the prodigious effect of religion in exalting the human
energies. Without recurring to the memorable areas of Joshua, David, and Maccabeus,
when a religious dependence on the Lord of Hosts excited to almost supernatural
valor, or to the histories of the Romans,
Greeks, and other Pagan nations, whom favorable omens, by inspiring the
even a superstitious sense of the protection of Heaven, were sure almost to
lead to victory or the combats under banners of the Cross for the tomb of our Saviour,
in which were strikingly displayed the triumph of religious enthusiasm over the
greatest privations and dangers; we see in our day the striking effects of
religion upon an army, which we call Barbarians, but to which enlightened
Europe now owes its deliverance. This army, although composed principally of raw
levies, yet inspired by a religious confidence, his trumped over the best
appointed and discipleship army, let by the most distinguished captain of the
age. The Russian gen. Suwaroff knew the poser of religion in the day of battle,
and always availed himself of with and Irresistible effect, and in the solemn
address of the renowned Kutusoff, and procession of the holy cross, at the
battle of Bernadine, who does not see the soul of that valor, displayed by the
Russians, in that most sanguinary of all conflicts.
Let, then every
officer inculcate by percept and practice, a regular attention to the duties of
religion and God we reward it by a gift of more than mortal strength and valor.
Various forms of
religious duties have been ordered, in all armies from a conviction of their unity
but they can never be effectual, unless they are felt as more than forms, by
officers and soldiers.
