On the Lakes 307 



nail testified before a Court of Inquiry in 1815, that 

 there were but 131 men and boys of every descrip- 

 tion on board the Lawrence in the action ; and the 

 Niagara was said to have had but 140. Lieutenant 

 Yarnall also said that "but 103 men on board the 

 Lawrence were fit for duty'* ; as Captain Perry in his 

 letter said that 31 were unfit for duty, this would 

 make a total of 134. So I shall follow the prize- 

 money list; at any rate the difference in number is 

 so slight as to be immaterial. Of the 532 men whose 

 names the list gives, 45 were volunteers, or lands- 

 men, from among the surrounding inhabitants ; 1 58 

 were marines or soldiers (I do not know which, 

 as the list gives marines, soldiers, and privates, and 

 it is impossible to tell which of the two former heads 

 include the last) ; and 329 were officers, seamen, 

 cooks, pursers, chaplains, and supernumeraries. Of 

 the total number, there were on the day of action, 

 according to Perry's report, 116 men unfit for duty, 

 including 31 on board the Lawrence, 28 on board 

 the Niagara, and 57 on the small vessels. 



All the later American writers put the number of 

 men in Barclay's fleet precisely at "502," but I have 

 not been able to find out the original authority. 

 James ("Naval Occurrences," p. 289) says the Brit- 

 ish had but 345, consisting of 50 seamen, 85 Cana- 

 dians, and 210 soldiers. But the letter of Adjutant- 

 General E. Bayne, Nov. 24, 1813, states that there 

 were 250 soldiers aboard Barclay's squadron, of 

 whom 23 were killed, 49 wounded, and the balance 

 (178) captured; and James himself on a previous 



