On The British Invasion

1814

From France, desponding and betray'd, From liberty in ruins laid, Exulting Britain has display'd Her flag, again to invade us.

Her myrmidons, with murdering eye, Across the broad Atlantic fly Prepared again their strength to try, And strike our country's standard.

Lord Wellington's ten thousand slaves,[A] And thrice ten thousand, on the waves, And thousands more of brags and braves Are under sail, and coming

[A] Lord Wellington's army embarked on the river Garonne, in France, in several divisions, for the invasion of the United States, amounting, it was said, to sixty or seventy thousand men.--Freneau's note.

To burn our towns, to seize our soil, To change our laws, our country spoil, And Madison to Elba's isle To send without redemption.

In Boston state they hope to find A yankee host of kindred mind To aid their arms, to rise and bind Their countrymen in shackles:

But no such thing--it will not do-- At least, not while a Jersey Blue Is to the cause of freedom true, Or the bold Pennsylvanian.

A curse on England's frantic schemes! Both mad and blind--her monarch dreams Of crowns and kingdoms in these climes Where kings have had their sentence.

Though Washington has left our coast, Yet other Washingtons we boast, Who rise, instructed by his ghost, To punish all invaders.

Go where they will, where'er they land, This pilfering, plundering, pirate band, They liberty will find at hand To hurl them to perdition:

If in Virginia they appear, Their fate is fix'd, their doom is near, Death in their front and hell their rear-- So says the gallant buckskin.

All Carolina is prepared, And Charleston doubly on her guard; Where, once, sir Peter badly fared, So blasted by fort Moultrie.

If farther south they turn their views, With veteran troops, or veteran crews, The curse of heaven their march pursues To send them all a-packing:

The tallest mast that sails the wave, The longest keel its waters lave, Will bring them to an early grave On the shores of Pensacola.

This poem was written early in August, on receipt of the news that a large squadron was on its way across the Atlantic to lay waste the seaboard cities. The squadron finally sailed into Chesapeake Bay and turned its attention first to Washington and Baltimore.