They were not only unaccustomed to the ship--though they knew of its reputation as an unlucky one--but were unacquainted with one another and nearly all were strangers to the officers.

The best of these were absent from illness and other causes.
Worse than all, many were in a maudlin state of drunkenness when the _Chesapeake_ started out with flags flying to engage the well-manned _Shannon_.
On the way down the bay some of the _Chesapeake's_ crew impudently notified Lawrence that they would not fight unless they received the prize money earned a short time before.

It was a humiliating situation for the young commander, but he was virtually in the face of the enemy and he issued prize checks to the malcontents.

Well aware of the character of the foe he was about to encounter, he must have looked upon the meeting with foreboding.

Maclay uses these impressive words: [Illustration: THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE "CHESAPEAKE" AND THE "SHANNON."] "The calm deliberation with which the American and English commanders went out to seek each other's life and the earnestness with which they urged their officers and men to steep their hands in the blood of their fellow beings form one of the sombre pictures of naval history.
Lawrence was the youngest son of John Lawrence, Esquire, counselor-at-law at Burlington, N.J., and was the second in command at the celebrated capture of the _Philadelphia_ in the harbor of Tripoli.
Broke was the descendant of an ancient family which had lived in Broke Hall, England, over three hundred and fifty years and for four hundred years at Leighton.