Brilliant victory, song----composed on the capture of the British schooner Dominico, mounting 16 guns, by the Decatur privateer of 7 guns

Reports of this action between an American privateer and a British schooner south of Bermuda on August 5, 1813, first appeared in the Charleston newspapers on August 21. Two weeks later the Boston Independent Chronicle repeated the reports from a classic New England slant. The opening section, “More Naval Laurels,” crowed about a success in which British losses were greater than the American, never mind that the American vessel was a privateer. “It would seem as if Heaven smiled upon a righteous cause, and shielded the American warrior in the hour of battle: As if those who gloriously fought for ‘Free Trade and Sailors’ Rights’ were under the peculiar protection of a Providence divine” (September 6, 1813).

“Decatur” was a popular privateer name, there having been at least three. The one mentioned here in Brilliant Victory almost certainly was the seven-gun schooner captained by Dominique Diron, who had previously captained a French privateer.

The text and the double-spaced layout—the short text is stretched to fill the broadside—suggests that Coverly and his poet were responding quickly to late-breaking news. The poetry is uneven in meter and composition and the title is sensationalist, hoping to capitalize on people’s desire for good war news.