HISTORY

June 1, 1814
Battle of Cedar Point

On 1 June 1814, The Chesapeake flotilla, led by Com. Barney in the USS Scorpion, moved down the bay and encountered the 12-gun schooner HMS St Lawrence (the captured US privateer Atlas), and boats from the 74-gun frigates HMS Dragon and HMS Albion near St. Jerome Creek. The flotilla pursued St Lawrence and the boats until they reached the protection of the two frigates. The American flotilla then retreated back to the upper Patuxent River, which the British blockaded unable to follow into the shallow waters. The British outnumbered Barney by 7:1, forcing the flotilla on June 7 to retreat into St. Leonard's Creek. Two British frigates, the 38-gun HMS Loire and the 32-gun HMS Narcissus, plus the 18-gun sloop-of-war HMS Jasseur, blockaded the mouth of the creek.

Battles continued through June 10th. The British, frustrated by their inability to flush Barney out of his safe retreat, instituted a "campaign of terror," laying waste to "town and farm alike" and plundering and burning Calverton, Huntingtown, Prince Frederick, Benedict and Lower Marlboro. Among the British units that participated in the campaign were a battalion of Royal Marines and the Corps of Colonial Marines, a unit that the British had recruited from among former American slaves.