W. Barnard after Joshua Cartwright, The Cambrian of Boston, Willm. Marshall Master. Beating off a French Butter Privateer, on 23 October 1804. Boston, C. Cave, 1805.
In the fall of 1804, the British ship Cambrian was part of a blockade of New York Harbor. This print depicts the ship engaging a French cutter (several French ships were blocked in the harbor at the time) just outside of New York Harbor. The dispute was part of the Napoleonic Wars being fought in Europe and would help to raise American ire prior to the War of 1812, where the young United States of America would have to assert itself on the open seas to fight back against privateering and impressments. The Society’s holdings of pre-1820 engravings are exceptionally strong.
