The HMS Cherub, as it appeared in Goderich Harbour in 1866.
Photo used with appreciation
The year 1866 was a crisis point in Anglo-American relations. Now that the southern states were vanquished, many in the United States felt it was time to fulfill its Manifest Destiny by annexing Canada to secure America’s northern border. The Fenian Brotherhood was more than willing to speed events along by threatening an invasion of British North America.
When the The Huron Signal reported in April that some ‘wag’ had mistaken the first ships of the season for “Fenian gunboats bristling with cannons and swarming with men,” Goderich Mayor J.V. Detlor called a special council meeting to request troops to defend the port. Immediately, the Huron Rifles and a volunteer company from New Hamburg were dispatched to Goderich.
Shovels were provided from the town to the riflemen for the digging of trenches around the port to repel a potential invasion. Town Council moved to pay ‘married’ men of the Rifles and Goderich Garrison Artillery 50 cents per day while on duty.
Although the Fenians never showed, General William Tecumseh Sherman did on Friday, 15 June 1866 aboard the ironclad USS Michigan.
As he received Mayor Detlor and the American Consul aboard ship, General Sherman’s reputation would have preceded him. Nicknamed the “Mad General,” Sherman was revered in the north for his famed March to the Sea that broke the back of the Confederacy during the Civil War.
Paradoxically, he was the most hated man in the south. His scorched earth policy burned a swath of destruction stretching from Atlanta to Savannah. Stories of the merciless cruelty of Sherman’s army would fuel southern resistance to federal authority (i.e. civil rights) for nearly a century.
In Goderich, the editor of The Huron Signal lavished praise on the appearance of the Michigan’s 24 man crew as he toured the ship. The Michigan’s guns were prominently displayed on deck to impress the Goderich delegation.
The militia which had taken to the trenches at the Michigan’s approach was immediately drawn up for the General’s inspection. Sherman was generous in his praise of the “smart and efficient appearance” of the volunteers. Yet, he must also have recognized that these were not the faces of the battle hardened veterans he had commanded barely a year before.
Did any of the awe-struck militiamen wonder that their celebrity visitor under different circumstances would not have hesitated to order this lakeside town to be put to the torch as he had ordered countless times before?
General Sherman and his entourage were driven around the town square before going to Dark’s British Exchange Hotel for a formal banquet. Bill Barlow’s Links to the Past records the toasts exchanged to the Queen Victoria and the President.
General Sherman gave a rather belligerent speech trumpeting the greatness of American arms. Belligerence seems to have been a Sherman trademark. Years later, when Sherman commanded army operations out west he summed up in brutal simplicity America’s Indian policy when he allegedly said that “the only good Indian is a dead Indian.” (Actually, what he said was “the only good Indians I ever saw were dead”). Bombast aside, Sherman was enthusiastically cheered by his hosts.
General Sherman’s visit either reassured or intimidated Mayor Detlor enough to disband five of the eight volunteer companies in Goderich immediately. Only the Seaforth and New Hamburg companies and the artillery gunners remained.
However, higher authorities must have been concerned by General Sherman’s impromptu visit as a gunboat was immediately sent to Goderich. The American Consul in Goderich was replaced within weeks.
Had General Sherman visited Goderich in August, he would have been impressed and possibly alarmed by the arrival of the Royal Navy gunboat, HMS Cherub, under the command of Lieutenant Huntley. Unlike the ill-trained militia volunteers, the Cherub’s crew were well armed and disciplined seamen.
HMS Cherub was the newest of three Britomart class of gunboats sent to defend Canadian ports on the Upper Lakes. Launched in 1865 in Portsmouth, England, the Cherub was 120 feet in length, 22 feet abeam, and, had an eight foot draught with a 200 horse power steam engine. The Huron Signal boasted of the Cherub’s two powerful 68 pound Armstrong breech loading guns, in addition to her 40 and 110 pound cannons.
However, more than the gunboat’s weaponry, the presence of the Royal Navy's Ensign on Lake Huron was an unmistakable warning to the Fenians that Britain was committed to defending this remote outpost of empire.
The Cherub was backed up by the guns and hulls of the Royal Navy. The most powerful and successful armed force since Rome's legions.
As the new American consul watched the gunnery drill of the Cherub’s 56-man crew, The Huron Signal gleefully reported that it was “a sight such as has never been witnessed in Goderich.
The ring of the big guns was deafening.” The paper went on to brag that “we doubt not, if the gallant commander had serious work to do, his jolly tars… would make precious short work of any Fenian fleet.”
It was an accurate assessment. The Cherub’s guns would have easily penetrated the armour of any American ironclad on the lakes at the time. The presence of the Cherub was duly noted by the American Consul residing in Goderich.
General Sherman’s arrival on the USS Michigan and the subsequent stationing of the HMS Cherub in 1866 was a not so subtle attempt at gunboat diplomacy. If the Fenian intent was to intimidate Canada, it backfired. The drama acted out on the Great Lakes’ shores convinced British North America of the need to unite for a common defence. The result was the Dominion of Canada in 1867.
When the Cherub arrived in Goderich in 1866, Canada was a colony when she sailed away for the final time, in 1868, Canada had become a nation.
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