HMS Chippeway (1812)

HMS Chippawa, or Chippeway (slang var.), was the mercantile schooner Chippawa, built and launched in 1810. The British brought her into service as HM Schooner Chippawa, sometimes recorded as Chippeway.

The United States later captured her at the Battle of Lake Erie, and brought her into service, as USS Chippewa. A storm drove her aground in October 1813, where a British force burned her in December.

Career
The small merchant schooner Chippawa, built in Chippawa, Ontario, Canada, in 1810, was under the command of her builder Captain Anderson Martin  or perhaps his brother Capt. Budd Martin, and trading on the Great Lakes. At the outbreak of the War of 1812 she was ferrying supplies and furs. The British initially armed Chippawa with two guns, and brought her into the Provincial Marine under the command of Lieutenant Rollette. During the one-month armistice in August 1812, Chippawa carried General Isaac Brock on Lake Erie. She was armed with only one gun and under the command of Master's Mate J. Campbell when on 10 September 1813 the American sloop USS Trippe (1812) captured her during the Battle of Lake Erie. The Americans concentrated their fire on the larger British vessels and Chippawa came under fire when she went to help them. The Americans then captured her and Little Belt while they were trying to escape. Her only casualty was Campbell, who was slightly wounded in the action.

The Americans took her into service as USS Chippewa, under the command of Acting Midshipman Robert S. Tatem. She then carried the baggage of the 27th and 28th regiments of Infantry from Put-in-Bay, Ohio.

Fate
A storm on 12 October drove Chippewa ashore near Buffalo. A later storm on 25–26 October drove Little Belt, Trippe, and USS Ariel (1813) ashore too at Buffalo. All efforts to refloat them failed, and on 30 December the British landing party that captured the Navy yard at Black Rock, New York (now a neighborhood of Buffalo), burned them during the Battle of Buffalo.