Episode 2 of 2

Java burned; survivors face court martial

When: 1 January – 23 April 1813
Where: off Brazil and at the subsequent court martial
Part of: USS Constitution defeats HMS Java

Bainbridge ordered Java burned on New Year's Day 1813; her surviving officers and men faced court martial aboard HMS Gladiator in April 1813.

On New Year's Day 1813, two days after the engagement, Bainbridge gave the order to set Java ablaze, and she subsequently blew up. Constitution returned to São Salvador on 1 January 1813 to disembark Java's prisoners, where she met Hornet and her two British prizes. On 23 April 1813, Lieutenant Chads and the other surviving officers and men of Java faced the customary court martial aboard HMS Gladiator for the loss of their ship.

Sources

HMS Java (1811) Wikipedia, revision of 2026-05-06
USS Constitution Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-13

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.