Beadle's Dime New York Library No. 657

# Long Tom Dart, the Yankee Privateer

This serial by Colonel E. Z. C. Judson (Ned Buntline) presents a naval action story set during the War of 1812. Long Tom Dart, a tall Salem sea captain, outfits his aging single-masted sloop as a privateer after his two sons are impressed into British naval service. With aid from townspeople and Deacon Jasper Doolittle, he mounts a captured sixty-four-pounder brass cannon aboard the renamed vessel Terror.

The story's action climax depicts the Terror attacking an English gun-brig fishing offshore. Through tactical maneuvering along a reef, Captain Dart positions his sloop to rake the brig with point-blank cannon fire. Three successive shots from "Old Ebenezer" destroy the enemy's steering gear and mainmast. Outgunned and sinking, the brig strikes colors. Dart captures the three boats of survivors, demands the return of his impressed sons from a nearby frigate, and returns to harbor flying his captured flag.