Caribbean Sea near Grand Cayman Island

November 26, 1814

Sixty warships leave Jamaica with about half the army sent to invade the US. Sails billow in a fair breeze over the bright blue Caribbean. They look like birds of prey with wings spread. The best of the Royal Navy, led by 20-gun sloops, 40-gun and 50-gun frigates. The fleet includes ships-of-the-line of sixty-four, seventy-four, eighty-guns, as well as 30-gun brigs, troop ships, supply ships. In all, over a thousand pieces of artillery close on America. The greatest navy the world, Britain’s heart-of-oak, the oak barrier no nation can defeat, extends British might across the globe.

from BATTLE KISS, Part 1, “The Redcoats are Coming” www.oneildenoux.net