John Ordronaux (16 December 1778 – 24 August 1841) was one of the most successful privateers of the War of 1812 between the United States and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. During the war he commanded two ships, Marengo, then Prince de Neufchatel. With these he captured or destroyed about thirty British merchant ships, outran about seventeen British warships and brought back goods to the US worth between $250,000 and $300,000.
First command: Marengo
Ordronaux was born at Nantes, Brittany, France to a French merchant skipper, John Ordronaux (senior) and an English mother, Joanna Hammond from the city of Hull, England. At the outbreak of the war on 18 June 1812, he commanded the French privateer Marengo which had been outfitted in New York City in November 1811. His patron was a French lady called Florye Charretton, who was allegedly a Parisian woman of considerable wealth.
On 23 June 1812 Marengo was in New London and being watched by the British 36-gun frigate (Captain Richard Byron). However Belvidera was sighted and chased away by and her squadron (Captain John Rodgers) allowing Marengo to capture the English brigantine Lady Sherbroke from Halifax, Nova Scotia. This prize was sent into New York on 10 August 1812. Marengo then went on to take the brigantines Eliza (Captain Sullivan) of Guernsey, and Lady Provost (Captain Jennings) of Halifax, Nova Scotia. This document suggests that Ordronaux was a gentleman and that he treated his prisoners of war sympathetically. It describes him handing over eighteen named prisoners to the British Consul at Fayal in the Azores Islands on 17 August 1812. The prisoners included two masters and three mates and an exchange was made for the same number of American prisoners of war. Jacques Bidois is named as the commander of Marengo in this document but he is thought to have been Ordronaux's mate at this time. In mid October 1812, Bidois is listed as master of Marengo in a book which also records her as having only six guns and a crew of fifty men. So her three captured prizes must have seemed a considerable success.
On 29 August 1812 Marengo captured the British brigantine Concord (Captain Taylor) between Tenerife and Fuerteventura according to Lloyd's List Marine Collection. Concord was taken to New York to auction as a prize Captain Taylor said in court evidence that he was allowed to mess with Marengo's officers on this trans-Atlantic voyage providing further evidence that her crew acted in a gentlemanly way to her prisoners. On arrival in New York the neutral Spanish owners of part of Concord'''s cargo of wine sued Florye Charretton and Ordronaux for the loss of their property and the 190 or so pages of court documents that have survived in the US archives provide much information about the effect of privateering on mercantile trade in this period.
Because of his involvement in this litigation and in arranging for the sale by auction of his prizes and their cargoes, Ordronaux was inactive as a privateer for approximately the next twelve months.Prize and related records of the District Courts of the United States – Record Group 21, M855, US Circuit Court – Southern District of New York, Roll 2, Case 36 – Florye Charetton & crew of Privateer Marengo v. Brig. Eliza, 1813. The sale of Concord alone raised the sum of $24,409. This was shared between her owners and each named member of her crew in proportions given in the surviving court documents. But most significantly, Ordronaux now had sufficient funds to buy a ship of his own.
Second command: Prince de Neufchatel
The response of the British to the successes of the small, early American privateers was to defend their ships more heavily. So during 1813 a number of ship builders on the East coast of the US built larger, faster, more heavily armed privateering vessels. Now enriched by his prize winnings and supported by his patron, Mme Charretton, Ordronaux purchased one of this new breed of ships, the Prince de Neufchatel, which was constructed in New York between 1812 and 1813 by the firm of Adam and Noah Brown to a design attributed to Christian Bergh. On 28 October 1813, he took command of the Prince de Neufchatel, and showing considerable skill, sailed her to Cherbourg virtually unarmed, arriving there on 27 January 1814 for fitting out. Showing further panache, Ordronaux managed to capture his next prize Hazard (Captain John Anderson) on 18 January, before his ship was properly fitted out.