The image portrays the end of a confrontation between the British Post Office Falmouth Packet, Hinchinbrook, on the left of the picture, and the American privateer, Grand Turk of Salem, on the right, on 1st May 1814. Both vessels are two-masted, square-rigged, flying pennants at their mainmast heads, and with their lower sails furled for action. All their sails are tattered and holed, with foresails trailing in the sea, main and topsails flapping in a following wind. Smoke from the portside cannons of the Hinchinbrook hangs in the air. The British ensign flies from the broken stern gaff of the Hinchinbrook, while the Grand Turk carries the American flag. Land is just visible in the distance.
The print illustrates very well Arthur H. Norway’s description of the action in History of the Post-Office Packet Service, 1895, p. 283. The Hinchinbrook was homeward bound from the West Indies when it encountered the American privateer off the Azores (presumably the shoreline in the distance). After fighting for over an hour the Americans twice tried to board the Hinchinbrook but were repelled by the netting (which can be seen on the deck). As the American vessel sailed clear, the Hinchinbrook luffed into the following wind, so turning across the privateer's stern, allowing the portside canons to deliver a broadside on the privateer. The privateer then fled.
The "9lb long brass guns" mentioned in the inscription are referred to in Norway (1895, p .283) as "Post Office guns" issued to the Atlantic packets.
Captain William James was no stranger to attacks by privateers or to being shipwrecked. As master of the Post Office Falmouth packet Duke of Marlborough he was slightly injured in the foot while fighting off a privateer off Barbados. The Hinchinbrook in this image was the second packet of this name, the first (also captained by William James) having been lost in a hurricane off the Bahamas in 1813 (L.E. Britnor, History of the Sailing Packets to the West Indies, 1973, pp. 90-112).