Probably the most valuable prize taken in the war fell to her guns--the ship "Queen," with a cargo invoiced at L90,000.

Indeed, such had been her audacity, and so many her successes, that the British were eager for her capture or destruction, above that of any other privateer.
In September, 1814, the "General Armstrong," now under command of Captain Samuel G.Reid, was at anchor in the harbor at Fayal, a port of Portugal, when her commander saw a British war-brig come nosing her way into the harbor.

Soon after another vessel appeared, and then a third, larger than the first two, and all flying the British ensign.

Captain Reid immediately began to fear for his safety.

It was true that he was in a neutral port, and under the law of nations exempt from attack, but the British had never manifested that extreme respect for neutrality that they exacted of President Washington when France tried to fit out privateers in our ports.
More than once they had attacked and destroyed our vessels in neutral ports, and, indeed, it seemed that the British test of neutrality was whether the nation whose flag was thus affronted, was able or likely to resent it.