“COME AND TAKE IT!”

The colony of Georgia was a late arrival to our Revolutionary War, her citizens needing British protection from hostile Creeks and Cherokees to their west.  Nevertheless, the Continental Congress authorized the construction of forts to protect Georgia’s (then) two most important coastal centers, Savannah and Sunbury.  Sunbury, on the Medway River, was a thriving export center for lumber, rice, and indigo, and the southern Georgia entry port for manufactured goods.  Fort construction began on a bluff jutting into the Medway just below the town.  Protected on three sides by impassable marsh, the unusually large earthen fort enclosed an acre-sized parade ground–large enough to accommodate most of the town’s residents.  The longest wall (275 feet) faced the river and mounted the largest of 24 cannon.  A surrounding moat further discouraged unwanted entry.  The fort was completed in the summer of 1777 and garrisoned with a newly formed company of artillery under CAPT Thomas Morris, for whom the fort was named.

It was British Florida, and its garrison at St. Augustine, that was the most immediate threat.   When MGEN Sir Henry Clinton sent a force from New York to the Carolinas in 1778, British BGEN Augustine Prevost, in St. Augustine, was ordered to push north in a coordinated attack to open an additional front and divide the southern colonies.  Prevost dutifully marched 400 troops against the Medway basin by land.  As a diversion he detached 500 men under LCOL Lewis Fuser to sail up the intercoastal waterways and “present themselves” off Sunbury.  Prevost’s march went better than expected, ahead of schedule.  The only resistance he encountered, on November 24^th, was a series of easy skirmishes with poorly organized colonials along the Savannah-Darien road (known as the “Battle of Medway”).  Not finding Fuser of Sunbury as expected, he burned the Medway Meeting House, “liberated” livestock, and turned back southward on the 25^th.

Contrary winds delayed Fuser’s arrival until this day, and when he disembarked his troops at Sunbury, he found that news of Prevost’s march had scurried the townspeople into Fort Morris.  He sent a note to the new commander, LCOL John McIntosh, demanding the 200-man garrison surrender the fort–to which McIntosh boldly replied, “Come and take it!”  When Fuser next turned and sailed away, elated Americans cheered McIntosh for his bravado against the vaunted Royal Army.

But Fuser’s mission was to link-up with his boss, and hearing that Prevost had doubled-back on his withdrawal and was returning north, Fuser had simply moved to a new rendezvous at Cumberland Island.  From there Prevost struck Sunbury again, overpowering Fort Morris on 10 January 1779 after a three-day siege.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  7-8 DEC 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Guss, John Walker.  Fortresses of Savannah Georgia.  Images of America Series, Charleston, SC: Arcadia Pub., 2002, pp. 17-18.

Searcy, Martha Condray.  The Georgia-Florida Contest in the American Revolution, 1776-1778.  Tuscaloosa, AL: Univ. of Alabama Press, 1985, pp. 118-19, 165-67.

Site visit, Fort Morris State Historical Site, Sunbury, GA, 17 September 2005.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Colonel McIntosh’s full reply was, “We, sir, are fighting the battle of America… As to surrendering the fort, receive this laconic reply:  Come and take it!”

The British occupied Fort Morris for the rest of the war.  They renamed it Fort George in honor of King George III.  The fort fell into disrepair over subsequent decades, but with the War of 1812, Americans reconstructed a smaller earthen fort at the same site, Fort Defiance.  This 1812 construction has been preserved today at Georgia’s Fort Morris State Historical Site, which can be easily reached off I-95 at Georgia Exit 67.

In its heyday, Sunbury was a booming commercial center, though it is difficult to locate on modern maps.  Having been sacked in the Revolutionary War, lashed by hurricanes in 1801 and 1804, scourged with yellow fever in subsequent years, and suffered the erosion of its economic base, the town has all but disappeared.  Only a small cemetery and Fort Morris State Park mark the site today.

“Come and take it!” is a phrase also remembered from the battle of Gonzales, the first battle of Texas’ struggle for independence from Mexico on 2 October 1835.  In reply to the Mexican Army’s request that the Texas garrison surrender their single cannon, the Texans made the famous reply.

The post “Come and Take It!” appeared first on Today in Naval History.

                                    THE BURNING OF FALMOUTH

Royal Navy North American theater commander, VADM Samuel Graves, took a hardline against the rebellious activities of Patriots in New England’s coastal towns.  He ordered Royal Navy LT Henry Mowat in HMS CANCEAUX, 6, to, “lay waste, burn and destroy” the seaports of Marblehead, Salem, Newbury, Cape Ann, Portsmouth, Ipswich, Saco, and Falmouth—seaports that had been the sites of anti-British stirrings.  Mowat saw this as revenge for an embarrassment he suffered five months earlier when CANCEAUX had been forced to flee Falmouth (modern Portland, Maine) under threat of numerically superior rebel militia (see story of 9 May).  Falmouth became the first target for Mowat’s squadron comprised of CANCEAUX, HMS HALIFAX, 12, HMS SPITFIRE (bomb barge), HMS SYMMETRY, and the privateer CAT, 20.  From Falmouth’s outer harbor on 16 October, Mowat sent a LT ashore with word that in two hours Mowat would “execute a just punishment” against their town “guilty of the most unpardonable rebellion.”  Negotiations subsequently granted a delay if the townspeople would swear loyalty to King George III and surrender small arms and gun carriages.  No oath was forthcoming, and only a few small arms were handed over.  At 0900 on this day the deadline passed.

At 0940 Mowat ran up the Red Ensign to begin the bombardment.  For eight hours British ships hurled 3000 projectiles–solid shot, grape, shell, bombs, carcasses, and musket shot.  As evening fell, Royal Marines were sent ashore to torch what remained.  They encountered scant resistance.  The earlier pause had given many residents the chance to flee.  Only one citizen was killed and one wounded.  Falmouth’s 400 structures were laid utterly waste, leaving 1000 homeless as winter approached.  Fifteen small vessels in Falmouth harbor were burned or captured.  Mowat moved next to Boothbay but had to call off that attack as the decks of his ships proved too weak for the recoil of guns in a prolonged bombardment.  In the four months that followed, Graves similarly struck: Stonington, Connecticut; Bristol, Rhode Island; and on 1 January 1776, Norfolk, Virginia.

 International condemnation ensued as the Continental Congress authorized, on 30 October, the purchase of two additional warships.  The French Foreign Minister proclaimed, “I can hardly believe this absurd and barbaric procedure on the part of an enlightened and civilized nation.”  Even the British home office was alarmed at the brutality unleashed on those who were still British citizens.  VADM Graves was relieved two months later, in part from the backlash over this raid.  Mowat, too, was repeatedly passed over for promotion.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  21-22 OCT 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Leamon. James S.  Revolution Downeast: The War for American Independence in Maine.  Amherst, MA: Univ. of Massachusetts Press, 1993, pp. 70-74.

“Letter from Rev. Jacob Bailey.” IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 2  1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1966, p. 500.

“Master’s Log of H.M. Armed Vessel CANCEAUX.” IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 2  1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1966, pp. 501-02.

“Narrative of Daniel Tucker of Falmouth.” IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 2  1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1966, pp. 500-01.

Sweetman, Jack.  American Naval History:  An Illustrated Chronology of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, 1775-Present, 3^rd ed.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 2002, p. 1.

“Vice Admiral Samuel Graves to Lieutenant Henry Mowat, H.M. Armed Vessel, CANCEAUX.”  IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 2  1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1966, pp. 324-26.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  “Carcasses” are hollow balls filled with flammable material and holed so the firing from a howitzer would ignite the incendiary.  Upon impact the projectile shatters, spreading the flames.

The post The Burning of Falmouth appeared first on Today in Naval History.

                                      THOSE SNEAKY PATRIOTS!

“Our Liberty Folks are really very active in Fomenting a Flame throughout the Province… but [with] 200 Soldiers & a Sloop of War I think that I should be able to keep every thing quiet & orderly.”  Such was the plea of the Crown’s governor of the colony of Georgia, Sir James Wright, to Lord Dartmouth, the British Secretary of State, in December 1774.  Since the Stamp Act in 1765, the Sons of Liberty and the independence-minded Whig political party had been strengthening in Georgia.  An extra-legal congress of the Whigs had formed a Council of Safety–intent on countermanding the power of the governor’s Royal Council.  Patriots had forced a trade ban with the mother country under which all goods bound for England were blocked from leaving port.  Savannah patriots staged their own “tea party” in February 1775, dressing as sailors with blackened faces, to reclaim sugar and molasses awaiting shipment to England in dockside warehouses.  Two British guards were thrown into the river in this raid; one drowned.  Dispossessed of a military force except his militia (who shared rebel sympathies), Wright’s only option was to ask repeatedly for naval and military support from British officials.  On June 27^th he wrote, yet again, to Royal Navy ADM Samuel Graves asking that a cruiser call on Savannah to show the Crown’s resolve.

No such ship appeared.  For serendipitously, the Royal Mail from colonial Georgia all routed through the post office in Charles Town, South Carolina.  Here members of the South Carolina Committee of Safety intercepted Wright’s letter and read the governor’s concern that 100 armed rebels were poised to ambush a gunpowder shipment at the mouth of the Savannah River.  The governor had been, “long expecting and impatiently looking for…a sloop of war of some force,” to deal with these insurrectionists.  The South Carolinians drafted their own version of the governor’s letter, copying paragraphs word-for-word except at key sentences.  At the above, they substituted, “It gives me the highest pleasure to acquaint you, that I have not any occasion for any vessel of war, and I am clearly of the opinion that his Majesty’s service will be better promoted by the absence than the presence of vessels of war in this port.”  The patriots sealed their substitute letter in Wright’s envelope and sent it on to Admiral Graves.

The seemingly transparent ploy worked!  History records that Graves believed he was supporting Governor Wright by not sending a cruiser.  Not until January of 1776 did any warships arrive, but then only to buy rice for British forces in Boston.  The Whigs retained control of Georgia until December 1778, ultimately forcing the Tory governor to flee the colony in March of 1776.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  3 JUL 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Johnson, James M.  Militiamen, Rangers, and Redcoats:  The Military in Georgia, 1754-1776.  Macon, GA: Mercer Univ. Press, 1992, pp. 105-13.

Letter of Governor James Wright to Adm. Graves, dtd 27 June 1775.  IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 1  1774-1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1964, pp. 764-65.

Letter of Governor James Wright to Adm. Samuel Graves as Substituted by the South Carolina Committee of Safety, dtd 27 June 1775.  IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 1  1774-1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1964, p. 765.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  This letter reinforced errant British beliefs about the southern colonies.  As the hotbed of revolution had been the New England area, British leaders mistakenly assumed the southern colonies remained Loyalist.  This misconception prompted the invasion of South Carolina in 1780-81 in an effort to rally support for the Crown.  That invasion ultimately led to Cornwallis’ surrender at Yorktown.

The post Those Sneaky Patriots! appeared first on Today in Naval History.

250^th ANNIVERSARY

                                      UNITY vs. HMS MARGARETTA

In June 1775 civilian Ichabod Jones, captain of the schooner Unity, requested clearance from British ADM Samuel Graves to carry a load of provisions from Boston to the far-flung town of Machias in what was then the colony of Massachusetts (now Maine).  Graves approval was contingent upon Unity returning with a load of much-needed lumber to build barracks for the British troops in Boston.  It had only been two months since the skirmishes we know as the battles of Lexington and Concord, and the seeds of rebellion were spreading throughout New England.  Thus, Graves sent Royal Navy Midshipman James Moore in the tender HMS MARGARETTA, 4, to insure Machias’ compliance.  Jones and Moore arrived to find the town in dire need.  Despite this, some of the townspeople resisted loading British lumber.  Jones responded with a refusal to sell provisions to the protesting citizens, but Moore’s threat to bombard the town with MARGARETTA’s 3-pounders won reluctant cooperation.  Resentment simmered over the subsequent days until Sunday, June 11th, when a band of irritated citizens tried to grab Moore and Jones as they left church services.  Both escaped, and Moore prudently moved his ships out of musket range.

Then early this morning, 40 lumbermen led by merchant captain Jeremiah O’Brien and his five brothers overpowered the crew of Unity.  Twenty more got Benjamin Foster’s nearby schooner Falmouth Packet underway.  Sensing the rage of the angry colonials, Moore hastily cut MARGARETTA’s lines in an effort to hail any stronger British warship that might be in the area.  The ungainly tender was quickly overhauled however, near Round Island at the mouth of the Machias River.  A lucky shot from Unity’s swivel killed MARGARETTA’s helmsman, sending the Briton into irons.  O’Brien now brought Unity alongside, and incensed lumbermen stormed across with handspikes, axes, and pitchforks.  Moore fell mortally wounded and British resistance quickly faded.  Both ships were taken back to Machias.

The schooner’s 3-pounders were transferred to the smaller, swifter Unity, whom O’Brien rechristened MACHIAS LIBERTY.  Under his capable hands and the sanction of the General Court of the Colony of Massachusetts, Liberty harassed British vessels along the New England coast until October 1776.  In that month, in the Bay of Fundy, O’Brien and his plucky sloop were finally captured.  Following his release in 1780 O’Brien returned to the independence effort as captain of registered privateers.  His contribution to the naval War of Independence continues to be remembered in the naming of five modern warships, most recently the Spruance-class O’BRIEN (DD-975). 

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  16 JUN 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 5 “N-Q”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1979, pp. 131-32.

Fowler, William M., Jr.  Rebels Under Sail:  The American Navy during the Revolution.  New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1976, pp. 26-28.

Giambattista, M.D.  “Captain Jeremiah O’Brien and Machias Liberty.”  Proceedings, February 1970, pp. 85-87.

Miller, Nathan.  Sea of Glory:  A Naval History of the American Revolution.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1974, pp. 29-35.

Pratt, Fletcher.  The Compact History of the United States Navy, 3rd ed.  New York, NY: Hawthorn Books, Inc., 1967, pp. 18-19.

Site visit, Fort O’Brien State Historical Site, Machiasport, ME, 21 August 2004.

Site visit, San Francisco Maritime Museum, San Francisco, CA, August 1998.

Sweetman, Jack.  American Naval History: An Illustrated Chronology of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, 1775-Present, 2^nd  ed.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1991, p. 1.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  It is important to note that this first naval action in defense of our soon-to-be nation was taken by the freedom-minded citizens of the British colony of Massachusetts before we had a Declaration of Independence or a Continental Navy.  Following this action the colonists of the region erected two protective earthenwork forts near the mouth of the Machias River, several miles downstream from the town.  However, Fort O’Brien and Fort Foster were overrun by the British without firing a shot later in the war.  Ft. O’Brien proved the more lasting, having been manned by American artillery batteries during the War of 1812 and later during the Civil War.  Ft. O’Brien is now a Maine State Historical Site.

Perhaps the best-known namesake of O’Brien is one of only two preserved WWII Liberty ships, SS Jeremiah O’Brien, currently part of San Francisco’s Maritime Museum.  (SS John W. Brown is the other in Baltimore.)  “Liberty” ships were mass produced in WWII to help counter losses to German U-boats.  A second series, the “Victory” ships, was similarly mass-produced, and the sole surviving member from that class is SS Lane Victory berthed today in San Pedro, California.

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                                       PINE TREE NAVAL ENSIGN

Samuel Thompson was a Brunswick (modern Maine) tavern owner appointed to command the Brunswick Militia in 1774.  The seeds of revolution were starting to sprout in New England in 1774, and Thompson was ordered by the Continental Congress to boycott all British goods.  His resolve was tested on 2 March 1775, when the sloop John and Mary arrived in Falmouth (modern Portland, Maine) having carried a shipment of spars, line, and rigging across the Atlantic.  The shipment was bound to Thomas Coulson, a Falmouth Loyalist and shipbuilder.  Thompson acted, halting the off-loading of the cargo and demanding the ship leave Falmouth harbor.  Coulson negotiated that the ship be allowed, at least, to make repairs after her trans-Atlantic crossing.  And while those repairs were proceeding, Coulson quietly sent word to the British in Boston.

HMS CANCEAUX was dispatched from Boston under command of LT Henry Mowat, RN.  She arrived in Falmouth on March 29, turning the tables in favor of His Majesty.  CANCEAUX was an 80-foot sloop built for charting and hydrographic surveying, but she mounted eight 1/2-pounders and six larger guns.  She had been used as a warship in situations calling only for moderate force.  Under her protective guns Coulson resumed the lightering of the naval stores.  Then word reached Falmouth of the Revolution’s start the previous month at the battles of Lexington and Concord outside Boston.

The news prompted Thompson.  Fifty patriot militiamen had arrived in Falmouth by then, each with a sprig of spruce tucked in his hat for identification.  A plan began to form for a small boat mass attack on CANCEAUX as more militia collected in town.  Indeed, their growing boat flotilla was led by one bearing a spruce tree with its bottom branches removed as an ensign tied to the transom.  By early May, nearly 600 patriot militia had gathered, whose goal was to capture His Majesty’s warship.

But events overtook the plan on May 9 when Mowat came ashore to arrange church services for his crew.  He was fallen upon and captured.  CANCEAUX’s 1^st LT fired two blank charges in the direction of the town and threatened an actual bombardment if Mowat was not released.  Though the British were vastly outnumbered, cooler heads did prevail.  Mowat was released, and CANCEAUX and the stores ship weighed anchor and departed on 15 May.  The Patriot militia, frustrated at missing a fight, loosed their venom by ransacking the homes of Coulson and another loyalist, Sheriff Tyng.

A spruce tree as a naval ensign is thought to have inspired the Pine Tree Flag used in several forms during the Revolution.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  12 MAY 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

“Colonel Samuel Thompson to the President of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress.” dtd. 29 April 1775. IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 1  1774-1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1964, p. 244.

“Falmouth Customs Officers to Commissioners of the Customs.” dtd. 29 April 1775. IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 1  1774-1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1964, p. 245.

“Jedidiah Preble to Massachusetts Provincial Congress.”  dtd. 14 May 1775. IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 1  1774-1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1964, pp. 327-29.

“Journal of His Majesty’s Ship Canceaux, Henry Mowat, Commanding.” dtd. 15 May 1775. IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 1  1774-1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1964, p. 333.

Leamon, James.  Revolution Downeast: The American Revolution in Maine.  Amhearst, MA: Univ. of Massachusetts Press, 1993, pp. 60-67.

“Lieutenant Henry Mowat, R.N., to Edward Parry.”  dtd. 29 April 1775. IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 1  1774-1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1964, pp. 244-45.

“Minutes of the Committee of Inspection of Falmouth, Maine Province,” dtd. 10 Apr 1775. IN: Clark, William Bell, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 1  1774-1775.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1964, pp. 174-75.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Mowat would exact his revenge that same year.  Under orders to bombard coastal towns thought to be aiding the rebels, Mowat returned to Falmouth in mid-October and burned most of the town to the ground.  He commanded British forces at the disastrous Patriot defeat at Penobscot Bay in 1779.  He rose to the rank of CAPT in the Royal Navy and died of natural causes while on deployment in 1798.

Thompson was promoted to BGEN of the Cumberland County Militia the following year.  He survived the war and went on to serve in public office for the State of Massachusetts.  He was a major benefactor of Bowdoin College.

The post Pine Tree Naval Ensign appeared first on Today in Naval History.

                                INTERCEPTING THE SUGAR FLEET

In the earliest days of our nation, the Marine Committee of the Continental Congress was not hesitant to give tactical direction to our naval forces afloat.  On this day, the Committee instructed that an American squadron rendezvous off the Bahamian island of Abacoa on 25 July, with the intent of intercepting the annual “sugar fleet.”  Each year more than 100 sail carried a Caribbean sugar bounty to England and, according to the Committee, usually departed Jamaica the last week of July.  USS RANDOLPH, 32, ANDREW DORIA, 14, SURPRIZE, 12, and COLUMBUS, 24, were detailed to the mission.

The Marine Committee’s quite prescriptive resolution directed the senior officer at Abacoa to assume command, work out signals, and arrange patrols.  The squadron was to set out in the direction of Havana, the presumed path of the Jamaica fleet.  While anticipating contact they were to practice signals, exercise the guns, and safeguard the health of the crews by taking, “infinite pains on board every Ship to sweeten the Air, and keep not only the ship clean but the Men so in their Cloathing [sic] and Persons.”  The squadron was to send what captured ships they could to Georgia or the Carolinas and burn the rest.  The captains were reassured that the British usually sent convoy escorts that had long been on station and were foul and due for overhaul.  The resolution concluded with a statement prescient for its day, “The Navy is in its infancy and a few brilliant strokes in this Era would give it a credit and importance that would induce seamen from all parts to seek the employ for nothing is more evident than that America has the means and must in time become the first Maritime power in the world.”

COLUMBUS, SURPRIZE and ANDREW DIRIA never cleared port.  CAPT Nicholas Biddle aboard RANDOLPH opened his sealed orders on 10 July as instructed, but that date found RANDOLPH in Charleston for repairs rather than cruising off Hispaniola as expected.  Biddle did put to sea promptly, but a lightning strike during a storm split his mainmast and forced him back to port.

The grand rendezvous never occurred–indeed fate had already condemned the enterprise.  On 28 April, the day before the Committee’s resolution, the Charleston Gazette of the State of South-Carolina ran the news that 176 sail were to leave Jamaica on or about 1 May, richly laden with sugar, rum, cotton, coffee and a quantity of Carolina indigo.  It seems that had the American squadron been able to execute their orders, the larger than expected sugar fleet would have passed already.  We can only hope that the failure of this endeavor on several counts did not impede the US Navy on her ascent to primacy!

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  4 MAY 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

“Continental Marine Committee to Captain Nicholas Biddle,” letter dtd. 28 April 1777.  IN:  Morgan, William James, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 8  1777.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1980, p. 471.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 1 “A”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1991, p. 294.

Gazette of the State of South-Carolina, excerpt dtd. 28 April 1777.  IN:  Morgan, William James, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 8  1777.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1980, p. 460-61.

Miller, Nathan.  Sea of Glory:  A Naval History of the American Revolution.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1974, pp. 226-27.

“Resolutions of the Continental Marine Committee, 29 April 1777.”  IN:  Morgan, William James, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 8  1777.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1980, p. 468-70.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  The reason the departure of the Jamaica fleet was newsworthy in Charleston was the mention of Carolina indigo in British hands.  In that day rice, lumber, and indigo (used for making dyes) were the major exports of the southern colonies, and this particular shipment had been sold in the French West Indies and there acquired subsequently by the British.  The intelligence reported by the Charleston newspaper was specific even as to the names of the “sugar fleet’s” five Royal Navy escorts:  HMS MAIDSTONE, 26, WICHELSEA, 26, BADGER, 16, PORCUPINE, 14, and RACEHORSE, 10. 

The Continental Navy frigate RANDOLPH was named for the patriot Peyton Randolph, a Virginia lawyer who served as the King’s Attorney for Virginia and Speaker of the House of Burgesses prior to the Revolution.  He became devoted to the cause of American liberty, protesting the Stamp Act in 1764 and serving as the President of the First Continental Congress in 1774.  He died unexpectedly of “apoplexy” (stroke) 22 October 1775.

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                                              LESLIE’S RETREAT

The garrisoning of Royal troops in the private homes of Boston residents risked the discovery of weapons and munitions stores hidden by Patriot colonials.  Such stores were secretly moved out of the city, prompting periodic expeditions into the countryside by the Royal Army to search out and destroy arms caches.  It was on such foray that the battles of Lexington and Concord would occur six weeks hence in April 1775.  Then, Rebel minutemen would attempt to halt a march against an arms stockpile in Concord, Massachusetts.  But a little-known similar expedition in nearby Salem almost started the war two months earlier.

No one took much notice this morning when a Royal Navy transport dropped anchor in the harbor at Marblehead, Massachusetts.  The comings and goings of British warships had become routine.  But LCOL Alexander Leslie, RA, had strategically chosen this Sunday to launch his sortie, when the religious fervor of the colonials compelled their attendance at church.  Out of sight below decks were 240 fusiliers of the 64^th Regiment of Foot.  At the height of the Sabbath around 1430 the troops suddenly appeared.  They sought 17 French cannon their spies identified as having been purchased by COL David Mason of the Massachusetts Committee of Safety, cannon that were now five miles inland at the foundry of Salem blacksmith CAPT Robert Foster.  It was Foster’s job to fashion limbers for the guns.

Leslie stepped-off toward Salem, his pipers mocking the local citizens with the tune, “Yankee Doodle.”  MAJ John Pedrick and other alarm riders spread a warning much as would Paul Revere two months later.  The cannon were quickly whisked into hiding, and the drawspan of Salem’s North Bridge was raised to block the British advance.  A stand-off developed when Leslie’s insistence upon using a public “King’s highway” fell on deaf ears.  Tempers flared, and more armed militia collected, including COL John Glover’s regiment of Marblehead sailors and fishermen.  Hundreds more minutemen mobilized from surrounding farms, and a company of Rebel cavalry in nearby Danvers mounted their horses.  When three gondolas were noticed on the riverbank west of the bridge, citizens fell upon them with axes lest the British commandeer them for a crossing.  A scuffle ensued, from which cooler heads emerged.  LCOL Leslie and the Rebel leaders negotiated a compromise.  Leslie would cross, but proceed peaceably no further than 50 yards beyond.

Having made a gesture of crossing, and aware that the cannon had been removed, Leslie turned his troops around.  Defiant colonials lined their return path to assail them with insults–far kinder than would Concord residents deliver in April.  The 64^th departed without the cannon and without a shot having been fired.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  3 MAR 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Billias, George Athan.  General John Glover and His Marblehead Mariners.  New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1960, pp. 63-64.

Endicott, Charles M.  “Account of Leslie’s Retreat at the North Bridge, in Salem, on Sunday, Feb’y 26, 1775.”  Proceedings of the Essex Institute, Salem, MA: William Ives & George W. Pease Printers, 1856.

Harris, Gordon.  “Leslie’s Retreat, or How the Revolutionary War Almost Began in Salem, February 26, 1775.”  Stories from Ipswich website, 5 July 2014.  AT: http://ipswich.wordpress.com/2014/07/05/leslies-retreat-or-how-the-revolutionary-war-almost-began-in-salem/, retrieved 27 August 2015.

Segar, D.A.  “Resistance and Retreat in Salem, 1775.”  Street of Salem website, 26 February 2014.  AT:  http://streetsofsalem.com/2014/02/26/resistance-and-retreat-in-salem-1775/, retrieved 27 August 2015.

Site Visit.  Leslie’s Retreat Marker, Salem, Massachusetts, 24 September 2015.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  “Committees of Safety” were founded in many New England colonies prior to independence, their euphemistic names belying their true purpose–to organize and administer resistance to the King’s authority.  Mason, Foster, Pedrick, and Glover held office with the minutemen of the Massachusetts Committee of Safety.  Glover would go on to earn greater fame fighting with Washington’s Continental Army.

Today the city of Salem marks this event with a stone and plaque near the site of the North Bridge.

LCOL Leslie’s career was apparently unmarred by this incident.  He rose to the rank of MGEN during the course of the war, commanding British troops in the New York and New Jersey campaigns.  In 1781 he replaced Cornwallis in command of British troops in the Carolinas after the latter moved toward Yorktown, Virginia.  He died in 1794 at his home in the British Isles.

Three US Navy warships have remembered the city of Salem and her storied past, most recently our WWII heavy cruiser SALEM (CA-139).  Glover is remembered as well with USS GLOVER (AGDE-1).

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                                  THE INDOMITABLE LEXINGTON

Many of the original thirteen colonies organized their own navies during the Revolutionary War.  For example, in February of 1776 the Maryland Committee for Safety sent Abraham Van Bibber to St. Eustatius in the Dutch West Indies to secure a ship.  He purchased a brigantine Wild Duck and filled her with precious gunpowder for the Maryland militia.  But within a week of reaching Philadelphia on the 9^th of March, Wild Duck was purchased by the Marine Committee of the Continental Congress and fitted out as the Continental Navy’s 14-gun sloop-of-war LEXINGTON.  CAPT John Barry commanded her, but before he could get to sea, the British slapped a blockade on their rebellious colonies.  Barry eluded that blockade, however, and on April 7^th, off the Virginia Capes, he met the sloop/tender HMS EDWARD, 6.  A fiery one-hour battle resulted in EDWARD’s defeat and transfer to Philadelphia.  LEXINGTON next raced south to meet ADM Sir Peter Parker’s attack on Charleston, where Barry barely escaped capture.

LEXINGTON marked that summer with her sisters; REPRISAL, 18; HORNET, 10; and WASP, 8, at Cape May behind the blockade of HMS LIVERPOOL, 32.  When the Pennsylvania Navy brig NANCY grounded while sneaking into that harbor on June 28^th, boats from the four Yankee ships lightered all but 100 of the 386 barrels of gunpowder she carried.  Barry rigged those remaining 100 barrels to detonate just as a British party boarded the next morning.  LEXINGTON slipped to sea again in July and captured the Tory privateer, LADY SUSAN.  Seven of the privateer’s crew signed on with Barry, one of these was Richard Dale, who quickly became Master’s Mate of LEXINGTON.

Under a new commander, CAPT William Hallock, the brigantine eluded the British blockade again in the autumn of 1776–this time bound for Cap Francois, Hispaniola, to secure a cargo of military provisions.  When LEXINGTON returned to the Delaware Capes on this day, a sail belonging to the British frigate HMS PEARL, 32, appeared on the horizon.  Shortly the frigate overhauled LEXINGTON.  The enemy prevailed in the duel that followed, and the brigantine’s hold was used to imprison the American officers and 70 crewmen.  But as the British prize crew secured the ship for the night, the captive Colonials began baiting them with promises of rum.  Their story seemed all the more believable to the British, who knew the ship had just returned from the Caribbean.  When the thirsty captors opened the hatches to investigate, the Continentals sprang forth and retook the ship.  Led by Master’s Mate Dale (who later served as mate to John Paul Jones on BONHOMME RICHARD) they resumed their mission to deliver LEXINGTON’s invaluable cargo to Baltimore.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  25 DEC 24

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 4 “L-M”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1969, p. 100.

Fischer, David Hackett.  Washington’s Crossing.  New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2004, 156-57.

Fowler, William M., Jr.  Rebels Under Sail:  The American Navy during the Revolution.  New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1976, p. 252.

Miller, Nathan.  Sea of Glory:  A Naval History of the American Revolution.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1974, p. 118.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  We are so used to thinking of the United States as a whole that it may seem strange that many of the original 13 colonies commissioned their own navies.  But each colony had been founded independently, each was governed independently, and the idea that all 13 would unite under one government seemed just as strange in that day.

Despite her successes above, LEXINGTON did not finish the war in American hands.  She ultimately fell to the enemy in a controversial battle with a weaker British sloop.  She nevertheless became the inspiration for five subsequent US warships named in her honor, including the WWII carrier CV-2 and her replacement CV-16.  The latter served as our training carrier, AT-16, in the 1990s.

African-Americans are widely believed to have served aboard many Continental Navy warships, however LEXINGTON, PROVIDENCE, and RANGER are the only three documented to have had black crewmembers.

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FIRST SUBMARINE

The world’s first operational submarine was the brainchild of physician and inventor David Bushnell while a student at Yale College in 1771.  During the 1775 British blockade of Boston, he and his brother Ezra gave the idea physical form.  Their efforts produced a one-man craft that was able to fully submerge and surface by flooding or pumping her bilges.  Forward motion was accomplished with a forward-mounted propeller connected to a manual crank inside.  The pilot navigated through glass portholes in a short conning tower.  By virtue of her egg-shaped hull, Bushnell named her Turtle.  She carried a single “torpedo,” a 100# gunpowder charge that floated externally tethered to a bolt.  That bolt could be screwed into the underside of an enemy vessel by means of a hand crank.  A timer would trigger detonation after one hour, hopefully enough time for the sub to retire.

By TURTLE’s launch, the British had vacated Boston for New York, where the sub made her debut late this night north of Staten Island.  Ezra Bushnell had fallen ill, and ironically it was a SGT in the Continental Army, Ezra Lee, who became the world’s first submariner.  Lee departed the dock about 2230, moving toward the largest warship in the British anchorage, HMS EAGLE, 64, the flagship of ADM Richard “Black Dick” Howe.  The novel craft proved surprisingly stable as Lee approached from the stern.  He was able to glide undetected to within earshot, where he opened the cocks and submerged as planned.  But as Lee rose under EAGLE’s hull he encountered a problem.  Copper sheathing (or perhaps marine fouling) prevented the bolt from penetrating.  Following a lengthy second attempt Lee, who was still new at the controls, accidentally broached beside the warship.  Luckily, he remained undetected, but the approach of dawn broke off Lee’s attack.

The speed of the little craft left much to be desired, and by sunrise Lee was still within sight of the British fort on Governor’s Island, cranking steadily.  A few curious British, unaware of what they were seeing, set out in a launch to investigate.  And as they rowed nearer, Lee imagined his capture to be inevitable.  In a last act of sacrifice he released the torpedo, hoping to destroy both his sub and the British launch.

His pursuers, however, lost interest and returned to shore.  The torpedo drifted with the tide and detonated harmlessly inside the enemy anchorage.  The explosion did startle Howe however, who slipped his cables and moved the fleet to the south of Staten Island.  Lee safely regained the dock.  He made two equally futile later attempts at enemy warships before TURTLE was lost in the Hudson River while escaping a British incursion.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  12-13 SEP 24

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 7 “T-V”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1981, pp. 354-55.

Friedman, Norman.  U.S. Submarines through 1945:  An Illustrated Design History.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1995, pp. 11-12.

Wagner, Frederick.  Submarine Fighter of the American Revolution:  The Story of David Bushnell.  New York, NY: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1963.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Only one week earlier, on the night of 29-30 August, GEN George Washington had escaped certain capture in the Brooklyn Heights when John Glover’s “Marbleheaders” ferried Washington, his troops, their horses, and their cannon across the East River in a stunning 9-hour night evolution.  Miraculously, the British fleet of “Black Dick” Howe had been prevented from blocking the East River by contrary winds.

TURTLE stood seven feet high and was constructed of wooden staves, much like a barrel.  Some texts refer to this craft as American Turtle.  As above, TURTLE rose and sank simply by flooding her bilges, then hand-pumping them dry.  The same system was used in the later Civil War submarine H.L. HUNLEY.

History commonly credits inventor John Ericsson of Civil War fame with the innovation of the screw propeller.  But in truth the propeller on TURTLE, though spindly and underpowered, looks much like a modern propulsion screw.

Underwater pumpkin carving contests are popular with sport diving clubs in October.  And as anyone who has attempted to carve a pumpkin underwater will attest, the effort above to screw a bolt into an enemy hull was doomed to fail.  At neutral buoyancy one is “weightless” underwater, and any force applied to the carving knife against the pumpkin simply results in your weightless body being pushed backward.

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                                  BATTLE OF TURTLE GUT INLET

The six-gun civilian brig Nancy headed north from St. Thomas and St. Croix.  Her Master, Hugh Montgomery, had shipped a cargo that would bring a handsome profit in his homeport of Philadelphia.  Nancy carried 386 barrels of gunpowder, sorely needed in anticipation of the declaration of American independence, 50 fire-locks, 101 hogsheads of rum and 62 hogsheads of sugar.  But as Nancy approached the mouth of the Delaware River on Friday evening June 28^th, the British warships, HMS ORPHEUS, 32, LIVERPOOL, 28, and KINGFISHER, 16, gave chase.

American lookouts at Cape May watched the chase unfold, Nancy being forced toward a small bay north of Cape May, Turtle Gut.  Word was sent to CAPT John Barry in the Continental Navy brig LEXINGTON, 14, who was standing by to assist vessels attempting to bring run past the British into Philadelphia.  He, along with CAPT Lambert Wickes in REPRISAL, 18, and CAPT John Bauldwin in WASP, 8, hurriedly met at nightfall to assess the situation.   Meanwhile, near the inlet to Turtle Gut, Nancy ran aground in the pitch-black night, unseen by the British.  LT Richard Wickes, REPRISAL’s 3^rd LT and brother of skipper Lambert Wickes, insisted upon commanding a longboat for Nancy’s aid.  But he could not find the subject brig in the darkness that night.  Not until dawn did LT Wickes reach Nancy, about the same time the shallow-drafted sloop HMS KINGFISHER anchored within 300 yards.  Just as Barry and more American longboats arrived, the British launched their own boat party!

LT Wickes quickly set his men to two tasks, one lightering Nancy’s cargo and the other to serve Nancy’s guns.  KINGFISHER opened fire while American patriots fought off the British boarding party.  KINGFISHER’s longboat was beaten back, and in response the sloop quickened her fire.  KINGFISHER pummeled Nancy for half an hour, cutting her alow and aloft.  Then five more boats were launched from KINGFISHER, this time intent on boarding at all costs.

By now Wickes’ men had off-loaded the muskets, much of the dry goods, and 265 barrels of gunpowder.  The enemy bombardment took its toll; it was soon clear the merchant brig could not be saved.  Barry now staged an ingenious booby-trap, wrapping the remaining barrels of gunpowder in a sail which he ignited as a sort of fuse.  The last man off Nancy climbed the rigging to lower our flag, and at that very moment, LT Wickes was sliced through the arm and chest with an enemy shot.  The approaching British interpreted the flag lowering as surrender, and just as they clamored aboard, the gunpowder exploded in a blast felt miles away.  Seven Royal Navy tars died, and several of their longboats were destroyed.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  6 JUL 24

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Captain Lambert Wickes to Samuel Wickes, dtd. 2 July 1776.  IN: Morgan, William James, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 5  1776.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1970, pp. 882-84.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 4 “L-M”. Washington, DC: GPO, 1969, p. 100.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 6 “R-S”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1976, p. 78.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 8 “W-Z”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1981, p. 293.

“Journal of the H.M. Sloop Kingfisher, Captain Alexander Graeme.” IN:  Morgan, William James, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 5  1776.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1970, pp. 817-18.

“Journal of the H.M.S. Orpheus, Captain Charles Hudson.”  IN:  Morgan, William James, (ed.), Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Naval Documents of the American Revolution Vol 5  1776.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1970, p. 818.

Site visit.  Sunset Lake Park, Cape May, New Jersey, 23 May 2001.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  This engagement transpired only a week before our independence was declared and is taken by historians as the first government-sponsored naval battle of our Revolutionary War.  Regardless, it has largely been forgotten.  This may be due in part to the fact that Turtle Gut has since been backfilled by Cape May County authorities.  A park now occupies the site bearing a marker commemorating the battle that took place this day.

CAPT Lambert Wickes is remembered today with the lead ship in a class of WWI destroyers, WICKES (DD-73), and with the Fletcher-class WWII destroyer DD-578.

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