Rebels at sea, p.30
Rebels at Sea, page 30
34 “fit out privateers . . . the minds of”: Josiah Bartlett to John Langdon, February 21, 1776, NDAR, vol. 4, 31; and Wednesday, March 13, 1776, Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 200.
34 “it behooves us”: Oliver Wolcott to Lyman, March 16, 1776, NDAR, vol. 4, 397.
34 The privateering debate soon: “Richard Smith Diary,” March 13, 1776, Letters of Members of the Continental Congress, ed. Edmund C. Burnett, vol. 1 (Washington, DC: Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1921), 386; Oliver Wolcott to Lyman, March 16, 1776, NDAR, vol. 4, 397; “Richard Smith Diary,” March 18, 1776, Letters of Members of the Continental Congress, ed. Burnett, vol. 1, 398; “Richard Smith Diary,” March 22, 1776, Letters of Members of the Continental Congress, ed. Burnett, vol. 1, 404; and Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 201–25.
34 “wherein the King”: “Proposed Preamble to a Congressional Resolution,” FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-22-02-0193, accessed July 15, 2021.
34 “was effectually severing”: “Richard Smith Diary,” March 22, 1776, Letters of Members of the Continental Congress, ed. Burnett, vol. 1, 404.
35 The very next day: Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 229–32.
35 “an unjust war . . . pertinaciously pursued”: Ibid., 229–30.
35 Privateers were free: Ibid., 230–31.
35 Later, neutral ships: Morse, “New England Privateering,” 64–68.
35 About the same time, Congress: Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 5, 605–6.
37 If it was a lawful prize, the privateer: Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 231.
37 “We have hitherto”: John Adams to Brigadier General Horatio Gates, March 23, 1776, NDAR, vol. 4, 481.
37 Although the privateering system: Background for the content of privateering regulations and the quote come from Wednesday, April 3, 1776, Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 251–55.
37 In May 1780: “The Form of the Bond,” Journals of the American Congress, from 1774 to 1788, vol. 3 (Washington, DC: Way and Gideon, 1823), 453.
38 “It is necessary”: “Philadelphia, April 10, 1776,” American Archives: Fourth Series, Containing a Documentary History of the English Colonies in North America, vol. 5, ed. Peter Force (Washington, DC: M. St. Clair Clarke and Peter Force, 1844), 1443.
38 John Adams had been: Middlekauff, The Glorious Cause, 318–19.
38 “This is not”: John Adams to Brigadier General Horatio Gates, March 23, 1776, NDAR, vol. 4, 481.
38 Privateering might have: Background for Paine’s experience with privateering comes from Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, Being an Answer to Mr. Burke’s Attack on the French Revolution, Part 1 (London: R. Carlisle, 1819), 68; Alyce Barry, “Thomas Paine, Privateersman,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 101 (October 1977): 451–61; Samuel Stokes, A Narrative of the Many Hardships, and Cruel Sufferings, While in France; of the Crew of the Terrible Privateer, Commanded by Captain William Death (London: J. Towers, 1757), 3–15; and Jett Conner, “Thomas Paine Goes to Sea: A Pre-Revolutionary Tale,” Journal of the American Revolution, November 6, 2018, https://allthingsliberty.com/2018/11/thomas-paine-goes-to-sea-a-pre-revolutionary-tale/, accessed January 2, 2021.
39 “were smothered to”: Stokes, A Narrative of the Many Hardships, 14.
40 “reconciliation . . . at hand”: Thomas Paine, Common Sense (Philadelphia: W. and T. Bradford, 1776), 18, 32–33, 43, 45, 87–88.
40 “now openly avow”: “The King’s Speech Opening the Session,” October 26, 1775, The Parliamentary History of England, from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, vol. 18 (London: T. C. Hansard, 1813), 695–96.
40 Many of the arguments: Middlekauff, The Glorious Cause, 324–35.
40 twenty-five editions: Gordon S. Wood, The American Revolution: A History (New York: A Modern Library Chronicles Book, 2003), 55.
40 On April 6: “Saturday, April 6, 1776,” Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 257–58.
41 “that these United”: “Friday, June 7, 1776,” Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 5, 425.
41 “objects of the most”: John Adams to William Cushing, June 9, 1776, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/06-04-02-0109, accessed May 11, 2021.
41 Still hesitant: “Tuesday, July 2, 1776,” Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 5, 506–7.
41 “the second day of”: John Adams to Abigail Adams, July 3, 1776, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-02-02-0016, accessed May 11, 2021.
41 It wasn’t until: Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 5, 431, 491–502, 509–16.
42 “the lives of our . . . of right do”: Ibid., 511–14.
43 Philadelphia’s Chance and Congress: Background for this section on the two privateers comes from Shomette, Privateers of the Revolution, 59–61; Elbridge Gerry to James Warren, June 6, 1776, Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, ed. Paul H. Smith et al. (Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 1979), 152; John Hancock to George Washington, June 5, 1776, Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 145; and Eugene S. Ferguson, Truxtun of the Constellation: The Life of Commodore Thomas Truxtun, U.S. Navy, 1755–1822 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 23–27.
43 With gunpowder: Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 250.
43 “The West Indian”: Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994; orig. 1944), 52.
43 The ships’ cargoes: Robert Morris to Silas Deane, June 5, 1776, Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 148.
44 “I fancy many”: Ibid.
44 “first truly global”: Niall Ferguson, The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World (New York: Penguin Press, 2008), 25–26.
44 “great occasion . . . essential service”: John Hancock to James Athearn, June 22, 1776, Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 293. See also John Hancock to George Washington, June 5, 1776, Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 4, 145; and “Wednesday, June 12, 1776,” Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789, vol. 5, 432.
44 To put such numbers: U.S. Census Bureau, Bicentennial Edition: Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1975), 1196; Bureau of Labor Statistics, History of Wages in the United States from Colonial Times to 1928 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1934), 53; and Alice Hanson Jones, Wealth of a Nation to Be: The American Colonies on the Eve of the Revolution (New York: Columbia University Press, 1980), 251–52.
44 As for mariners: Bureau of Labor Statistics, History of Wages, 97.
44 By one calculation: MeasuringWorth.com, https://www.measuringworth.com/index.php, accessed January 4, 2021.
45 “privateers will”: John Adams to John Winthrop, June 23, 1776, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/06-04-02-0134, accessed May 11, 2021.
45 “Thousands of schemes”: John Adams to Abigail Adams, August 12, 1776, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-02-02-0054, accessed May 11, 2021.
45 “The rage for”: Abigail Adams to John Adams, September 7, 1776, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-02-02-0079, accessed May 11, 2021.
45 “The spirit of”: James Warren to Samuel Adams, August 15, 1776, NDAR, vol. 6, 191. See also David Cobb to Robert Treat Paine, September 9, 1776, NDAR, vol. 6, 775.
45 “In the eastern”: Robert Morris to the Commissioners, December 21, 1776, The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, vol. 1, ed. Jared Sparks (Boston: Nathan Hale and Gray & Bowen, 1829), 243.
45 “privateering was never”: “Extract of a letter from a seaport-town, in Massachusetts Bay, dated May 16, 1779,” Pennsylvania Packet, June 8, 1779.
45 “Privateering still”: Morse, “New England Privateering,” 277.
45 The demand for: See, for example, John Avery to the President of Congress, June 16, 1777, NDAR, vol. 9, 123; and Peter E. Jones, “Grant Us Commissions to Make Reprisals upon any Enemies of Shipping,” Rhode Island History, November 1975, 105–6.
45 “for want of”: Thomas Jefferson to John Jay, June 19, 1779, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-03-02-0004, accessed May 11, 2021.
Chapter 4: A PrIvateersman’s LIfe
46 “during the gay”: John Adams to Abigail Adams, April 23, 1777, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-02-02-0166, accessed May 11, 2021.
47 “sprightly”: John Adams to Abigail Adams, April 23, 1776, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-01-02-0255, accessed May 11, 2021.
47 “that a privateer . . . enjoy it”: John Adams to Abigail Adams, April 23, 1777, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-02-02-0166, accessed May 11, 2021.
48 “The stagnation”: “Voted, That the following INSTRUCTIONS be given to the Gentlemen who represent the Town in the General Court, viz.,” December 11, 1781, Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, vol. 4 (Boston: Published by the Society, 1889), 51.
48 “those who have”: Robert Morris to Silas Deane, September 12, 1776, NDAR, vol. 6, 794.
49 “You must know”: Robert Morris to William Bingham, December 4, 1776, NDAR, vol. 7, 368.
49 Morris proceeded: Charles Rappleye, Robert Morris: Financier of the Revolution (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010), 105.
49 “My scruples”: Robert Morris to William Bingham, April 25, 1777, NDAR, vol. 8, 429.
50 Of the 158: Robert E. Peabody, “The Derbys of Salem, Mass.,” Historical Collections of the Essex Institute, July 1908, 215; and “Memoir of Elias Hasket Derby,” 163–64.
50 Another privateering . . . “The Millionaire Maker”: Shomette, Privateers of the Revolution, 132–33 (including quotes).
50 Privateering spurred: Bulletin of the Business Historical Society 7, no. 3 (May 1933): 9.
51 Among the more . . . multiple ventures: To George Washington from John Parke Custis, October 1777, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-12-02-0068, accessed May 11, 2021; George Washington to John Parke Custis, November 14, 1777, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-12-02-0235, accessed May 11, 2021; Erna Risch, “The Logistical Problems of the Continental Army,” United States Army Logistics, 1775–1992: An Anthology, ed. Charles R. Shrader, vol. 1 (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, 1997), 67–69; Phillip Hamilton, The Revolutionary War Lives and Letters of Lucy and Henry Knox (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2017), 189n58; Patton, Patriot Pirates, 85–87, 105–8; and Crawford, “The Privateering Debate,” 234.
51 Other noted personages: To George Washington from Samuel Allyne Otis, December 24, 1777, FONA, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-12-02-0642, accessed May 11, 2021; John Bradford to John Hancock, September 30, 1776, NDAR, vol. 6, 1053; NRAR, 230, 308, 323; Benson J. Lossing, Our Countrymen: Or Brief Memoirs of Eminent Americans (New York: Ensign, Bridgman & Fanning, 1855), 251; and Michael M. Greenburg, The Court-Martial of Paul Revere: A Son of Liberty & America’s Forgotten Disaster (Lebanon, NH: University Press of New England, 2014), 217.
51 One could bet: Ralph D. Paine, The Ships and Sailors of Old Salem (Chicago: A. C. McClurg & Co., 1912), 64–65.
51 When Andrew Sherburne: Andrew Sherburne, Memoirs of Andrew Sherburne: A Pensioner of the Navy of the Revolution (Providence, RI: M. M. Brown, 1831), 34.
51 “It is well”: Willing, Morris & Co. to William Bingham, October 20, 1776, NDAR, vol. 6, 1339.
52 It was common: The Freeman’s Journal, or, The New-Hampshire Gazette, June 9, 1778.
52 “An Invitation to all”: Sidney G. Morse, “The Yankee Privateersman of 1776,” New England Quarterly 17, no. 1 (March 1944): 71–72; and Independent Ledger and the American Advertiser, November 20, 1780.
53 Those who responded: Paine, The Ships and Sailors of Old Salem, 68.
53 “At this period”: Sherburne, Memoirs of Andrew Sherburne, 19.
53 The agreement for: Background and all the quotes pertaining to the Hibernia’s articles come from Louis F. Middlebrook, History of Maritime Connecticut During the American Revolution, 1775–1783, vol. 2 (Salem, MA: Essex Institute, 1925), 123–30.
54 “Her love for”: Maclay, A History of American Privateers, 8.
55 The average age: Michael Schellhammer, George Washington and the Final British Campaign for the Hudson River, 1779 (Jefferson: McFarland & Company, 2012), 74; Charles Patrick Neimeyer, America Goes to War: A Social History of the Continental Army (New York: New York University Press, 1996), 16; and Harold E. Selesky, A Demographic Survey of the Continental Army That Wintered at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, 1777–1778 (New Haven, CT: Privately published, 1987), 17.
55 Lending further support: Paul A. Gilje, Liberty on the Waterfront: American Maritime Culture in the Age of Revolution (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004), 27.
55 Many privateers had: Christopher Prince, The Autobiography of a Yankee Mariner: Christopher Prince and the American Revolution, ed. Michael J. Crawford (Washington, DC: Brassey’s Inc., 2002), xxi.
55 An extreme example: William Arthur Baller, “Military Mobilization During the American Revolution in Marblehead and Worcester, Massachusetts” (PhD diss., Clark University, 1994), 181–84.
56 By one account: Maclay, A History of American Privateers, vii.
56 These men include: Louis Arthur Norton, Captains Contentious: The Dysfunctional Sons of the Brine (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2009), 46–63; Amos Blanchard, American Military and Naval Biography (Cincinnati: A. Salisbury, 1832), 454; William Barry Meany, Commodore John Barry: The Father of the American Navy (New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1911); and Ferguson, Truxtun of the Constellation.
57 “no consideration”: Lieutenant James Campbell to Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer, May 1, 1776, NDAR, vol. 4, 1369.
57 “in order to be”: Captain James Smith to the Maryland Council of Safety, May 1, 1776, NDAR, vol. 4, 1369.
57 Black men served: Benjamin Quarles, The Negro in the American Revolution (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996), 92–93.
57 Slave owners seeking: See, for example, Pennsylvania Gazette (Philadelphia), December 12, 1776; Advertisement, Newport (RI) Mercury, July 15, 1780; Pennsylvania Gazette, January 12, 1777; and Advertisement, Connecticut Gazette (New London), October 13, 1779.
57 “To be SOLD”: Winslow, “Wealth and Honour”: Portsmouth During the Golden Age of Privateering, 1775–1815, 26.
58 Joshua Barney . . . the Hyder Ally: Joshua Barney, A Biographical Memoir of the Late Joshua Barney: From Autographical Notes and Journals, ed. Mary Barney (Boston: Gray and Bowen, 1832), 112–22, 303–4; Shomette, Privateers of the Revolution, 216–30, 408; Hulbert Footner, Sailor of Fortune: The Life and Adventures of Commodore Barney, U.S.N. (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1940), 101–15; and “Philadelphia, April 16,” Pennsylvania Evening Post, April 16, 1782.
59 American privateers captured: Christian McBurney, Dark Voyage: An American Privateer’s War on Britain’s African Slave Trade (Yardley, PA: Westholme, 2022), in press.
59 “The unintended”: Ibid.
59 Providence merchant . . . Brown’s pockets: McBurney, Dark Voyage.
60 Babcock met with: “Providence, June 13,” Massachusetts Spy, June 25, 1778.
60 In Cape May . . . human cargo: Hand and Stites, The Cape May Navy, 94–96.
60 “presumed that”: Charles R. Foy, “Eighteenth Century ‘Prize Negroes’: From Britain to America,” Slavery and Abolition 31, no. 3 (September 2010): 388.
60 “Titus cares not”: Pynchon, The Diary of William Pynchon of Salem, 103. See also L. Vernon Briggs, History and Genealogy of the Cabot Family, 1475–1927, vol. 2 (Boston: Charles E. Goodspeed & Co., 1927), 799.
61 The financial reward . . . among all comers: Morse, “New England Privateering,” 175–76.
61 The role of money: See, for example, Jay F. Feyerabend, “For Prize or Patriotism: The Understood Role of Privateers in the American Revolution,” James Blair Historical Review 9, no. 1 (2019), https://scholarworks.wm.edu/jbhr/vol9/iss1/3, accessed May 7, 2021; Crawford, “The Privateering Debate,” 226–34; and Paul A. Gilje, “Loyalty and Liberty: The Ambiguous Patriotism of Jack Tar in the American Revolution,” Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies 67, no. 2 (Spring 2000): 165–93.
62 “the common class”: John Henry Sherburne, The Life and Character of the Chevalier John Paul Jones, a Captain in the Navy of the United States (New York: Vanderpool & Cole, 1825), 21.
62 “were unlike any”: Francis Raymond Stark, The Abolition of Privateering and the Declaration of Paris (New York: Columbia University, 1897), 121.
62 “Thousands of men”: Gilje, “Loyalty and Liberty,” 166.
62 “had a tendency:” Mercy Warren, History of the Rise, Progress and Termination of the American Revolution, vol. 1 (Boston: Manning and Loring, 1805), 366.
62 Many of the Founding Fathers: Gordon S. Wood, “Classical Republicanism and the American Revolution,” Chicago-Kent Law Review 66, no. 1 (April 1990): 13–38.
63 Had Congress deemed: Crawford, “The Privateering Debate,” 233–34.
63 The argument that . . . than they were: John Ferling, “Myths of the American Revolution,” Smithsonian Magazine, January 2010; Alan Taylor, American Revolutions: A Continental History, 1750–1804 (New York: W. W. Norton, 2016), 194–96; Gilje, “Loyalty and Liberty,” 165; and Stuart D. Brandes, Warhogs: A History of War Profits in America (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1997), 35–37.
63 “It really gives me”: Thomas Egleston, The Life of John Paterson, Major-General in the Revolutionary Army (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1898), 215. See also Ray Raphael, A People’s History of the American Revolution: How Common People Shaped the Fight for Independence (New York: Perennial, 2001), 76–83.
