The executive committee of the Naval History Society having decided
to publish for its initial volume the logs of the three ships
commanded by John Paul Jones during the years 1779 and 1780, the
owner has consented to edit this publication, with a description
of the book itself, together with its history, so far as it can be
ascertained, believing that it will add something of interest to
the voluminous records and the literature relating to the life and
services of the distinguished hero of our Revolutionary navy.
Besides these logs of the _Serapis_, _Alliance_, and _Ariel_, there
are, in the Library of the Navy Department, copies of the log of the
_Ranger_, beginning November 26, 1777, and ending May 18, 1778; also
of the log of the _Bon Homme Richard_, beginning at L'Orient May 18,
1779, and ending September 24, 1779.
The original log-books, as shown by notes and a copy of a letter
accompanying and attached to them, are stated to have been purchased
by Captain Boyd, of Greenock, from a person of the name of Harding,
a baker, in New York, in 1824; and to have been presented to Lady
Isabella Helen Douglas, daughter of the fifth Earl of Selkirk, by
William John, ninth Lord Napier, on March 17, 1830; they are now
supposed to rest among the manuscripts of the Selkirk family.
Had the editor known of the existence of this log of the _Bon Homme
Richard_, covering the period of her commissioning and cruise prior
to the engagement with the _Serapis_, he would have deemed it proper
to have included it in this publication. The information came to him
too late to have it fully transcribed and prepared for the printer. A
few excerpts from it are placed in the Appendix.[1]
[Footnote 1: See Appendix A.]
The log-book now published is one of the few relics known to exist
of the engagement between the _Bon Homme Richard_ and the _Serapis_,
as most of the records and official papers of both ships were lost
when the _Bon Homme Richard_ sank, or following the confusion on the
_Serapis_ after her capture.
The book is fourteen inches tall, nine and one quarter inches wide,
bound in old vellum, stained, warped, worn with age and hard usage on
land and sea. The paper is rough, greenish in color, the hand-made
linen paper of the period, with a watermark showing it to be of
English manufacture.
Upon the exterior of both covers are numerous scribblings:
"R. D. June 2d, 1779"--"R. D. June 26, 1779"--"Richard Dales
book"--"September the 3d--1780--This book belongs to Mr. Henry Lunt,
Lieutenant of the Ship of War, the (_Ariel_)." Richard Dale's name is
also found in several places on the pages of the book.
It was first used to enter the names of the officers and crew
of the _Bon Homme Richard_, giving their rank, rating, and the
dates and places of their enlistment.[2] It evidently constituted
the muster-roll of that ship when Robert Robinson was the first
lieutenant, and, after the dismissal of that officer by sentence of
court martial for "negligence of duty," it passed into the keeping of
Richard Dale, who succeeded Robinson as first lieutenant, he entering
therein, on the pages immediately following the muster-roll: "A List
of The Men Names that has Desarted from _The Bone Homme Richard_,
Lorient July, 19th. 1779"[3]
[Footnote 2: See p. 3.]
[Footnote 3: See p. 18.]
When the _Richard_ sank off Flamborough Head, the muster-roll was
saved and taken on board the _Serapis_, as constituting the official
list of those entitled to prize money--then as now the great
incentive to naval enlistment and activity.
As may well be imagined, a blank-book suitable for a log was
not available at that moment of supreme confusion, so that the
muster-roll book of the _Richard_, with only a few of its pages
in use, was seized upon and used to enter the daily transactions
on board the _Serapis_, from the time of her capture until, as a
result of the political situation between Holland and England, she
was turned over to the French, and, under the command of Captain
Cottineau, hoisted the French colors in the Texel Roads.
The book was reversed, and the log of the _Serapis_ begun at
the other end, preceded by a brief memorandum--"Some Remarkable
Occurrences that happened on the 23d day of September, 1779,"--which
briefly records the capture of the _Serapis_.
No other or more circumstantial account of the fight existed in
the book when it came into the possession of its later owners, but
a close examination showed that, besides minor mutilations, two
leaves, immediately preceding that containing the statement of "Some
Remarkable Occurrences," had, at some time, been torn out. In order
to incorporate into the book a clearer and more circumstantial
account of the fight, a former owner caused to be copied on several
blank leaves the narrative found amongst the Peter Force Collection
of Manuscripts, "John Paul Jones Papers," Volume VI, number 29.
The authorship and penmanship of this document have been ascribed by
various biographers of Jones to Richard Dale.[4]
[Footnote 4: Memoirs of Rear-Admiral Paul Jones, Edinburgh, 1830;
Professor Marion, John Paul Jones' Last Cruise and Final Resting
Place, Washington, 1906.]
The present owner's attention was specially called to it by seeing
a small photographic reproduction, published in a book by Professor
Marion entitled, "John Paul Jones' Last Cruise and Final Resting
Place," Washington, 1906. The author describes this valuable and
historical document as a "manuscript written on two pages of rough,
greenish paper, evidently torn out of a log book," and attributes it
to Richard Dale, the first lieutenant of the _Bon Homme Richard_.
The compiler of the "John Paul Jones Manuscripts" in the Library of
Congress attributes it possibly to Jones' secretary.[5] The author
of the "Memoirs of Rear-Admiral Paul Jones," published in Edinburgh
and London, 1830, Volume I, page 192, states "that the fact of
Landais' firing into the _Bon Homme Richard_ is also confirmed by
the log-book, which was preserved when the ship sunk, and by a very
interesting and seaman-like narrative of the engagement, drawn up by
Mr. Dale." He adds in a footnote in reference to the log-book: "This
battered volume, after many adventures by land and water, is now
(1830) in the possession of Mr. Richard Napier, Advocate."
[Footnote 5: Calendar of John Paul Jones Manuscripts, pp. 104, 105.]
As this author bases his book upon documents then in the possession
of Mrs. Jeanette Taylor, the sister of Paul Jones, which she came
into possession of when he died in Paris, the "battered volume"
referred to must have been amongst Jones' papers, and is undoubtedly
the same log-book now under review. As will be shown later, it was
surely in the possession of Richard Dale as late as 1782, and at some
time after the war he probably restored it to Jones, who certainly
had a good claim to it, as the muster-roll of the _Bon Homme
Richard_, contained in it, was necessary in the prosecution of his
prize-money claims in France.
However this may be, the present owner procured a photograph of the
narrative of the engagement, of the exact dimensions of the sheets
upon which it was written, and on comparison of these sheets with the
leaves of the log-book it was found that in dimensions, in the color
and quality of the paper, even in the indenture of the torn edges,
there could be no possible doubt that the document was torn from this
log-book, and found its way into the Peter Force Collection, and
thence to the possession of the Congressional Library. The facsimile
is now where the original was, and the narrative is included in this
publication of the _Serapis'_ log.[6] Still there was doubt as to
its authorship. A comparison of the handwriting with that of Richard
Dale, to whom it was attributed, showed conclusively that he was not
the writer. Amongst the various scribblings upon the covers of the
log-book is found:
September the 3d, 1780. This book belongs to Mr. Henry
Lunt, Lieutenant of the Ship of War, the (Ariel)
a memorandum undoubtedly written by Lunt himself, who was, on the
date named, the second lieutenant of the _Ariel_, commanded by Jones,
Dale being her first lieutenant.[7]
[Footnote 6: See p. 22 of log of _Serapis_.]
[Footnote 7: See List of Officers of _Ariel_, p. 20.]
Comparisons of letters of Henry Lunt, also in the Peter Force
Collection, with the narrative establish beyond any doubt that it is
the penmanship of Lieutenant Henry Lunt. Mr. Gaillard Hunt, chief of
the Manuscripts Division of the Library of Congress, in a letter to
the editor, in reply to his suggestion that Lunt may have been the
writer, states as follows:
That the two pages of the _Serapis_ log are in the
hand of Lieutenant Henry Lunt. They have been compared
with a letter of Lunt to Jones, October 7, 1779, and
there can be no question of the identity of the hand.
A few words as to Lieutenant Henry Lunt. As is well known, he was not
on board the _Bon Homme Richard_ during the engagement, having been
sent, with fifteen of the crew, to take possession of a brigantine
which had been chased inshore, and, although recalled by signal, he
did not return until after the action. His conduct in this respect
has been properly criticized. He states himself:
Having, on the 23d of September, 1779, been ordered
in a pilot boat with a party of men after a brig, but
some time after I set out from alongside, a signal was
made for me to return back to the _Bon homme Richard_,
she being then in chase of two British ships-of-war,
the _Serapis_ and _Countess of Scarborough_, and
before I could get on board the _Bon homme Richard_
she commenced the engagement with the _Serapis_. It
being night, I thought it not prudent to go alongside
in time of action....
This is signed, "On board the _Serapis_, at the Texel, 25th of
October, 1779. Henry Lunt."
Jones indorses this as follows:
This certificate of Lieut. Lunt, who was a mere
spectator, is of great weight and importance, it being
only in the power of this gentleman to give a true
account of the respective positions and manoeuvres of
the ships engaged.