CHAPTER XXI.

PERSONAL APPEARANCE--CHARACTERISTICS--WAS HE A PIRATE?--FAREWELL.

Paul Jones was a small, slender man, somewhat under the middle

stature, or about five feet five inches in height. As is frequently

the custom with seamen, who pass much of their lives between decks,

his shoulders were slightly rounded, and at first glance he seemed

smaller than he was. In physique he was active and graceful, well

proportioned and strong. Many portraits of him exist, some of them

gross caricatures, representing him as the proverbial pirate of early

days clad in fantastic costume, his belt bristling with pistols and

knives, and depicting him in the act of slaying some terrified and

helpless sailor; but it is from such representations as the painting

by Peale,[56] the bust by Houdon, the naval medal, and the miniature

by the Countess de Lavendahl, that we get a correct idea of his

appearance. His features were regular; his nose was straight,

prominent, and slightly enlarged at the tip; his lips were elegantly

curved. His head was well proportioned, and set firmly upon his

shoulders; in spite of his stoop he held it erect, which gave him an

intent, eager expression. His large black eyes were set deep in their

sockets under heavy, arched eyebrows; in moments of action they

sparkled with fire and passion. His hair was black and plentiful, and

the darkness of his complexion had been intensified by years of

exposure to wind and weather. His hands and feet were small and of

good shape. He was always particular in his dress, which was of

material as rich and in cut as elegant as his means permitted. Without

being handsome, therefore, he was a man of distinctly striking and

notable appearance in any society.

His habitual expression was thoughtful and meditative. His face was

the face of a student rather than that of a fighter. As it looks out

at us from the canvas of the past in Peale's portrait, there is a

little touch of wonder and surprise in the soft, reflective eyes. The

mystery of life is there. We feel that the man is speculating upon us,

measuring us, wondering who and what we are. There is a gentle gravity

about the face which is most attractive. In the profile on the medal

and in the Houdon bust other qualities predominate. You catch a

glimpse of the proud, imperious, dashing sailor in the uplifted poise

of the head, the tense, straight line of the lips, and the firm,

resolute chin; and there is a suggestion of humor, grim enough, in the

whole face. The Countess de Lavendahl apparently depicts him in the

role of a lover, fashionably attired and arrayed for conquest. In each

of these representations we have the broad, splendid brow which

typifies the mind that was in him. It is probable that these different

portraits were each good likenesses, and that each artist, in

accordance with his insight, wrought into his presentment what he saw

in the man.

A man of abundant self-confidence, he was not easily embarrassed, and

we find him at home as well in the refined and cultivated colonial

society of North Carolina as upon the decks of a ship manned by the

rudest and roughest of men. He bears himself with easy dignity at

the courts of Russia and France, and is not discomfited in the

presence of king, queen, or empress. His manners were easy and polite.

There was a touch of the directness of the sailor and the fighter in

his address, I doubt not, but his behavior was certainly that of a

gentleman--quiet, dignified, somewhat haughty, but pleasing. This is

established by the testimony of those who knew him, including the

Englishwoman mentioned above; by traditions which have come down to

us; by the fact that he was admitted into the most exclusive circles

in various courts of Europe, and that he retained the place which had

been accorded him through years of acquaintanceship. He has been

called low, brutal, common, and vulgar, but such accusations are

incompatible with the position he occupied. He might have been

received, of course, but he never would have been not merely

tolerated, but admired and sought after, if the charges were correct.

In saying this, I do not wish to be understood as being oblivious of

his faults. As occasion has demanded, I have not hesitated to call

attention to them. He was irritable and impatient, captious and

quarrelsome, at times variable and inconsistent. We find him

addressing a superior at one time in terms that are almost too

respectful, and in his next communication writing with a blunt

frankness of a superior to an inferior. This frequently caused him

trouble, inasmuch as he usually had to deal with men who were his

superiors in birth and station, though not to be compared with him in

talents and education. The limitations of his humble origin account

for this variant attitude to the world's so-called great.

His great fault was his vanity. It was a weakness, like some of his

other qualities, colossal. It manifested itself in every way that

vanity can manifest itself. No defense can be uttered. We recognize

the fact and note it with pain, but in the presence of his great

qualities pass it by, after calling attention to the strange fact that

other and more famous sailors, including the greatest man who ever

fought a ship or squadron, Lord Nelson, were under the spell of the

same weakness--and other greater weaknesses. No character in history

is without weakness. There was but One who manifested no weakness, not

even on a cross.

His mind was a well-furnished one. From boyhood he had cultivated the

studious habit with which he was endowed in large degree, with the

assiduity and perseverance of a Scotsman. He was thoroughness itself;

whatever he attempted he did so well that he usually left nothing

further to be desired. His brain was alert and active. He was

quick-witted, and not devoid of humor, although there is always a

touch of sternness in his persiflage. His letters fall into two

classes. When he wrote under pressure of strong emotion or excitement,

he expressed his personality with his pen as adequately as he did in

his actions; his remarks were short, sharp, direct, logical, and in

good taste; his style was vigorous and perspicuous. On the other hand,

he frequently descended, especially when addressing women, into

verbosity, and verbosity of that most intolerable species known as

fine writing--witness his letter to Lady Selkirk. As a phrase maker

many of his sentences ring with his spirit. "I do not wish to have

command of any ship that does not sail fast, for I intend to go in

harm's way"; "I have not yet begun to fight"; "I have ever looked out

for the honor of the American flag"; "I can never renounce the

glorious title of a citizen of the United States," are some of his

sayings which have passed into history, and might appropriately serve

for inscriptions on the four sides of his monument, when a too tardy

people pay him the honor of erecting one.[57]

He spoke French well and wrote it better. He found no difficulty in

making himself understood in France, and that language was used

entirely in his Russian campaign. In an age when everybody scribbled

verse he wrote poetry which is creditable to him. It has been remarked

that it was much better verse than Nelson wrote. Like many other naval

officers of that day, he played the flute and had a taste for music.

He was undoubtedly a member of the Presbyterian Church by baptism in

infancy, and although, so far as is known, he was not actively in

communion with any religious organization during his life, he was in

no sense an irreligious man. "They that go down to the sea in ships

that do business in great waters," who see "the works of the Lord, and

his wonders in the deep," are rarely ultimately indifferent to

religion. They are superficially careless, perhaps, but they are

neither skeptics nor atheists.[58] Nothing could be sweeter and more

gentle than his letters to his sisters with their unequivocal

recognition of the Power above which shapes our ends.

In a day when seamen--and no less the naval officer than the

merchantman--considered a capacity for picturesque and plentiful

profanity a mark of professional aptitude, he was distinguished by

refraining from oaths and curses. Mark the words: "Do not swear, Mr.

Stacy--in another moment we may all be in eternity--but let us do our

duty." Uttered in the heat of action, and in a critical moment, the

sentence is as rare as it is beautiful, and it somehow reminds me of

the dying words of Nelson in the cockpit of the Victory. He was

clean-mouthed and clean-hearted. I do not wish to say that he was

immaculate, a saint, or anything of that sort, but there is no man of

similar upbringing, who lived in his day, and under such

circumstances, whose life appears to be cleaner. There is a total

absence of sensuality in his career. In over thirteen hundred letters

which have been examined, there is not a coarse or indelicate

allusion; no _double entendre_ ever sullies his pages, and the name of

no woman is mentioned save in terms of respect. It is probable that

his amour with Madame de Telison passed the bounds of Platonic

friendship or romantic admiration, and it is possible that they did

have a child; but even this is by no means certain, and the conclusion

may do him an injustice.

When one remembers that from a tender age he was deprived of those

gentle restraints imposed by pious and loving family ties, his

character is remarkable. I have observed in much experience with men

that when the check put upon humanity by the Church, by association

with good women, and by keeping in touch with law-abiding society is

removed, and men are assembled far from these things in camps or

ships, where the principal requirement is a stern obedience to law,

and the atmosphere strictly masculine, they are apt to think, say, and

do things to which they would never descend under ordinary

circumstances. Jones had been a sailor--an apprentice boy at that--at

twelve years of age; for sixteen years thereafter he had never been

off blue water for more than a few months. Five years of that time he

had been on a slaver, beginning as third mate at sixteen and quitting

as chief mate at twenty-one, and of all the degrading, brutal

influences to which humanity could be subjected there was nothing that

equaled the horrors of a ship in the slave trade. The tough moral

fiber of the Scotsman stood him in good stead here, for the thing

which with a boy's indifference he could countenance, he could not

endure as a man.

And this brings us to another of his qualities, which awakens our

interest--his intense love of liberty. Probably it began with the

slave trade; at any rate, it was always and everywhere present with

him. Practically his first military effort was an attempt to set free

American prisoners, and his last commission from the United States was

the appointment to effect the release of the unfortunate Americans

held by the Barbary States. Thus he fought not merely for the

establishment of civil liberty and national independence, but with an

eye single to the individual prisoner, and his spirit was sufficiently

catholic to make him kindly disposed even when the prisoners were

trophies of his prowess. His pleading at L'Orient, when he was left

with the dishonored draft, mutinous crew, and over one hundred

prisoners, was as much for those Englishmen whom the fortune of war

had thrown into his power as for his own people.

Like most men of fierce passions and quick temper, he did not long

cherish animosities. He was not a good hater, and this very quality

sometimes led him into mistaken kindness. He was a humane man, in no

sense the cruel and bloodthirsty warrior of popular imagination. He is

thankful, for instance, after the descent on Whitehaven, that there

was no loss of life on either side, and we have no reason to doubt the

genuineness of his outburst of gratitude when peace was declared,

although it left him without occupation.

He had a good head for business also. In spite of his roving life he

succeeded in amassing considerable property, and his success as a

trader before he entered the naval service had been better than the

average. In fact, his merchant services resulted in an unbroken line

of testimonials not only to his capacity but to his probity and

trustworthiness as well. As a negotiator or diplomatist he was open,

straightforward, persistent, and unusually successful. A solid

foundation of good qualities must have been laid by his homespun

mother in those twelve years in which she watched over and shaped the

future character of the boy.

While he was too much of a wanderer ever to form those deep and

abiding social ties which are the delight of old age and

reflection--though to youth matters of indifference--yet his various

duties brought him into intimate association with great men all over

the world, and there is a universal testimony from them as to his

worth. They were not blind to his faults, but they saw the worthiness

of the man beneath them. Franklin, the keen philosopher and diplomat,

who knew him best, esteemed him most; but Robert Morris, the

incorruptible financier; Thomas Jefferson, the great Democrat;

Gouverneur Morris, the accomplished man of the world; John Adams, the

shrewd statesman; and Washington, the first of them all, esteemed and

admired him, and considered themselves honored in his friendship.

Richard Dale, his great subordinate, who had been with him in times

that tried men's souls, entertained the most devoted feelings of

attachment toward him, and Cooper, who knew Dale personally, tells us

that to the day of his death he never lost his affectionate regard for

his old captain. The terms of their intimacy when not on duty

permitted Dale to address Jones by the friendly name of Paul, and

Cooper chronicles the peculiar tenderness with which he uttered the

word in his old age.

Among the French who respected and admired him, the gallant and

impetuous Lafayette is pre-eminent. That warm-hearted representative

of the haute noblesse of France sought opportunities for service with

the commodore, and never failed to express his affection for him in

the most unequivocal words. Among others were Rochambeau, the soldier;

Malesherbes, the great advocate, defender of his king; the Baron de

Viomenil, who led the French assaulting column at Yorktown; and

Admirals d'Orvilliers, de Vaudreuil, and d'Estaing. Among other

foreign friends were van der Capellen, the Dutch statesman and

diplomat and friend of America; of Russians, Krudner and Grimm; and

the immortal Kosciusko, of Poland. His acquaintance with these men was

no mere passing contact, but was intimate and personal; and his

relations in most instances were not temporary and casual, but lasting

and permanent. Laughton, the English authority in naval history, in

his famous sketch entitled "Paul Jones, 'the Pirate'"[59] says that

Jones' moral character may be summed up in one word--detestable! He

calls him a renegade and a calculating liar, incapable of friendship

or of love, and says that, "Whenever his private actions can be

examined, they must be pronounced to be discreditable; and as to many

others that appear to be so, there is no evidence in favor except his

own unsubstantial and worthless testimony." It is not an indictment

against Jones alone that Professor Laughton so lightly writes, but

against the great men who, with infinitely better opportunities for

observation than any of his biographers have enjoyed, have not been

slow to call him their friend. Is it to be conceived for a single

moment that Franklin, Jefferson, Lafayette, the Morrises, or any of

the others, would have associated with, corresponded with, and

publicly praised a vulgar blackguard? Would such a man, however

successful, have been admitted to any society whatsoever? Or, having

in the first flush of joy at the news of his tremendous victory been

so admitted, could such a man have retained his position for thirteen

years--until he died, in fact? Nonsense! He looked like a gentleman;

he wrote like a gentleman; whenever his words have been recorded we

find he spoke like a gentleman, and he certainly fought like one.

Never was a man so calumniated. His actions were so great that intense

interest was felt in his career from the day of his arrival in Europe,

and after his death quantities of sketches of him appeared, many of

which are still extant. They are of the chap-book order--the dime

novel of the day--and usually contain an awe-inspiring picture, and

relate a tale in which smuggling, gambling, falsehood, theft, rape,

murder, and everything else that is vile, are included. Laughton seems

to have arrived at his estimation of Jones by accepting these

scandalous tales as authentic, and building his biography of material

culled from these disgraceful and discredited sources. No man can

conceal his real character for any great length of time, especially a

man in official station, who lives in the white light of public

criticism. If Jones were the creature that Laughton describes him, it

would appear somewhere in some serious page of his own. He was a most

voluminous correspondent--Philip II was not a more indefatigable

letter writer than he--and he spoke of the subjects under discussion

with a sailor's frankness. Why is it that none of these things are

evident? He was foolish sometimes, but never base. It is too late to

write down in a few careless words the great men who entertained so

high an opinion of the commodore. But Professor Laughton is not alone

in his opinions. Indeed, his conclusions appear to represent a general

English sentiment. So great a novelist as the gentle Thackeray calls

Jones a traitor, and the popular opinion even in this day does not

seem to have changed. In the current number of the London Academy[60]

he is again called a "pirate." Let us settle this question at least.

What is a pirate? Says President Woolsey: "Piracy is robbery on the

sea, or by descent from the sea upon the coast, committed by persons

not holding a commission from, or at the time pertaining to, any

established state. It is the act (1) of persons forming an

organization for the purpose of plunder, or with malicious intent; but

who, inasmuch as such a body is not constituted for political

purposes, can not be said to be a body politic; (2) of persons who,

having in defiance of law seized possession of a chartered vessel, use

it for the purpose of robbery; (3) of persons taking a commission from

two belligerent adversaries. The reason for ranking these latter among

pirates is that the _animus furandi_ is shown by acting under two

repugnant authorities. It has been held by some that a vessel which

takes commissions even from two allies is guilty of piracy, but others

regard such an act only as illegal and irregular."[61]

Chancellor Kent calls piracy "robbery, forceful plunder, or murder by

marauders on the high seas _in the spirit and intent of universal

hostility_." The Century Dictionary defines it as follows:

"Specifically in the law of nations, the crime of depredations or

willful and aggressive destruction of life and property, committed on

the seas by persons having no commission or authority from any

established state. As commonly used, it implies something more than a

simple theft with violence at sea, and includes something of the idea

of general hostility to law."

By any of these definitions can Paul Jones be called a pirate? It will

be readily seen that the charge hangs upon the question as to whether

Jones held a commission from an established state. In fact, the

determination of that point settles the matter. He was regularly

commissioned a captain in the navy of the United States, as we have

seen.[62] Was the United States an established power, a sovereign

state? The United States began to be with the Declaration of

Independence. To quote Woolsey again: "The sovereignty of a state

dates from its _de facto_ existence, and does not depend upon its

recognition by foreign powers. Thus the sovereignty of the United

States was complete from July 4, 1776, not 1782, when the English

Government recognized, not granted, its independence." If the United

States had not a legal existence as a sovereign power competent to

wage war, and therefore to issue commissions to naval officers, until

the treaty of peace, England would have granted independence thereby,

instead of which she recognized a long-accomplished fact. Moreover,

the British Government, long before peace was declared, had conceded

belligerent rights to the revolted colonies, after much protestation.

But necessary privileges of belligerency are those of raising forces

and commissioning officers whose status as individual belligerents is

determined by the recognition. None of the American prisoners taken

from time to time were hanged as rebels or traitors, nor would such

action have been permitted by the British people, if it had been

seriously entertained by the king. Even if they had captured Paul

Jones, the English, in all their fury, would not have dared to treat

him as a pirate. Upon the point of law there is no justification for

the charge. Paul Jones' commission was as valid a document as any

under which a naval officer ever sailed. The sovereignty of the United

States had been recognized long before the termination of the war by

France, Spain, and Holland, and Frederick the Great, by opening the

port of Dantzic to American ships, had practically committed himself

to that side; although the failure of any or all of these to do so

would not have abrogated our _de facto_ existence as a nation.

But, turning from the subject of the commission as established, let us

examine the other phases involved in the charge. Piracy consists of

murder and robbery in a spirit of universal hostility toward humanity

(the _animus furandi_ of Woolsey's paragraph). Jones directed his

attacks at England alone. There was no killing unless in open combat;

no robbery except by taking ships and property in open warfare, and

surely Jones' conduct with regard to Selkirk's plate was not that of a

robber or a pirate! By the law of nations a pirate, whatever his

nationality, is subject to the jurisdiction of any country. Thus, an

English pirate caught by the French Government, or a French pirate

caught by the English Government, would be summarily dealt with

without the slightest reference to the country of his nationality. If

Jones had been a pirate France would either have made short work of

him, or else have incurred the odium of humanity as an abettor of

piracy.

His acts were not those of an irresponsible person or a body of people

who sent him forth with malicious intent, but were undertaken for

distinctly political purposes at the instance of an undoubted body

politic. These purposes were: (1) The protection of our coasts by

showing the vulnerability of the coasts of England. (2) The stoppage

of the ravages on our seaboard, by demonstrating some of their horrors

in the land of the ravagers. (3) The securing of prisoners by which

the principle of exchange should be established, and thus our citizens

released from a captivity in which they were treated with scant regard

to the laws of humanity. (4) The breaking up of the enemy's commerce

and the impairment of his material resources, so that the burden of

consequences would induce him to end the war and recognize our

independence. (5) The making of a diversion in the north which would

facilitate the proposed grand operations of the French and Spanish

fleets in the south. These are legitimate motives in the highest

sense. They are of the deepest importance, and they constitute a brief

catalogue of his accomplishments. Add to the list the shattering of

British prestige by his hard and successful fighting, and mention the

way he contrived to force the Netherlands finally to declare for the

United States, and we have a catalogue of achievements of which any

one might be proud.[63]

There was no thought in Jones' mind of private gain. Prize money had

accrued from captures from time immemorial, but Jones was ambitious of

distinction, and as anxious to worthily serve his country as Farragut

or Sampson, and the question of prize money was purely a minor one

with him. If gain had been his object, a privateering commission which

he was urged to accept in France--and which he could undoubtedly have

received in America--but which he rejected with disdain, would have

given him greater opportunity than he ever enjoyed of acquiring

wealth. His whole career, in fact, shows him to have been absolutely

indifferent to money. He never hoarded or amassed it, and, though he

received large sums from time to time, he usually spent it in generous

profusion as fast as it came in. Had professional advancement been his

sole desire, he would have accepted the rank of _Capitaine de

Vaisseau_--that is, a captain of a ship of the line--which

d'Orvilliers had offered to procure for him, from which he might have

progressed to the highest naval rank, instead of which he chose to

remain in command of the petty little Ranger. How Laughton can deny

his enthusiasm for America when, with but little hope of reward, he

periled his liberty and his life in her service, and absolutely

refused under any circumstances to withdraw from that service, I fail

to understand.[64]

He did not, in defiance of law, charter a vessel for the purpose of

waging private war. On the contrary, his ship was provided by the

French king, and commissions for those officers who had not been

commissioned directly by Congress, as had Jones himself, were issued

by Franklin, who possessed the unquestioned power to do this by the

specific action of Congress. Indeed, such was Franklin's power, that

when he displaced Landais from his command he did not hesitate to

overrule a commission issued by Congress under circumstances of

peculiar importance, and he was upheld by that body when his action

was called in question.

Nor did Jones take a commission from two belligerent adversaries--that

is, he had no commission from England which he threw up to accept that

of the United States. He had never served in the English navy in any

capacity. There were officers in the United States land service who

had held English commissions and yet accepted American commands, but

Jones was not one of them. He had never, until he entered the Russian

service, sailed under any commission save that of the United States,

and one of the noblest acts of his life was his indignant repudiation

of a French letter of marque when his acceptance of it was considered

the only way of saving his head. Nothing could induce him to declare

the Alliance a French ship in those hazardous moments in the Texel

when he was menaced by the Dutch fleet on one side and the English

fleet on the other, nor would he even temporarily hoist the French

flag on that ship. He did not even commit the so-called illegal and

irregular act of accepting a commission from two allies, for he

refused a French commission again and again. This certainly

constitutes a clear and overwhelming refutation of the charge of

piracy. Indeed, on the question of piracy, Jones' own ingenious

comment is not without interest. Laughton has called attention to it

in the following words:

"Paul Jones strongly objected to the word as applied to himself; he

had, he said, looked in the dictionary and found the definition of

pirate to be 'an enemy against mankind.' Now, he was not the enemy of

mankind, but only the enemy of England. With a _tu quoque_ argument,

not wanting in ingenuity, he urged that, as England was then at war

with the whole of America, the greater part of Europe, and much of

Asia, not to speak of a part of Africa, she, in point of fact, came as

near being the enemy of mankind as could well be conceived--that

England was therefore the pirate, not Paul Jones."

Why was it that the English called him a pirate, put a price on his

head, and attempted to compass his death or capture by private hands?

Why was it that he evoked such widespread animosity, and became the

object of a hatred which has not exhausted itself to this day? Surely

not because he had been a British subject! All who fought on the

American side had been British subjects. Jones had removed to America

and had determined to settle there before the war broke out. Why

should any one attempt to insinuate that the same feelings which

actuated Adams, Washington, and Patrick Henry did not operate to make

him espouse the colonial cause? He was as fond of freedom as they, and

as anxious to promote it.

Many of the most distinguished colonists were not only British

subjects, but they had worn the king's uniform, fought under the

king's flag, and eaten the king's bread; as, for instance, the great

Washington. Richard Montgomery, an Irishman, who laid down a life

valuable to his adopted country when he fell in the assault on Quebec,

had been a British officer; and there were many others, some of whom,

like the traitor Charles Lee and the worthless Gates, were actually

half-pay officers in the British army when they entered the American

service!

Among the naval officers, the heroic Biddle, who matched the little

Randolph, of thirty-two small guns, against the huge line of battle

ship Yarmouth, and fought until his ship was blown to pieces, and he

and all his crew were lost except four men, had been a midshipman in

the British navy with Nelson. Stout old John Barry, who commanded the

Alliance when he captured the Atlanta and the Trepassy, and fought the

last action of the war by beating the frigate Sibylle, of superior

force, was an Irishman.[65] The most bigoted Englishmen to-day speak

of those men with respect which they will not accord to Jones. Why is

this?

The reason for the strange exception lies in the brilliant success

with which he cruised and fought. The English claimed and exercised an

absolute and practically undisputed supremacy on the high seas. Their

arrogant navy for more than a hundred years had been invincible. In

single ship actions they had always conquered. No enemy had landed on

their shores for over a century. They could stand being beaten on

land--they were accustomed to it. With few notable exceptions England

does not produce great soldiers--Carlyle feelingly refers to the

average English commander as a "wooden hoop pole wearing a cocked

hat"[66]--but such a line of sailors as had sprung from their shores

has never been equaled in the history of the world. Such sea

leadership and such sea fighting has never been exceeded, or even

equaled, by any nation.[67]

The capture of the Serapis was a trifling circumstance; it did not

impair the naval efficiency or abridge the maritime supremacy of

England an appreciable degree; but it had a moral significance

that could not be misunderstood by the nations of the world. They saw

and approved.[68] English ships had been beaten in fair fight, in one

instance by a ship of equal, and in the other instance of inferior,

force. The English coasts, in spite of swarms of great ships of the

line, had been shown to be as vulnerable as any other.[69] The affront

had been to her pride, and never since the days that brave old

Tromp--gallant Dutchman, for whose character I have the greatest

admiration--swept the narrow seas with a broom at his masthead, and

actually entered the Thames under that same provoking emblem, had

England suffered such naval humiliation. The English cheek tingles

still from the blow dealt upon it by the hot-handed sailor. Naturally,

they did not love Paul Jones. The hatred, which after a hundred years

still rankles, is evidence of what they feel--and what he did! As for

us, we love the bold little captain for the enemies he has made.

It has been stated by unthinking people that the Bon Homme Richard was

a privateer or a letter of marque: in one case an armed vessel owned

by private individuals and authorized, under certain restrictions, to

cruise at private expense to prey upon the commerce of the enemy; in

the other case, an armed vessel engaged in trade, but possessing the

right to capture ships of the enemy should she happen to fall in with

them. There is nothing disgraceful about either of these commissions,

though, to be sure, their essence consists in making war for

individual gain. The Bon Homme Richard was purchased and converted

into a man-of-war by the French Government, and then loaned to the

American Government for the time being. De Chaumont acted only as the

representative of the king--that is, of the Government. There was no

question of individual gain in the matter. The money for the sale of

the prizes was received, and the share of Jones was paid, by the

French Government. Therefore it was a Government ship, not a private

vessel. France and the United States were allies in a war against

England when she was commissioned, and the transaction was customary

and legitimate. The Bon Homme Richard was as bona fide an American

man-of-war as the Constitution. Of course, there could be no exception

to the status of the Ranger or any of the earlier ships in which Paul

Jones sailed.

I have considered the personal character and professional status of

Paul Jones, now let me say a few words as to his qualities as an

officer. Here at last we reach a field in which there is practically

little disagreement. First of all, he was a thorough and accomplished

seaman. His experiences had been many and varied. His handling of the

Providence in the Gut of Canso, of the Alfred along the coast of Cape

Breton, his splendid seamanship in the Ariel in the terrific gale off

the Penmarques, his daring passage of the Baltic amid the winter gales

and ice, not to speak of the way he maneuvered the Richard in the

battle with the Serapis, all tell the same story of skill and address.

Not only did he understand the sailing of ships, but he acquired no

small familiarity with the principles of naval architecture. Witness

his remodeling of the Alliance, the improvements he introduced in the

America, and the skillful way he managed the launching of that ship.

Some of his suggestions were radical, and some of the principles he

laid down were embodied in shipbuilding by naval architects until the

advent of the ironclad age.

He was a stern disciplinarian, and usually managed to work his very

indifferent crews into something like fair shape. In none of his

commands did he have a first-class crew of American seamen, such as

the 1812 frigates exhibited. His sway on his ships was absolute. His

officers were generally creatures of his own making (Simpson being an

exception), and completely under his domination; with few exceptions,

like Dale, whom he loved and respected, they were poor enough. In his

passionate impatience with their stupidity or inefficiency, he

sometimes treated them with great indignity, even going to the length

of kicking them out of the cabin when they displeased him.[70] He was

a fierce commander, who brooked no interference, needed no

suggestions, and had no tolerance for ignorance and incapacity.

Notwithstanding all this, he was a merciful captain in an age in which

the gospel of force, punctuated by the cat-o'-nine-tails, was the only

one in vogue on ships of war. He resorted but rarely to the practice

of flogging, and in comparison with most commanders of the period his

rule was not intolerable. He did not, however, inspire affection in

his crews; they respected his talents, trusted to his skill, and

admired his courage, but nothing more. His men were drilled and

exercised incessantly, and target practice was had as frequently as

the poverty of his supplies permitted. His ships were all notably

clean and orderly.

As a commander we may consider his achievements from three points of

view: as a strategist, as a tactician, and as a fighter. Strategic

operations tend to bring you where sound policy dictates you should

be, while tactical maneuvers refer to the manipulation of your force

at the point of contact. A man may be a brilliant strategist and a

poor tactician, or the reverse; or he may be both, and yet not be a

hard, determined fighter. Jones was all three in large measure. His

strategic conceptions were excellent. His successful destruction of

the fishery industry at Canso, and his attempt upon the coal fleet in

the Alfred; the brilliant plan which would have resulted in the

capture of Lord Howe by d'Estaing if it had been carried out in time;

the project he conceived for taking the homeward-bound East Indiamen

by capturing St. Helena as a base of attack, and the other enterprises

he urged upon the French Government indicate these things; but the

conception which lifted him above the ordinary sea officer was his

acute realization of the great principle that should regulate commerce

destroying, which is one of the legitimate objects of warfare, and

merciful in that it tends to end the conflict, and is aimed at

property rather than life.

His idea was that, to be successfully accomplished, it could not be

committed to the cruiser or commerce destroyer, but that attacks on

centers of trade must be made by forces sufficiently mobile to enable

them to cover great distances rapidly, and sufficiently strong to

defeat any reasonable force, and then crush the enemy's commerce at

vital points. A single ship may catch a single ship upon the high

seas, or from a fleet in convoy perhaps cut out two or three; but a

descent upon a great body of shipping in a harbor--unprotected as were

the harbors of those days--would result in an infinitely greater loss

to the enemy. Mahan has demonstrated that the necessary preliminary to

the destruction of the enemy's commerce is to batter his navy to

pieces--then it is at one's mercy. So far as I know, Jones is the only

sailor of his day, or of many subsequent days in any navy, who had a

glimmer of an idea in this direction; and, without detracting from

Mahan's originality, in a limited sense Jones forestalled him. Mahan,

indeed, gives him full credit for his genius on this very point.

The beginning of strategy is to determine the vital point at which to

aim, and Jones began well. He tried to carry out his idea of commerce

destroying with the Ranger in the Irish Channel, and he came near

enough to success to demonstrate the absolute feasibility and value of

his conception, given adequate force to carry it out. He had a greater

force, of course, under his partial command in his famous cruise in

the Bon Homme Richard, but the peculiar constitution of that squadron,

which was an assemblage of co-operative ships rather than a compact

body responsive and obedient to one will, also prevented him from

carrying out his plans. Suppose, for instance, that the Alliance had

obeyed his orders, and that the Vengeance, the Cerf, and the

privateers had remained with the Pallas under his command, and that

all had been well officered and manned! He would have taken the

Serapis in half an hour or less, and the great Baltic fleet, worth

millions of dollars, would have been at his mercy. What he attempted

at Leith he could have carried out at Newcastle and Hull.

The largest force under his command was the Russian squadron in the

Liman. He chose his admirable position there with an eye to its

strategic possibilities, and it was due to him, and not to the trained

and veteran soldier Suvorof, that the fort was placed on Kinburn

Point, which practically determined the fate of Otchakoff, since it

prevented the Turks from re-enforcing their fleet, and kept them from

escaping after Jones had defeated them. Fortune never gave him an

opportunity, but it can not be doubted from what he did accomplish

with an inferior force that if he had been given a chance he would

have made a name for himself as a sea strategist not inferior to that

of Nelson or Sampson.

As a tactician he was even more able--perhaps because he enjoyed

better opportunities. It was seamanship and tactics which enabled him

to escape from the Solebay, and it was seamanship and tactics by which

he diverted the Milford from the pursuit of his prizes and insured

their safety. His tactics when he fought the Drake were admirable. In

his famous battle with the Serapis they were even more striking. One

never ceases to wonder how he succeeded in maneuvering his slow,

unwieldy ship so as to nullify the greater speed and gun power of the

Serapis. His action in laying the Bon Homme Richard aboard the English

frigate was the one chance that he had of success, and he made that

chance himself.

His tactics in the Liman were even higher than elsewhere. It was he

who so maneuvered the boats of the flotilla on June 17th as to

precipitate the flight of the Turks; it was he who again, on June 28th

and 29th, so placed his ships that he drove the Turks from their

stranded flagships. It was he who dispatched the flotilla to clear the

right flank, which would have enabled the Russians to take possession

of the two frigates if Nassau had not foolishly burned them. It was he

who, by his splendid disposition of his ships and the battery on the

point, forced the Turkish ships to take ground upon the shoals, in

their attempt to escape, where Nassau destroyed them. On the other

hand, he was never reckless. He coolly calculated chances and

judiciously chose the right course, and he was happy in that the right

course was usually the bold and daring one.

In the third capacity of an officer, there is no question as to his

willingness and ability to fight. No one ever called him a coward. He

certainly exhibited the very highest reach of physical bravery. It was

not the courage of the braggart, for he was not continually thrusting

it in the face of people on all occasions. Having established his

reputation, he was content to rest upon it, and did not seek

opportunity--which he did not need--for further demonstration. Nothing

could surpass the personal courage and determination with which he

fought his ships. Unlike most commanders, who confine their efforts to

direction, he labored and fought with his own hands.

We find him heading the boarders on the forecastle of the Richard,

and, pike in hand, repelling those from the Serapis; he assists in

lashing the two ships together; he takes personal command of the

quarter-deck guns, one of which, with the assistance of a few resolute

souls, he dragged across the deck from the unengaged side. When the

Ariel was drifting in deadly peril upon the Penmarques, with his own

hand he heaves the lead. At Kinburn, after repeated efforts to get the

galley fleet to move, he leads it forward himself. To ascertain the

depth of water, he goes in a small boat under the walls of Otchakoff,

within easy range of the cannon. He takes his barge on the Liman in

the midst of the hottest engagement, and rows about through the

contestants. When the assault is made on the flotilla under the walls

of that town, he leads in person, and captures two gunboats by

boarding. At Whitehaven, alone he confronts a mob and keeps them in

check until the fire which he started himself has gained sufficient

headway. The bullying of the Dutch admiral in the Texel can not move

him a single foot.

While he did not always exhibit the same amount of moral courage, yet

in some very interesting situations he showed that he possessed it in

large measure. His physical courage was, of course, natural. His moral

courage seems to have arisen in part from an absolute confidence in

his own ability and an habitual reliance upon the accuracy of his own

judgment. He showed this moral courage when, at the peril of his

commission, he assumed the responsibility of piloting the Alfred to

her anchorage in the Bahama expedition. He showed it particularly

when, after assuming the proper position demanded by good strategy in

the opening of the Liman campaign, he refused to be moved from it by

the representations of such fire eaters as Nassau and Alexiano. His

declining to hoist the French flag, or to sail under a French letter

of marque, were evidences of this quality, and he showed it again by

sending a present to Louis XVI in the dark days of the Revolution,

when respect to the king in his hours of humiliation marked a man

immediately.

On the other hand, he showed a sad lack of moral courage if de Ségur's

statement be true that he found him, pistol in hand, in his apartments

in St. Petersburg, apparently contemplating suicide. Moral courage is

perhaps a more universal requisite for true greatness of character

than any other virtue, and he did not rise in this sphere quite to the

height he attained in the others. In other words, he was greater as a

commander and as an officer than as a man.

As a commander he made mistakes. What commander did not? His quickness

to imagine or to resent a slight was marred by too great a willingness

to forgive. His treatment of the mutinous Simpson was entirely too

gentle and forgiving for the maintenance of that discipline necessary

to the welfare of the service. It was certainly a mistake to yield to

Landais' importunities and leave the advantageous situation off

Limerick, and, as I have stated, the excuse was worse than the action.

His failure to keep his promise to his men after leaving Corunna in

the Alliance was a more serious blunder. There are few professions in

which the word of an officer is so implicitly relied upon by his

inferiors as in the naval service. The lives of the crew are so

entirely in the hands of the officers that without confidence the

situation is impossible. His extravagant outfitting of the Alliance

was also a wrong to Franklin under the circumstances. His method of

dealing with the mutiny on the Alliance and with Landais' successful

attempt to get command of her was weak, and can only be explained by

the postulation that he did not really desire to get possession of

her; but even the explanation leaves him in a bad position. His

dawdling at L'Orient is also censurable. This, however, is a small

catalogue in view of what he attempted and accomplished. Otherwise in

his campaigns and in his military life he made no blunders.

He has been severely censured for choosing localities with which he

was familiar from childhood as the scene of his military operations.

The war of the Revolution was practically a civil war, with all the

rancorous passions attendant thereon superadded to those ordinarily

engendered in conflict. In America, friend met friend in deadly

hatred, and not one royalist or rebel hesitated to use his local

knowledge for the advancement of his cause. In accordance with his

duty, by his oath as an officer, Jones was bound to put all the

information as well as the ability he possessed at the services of the

country under whose flag he fought. He was not born at Whitehaven,

and, while he had sailed from the port many times, he had no special

attachment for the place and people which comes from long association

in society and business. When he made his famous descent upon the

place it was seven years since he had set foot in it. At any rate, he

was only doing in England what other people on both sides were doing

in America without censure, and he was doing it with so much more

respect to the laws of civilized warfare, and with so much more mercy,

that there is no comparison between his forays and those, let us say,

of Lord Dunmore, for instance, or Mowatt at Portland. The journal of

an officer of the Serapis, who was killed in the action, was found

after the battle was over. He had been under Dunmore's command in

Virginia at the outbreak of the Revolution, and such a tale of

maraudings, accompanied by destruction of property, murdering, and

outraging of women as the volume contained would have been incredible

had it not been confirmed by the statement of hundreds of witnesses in

America. None of this kind of warfare was waged where Jones commanded.

A century and a decade, lacking two years, have elapsed since the

lonely little commander entered upon his long, long rest; and the

country whose first banner was hoisted by his hands at the masthead of

the Alfred, whose permanent standard was flung to the breeze by the

same hands from the truck of the Ranger, whose ensign was first

saluted by one of the greatest powers of the world through his address

and determination, whose flag was made respectable in the eyes of the

world by the desperate gallantry with which he fought under it, which

alone among the powers that sailed the sea through him demonstrated

its ability to meet successfully the Mistress of the Ocean, has done

nothing to perpetuate the memory of this founder of the Republic and

rescue him from oblivion. The place of his grave is known, but squalid

tenements and cheap stores have been erected over his remains.

Commerce, trade, and traffic, restless life with its passions, noble

and ignoble, flows on above his head, and it is probable that so it

will be until the end of time. "So runs the world away!"

It is all so mournful in some strange way. In spite of his glory and

his heroism, in spite of his strenuous life and his strugglings, the

note that lingers in my mind as I write these concluding words is one

of sadness. I read of hopes that brought no fruition; of plans made

and abandoned; of opportunities that could not be embraced; of great

attempts frustrated by inadequate means; of triumphs forgotten. I see

a great life that might have been greater, a man of noble qualities

marred by petty faults, and yet I love him. I can not tell why

exactly, but the words of Solomon come into my mind as the vision of

the little captain appears before me, dying alone of a broken heart,

fretted away--_Vanitas vanitatem_.

And yet he did not live in vain, and his exploits shall live forever

in the minds of his countrymen. So long as we possess that masculine

virility which is the heritage of a great nation whose rugged coasts

are washed by thousands of leagues of beating seas; so long as the

beautiful flag we love waves above the mighty Republic, which, true to

the principles of its founders, stands in every quarter of the globe

for freedom of person, for liberty of conscience, for respect to law,

so long shall the story be told of the little captain from the far

land who loved these things, and who fought so heroically to establish

and to maintain them.

APPENDIX I.

CONCERNING JOHN PAUL'S ASSUMPTION OF THE NAME OF JONES.

A.

_Letter of Mr. W. M. Cumming, of Wilmington, N. C., May 21, 1899_.

"John Paul adopted the name of Jones in token of affectionate regard

for the Honorable Willie (pronounced Wylie) Jones, of North Carolina,

and his beautiful and charming wife, who had both been very kind to

him in his days of obscurity. He was particularly devoted to Mrs.

Jones, and called himself her son. It was through the influence of

Honorable Willie Jones (member of Congress, I think, from North

Carolina), that John Paul obtained his commission in the navy of the

young Republic, and it was about this time that he adopted the name of

his friend and patron."

B.

_Letter of Mr. Junius Davis, of Wilmington, N. C., February 23, 1900_.

"I first heard from my father, the late Hon. George Davis, who was a

devoted student of the history of North Carolina, and perhaps the

highest authority in the State upon such subjects, that _Paul_,

shortly after going to Virginia to take the estate left him by his

brother, met Willie Jones of this State; that Jones took a fancy to

him and invited him to pay him a visit in North Carolina; that Paul

did so and remained quite a long time with him and became so attached

to Jones and his wife that he adopted their name. _Willie_--pronounced

_Wylie_--Jones and his brother Allan were educated at Eton, and were

gentlemen of large means, high ability, and devoted Whigs. They were

prominent in every movement and assembly in this State prior to and

during the Revolution. Allan lived upon his plantation, 'Mount

Gallant,' in Halifax County, and Willie upon his, 'The Grove,' in the

adjoining county of North Hampton. They were warm friends and

associates of Joseph Hewes, of Edenton, one of the delegates from

North Carolina to the first and second Provincial Congresses. Wheeler,

the historian of North Carolina in his Reminiscences and Memoirs of

North Carolina and Eminent North Carolinians, says as follows:

"'The daring and celebrated John Paul Jones, whose real name was John

Paul, of Scotland, when quite young visited Mr. Willie Jones at

Halifax, and became so fascinated with him and his charming wife that

he adopted their family name. Under this name, John Paul Jones, he

offered his services to Congress and was made a lieutenant, December

22, 1775, on the recommendation of _Willie_ Jones.' ... Jones in the

very outset of his Autobiography says: 'I at the same time acquainted

Mr. Hewes, a member of Congress and my particular friend, with the

project for seizing the island of St. Helena,' etc. This is the Mr.

Hewes mentioned above. In the second Congress Hewes was at the head of

the committee in charge of naval affairs, and was virtually the first

Secretary of the Navy. Paul could only have known Hewes, whom he calls

his particular friend, through the Joneses, and it has always been one

of the traditions of this State that it was the Jones influence with

Hewes that got Paul his lieutenancy in the American navy. In a letter

received recently from my aged kinsman, Colonel Cadwallader Jones, of

Rock Hill, South Carolina, a lineal descendant of _Allan_ Jones, I

find that Colonel Jones' mother was a granddaughter of General Allan

Jones, was raised by him, married in 1810, and lived in Halifax until

1826. Up to this time she was a frequent visitor at 'The Grove,' the

residence of Willie Jones, as was also Colonel Cadwallader Jones. The

latter, who is now eighty-six years of age, has always heard that John

Paul assumed the name of Jones as a mark of respect and affection for

these brothers, Willie and Allan Jones, and for the wife of the

former, whose virtues might well win the admiration of any man.

Colonel Jones remembers his aunt, Mrs. Willie Jones, perfectly; she

survived her husband many years. The statement that John Paul was

invited by Willie Jones to visit 'The Grove' while he was looking

after his property in Virginia is corroborated by Colonel Jones.... I

quote the following from newspaper clippings:

"1. From the Charleston Observer of November, 1899:

"'Fredekicksburg, Va., _November_ 18_th_.

"'The announcement that the remains of that distinguished naval hero,

John Paul Jones, have been located in Paris, France, brings to light

that the deceased was once a resident of this city. According to the

records of the county court, he came here in 1773 to administer on the

records of his brother, William Paul, who lived here in 1772. William

Paul came here in 1760 and shortly afterward entered the mercantile

business, in which he was engaged up to the time of his death. The

store occupied by him is on the corner of Main and Market Streets, and

is the same building in which George Washington was made a Mason.

Tradition also says that one of the rooms in the building was used by

John Paul during his residence here, which was nearly two years, as

his lodging quarters. It was also during his citizenship here that he

received his appointment from the Colonial Congress as lieutenant in

the navy. It was here, too, that he added Jones to his patronymic,

which, it is said, was in token of the friendly act of Colonel Willie

Jones, of North Carolina, who became his bondsman for five hundred

pounds when he administered on his brother's estate.'

"2. The State, Columbia, S. C., Monday, November 6, 1899:

"'Saratoga, Buckingham County, Va., _February_ 22,1899.

"'... While no Revolutionary biography can boast more public events of

vivid and intense interest than that of Paul Jones, none is so bare

and meager in personal detail. Even the fact that he has immortalized

a name which was his only by selection and adoption is slurred over in

history with the calm statement that "he changed his name for unknown

reasons." As the reasons were not unknown, and, however difficult to

obtain later, were then easily accessible, it appears to have been

rather a lack of careful and intelligent investigation than of facts

which caused their suppression. They are now for the first time given

to the public.... In 1773, the death of his brother in Virginia, whose

heir he was, induced him to settle in America. It was then he added to

his name and thenceforth was known as "Paul Jones." This was done in

compliment to one of the most noted statesmen of that day, and in the

love and gratitude it shadows forth is a scathing reproach and a

touching example to a people who could neglect in life and forget in

death. It appears that before permanently settling in Virginia, moved

by the restlessness of his old seafaring life, he wandered about the

country, finally straying to North Carolina. There he became

acquainted with two brothers, Willie and Allan Jones. They were both

leaders in their day, and wise and honored in their generation. Allan

Jones was an orator and silver-tongued; Willie Jones, the foremost man

of his State, and one of the most remarkable of his time....

"'His home, "The Grove," near Halifax, was not only the resort of the

cultivated, the refined, but the home of the homeless, Mrs. Jones

having sometimes twenty orphan girls under her charge, and it was here

the young adventurer, John Paul Jones, was first touched by those

gentler and purer influences which changed not only his name but

himself, from the rough and reckless mariner into the polished man of

society, who was the companion of kings and the lion and pet of

Parisian salons. The almost worshiping love and reverence awakened in

his hitherto wild and untamed nature by the generous kindness of these

brothers found expression in his adoption of their name. The truth of

this account is ... attested by the descendants of Willie Jones.

"'In addition to the above, I would say that General Allan Jones of

the Revolution was my great-great-grandfather. My grandmother was

raised by him, and was often at "The Grove," the residence of her

great-uncle, Willie Jones. My father, Colonel Cadwallader Jones, now

eighty-six years of age, in his youth was also often an inmate of "The

Grove," and heard the facts spoken in both families.

"'A. I. Robertson,

"'Secretary Columbia Chapter, D. A. R.'"

C.

_Letter of Mrs. A. I. Robertson, of Columbia, S. C.,

April 14, 1900_.

"John Paul was thrown more with Mr. and Mrs. _Willie_ Jones, I think,

than _Allan_, as he was more at 'The Grove' (the residence of Willie

Jones) than at 'Mount Gallant' (the residence of Allan Jones), though

a great deal at both places. I have an exact facsimile of the

commission which these brothers got for him, which appeared in the

World, February 11, 1900.

"Mrs. Allan Jones was Mary Haynes, married 1762; their daughter Sarah

married General William R. Davis.

"Mrs. Willie Jones was Mary Mumford, daughter of Joseph Mumford, son

of Robert Mumford and wife Anne, daughter of Robert Bland. These two

Mrs. Jones are spoken of in Mrs. Elliot's Women of the Revolution,

Wheeler's History of North Carolina, and Appletons' Cyclopædia of

American Biography.

"I quote you the following from the family book of my father: 'When

the army of Cornwallis passed through Halifax to Virginia, his

officers quartered for some time in the town. Colonel Tarleton was at

"The Grove," the residence of Willie Jones. He had been wounded in the

_hand_ at Cowpens by a sabre cut by Colonel William Washington.

Speaking of Colonel Washington, Tarleton said he was a common,

illiterate fellow, hardly able to write his name. "Ah, colonel," said

Mrs. Jones, "you ought to know better, for you bear upon your person

proof that he knows _very well how to mark his mark_."' I inclose a

MS. of my father on the subject, which you are at liberty to copy."

_MS. of Colonel Cadwallader Jones inclosed in above Letter_.

"Paul Jones--Why he changed his name--Colonel Hubard's account.

"A recent sketch of the life of Paul Jones in the Century has revived

the memory of his gallant achievements, and rekindled public interest

in this famous hero. There is much inquiry as to his reason for

adopting the name of Jones. It is not a little remarkable that such an

incident in the life of one so renowned should be so soon forgotten.

"Let me tell you what I know about this man and how I know it; the

public mind needs to be refreshed. When John Paul came to Virginia,

some three years before the war of the Revolution, looking after an

estate left him by his brother, he visited Halifax, North Carolina, at

that time a place of considerable repute. Here he made the

acquaintance of those grand old patriots, Allen and Willie Jones; he

was a young man but an old tar, with a bold, frank sailor bearing that

attracted their attention; he became a frequent visitor at their

homes, where he was always welcome; he soon grew fond of them, and as

a mark of his esteem and admiration, he adopted their name. Why John

Paul became John Paul Jones--it was his fancy...."

D.

_Letter of General Edward McCrady, of Charleston, S. C., April 3,

1900_.

"Mrs. McCrady was the granddaughter of General William R. Davie, of

Revolutionary fame, who married the daughter of General Allan Jones,

of Mount Gallant, Northampton, North Carolina. Tradition in her branch

of the family has been that it was _Allan_ Jones who befriended John

Paul, and not his brother _Willie_--pronounced _Wylie_, not Willie. It

was in honor of Allan Jones that he adopted the name of Jones as

surname to that of Paul...."

E.

In a subsequent letter from Mr. Junius Davis, Wilmington, North

Carolina, dated April 24, 1900, he writes as follows:

"In respect to the name of Jones, I never heard the question raised in

the State as to whether Willie or Allan was the man, who, as it were,

picked up John Paul and was his closest friend. Beyond all question,

_Willie_ was the man, but above Willie in the affection of John Paul

was Mrs. Willie Jones. Undoubtedly it was his affection for her that

induced him to change his name. She was a Miss Montford, daughter of

Colonel Joseph Montford, and had a sister who married Colonel John

Baptiste Ashe, a distinguished soldier of this State, during the war

of the Revolution. In regard to the retort made by Mrs. Willie Jones

to Tarleton, you will find it mentioned in Mrs. Elliot's Women of the

Revolution. It is also mentioned by Wheeler in vol. ii, page 186, of

his History of North Carolina. It is a little singular that Mrs. Ashe,

sister of Mrs. Willie Jones, also retorted upon Tarleton. On one

occasion, when he said with a sneer that he would like to meet Colonel

Washington, she replied, 'If you had looked behind you at the battle

of Cowpens you would have had that pleasure.' These two ladies were

both very beautiful women, highly gifted in mind and character, and

highly educated."

F.

On this subject see also Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography,

vol. iii, under Jones.

APPENDIX II.

CONCORDAT MADE BETWEEN CAPTAIN JOHN PAUL JONES AND THE OFFICERS OF THE

SQUADRON.

"_Agreement_ between Messieurs John Paul Jones, captain of the Bon

Homme Richard; Pierre Landais, captain of the Alliance; Dennis

Nicholas Cottineau, captain of the Pallas; Joseph Varage, captain of

the Stag; and Philip Nicholas Ricot, captain of the Vengeance;

composing a squadron that shall be commanded by the oldest officer of

the highest grade, and so in succession in case of death or retreat.

None of the said commanders, while they are not separated from the

said squadron, by order of the minister shall act but by virtue of the

brevet, which they shall have obtained from the United States of

America, and it is agreed that the flag of the United States shall be

displayed.

"The division of the prizes to the superior officers and crews of said

squadron, shall be made agreeable to the American laws; but it is

agreed that the proportion of the whole coming to each vessel in the

squadron shall be regulated by the Minister of the Marine Department

of France, and the Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States of

America.

"A copy of the American laws shall be annexed to the present

agreement, after having been certified by the commander of the Bon

Homme Richard; but, as the said laws can not foresee or determine as

to what may concern the vessels and subjects of other nations, it is

expressly agreed that whatever may be contrary to them should be

regulated by the Minister of the French Marine, and the Minister

Plenipotentiary of the United States of America.

"It is likewise agreed that the orders given by the Minister of the

French Marine, and the Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States

be executed.

"Considering the necessity there is of preserving the interests of

each individual, the prizes that shall be taken shall be remitted to

the orders of Monsieur le Ray de Chaumont, honorary intendant of the

Royal Hotel of Invalids, who has furnished the expenses of the

armament of the said squadron.

"It has been agreed that M. le Ray de Chaumont be requested not to

give up the part of the prizes coming to all crews, and to each

individual of the said squadron, but to their order, and to be

responsible for the same in his own and proper name.

"Whereas the said squadron has been formed for the purpose of injuring

the common enemies of France and America, it has been agreed that such

armed vessels, whether French or American, may be associated therewith

by common consent, as shall be found suitable for the purpose, and

that they shall have such proportion of the prizes which shall be

taken as the laws of their respective countries allow them.

"In case of the death of any of the before-mentioned commanders of

vessels, he shall be replaced agreeably to the order of the tariff,

with liberty, however, for the successor to choose whether he shall

remain on board his own vessel, and give up the next in order, the

command of the vacant ship.

"It has, moreover, been agreed, that the commander of the Stag shall

be excepted from the last article of this present agreement, because

in case of a disaster to M. de Varage he shall be replaced by his

second in command, and so on by the other officers of his cutter, the

Stag.

"J. Paul Jones.

"P. Landais.

"De Cottineau.

"De Varage.

"Le Ray de Chaumont.

"P. Ricot."

APPENDIX III.

ON THE FLAG OF THE BON HOMME RICHARD.

The statement is frequently made that the flag under which the Bon

Homme Richard fought the Serapis is still in existence, and the

following letter from the assistant secretary of the Smithsonian

Institution gives a history of the claim:

"I am authorized by the secretary to acknowledge the receipt of and

reply to your letter of the 27th instant, in which you ask whether the

identical flag used by John Paul Jones on the Bon Homme Richard is the

one now in the custody of the Smithsonian Institution.

"Your letter has been referred to Mr. A. H. Clark, Custodian of the

Section of American History in the National Museum, who has submitted

the following facts, which I submit to you as the opinion of this

institution in the case."

"'The evidence appears conclusive that the flag in the National Museum

is the identical one used by John Paul Jones on the Bon Homme Richard.

This flag was presented to James Bayard Stafford in 1784, by the

Marine Committee, with the following letter. The sword and musket are

exhibited with the flag together with the original letter:

"'"Philadelphia, _Monday, December_ 13, 1784.

"'"_James Bayard Stafford_.

"'"Sir: I am directed by the Marine Committee to inform you that on

last Thursday, the 9th, they decided to bestow upon you, for your

meritorious service thro' the late war, Paul Jones' Starry Flag of the

Bon Homme Richard--which was transferred to the Alliance--a boarding

sword of said ship, and a musquet captured from the Serapis.

"'"If you write to Captain John Brown, at the Yard, what ship you wish

them sent by to New York, they will be forwarded to you.

"'"Your humble servant,

"'"James Meyler,

"'"_Secretary, pro tem_."

"'In the United States Senate, May 1, 1872, the Committee on

Revolutionary Claims favorably reported a bill (S. 1060) for payment

to Sarah S. Stafford, for the services of her father, James Bayard

Stafford, an officer of the Revolution. In the committee's report,

Commodore Barry, of the Alliance, certified to the service of

Lieutenant Stafford, and the report further states that "it fully

appears from the testimony before the committee that James Bayard

Stafford entered the navy at the beginning of the War of Independence,

and was in constant and active service, and in frequent battles, and

remained in the service until the close of the war; that his ship was

captured by a British cruiser, and subsequently recaptured by John

Paul Jones, when he volunteered on the Bon Homme Richard, where he

received wounds, which, owing to unskillful treatment, broke out after

a time, disabling both his arms."

(Signed.) "'A. H. Clark,

"'Custodian, Section of American History,

United States National Museum.'

"Yours very respectfully,

(Signed.) "Richard Rathbun,

"_Assistant Secretary_."

This is an opinion with which I must disagree. Stafford, it is

claimed, had been a sailor in the American armed ship Kitty, which had

been captured by a British cruiser, said cruiser and her prize being

subsequently taken by the Richard, whereupon Stafford volunteered for

service on the Richard, was warranted a midshipman, and is alleged to

have performed several heroic deeds in connection with the flag during

the action.[71] There is no authority whatever for any of these

statements in any existing contemporary account of the battle, yet the

occurrence was sufficiently important to be mentioned somewhere,

surely, if it had occurred. Stafford's name does not appear in any of

the lists of the officers and crew, and the Richard certainly did not

capture any British cruiser and her prize. But we have evidence which

is more than negative, for Jones explicitly states that when the

Richard went down, a flag--presumably that which had been shot from

the staff, or had fallen with it, during the action, and had been

recovered the next day--was left flying at the peak. In subsequent

letters, though, he takes occasion to refer specifically to the fact

that he sailed under American colors in the Alliance--he calls them

"my very best American colors," a phrase certainly inappropriate for

the battle-torn ensign of the Richard--he never makes the slightest

reference to their having been used in the famous battle. Again, the

Alliance sailed finally under the command of Landais, and no mention

of any particular flag appears thereafter. It may be possible,

however, though doubtful, that the flag which was given to Stafford

was the "best American colors" under which Jones sailed from the

Texel, and, if so, it is an interesting relic. The last circumstance

that militates against the claim is the size of the flag in question.

It is so small that it is highly improbable it was ever used for a

battle flag!

APPENDIX IV.

SONG AND MUSIC.

"Here comes brave Paul Jones, Oho!

He's a jolly good fellow.

His ship has sunk 'neath the sea,

On a bold English cape, O.

"Here comes brave Paul Jones, Oho!

He's a jolly good fellow.

Born an American true,

And English not a bit, O.

"Here comes brave Paul Jones, Oho!

He's a jolly good fellow.

He does so many brave deeds

For the good of his friends, O."

Chorus.

"Oh, had we him here,

Or had they him there,

He'd well know what to try for

And luck he'd let go by, sir!"

[Illustration:

HIER KOMT PAL JONES AAN.]

APPENDIX V.

"_Testament of Paul Jones, July 18, 1792_.

"Before the undersigned notaries, at Paris, appeared Mr. John Paul

Jones, citizen of the United States of America, resident at present in

Paris, lodged in the street of Tournon, No. 42, at the house of Mr.

Dorberque, _huissier audiancier_ of the tribunal of the third

_arrondissement_, found in a parlour in the first story above the

door, lighted by two windows opening on the said street of Tournon,

sitting in an armchair, sick of body, but sound of mind, memory, and

understanding, as it appeared to the undersigned notaries, by his

discourse and conversation,--

"Who, in view of death, has made, dictated, and worded, to the

undersigned notaries, his testament as follows:

"I give and bequeath all the goods, as well movable as heritable, and

all, generally, whatever may appertain to me at my decease, in

whatever country they may be situated, to my two sisters, Janette,

spouse to William Taylor, and Mary, wife to Mr. Loudon, and to the

children of my said sisters, to divide them into as many portions as

my said sisters and their children shall make up individuals, and to

be enjoyed by them in the following manner:

"My sisters, and those of their children who on the day of my death

shall have reached the age of twenty-one, will enjoy their share in

full property from the date of my decease. As for those of my nephews

and nieces who at that period of time may not reach the age of

twenty-one years, their mothers will enjoy their shares till such time

as they attain that said age, with charge to them to provide for their

food, maintenance, and education; and as soon as any of my nephews or

nieces will have reached the age of twenty-one years, the same will

enjoy his share in full property.

"If one or more of my nephews and nieces should happen to die without

children before having reached the age of twenty-one, the share of

those of them who may have deceased shall be divided betwixt my said

sisters and my other nephews and nieces by equal portions.

"I name the Honourable Robert Morris, Esq., of Philadelphia, my only

testamentary executor.

"I revoke all other testaments or codicils which I may have made

before the present, which alone I stand by as containing my last will.

"So made, dictated, and worded, by said testator, to the said notaries

undersigned, and afterward read, and read over again to him by one of

them, the others being present, which he well understood, and

persevered in, at Paris, the year 1792, the 18th July, about five

o'clock, afternoon, in the room heretofore described, and the said

testator signed the original of the present, unregistrated, at Paris,

the 25th of September, 1792, by Defrance, who received one livre,

provisionally, save to determine definitively the right after the

declaration of the revenue of the testator. The original remained with

Mr. Pettier, one of the notaries at Paris, undersigned, who delivered

these presents this day, 26th September, 1792, first of the French

Republic.

(Signed.) "Pottier.

"L'Avernier."

(COPY.)

"_Schedule of the Property of Admiral John Paul Jones, as stated by him

to me, this 18th of July, 1792_.

"1. Bank stock in the Bank of North America, at Philadelphia, six

thousand dollars, with sundry dividends.

"2. Loan-Office certificate left with my friend Mr. Ross, of

Philadelphia, for two thousand dollars, at par, with great arrearages

of interest, being for ten or twelve years.

"3. Such balance as may be in the hands of my said friend John Ross,

belonging to me, and sundry effects left in his care.

"4. My lands in the State of Vermont.

"5. Shares in the Ohio Company.

"6. Shares in the Indiana Company.

"7. About eighteen thousand pounds sterling due to me from Edward

Bancroft, unless paid by him to Sir Robert Herries, and is then in his

hands.

"8. Upward of four years of my pension due from Denmark, to be asked

from the Count de Bernstorf.

"9. Arrearages of my pay from the Empress of Russia, and all my prize

money.

"10. The balance due to me by the United States of America, of sundry

claims in Europe, which will appear from my papers.

"This is taken from his mouth.

"GOUVERNEUR MORRIS."

This property was estimated as being worth about thirty thousand

dollars at the date of Jones' death.

APPENDIX VI.

Ranger, Nantes 11_th Dec_. 1777.

"Honored Sir:--I think it my duty to give you some account of my

Passage from Portsmouth to this place, as this may perhaps find you at

home in the Bosom of domestic happiness. I had passed the Western

Islands before a Sail appeared within our Horizon from the Mast head;

but this Halcyon Season was then interrupted, and changed into

continued alarms Night and day till the Ranger cast Anchor here the 2d

Current, this afforded me excellent opportunities of exercising the

Officers and Men especially in the Night, and it is with much Pleasure

that I assure you their behaviour was to my entire Satisfaction. I

fell in with an Enemies Fleet of Ten Sail off Ushant, bound up

Channel, but notwithstanding my best endeavours, I was unable to

detach any of them from the strong Convoy under which they sailed. I

fell in with and brought too a number of other Ships and Vessels none

whereof proved to be British Property except two Brigantines with

fruit from Malaga for London which became Prizes, the one is arrived

here, the other I am told in Quiberon Bay. The Rangers sailing does

not answer the general expectation, oweing in a great measure to her

being too deep, very foul and over Masted, her Ballast laid too high,

on account of its improper quality, for a Ship of this construction,

this with the extraordinary weight of her lower Masts; occasioned her

being very Crank, I am paying my whole Attention to remedy these

inconveniences as much as Possible, I am shortening the lower Masts,

shifting the Main Mast further aft, and mean to ballast with Lead; as

that Article will store under the lower tier of Water the less

quantity will be sufficient, of course the Ship will be so much the

lighter, and Sail so much the faster, and we shall then, I hope, be

able to store the Cables under the Platform. Tho' I have yet received

no Letter from the Commissioners, I understand that they had some time

ago provided for me one of the Finest Frigates that can be imagined,

calculated for Thirty two, Twenty four Pounders, on One deck, and

longer than any Ship in the Enemies Fleet, but it seems they were

unfortunately under the necessity of giving her up on Account of some

difficulties which they met with at Court, however I esteem the

intention as much as tho' it had succeeded, as I shall always cherish

the grateful remembrance of the Honor which Congress hath conferred on

me by this and every other instance of their generous Approbation, I

shall be the happiest of Men if a Life of services devoted to the

Intrests of America can be rendered instrumental in securing its

Independance.

"My particular thanks are due to you Sir, as one of the four Members

of that Honorable Committee to whose generous intention, and

Approbation I more immediately owe this great and unsolicited

Obligation, but I hope for Opportunities of proving by my Conduct the

deep sense I entertain of that favor.

"The inclosed letter, and its consequences hath given me real concern.

Malice is a stranger to my Nature. I hate domestic broils, or

misunderstandings, and would do, or suffer much, as a private Person

to prevent them. But as an Officer, honored with the Approbation of

Congress, and conscious of having at no time exceeded even in Thought

the delicate lines of my duty, or express letter of my Orders; I am in

the highest degree tenacious of the respect due to my Signature; and I

bid the most contemptuous defiance to the insinuation of any Man out

of Congress.

"I have been informed in Portsmouth that the four Oared Boat which

attended the Ranger was built for the Portsmouth Privateer, and after

being rejected as misconstructed and unuseful for that Ship, was

assigned over to the Ranger, be this as it may, I will boldly affirm

that she was the worst constructed and most unservicable Boat that I

ever saw, belonging to a Ship of War, for tho' a Man stepping on her

Gunnel, would bring it down to the Waters edge, yet was her Weight

equal, or nearly so to that of the Cutter, which I planned, and had

built, capable of carrying 40 Armed Men, had I been able, which I was

not, to stow the two Boats, which I found provided for the Ranger, I

must have been reduced to the Alternatives of throwing them overboard,

or strikeing the Top Masts several times, on the Passage to prevent

oversetting the Ship. I mention this matter to you _in confidence_ as

a Friend, declaring on the Honor of a Gentleman that I wish on my part

to give it to Oblivion. I have the Pleasure to hear that Captains

Thompson and Hinman are well at Lorient of which please to inform Mrs.

Thompson. I shall endeavour to procure the Articles mentioned in Mrs.

Whipple's Memorandum, I hope to live in the remembrance of the few

acquaintances I have in Portsmouth, and I have the honor to be with

due Respect.

"Sir

"Your very Obliged

"very Obedient

"most humble Servant,

"Jno P Jones"[72]

The Hon'ble

Gen'l Whipple

FOOTNOTES

[Footnote 1: Among the gross slanders by which envy strove to blacken

the fame of the great commodore in after years--the foulest, because

it attempted to rob a virtuous woman of her crown of honest motherhood

and question the legitimacy of Jones' birth--was one which ascribed

his paternity to the Earl of Selkirk. To the English snob of that day

it may probably have seemed impossible that so much greatness could

spring from so plain a stock, and in a left-handed descent from Lord

Selkirk was sought an explanation of Jones' fame. The calumny was

refuted not only by its antecedent incredibility, but by the testimony

of persons in position to affirm as to the high personal character of

Jean MacDuff Paul and by the loving and tender family relationship she

ever sustained to her husband and children. The family was well known

and highly respected. It may be noted, by the way, that the Earl of

Selkirk was not conspicuous for ability or anything else, and if it

had not been for a subsequent exploit of Jones' he would have been

forgotten long since.]

[Footnote 2: See Appendix I.]

[Footnote 3: The Marine Corps was established by the Congress November

10, 1775.]

[Footnote 4: A fictitious house, under the name of which the

commissioners sent out military stores.]

[Footnote 5: A coarse thin stuff, a very poor substitute for the

ordinary canvas.]

[Footnote 6: English accounts state their casualties at twenty-five.]

[Footnote 7: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 8: The ship of the line Thesée (74), commanded by the

celebrated de Kersaint, was lost in the night battle between Hawke and

Conflans at Quiberon Bay, because in the midst of a terrific gale,

with a very heavy sea on, the Frenchman unfortunately opened his lower

deck ports to make use of his heavy battery in the action.]

[Footnote 9: There is a discrepancy in the various accounts of the

armament of the Richard, some authorities asserting that all the guns

on the main deck were 12-pounders and that the small guns on the poop

and forecastle were 6-pounders. The probabilities are as I have

stated.]

[Footnote 10: See Appendix No. II.]

[Footnote 11: In case of disaster, that is.]

[Footnote 12: The English learned this in 1812, when with the long

eighteens of the Guerrière and the Java they tackled the long

twenty-fours of the Constitution's broadside.]

[Footnote 13: From the author's novel, The Grip of Honor.]

[Footnote 14: See remarks on page 226.]

[Footnote 15: Doubtful.]

[Footnote 16: Possibly he might be an ensign.]

[Footnote 17: Some authorities imply that the flag had been nailed to

the masthead, and that it was necessary for Pearson to go aloft in

default of any one else in order to strike his colors. Nailing a flag

to the masthead is a figure of speech, and I doubt the actuality of

the performance. On the other hand, it would be easy and natural for

Pearson to have nailed the ensign to a staff, which contemporary

prints show that ships sometimes carried for the purpose of flying the

colors. In the latter case it would be easy for Pearson to tear it

down; in that hypothesis his whole action then and subsequently is

understandable. If the flag had been nailed to the masthead it is

extremely unlikely that he would have taken the time, trouble, and

risk of going aloft to tear it down when by a simple word or two he

could have surrendered his ship.]

[Footnote 18: It has been incorrectly stated that many wounded and

prisoners were carried down with the ship. Jones, who was in a

position to know, asserts the contrary.]

[Footnote 19: See Appendix No. III.]

[Footnote 20: Thackeray told an American friend that the account of

the amazing capture of the Serapis by Paul Jones was one of the most

extraordinary stories in naval annals, and Mrs. Ritchie, writing of

her father's last days, says: "Sometimes we found him in great

spirits, as when he had been reading about the famous fight of the

Serapis, a stirring thing indeed."--Editor.]

[Footnote 21: Captain A. T. Mahan, U. S. N. (retired). The greatest

authority, living or dead, on warfare on the sea, especially from the

philosophical standpoint.]

[Footnote 22: She could only have engaged to starboard by crossing the

path of the Richard, in which event she would have raked her, of

course, with her port battery, and then have brought her starboard

battery in play when she got alongside again.]

[Footnote 23: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 24: By resolution of the Marine Committee, dated September

5, 1776, this was, for captains: "A coat of blue cloth with red

lapels, slashed cuffs, a stand-up collar, flat yellow buttons, blue

breeches, and a red waistcoat with yellow lace." In Jones' case the

"flat yellow buttons" were made of gold and the lace was woven of the

same precious tissue. Nothing was too good for him, for the rank he

supported, and the cause he upheld.]

[Footnote 25: See Appendix No. IV.]

[Footnote 26: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 27: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 28: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 29: As this is the last appearance of Pearson in our pages,

it may be interesting to note that when he returned to England he was

knighted for "his gallant defense of the Serapis against a greatly

superior force"; in addition to which the merchants of London

presented him, and Captain Piercy as well, with very valuable services

of plate for their efficient protection of their convoy. Pearson

afterward rose to high rank in the British service. He certainly had

protected his convoy, for all of them escaped, and the gratitude of

the merchants was natural. On the other hand, he had been beaten by an

inferior force, and merited no honors on that score. As a matter of

fact, the Serapis alone, to say nothing of the Countess of

Scarborough, was nearly a match for Jones' whole squadron. Suppose,

for instance, that Jones had been in command of the Serapis and

Pearson of the Richard. Does anybody doubt that Jones could have

beaten the Richard, the Alliance, and the Pallas with the Serapis

alone? But it is unprofitable to discuss this question further. When

Jones heard of these honors, he is reported to have made the following

remark:

"He has done well, and if he get another ship and I fall in with him

again, I will make a duke of him." There is a grim humor about his

comment which is highly pleasing, in spite of Jones' subsequent

repudiation of it.]

[Footnote 30: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 31: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 32: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 33: For another specimen of Jones' verse-writing, see page

277.]

[Footnote 34: "Louis XVI, the rewarder, to the mighty deliverer, for

the freedom of the sea."]

[Footnote 35: Italics mine.]

[Footnote 36: Evidently Truxtun learned the lesson well, for in the

war with France he became one of the sternest and most severe

disciplinarians in the naval service, in spite of which his crews

adored him. See my books, Reuben James, A Hero of the Forecastle; and

American Fights and Fighters.]

[Footnote 37: That was beyond his power. They never did and to this

day do not "esteem" him other than a pirate. His courage and ability

are, however, alike unquestioned by friends and foes.]

[Footnote 38: The remarks of John Adams as to the need of a great navy

are even more apposite now than they were then.]

[Footnote 39: Nearly $40,000, equivalent in that day to much more than

at present.]

[Footnote 40: Quite what might have been expected from a "canny Scot."

But it must not be forgotten that the chevalier had been a trader

before he became a fighter.]

[Footnote 41: Very unlike a "canny Scot" in this instance.]

[Footnote 42: After his dismissal Landais resided in Brooklyn, where

he lived in very straitened circumstances on a small annuity, the

income upon an advance of four thousand dollars from Congress on

account of arrears of prize money due him, which amount was to be

deducted from his share of whatever was recovered from Denmark. His

income was about two hundred dollars a year, but by strict economy it

sufficed him. He is reputed to have cherished a high feeling of

independence, and would never consent to receive a gift he was unable

to return. Toward the close of his life he was a constant petitioner

for five thousand dollars with interest, which he conceived to be

still due him on account of the Danish claim. Every other year he

contrived to visit the seat of government to plead his cause in

person. On one occasion, having heard that a member of Congress had

spoken slightingly of him, he put on his faded Continental uniform,

buckled on his small sword, repaired to the gallery of the House of

Representatives, and expressed his readiness to meet any gentleman who

wished for an honorable satisfaction. His quaint figure, so attired,

was often seen on the streets of New York. He used to carry his hat in

his hand for hours in the street, out of respect to his lawful

monarch, executed by the rebels of France! He never ceased to affirm

that he, and not Paul Jones, had captured the Serapis. He died in 1818

at the age of eighty-seven years, and was buried in St. Patrick's

Cathedral churchyard. He had probably returned to the Roman Catholic

Church, which he is said to have abjured on his entry into the

American service. One of his biographers tells us that he was a cadet

of the family of a younger son of the youngest branch of one of the

oldest, proudest, and poorest families in Normandy; that, owing to his

lack of court interest, which was due to his poverty, he was kept for

thirty years a midshipman in the French navy. The same ingenious

apologist makes the following quaint comment on the respective actions

and qualities of Landais and Jones:

"Paul Jones, by his impetuous and undisciplined gallantry, earned the

reputation of a hero, and poor Landais, by a too scrupulous attention

to the theory of naval science, incurred that of a coward. I believe

that naval authority is against me, but I venture to assert _meo

periculo_ and on the authority of one of my uncles, who was in that

action as a lieutenant to Paul Jones, that Landais erred not through

any defect of bravery, but merely from his desire to approach his

enemy scientifically, by bearing down upon the hypothenuse of the

precise right-angled triangle prescribed in the thirty-seventh

'man[oe]uvre' of his old text-book."

Surely the author of this extraordinary paragraph must have been more

than an unconscious humorist!

A stone erected over his remains, which has long since disappeared,

bore the following inscription:

A la Mémoire

de

Pierre De Landais

Ancien Contre-Amiral

au service

Des États Unis

Qui Disparut

Juin 1818

Agé 87 ans.

There is something pathetic in the picture of the "Ancien

Contre-Amiral," in his faded Continental uniform and the proud

independence of his old age; and perhaps after all we may charitably

attribute his colossal blunders to insanity and incompetency rather

than to malice or treachery.]

[Footnote 43: Negotiations on this claim were protracted for over

sixty years. In June, 1847, the Danish Government formally and finally

denied the validity of the claim, and it has not been paid. Congress,

however, on March 21, 1848, provided for the payment of the prize

money involved, to the heirs of Paul Jones and other persons entitled

to share in the distribution of the fund.]

[Footnote 44: The rouble was then worth about one dollar, and, as has

been mentioned, a dollar was greater then than now.]

[Footnote 45: In after years Jones indorsed upon this letter a grim

comment: "Has he kept his word?"]

[Footnote 46: Some authorities say fourteen; the difference is

immaterial.]

[Footnote 47: All dates given, except in letters, are new style,

eleven days in advance of Russian dates.]

[Footnote 48: This is a mistake, he was never a vice admiral.]

[Footnote 49: Old style.]

[Footnote 50: Nassau was then in command of the Russian fleet in the

Baltic, and an encounter with him--had a Swedish command been tendered

Jones, and if he could have accepted it--would have been interesting.

There would have been a final demonstration, which probably would have

convinced even Nassau, as to the merits of the rival commanders in the

Liman. Nassau, by accepting the advice of the English and other

foreign officers associated with him, succeeded with a superior force

in beating the Swedes, whereupon honors were showered upon him--more

land, more peasants, more roubles, more rank. His favor was higher

than ever; but he was magnificently beaten a short time after by a

very inferior Swedish fleet, and his defeat was as decisive as it was

disgraceful. He lost fifty-three vessels, fourteen hundred guns, and

six thousand men. He had refused to take anybody's advice on this

occasion and had conducted the battle himself. His cowardice and

incapacity therefore were entirely apparent. He tried to attribute

this defeat, which compelled Catherine to make peace upon terms not

advantageous to her, to the cowardice of the Russians whom he

commanded. The Russians were not cowards. He fell from favor, left the

court, and passed the remainder of his life on his estate in Poland in

the society of his homely but devoted wife. It is to be hoped that she

made things interesting for him, but it is hardly likely. He died in

obscurity and poverty in 1809, unregretted and forgotten.]

[Footnote 51: A portion was subsequently paid to his heirs by the

French Government.]

[Footnote 52: See Appendix No. V.]

[Footnote 53: From my book, American Fights and Fighters.]

[Footnote 54: This sword was, of course, not that presented to him by

the King of France. After Jones' death his heirs gave this famous

sword to Robert Morris. Morris, in turn, presented it to Commodore

John Barry, at that time senior officer of the United States Navy. By

him it was bequeathed to his friend Commodore Richard Dale, once of

the Bon Homme Richard, and it now remains in the possession of his

great-grandson, Mr. Richard Dale, of Philadelphia.]

[Footnote 55: Why a monument has not been erected to Jones I can not

understand. It would be a noteworthy object for individual and

national effort, and in no better way could we commit ourselves to the

fame and achievements of the great captain, and forever stamp with

disapproval those calumnies with which envy seeks to sully the name of

our first great sailor.]

[Footnote 56: The frontispiece of this volume.]

[Footnote 57: Some of his phrases in his Russian letters remind me of

Shakespeare's Henry V.]

[Footnote 58: I have known hundreds of sailors more or less

intimately, and I have never met one who might be included in either

of those melancholy classes.]

[Footnote 59: Studies in Naval History, by John Knox Laughton, M. A.,

Professor of Modern History at King's College, London, and Lecturer on

Naval History at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich, etc., 1887.]

[Footnote 60: July 6, 1900.]

[Footnote 61: Woolsey, International Law, section 144, page 233.]

[Footnote 62: And not a captain of a special ship, as was sometimes

the case, but a captain in the service, and therefore eligible to

command any ship. See page 75.]

[Footnote 63: The following interesting document was found in his

papers; it enumerates a few of the things he did: "In 1775, J. Paul

Jones armed and embarked in the first American ship of war. In the

Revolution he had twenty-three battles and solemn rencontres by sea;

made seven descents in Britain and her colonies; took of her navy two

ships of equal, and two of superior force, many store ships, and

others; constrained her to fortify her ports; suffer the Irish

volunteers; desist from her cruel burnings in America, and exchange,

as prisoners of war, the American citizens taken on the ocean, and

cast into the prisons of England, as 'traitors, pirates, and

felons!'"]

[Footnote 64: Notwithstanding this, he was as ambitious of glory,

honor, and fame to himself in the service of his country as Nelson

was. They were both of them

"Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel.

Seeking the bubble reputation

Even in the cannon's mouth."]

[Footnote 65: See my book, American Fights and Fighters.]

[Footnote 66: The recent war in South Africa demonstrates the

accuracy of Carlyle's perspicuous observation.]

[Footnote 67: The United States has shown that it possesses in full

measure the sea adaptability and capacity of the Anglo-Saxon, but

opportunity for demonstrating that capacity, except upon a small

scale, has never been afforded us. The almost unbroken line of

victories on the sea, however, which we have won with anything like

equality of force from English, French, and Spaniards, enables us to

confidently await the issue of any future naval action under

conditions of equality; and the names of Jones, Dale, Biddle, Barry,

Preble, Hull, Decatur, Bainbridge, Lawrence, Stewart, MacDonough,

Perry, Farragut, Dewey, and Sampson will not be outshone by any

galaxy.]

[Footnote 68: So careful and accurate an historian as John Fiske makes

the mistake of saying that Russia bestowed the order of St. Anne on

Jones for this action.]

[Footnote 69: Paul Jones and his men were the last foreign foemen to

land on the shores of England.]

[Footnote 70: See Park Benjamin's History of the Naval Academy for

similar instances on the part of less famous captains. Personal abuse

was a custom of the service, apparently.]

[Footnote 71: See Preble's History of the American Flag, where the

story of Stafford is given _in extenso_.]

[Footnote 72: The above hitherto unpublished letter, with its unusual

signature, was addressed to William Whipple, one of the signers of the

Declaration of Independence from New Hampshire, who in 1777 was a

member of the Continental Congress, and one of the four Navy

Commissioners. The original of the Commodore's interesting

letter is in the collection of Mr. Ferdinand J. Dreer, of

Philadelphia.--Editor.]

End of Project Gutenberg's Commodore Paul Jones, by Cyrus Townsend Brady