_Bearding the British Lion._
Aid from France.—Plan for the Destruction of the British Fleet.—The
American Flag Saluted.—Bold Movement of Captain Jones.—Cruise along
the Shores of England.—Capture of Prizes.—Salutary Lessons given to
England.—Operations in the Frith of Clyde.—At Carrickfergus.—Attempt
upon the Drake.—Burning the Shipping at Whitehaven.—Capture of the
Plate of Lord Selkirk.
France, upon recognizing the independence of the United States and
entering into an alliance with our Government, promptly engaged in
fitting out a naval expedition to assist the American patriots who were
so heroically struggling for freedom. Captain Jones immediately wrote a
letter to the Commissioners in Paris, suggesting a plan of operations
for the French fleet, which was placed under the command of Count
d’Estaing. The count was a brave man, an able officer, and was heartily
devoted to the cause of the feeble colonies. The plan Captain Jones
recommended was eventually adopted. Had it been at once carried into
execution, it would probably have so crippled the English as to have
brought the war to a speedy termination.
[Illustration: PAUL JONES RAISING FIRST AMERICAN FLAG.]
Nearly the whole British fleet, sent to operate against the colonies,
was in the Delaware. It had abundant supplies for the British army,
which, almost without hindrance, was ranging the country, plundering and
burning. The plan proposed was, that Count d’Estaing, with the superior
force which he had under his command, should fall suddenly upon the
British fleet under Lord Howe, and destroy it, or, at least block it up
in the Delaware, with all the transport ships under its convoy. This
could then have easily been done.
But unfortunately the fleet, instead of being fitted out at Brest, on
the Atlantic coast, whence it could have a speedy voyage across the
Atlantic, was got ready at Toulon, a Mediterranean port, requiring a
much longer voyage. Just before the fleet arrived, Lord Howe, aware of
his danger, had effected his escape. In those days the French fleet
could have arrived almost as soon as the intelligence of the alliance
had reached these shores. In a letter to M. De Sartine, the French
Minister of Marine, Captain Jones subsequently writes:
“Had Count d’Estaing arrived in the Delaware a few days sooner, he might
have made a glorious and most easy conquest. Many successful projects
may be adopted from the hints which I had the honor to draw up. And if I
can furnish more, or execute any of those already furnished, so as to
distress and humble the common enemy, it will afford me the truest
pleasure.”
Captain Jones, on his voyage from Nantes to Brest, convoyed some
American merchant vessels as far as Quiberon Bay. Thence they were to be
convoyed to America by a French fleet, commanded by Admiral La Motte
Piquet. Here, for the first time, the Stars and Stripes of our Union
received the honor of a national salute. John Paul Jones managed the
somewhat delicate affair with the instincts of a gentleman, and the
sensitiveness of an accomplished naval officer, conscious that the honor
of the infant nation was, in some degree, intrusted to his guardianship.
I give the interesting event in his own words. In a letter to the Marine
Committee, dated February 22, 1778, he writes:
“I am happy in having it in my power to congratulate you on my having
seen the American flag, for the first time, recognized in the fullest
and completest manner by the flag of France. I was off their bay the
13th instant, and sent my boat in, the next day, to know if the admiral
would return my salute. He answered that he would return to me, as the
senior American Continental officer in Europe, the same salute which he
was authorized, by his court to return to an admiral of Holland, or any
other republic; which was four guns less than the salute given. I
hesitated at this, for I had demanded gun for gun.
“Therefore I anchored in the entrance of the bay, at a distance from the
French fleet. But, after a very particular inquiry, on the 14th, finding
that he had really told the truth, I was induced to accept of his offer,
the more so as it was, in fact, an acknowledgment of American
independence. The wind being contrary and blowing hard, it was after
sunset before the Ranger got near enough to salute La Motte Piquet with
thirteen guns, which he returned with nine. However, to put the matter
beyond a doubt, I did not suffer the Independence to salute till next
morning, when I sent the admiral word that I would sail through his
fleet in the brig, and would salute him in open day. He was exceedingly
pleased, and he returned the compliment also with nine guns.”
The Independence here alluded to, it is said, was a privateer which had
been fitted out to sail under the orders of Captain Jones. His sailing
through the French fleet was characteristic of the man, as he fully
appreciated, at this time, the importance of this interchange of
national courtesies, and the importance that it should be so
emphatically done that there could be no denial of it. Thus he who first
raised the American Pine-Tree flag to the topmast of the Alfred, and who
first unfurled the national banner from the Ranger, now enjoyed the
honor of being the first to secure for that flag a national salute. The
times have changed. The infant republic has become one of the most
powerful nations on the globe. There is no Government now which
hesitates to return, in salute of our national banner, gun for gun.
On the 10th of April, Captain Jones, in the Ranger, sailed from Brest.
It was his intention to strike a blow first upon some unprotected point
on the south side of England. It was indeed a bold and chivalric
movement for the little Ranger, with her eighteen guns, to plunge into
the very heart of the British Channel, which was crowded with the
massive seventy-fours of Britain’s proud navy. England was discharging
the broadsides of her invincible fleet upon our defenceless towns, and
was landing her boats’ crews to apply the torch to our peaceful
villages. Not a fishing-boat could leave a cove without danger of
capture and the imprisonment of all the crew.
Little did the British Government imagine that any commander of an
American vessel would have the audacity to approach even within sight of
her shores. It was the main design of Captain Jones to punish England
for the atrocities she was so cruelly perpetrating upon us—and to punish
her in kind. On the 10th of August he launched forth, from the
magnificent harbor of Brest, and directed his course almost due north,
for Land’s End, the extreme southern cape of the island of Great
Britain. The distance across, at this point, is about one hundred and
fifty miles.
About thirty miles off the southern coast of England, in a southwest
direction, there is a group of islands called the Scilly Islands.
Captain Jones ran his vessel between them and Cape Clear, within full
view of the shores of England, and where the flash of his guns could be
seen and the thunders of his cannon distinctly heard on those shores.
Opposing winds and a rough sea so impeded his progress that he did not
gain sight of England’s coast until the 14th. Then he descried a
merchant-brig. He bore down upon her and captured her. The brig was
freighted with flax, and was bound from Ireland to Ostend, in Belgium.
As the freight was of no value, and Captain Jones did not wish to
encumber himself with prisoners, the crew were sent ashore in the boats
and the brig was scuttled and sunk.
These tidings must have created a strange sensation, as they spread like
wildfire throughout England. It must have roused the whole British navy,
to wreak vengeance upon the intrepid voyager. He then entered St.
George’s Channel, which separates Southern England from Ireland. When
almost within sight of the spires of Dublin he encountered, on the 17th
of August, a large London ship. He captured her. Her cargo consisted of
a variety of valuable merchandise. The crew were sent ashore. The prize
he manned and sent back to Brest.
Thus far dense clouds had darkened their way, and rough winds had
ploughed the seas, but now the weather changed. The skies became fair
and the wind favorable. He sailed rapidly along into the Irish Sea, and
passed by the Isle of Man, intending to make a descent at Whitehaven,
with whose harbor and surroundings he from childhood had been familiar.
About ten o’clock in the evening of the 17th, he was off the harbor,
with a boat’s crew of picked men ready to enter and set fire to the
shipping. But the wind, which had been blowing strong during the
afternoon, by eleven o’clock increased to a gale, blowing directly on
shore, and raising such a heavy sea that the boats could not leave the
ships. During the night the storm so increased, threatening to drive the
vessel upon the rocks, that it became necessary to crowd all sail, and
put out to sea so as to clear the land.
The next morning the storm abated, and the Ranger was near Glestine Bay,
just off the southern coast of Scotland. A revenue wherry hove in sight.
It was the custom of the revenue boat to board all merchant vessels in
search of contraband goods. As the Ranger concealed, as much as
possible, all warlike appearance, Captain Jones hoped that the wherry,
which was one of the swiftest of sailers, would come alongside, so that
he might effect her capture. But it seems that the tidings of the Ranger
had reached the ears of the officers of the governmental boat. After
examining the vessel carefully with their glasses, they crowded on all
sail, to escape. The Ranger pursued, opening upon the affrighted boat a
severe cannonade. The balls bounded over the waves, and the explosions
reverberated amid the cliffs of Scotland, but the wherry escaped.
The next morning, April 19th, when near the extreme southern cape of
Scotland, called the Mull of Galloway, he overtook one of the merchant
schooners of the enemy, from which he took what he wanted, sent the crew
ashore, and sunk the vessel. By a just retribution he was thus
chastising England for the crimes she was committing on the American
coast. Hudibras writes:
“No man e’er felt the halter draw
With good opinion of the law.”
England was astonished and enraged in finding the laws of naval warfare
which she had enacted, and had so long practised with impunity upon all
other nations all around the globe, now brought home to herself. She
called Paul Jones all manner of hard names. He was a beggar, a thief, a
traitor, a highway robber, a pirate. He was thus denounced for doing
that, in the English and Irish Channel, which England’s fleet was doing
all along the coast of America. And yet it was heroic in Jones thus to
brave all the terrors of the British navy, while it was ignoble and mean
for that proud navy to plunder and burn the few unprotected vessels of
the feeble colonies struggling for existence in the New World.
England had long made her banqueting-halls resound with the song,
“Britannia needs no bulwarks
To frown along the steep;
Her march is on the mountain wave,
Her home is on the deep.”
It was the noble mission of Paul Jones to teach Britannia that the arm
of the avenger could reach her even in her own Channel, and in her own
harbors. Thus England was compelled to drink of the poisoned cup which
she was forcing to the lips of others.
Upon the western coast of Scotland, about fifty miles north of the Mull
of Galloway, there was a capacious harbor called Lochryan, or Lake Ryan.
Captain Jones learned from his captives that there was there a fleet of
ten or twelve English merchant vessels, and also the tender of a
man-of-war, which had on board a large number of impressed seamen, who
were to be forced into the British navy. It was not improbable that many
of these were American citizens, who had been seized in our merchant or
fishing vessels, and who would thus be compelled to work the guns of
Great Britain against their own countrymen. “I thought this an
enterprise,” writes Paul Jones, “worthy of my attention.”
Indeed it was. He spread his sails for Lochryan. The wind was fair, so
that he could run into the bay, speedily apply the torch, kindle the
whole fleet into flame, and then run out before a sufficient force could
be collected to prevent his escape. But just as he reached the entrance
of the bay, and everything was in readiness for the successful
prosecution of his enterprise, the wind changed, and blew with great
fierceness directly into the bay. Thus, though he could easily effect
his entrance, he could not sail out from the bay until the wind changed.
He might therefore be caught in a trap. He was thus constrained to
abandon the project.
About sixty miles north of Lochryan is the Frith of Clyde, whose river
is the most important stream in the west of Scotland. Captain Jones
seeing upon his lee bow a cutter, or small sloop-rigged vessel,
belonging as a tender to a man-of-war, steering for the Clyde, gave
chase. But when he reached the remarkable rock of Ailsa, finding that
the cutter was outsailing him, he abandoned the chase. In the evening he
fell in with a merchant sloop, which he sunk.
The next day, which was the 21st, he entered the Bay of Carrickfergus,
on the eastern coast of Ireland. At the western extremity of the bay
lies the city of Belfast, which occupies the first rank among the
commercial marts of Ireland. The fortified town of Carrickfergus is
situated upon the northern shore. A British ship of war, the Drake,
mounting twenty guns, was at anchor in the bay. Thoroughly armed and
manned, she was a formidable antagonist for the Ranger to attack. As
vessels of all sizes were continually coming and going in this great
thoroughfare, and as the Ranger carefully avoided all warlike
appearance, no suspicion of her formidable character was excited on
board the Drake. Jones therefore cast anchor, preparing to make his
attack in the night. I will give the result in his own words:
“My plan was to overlay her cable, and to fall upon her bow, so as to
have all her decks open and exposed to our musketry. At the same time it
was our intention to have secured the enemy by grapplings, so that, had
they cut their cables, they would not thereby have attained an
advantage. The wind was high, and unfortunately the anchor was not let
go so soon as the order was given; so that the Ranger was brought to
upon the enemy’s quarter, at the distance of half a cable’s length.
“We had made no warlike appearance. Of course, we had given no alarm.
This determined me to cut immediately, which might appear as if the
cable had parted. At the same time it enabled me, after making a tack
out of the Loch, to return with the same advantage which I had at first.
I was, however, prevented from returning, as I with difficulty weathered
the light-house on the leeside, and as the gale increased. The weather
now became so very stormy and severe, and the sea ran so high, that I
was obliged to take shelter under the south shore of Scotland.”
The North Channel, which separates Ireland from Scotland, is at this
point about thirty miles wide. The next morning the sun rose in a
cloudless sky. It was bitterly cold in those northern latitudes. Captain
Jones was on the same parallel with Newfoundland. From the deck of his
vessel he could clearly discern the coasts of England, Scotland, and
Ireland. A white mantle of snow covered the hills and valleys as far as
the eye could extend. He decided to direct his course to the shores of
England, and to make another attempt upon the shipping in the harbor of
Whitehaven. The wind became very light, and it was not until midnight
that he reached the entrance to the harbor. For the hazardous enterprise
of penetrating a harbor defended by two batteries, he manned two boats
with volunteers, fifteen men in each. There were in the harbor two
hundred and twenty vessels, large and small. The tide was out, and many
of these vessels aground. About one hundred and fifty of them were on
the south side of the harbor adjoining the town. The remainder were on
the north side.
Captain Jones had command of one of the boats. Lieutenant Wallingford
was intrusted with the other. Jones supplied Wallingford with the
necessary combustibles to set fire to the shipping on the north side.
With fifteen men, armed only with pistols and cutlasses, he set out to
capture two English forts on the south side, and then to set fire to the
shipping there. The garrisons of these forts had no more apprehension of
an attack from the despised Americans, than Gibraltar fears assault from
some feeble tribe in Southern Asia with whom England may chance to be at
war.
In consequence of the unfortunate delay, they did not reach the first
fort until just as the morning was beginning to dawn. Most of the
soldiers were soundly asleep in the guard-house. There were a few drowsy
sentinels dozing at their posts. Jones, with his heroic little band,
silently clambered over the ramparts. The terrified sentinels, not
knowing what was coming, rushed into the guard-house. Jones quietly
locked them in, spiked every gun, and then rushed forward to the next
battery, which was distant about a quarter of a mile. Here he
successfully repeated his achievement, so that not a gun from either of
the batteries could harm his boats.
He looked eagerly across the harbor, expecting to see the bursting forth
of the flames. It was now broad day; but no sign of flame or smoke was
to be seen. To his great disappointment, the boat under Lieutenant
Wallingford had crossed to the south side, having accomplished nothing.
The party seemed confused and embarrassed, and made the very
extraordinary statement that their torches went out just as they were
ready to set fire to the ships!
The failure was probably caused by sheer cowardice. And it must be
admitted that it was indeed one of the most desperate of enterprises.
These fifteen men, having crossed an ocean three thousand miles wide,
had penetrated the heart of a British harbor, to apply the torch to
seventy vessels.
The crews could not have amounted to less than ten men, on an average,
to each vessel. Thus the British sailors alone in that half of the
harbor, would amount to seven hundred men. The assailants, it will be
remembered, amounted to but fifteen men, in a frail boat, armed only
with swords and pistols. Even the bravest might recoil from such odds.
But as these men had volunteered for the enterprise, and knew all its
perils, it was the basest poltroonery in them to prove recreant at the
crisis of the expedition.
The torches which Captain Jones’s boat party carried, had also, by some
strange fatality, all burned out. Captain Jones, however, obtained a
light from a neighboring house, entered a large ship, from which the
crew fled, and deliberately built a fire in the steerage. This ship was
closely surrounded by at least a hundred and fifty vessels lying side by
side, and all aground. Captain Jones, to make the conflagration certain,
found a barrel of tar, and poured it upon the kindling. The flames soon
burst from all the hatchways, caught the rigging, and, in fiery wreaths,
circled to the mast-head.
“The inhabitants,” writes Captain Jones, “began to appear in thousands,
and individuals ran hastily toward us. I stood between them and the ship
on fire, with a pistol in my hand, and ordered them to retire, which
they did with precipitation. The sun was a full hour’s march above the
horizon, and, as sleep no longer ruled the world, it was time to retire.
We reëmbarked without opposition, having released a number of prisoners,
as our boats could not carry them. After all my people had embarked, I
stood upon the pier, for a considerable space, yet no person advanced. I
saw all the eminences round the town covered with the amazed
inhabitants.”
When the boats had been rowed some distance from the shore, the English
began to run to their forts, to open fire from the great guns. To their
surprise they found the garrisons locked up in the guard-houses, and the
cannon all spiked. After some delay they found one or two cannon on the
beach, which were dismounted, and which had not been spiked. These they
hastily loaded and fired; but with such ill-directed aim that the shot
all fell wide of their mark. Captain Jones’s men, in derision, fired
their pistols, returning the salute.
If the boats could have entered the harbor a few hours earlier, the
success would doubtless have been complete, and not a vessel would have
escaped the flames. “But what was done,” writes Captain Jones, “is
sufficient to show that not all their boasted navy can protect their own
coasts; and that the scenes of distress, which they have occasioned in
America, may be soon brought home to their own door.”
The Ranger now struck across the broad mouth of Solway Frith, to St.
Mary’s Island, on the Scottish shore, in Kirkcudbright Bay. Here Lord
Selkirk had his residence, in a fine mansion. It will be remembered that
the father of Paul Jones had been attached to his household. The British
were shutting up our most illustrious men in the hulks of prison ships,
and treating them with barbarity which would have disgraced savages.
Captain Jones deemed it of the utmost importance, as a measure of
humanity, to seize some distinguished Englishman and hold him as a
hostage, to secure the better treatment of our own noblemen who had
fallen into the enemy’s hands. For this patriotic movement the English
press denounced him in terms of unmeasured abuse. The motive which
influenced him was an exalted one. And he merits the highest encomiums
for the manner in which he conducted the enterprise. In justice to
Captain Jones, I feel bound to give the narrative in his own words. It
is contained in letter which he wrote to the Countess of Selkirk, with
whom he was personally acquainted, immediately after the Ranger returned
from its cruise to Brest.
“RANGER, BREST, May 8.
”TO THE COUNTESS OF SELKIRK.
“MADAM—It cannot be too much lamented that, in the profession of
arms, the officer of fine feeling and of real sensibility should be
under the necessity of winking at any action of persons under his
command which his heart cannot approve. But the reflection is doubly
severe, when he finds himself obliged, in appearance, to countenance
such actions by his authority.
“This hard case was mine when, on the 23d of April last, I landed on
St. Mary’s Isle. Knowing Lord Selkirk’s interest with his king, and
esteeming, as I do, his private character, I wished to make him the
happy instrument of alleviating the horrors of hopeless captivity,
when the brave are overpowered and made prisoners of war.
“It was perhaps fortunate for you, madam, that he was from home; for
it was my intention to have taken him on board the Ranger, and to have
detained him until, through his means, a general and fair exchange of
prisoners, as well in Europe as in America, had been effected.
“When I was informed, by some men whom I met at landing, that his
lordship was absent, I walked back to my boat determined to leave the
island. On the way, however, some officers who were with me, could not
forbear expressing their discontent. They said that, in America, no
delicacy was shown by the English, who took away all sorts of movable
property; setting fire not only to towns and to the houses of the
rich, without distinction, but not even sparing the wretched hamlets
and milch cows of the poor and helpless, at the approach of an
inclement winter.
“That party had been with me, the same morning, at Whitehaven. Some
complaisance was therefore their due. I had but a moment to think how
I might gratify them, and, at the same time, do your ladyship the
least injury. I charged the two officers to permit none of the seamen
to enter the house, or to hurt anything about it; to treat you, madam,
with the utmost respect; to accept of the plate which was offered; and
to come away, without making a search or demanding anything else.
“I am induced to believe that I was punctually obeyed; since I am
informed that the plate, which they brought away, is far short of the
quantity expressed in the inventory which accompanied it. I have
gratified my men. And when the plate is sold I shall become its
purchaser, and will gratify my own feelings by restoring it to you, by
such conveyance as you shall please to direct.
“Had the Earl been on board the Ranger the following evening, he would
have seen the awful pomp and dreadful carnage of a sea engagement;
both affording ample subject for the pencil, as well as melancholy
reflection to the contemplative mind. Humanity starts back from such
scenes of horror, and cannot sufficiently execrate the vile promoters
of this detestable war.
“‘For _they_, ’twas _they_ unsheathed the ruthless blade,
And Heaven shall ask the havoc it has made.’
“The British ship-of-war Drake, mounting twenty guns, with more than
her full complement of officers and men, was our opponent. The ships
met, and the advantage was disputed, with great fortitude on each
side, for an hour and four minutes, when the gallant commander of the
Drake fell, and victory declared in favor of the Ranger. The amiable
lieutenant lay mortally wounded; a melancholy demonstration of the
uncertainty of human prospects, and of the sad reverses of fortune
which an hour can produce. I buried them in a spacious grave, with the
honors due to the memory of the brave.
“Though I have drawn my sword, in the present generous struggle for
the rights of man, yet I am not in arms as an American, nor am I in
pursuit of riches. My fortune is liberal enough, having no wife nor
family, and having lived long enough to know that riches cannot insure
happiness. I profess myself a citizen of the world, totally unfettered
by the little, mean distinctions of climate or of country, which
diminish the benevolence of the heart and set bounds to philanthropy.
Before this war was begun I had, at an early time of life, withdrawn
from sea service, in favor of calm contemplation and poetic ease. I
have sacrificed not only my favorite scheme of life, but the softer
affections of the heart and my prospects of domestic happiness, and I
am ready to sacrifice my life also, with cheerfulness, if that
forfeiture could restore peace and good-will among mankind.
“As the feelings of your gentle bosom cannot but be congenial with
mine, let me entreat you, madam, to use your persuasive art, with your
husband’s, to endeavor to stop this cruel and destructive war, in
which Britain never can succeed. Heaven can never countenance the
barbarous and unmanly practice of the Britons in America, which
savages would blush at, and which, if not discontinued, will soon be
retaliated on Britain by a justly enraged people. Should you fail in
this, for I am persuaded that you will attempt it—and who can resist
the power of such an advocate?—your endeavors to effect a general
exchange of prisoners will be an act of humanity which will afford you
golden feelings on your death-bed.
“I hope this cruel contest will soon be closed. But should it
continue, I wage no war with the fair. I acknowledge their force and
bend before it with submission. Let not, therefore, the amiable
Countess of Selkirk regard me as an enemy. I am ambitious of her
esteem and friendship, and would do anything consistent with my duty
to merit it.
“The honor of a line, from your hand, in answer to this, will lay me
under a singular obligation. And if I can render you any acceptable
service in France or elsewhere, I hope you see into my character so
far as to command me without the least grain of reserve.
“I wish to know exactly the behavior of my people, as I am determined
to punish them if they exceed their liberty. I have the honor to be,
with much esteem and with profound respect,
“Madam, yours, etc.,
“JOHN PAUL JONES.”