_The War Ended._
Promise of the South Carolina.—A New Disappointment.—The Great
Expedition Planned.—Magnitude of the Squadron.—The Appointed
Rendezvous.—Commodore Jones Joins the Expedition.—His Cordial
Reception.—Great Difficulties and Embarrassments.—The Rendezvous at
Port Cabella.—Tidings of Peace.—Return to America.—New Mission to
France.
Honorable Robert Morris wished to give Commodore Jones command of a
large, strongly built frigate called the South Carolina, then in the
service of that State. This was the ship built at Amsterdam, called the
Indian, the command of which was promised to him when he went to Europe.
Either from the inability of the commissioners to pay for the ship, or
from the remonstrances of England that a ship should be built in a
neutral court to aid her insurgent colonies, the object was defeated. In
some way the King of France came in possession of the ship, and having
at that time no special use for it he loaned it to one of the prominent
members of his court, the Chevalier de Luxembourg. He loaned it to South
Carolina for three years, to guard her coasts, on condition that he
should receive one-fourth of the proceeds of her prizes. It was placed
under the command of Commodore Gillon, who, with a small fleet, was to
protect the harbors of the State. He changed the name to the South
Carolina.
It was an uncommonly fast and formidable ship. Congress was anxious to
get possession of it. As the Chevalier de Luxembourg had received no
payment, though many prizes had been taken, he was dissatisfied, and
very justly deemed the contract annulled. He therefore authorized the
French minister at Philadelphia to coöperate with Mr. Morris in
obtaining the surrender of the ship to the United States. Gillon heard
of these movements, and escaped the legal process for seizing the ship,
by suddenly putting to sea.
The South Carolina had but just cleared the Capes of Delaware, when she
was pounced upon and captured by three English frigates, the Diomede,
the Astrea, and the Quebec, which had been stationed there to intercept
her. Thus again were the hopes of Commodore Jones blighted. He had fully
expected to take command of the South Carolina. It was certainly from no
fault of his own that he was disappointed.
A French fleet of ten sail of the line was then at Boston, on the eve of
sailing for the West Indies. It was there to unite with a combined
French and Spanish fleet, under Count d’Estaing. This formidable
squadron, consisting of seventy vessels in all, with a strong land
force, was to make a descent on the island of Jamaica, and wrest it from
the English. Jones earnestly applied for permission to embark in this
expedition. Ever eager to learn, and ever modestly conscious that he had
much to learn, he hoped thus to become practically acquainted with the
evolution of fleets on a scale so grand. His enthusiasm was aroused at
the idea of witnessing so sublime a naval display. He also hoped, from
his intimate acquaintance with those seas, to be able to render eminent
assistance to Count d’Estaing.
Mr. Morris applied to Congress, in behalf of Commodore Jones, that
permission might be given him to join the expedition. In a very
complimentary letter he wrote:
“His present desire, to be sent with Count d’Estaing, consists with all
his former conduct. And it will, I dare say, be a very pleasing
reflection to Congress that he is about to pursue a knowledge of his
profession, so as to become still more useful, if ever he should be
again called to the command of a squadron or a fleet.”
Congress passed a very flattering resolve, granting his request, and
especially recommending him to his excellency the Marquis de Vaudreuil.
The commodore immediately repaired to Boston, where he was received by
the marquis with every mark of attention. Though the flag-ship of the
marquis, the Triomphante, was crowded, and sixty officers sat daily at
his table, Commodore Jones was received on board that ship, and was
assigned lodgings corresponding with those of Vaudreuil. The splendors
of the court of Louis XVI. still lingered around the court and camp of
Louis XVI.
Nearly all the officers of the French army and navy were men of
illustrious birth, intelligent, chivalric, high-bred gentlemen. In this
society Jones, himself a courtly and well-educated man, found congenial
companionship. He was a man of pure lips and refined bearing, fond of
cultivated female society, and instinctively recoiling from all
coarseness and vulgarity. He was esteemed a very valuable acquisition to
the enterprise. His modest, friendly spirit, united with his unrivalled
intrepidity, won the affection of the officers and the homage of the
crew. The fact was also recognized that there was not, on board the
fleet, a single man so intimately acquainted with those seas, and
particularly with the island of Jamaica, as he was. Jones was highly
pleased with the opportunity of improvement thus presented him, and with
the very kind manner in which he had been received. In his journal he
wrote, with characteristic modesty:
“As the Marquis d’Estaing had commanded a fleet of more than seventy
sail of the line, I had the flattering hope of finding myself in the
first military school in the world; in which I should be able to render
myself useful, and to acquire knowledge very important for conducting
great military operations.”
The squadron, consisting of ten sail of the line, left Boston on the
24th of December, 1782. The course of the ships was directed toward the
mouth of Portsmouth harbor, where they were to be joined by two other
ships of the line, the Auguste and the Pluton. But a severe wintry storm
arose, with freezing gales and snow, and drove the squadron far away to
the vicinity of the Bay of Fundy. Here the fleet was for a time in
imminent danger from its proximity to the land and to vast fields of
floating ice.
Many of the vessels were lost sight of in the storm. The Marquis de
Vaudreuil steered to the southward, to an appointed rendezvous in the
harbor of St. John, on the island of Porto Rico. As he made the land he
was informed that sixteen British men-of-war, under Admiral Hood, were
cruising off Cape Francois, on the look-out for him; and that a still
larger naval force, under Admiral Pigot, was watching for him at Lucca,
one of the extreme western towns of the island of Jamaica. England had
made such ample preparation for this anticipated assault; that it was
thought that the French squadron must fall a prey, either to Hood or
Pigot.
Vaudreuil remained at St. John, Porto Rico, ten days, waiting the
arrival of other vessels of his fleet. Here he performed all kinds of
naval evolutions, as a general on land would review his army. He also
found at this place a very ample supply from France, to replenish his
stores. The island of Porto Rico, which lies off the eastern coast of
St. Domingo, is about one hundred and thirty miles in length, by thirty
miles in breadth.
The strait, but eighty miles wide, which separates it from San Domingo,
is called the Mona Passage. The island was then in a state of
prosperity, and it carried on very extensive commerce with France and
Spain. It at that time belonged to Spain, and contained a population of
about eighty thousand. The native inhabitants had all melted away. The
principal city, St. John, enjoyed a very fine harbor, and had a
population of about thirty thousand.
The marquis convoyed, with his fleet, sixteen French merchant vessels
from the eastern to the western end of the island, along the northern
coast. The general rendezvous, for the French and Spanish fleet, had
been appointed, with the greatest secrecy, at a little island called
Port Cabello, but a few miles off the extreme northern coast of
Venezuela. Some light vessels of Admiral Hood’s squadron, which were
cruising as scouts, caught sight of the French fleet in the Mona
passage. They immediately ran back with the tidings that the fleet was
coasting along the southern shore of the San Domingo.
But Vaudreuil suddenly turned his direction south, sailed down between
two and three hundred miles to the unfrequented islands which are
scattered along the northern shore of Venezuela. The little island of
Port Cabello was about sixty miles west of the much better known island
of Curaçoa. A great expedition of this kind is liable to innumerable
hindrances. It can never succeed, unless there is some imperial,
Napoleonic mind, which can appreciate all its grandeur, and at the same
time can regulate all its minutest details. Such enterprises render a
dictatorship, for that purpose, indispensable. A ship of war, an army, a
fleet, must be under dictatorial power.
But here was a squadron of more than seventy vessels to be gathered from
several ports in the United States, from wide dispersion on the cruising
grounds of an intense naval warfare, from several ship-yards of Spain
and France, exposed to storms, to shipwreck, to misunderstood orders, to
delays in equipping the ships, to the antagonisms and jealousies of
rival officers, and to meet, at an almost unknown island, thousands of
miles from the place of departure of each ship.
The fleet of the Marquis de Vaudreuil was swept, by the trade winds and
the strong current of the Gulf Stream, sixty miles west of Port Cabello.
It required three toilsome weeks to recover this distance, beating
against wind and tide. The accompanying transports, being heavily laden
merchant ships, and not fleet sailors, bearing stores of provisions and
ammunition and many land troops, were unable to recover the lost space,
against wind and flood. After many ineffectual attempts they were
compelled to relinquish the endeavor. They left the squadron, and bore
away to the coast of San Domingo.
One of the finest of the war-ships, the Burgoyne, of seventy-four guns,
in a dark and stormy night, ran upon a rock, and was totally lost, with
two hundred of her crew. On the 18th of February, 1783, the Triomphante
reached Port Cabello. The Auguste and Pluton, which had been separated
from the fleet by the storm, near the Bay of Fundy, had arrived a few
days before. Soon after, the remaining war-ships of the squadron, one
after another, came in.
The Spanish fleet was to sail from Havana, under command of Don Salano.
He had promised to be at the rendezvous punctually. But he did not keep
his word. Probably some pique stood in the way. Nothing was seen of him,
or heard from him. The Spanish government was dissatisfied with his
course, ordered him home, and another was placed in command.
The large combined force, of French and Spanish ships, was to sail from
Cadiz, in the extreme south of Spain, under Count d’Estaing. At Port
Cabello, he was to take command of the whole expedition. But just as the
fleet was on the eve of sailing, the British government, alarmed by the
little success which had attended its efforts thus far, the enormous
expense which the conflict involved, the loss of all its trade with the
colonies, the interruption of its commerce throughout the world, and
more than all by the clamor of popular indignation, which rose, in
England, against the unrighteous war it was waging, which clamor would
make itself heard in the House of Commons and the House of Lords, very
reluctantly felt constrained to consider terms of peace. It was decided
to defer the sailing of the fleet till the result of the negotiations
could be ascertained. Thus when Vaudreuil was hourly looking for the
arrival of his whole squadron at Port Cabello, his transports were
distant four hundred miles at Cape Francois, in San Domingo. The Spanish
squadron, under Don Solano, was distant nearly fifteen hundred miles in
Havana; while the great combined fleet of France and Spain, under
D’Estaing, was quietly reposing, at the distance of many thousand miles,
in the harbor of Cadiz.
The last thing at night, the officers at Cabello were seen at the
mast-heads of the ships, ranging the horizon with their glasses, in
search of the expected fleets. The earliest dawn of the morning found
them again upon the eager, anxious look-out. Thus the remainder of
February, and the whole of the month of March passed sadly away. Not a
sail was seen to break the outline where the ocean and the sky seemed to
meet. The anxiety of the officers became intense. Their decks were
blistered beneath the heat of a tropical sun. The climate was
insalubrious. There was nothing in their surroundings to cheer them. The
disappointment was terrible. The officers who had embarked on the
enterprise with high ambition, anticipating renowned achievements and
unfading laurels, saw all their hopes vanishing, and that the ridicule
of the community, instead of its plaudits, would attend their return.
Such is life:
“A path it is of joys and griefs, of many hopes and fears,
Gladdened at times by sunny smiles, but oftener dimmed by tears.”
Serious sickness broke out, which seized alike officers and crew.
Commodore Jones was attacked with intermittent fever, which seemed to
paralyze his physical energies, leaving his mental powers in all their
activity. On the 27th of February, the evening before his arrival at
Port Cabello, he wrote to the Duke de la Rochefoucauld, saying:
“The English affairs seem in so bad a situation in the East Indies, that
I think even the most sanguine among them can expect no manner of
advantage for continuing the war. As Spain has, at last, wisely
abandoned the siege of Gibraltar, and, as we are told, doubled her ships
with copper, I cannot think the English so blind as not to see the great
risk they run of being as effectually humbled by sea, as they are by
land, should they neglect the present moment to make their peace. I most
ardently wish for peace, for humanity tells me there has been too much
blood spilt already. I am in hopes to have the happiness, soon after the
war, to revisit France.”
The same day he wrote to Honorable Mr. Morris as follows: “I have
already received much useful information, since I embarked, and am on
such happy terms with the admiral and officers, both of the fleet and
army, that I have nothing to wish from them. Deeply sensible how favored
I am in being thus placed, I beg you to express my gratitude to Congress
on the occasion, and to the Chevalier de Luzerne. The Marquis de
Vaudreuil is promoted to the rank of lieutenant-general, and now carries
a vice-admiral’s flag.”
On the 25th of March Jones wrote to Lafayette, who had received from the
king military promotion. In this letter he wrote:
“I am really happy to hear that justice has been rendered, by his
majesty, to such distinguished worth and exertion as yours. No less
indeed could be expected from such a prince to such a subject. We hear
that you are at Cadiz, in order to embark with his excellency Count
d’Estaing. This would afford me the greatest pleasure, did not my love
of glory give place to my more ardent wish for peace, and that you might
have the happiness to carry over the olive branch, to a country that
already owes you so much gratitude.
“Humanity has need of peace; but though I was led to expect it from the
late speech from the throne, I begin to fear it is yet at some distance.
There seems to be a malignity in the English blood, which cannot be
cured till, in mercy to the rest of mankind, it is let out, that the
disease may not become epidemical. I pray you to present my most
respectful compliments to the Count d’Estaing. If the war continues, I
hope for the honor of making the campaign under his orders.”
Early in April a solitary ship was seen in the distant horizon. Her
approach was watched with the most intense eagerness. She entered the
harbor with floating banners and triumphant music and shouts of peace.
She conveyed the tidings of the treaty which brought the dreadful war to
a close. There were but few Americans in the fleet. Their joy must have
been great, that their country had successfully fought the battles of
freedom, and had at length escaped from the grasp of the oppressor. We
know not with what emotions the French received the tidings which
convinced them that the naval campaign in which they had anticipated
such great results had proved so serious a failure.
Commodore Jones was weary of war. He ever abhorred those atrocities
inevitably involved in what Napoleon I. has called “The science of
barbarians.” Just before the sailing of the fleet he thought he saw
indications that peace was not far distant. There was quite a sum of
money due to him from France, whose remittance he was daily expecting.
There was a farm house and an extensive tract of excellent land for sale
near Newark, New Jersey. It had been valued at forty thousand dollars.
But property had so depreciated during the war, and money was so scarce,
that it was now seeking a purchaser at ten thousand dollars. Commodore
Jones, with his humane feelings, literary taste, and yearnings for the
joys of domestic life, was anxious to purchase this property. He wrote
accordingly, on the 24th of December, 1782, intrusting the business to
his friend John Ross, Esq.
But the money did not come. The purchase was not made. Jones was far
away in the harbor of Port Cabello. He had received no response to his
letter, and did not even know whether his agent had ever received it. In
this uncertainty he again wrote to Mr. Ross, from Port Cabello, on the
16th of March, 1783. After briefly recapitulating the contents of his
former letter he added:
“As New York will probably be one of our first naval ports, the
proximity of that estate made me more desirous to own it. If, therefore,
you should find, on inquiry, that I have been rightly informed, and if
you can turn the merchandise in your hands into money, to answer for the
purchase, I pray you to act for me as you would for yourself on the
occasion.
“We have as yet no certain news from Europe. If the peace should, as I
wish it may, be concluded, I wish to establish myself on a place I can
call my own, and offer my hand to some fair daughter of liberty. If, on
the contrary, Count d’Estaing should come out with fifty sail of the
line, copper sheathed, and eighteen thousand troops, I shall have
instructions at the greatest military school in the world.”
The satisfaction of Jones, upon the establishment of peace, and the
independence of the land of his adoption, appears to have been
unqualified. He immediately wrote to a friend:
“The most brilliant success, and the most instructive experience in war
could not have given me a pleasure comparable with that which I
received, when I learned that Great Britain had, after so long a
contest, been forced to acknowledge the independence and sovereignty of
the United States of America.”
Nothing can be more evident, in the whole career of Commodore Jones,
than that he fought not from the love of war, but to secure for America
an honorable peace. Immediately upon the receipt of the intelligence of
the treaty, the little squadron weighed anchor, and sailed for Cape
Francois, upon the island of San Domingo. After a passage of eight days
the cape was reached on the 16th of the month. Here Commodore Jones,
though still suffering from an intermittent fever, took leave of his
friends, and embarked for Philadelphia. It is manifest that he had
commanded warmly the esteem of all his associates, by his upright and
noble character. The Marquis de Vaudreuil wrote to Chevalier de la
Luzerne, the French minister in America, as follows. The letter was
dated at Cape Francois, April 20th, 1783.
“The peace, which has been so much desired, and which is going to make
the happiness of America, since it puts a seal to her liberty,
terminates our projects. We shall sail for France in a week, with the
troops under command of Baron de Viomenil. Mr. Paul Jones, who embarked
with me, is about returning to his dear country. His well-deserved
reputation had made him very acceptable to me, not doubting but that we
should have had some opportunities in which his talents might have shone
forth. But peace, of which I cannot but be glad, puts an obstacle in the
way; so we must part. Permit me, sir, to request of you the favor of
recommending him to his superiors. The intimate acquaintance, which I
made with him since he has been on board the Triomphante, makes me take
a lively interest in what concerns him; and I shall be very much obliged
if you will find means of being serviceable to him.”
It will be remembered that Paul Jones had been assigned a room on board
the crowded Triomphante, with Baron de Viomenil, who was in command of
the land forces. The baron, for five months, was in the most intimate
relation with Jones. No one could have a better opportunity of
ascertaining his true character. He wrote as follows, to the French
ambassador at Philadelphia:
“Mr. Paul Jones, who will have the honor of delivering to you, sir, this
letter, has for five months deported himself among us with such wisdom
and modesty as add infinitely to the reputation gained by his courage
and exploits. I have reason to believe that he had preserved as much the
feeling of gratitude and attachment toward France, as of patriotism and
devotion to the cause of America. Such being his titles to attention, I
take the liberty of recommending to you his interests near the President
and Congress.”
Viomenil also wrote the Honorable Mr. Morris, in high commendation of
Paul Jones, and expressing his desires for the prosperity of “_ce brave
et honnête homme_.”
Jones appeared in Philadelphia on the 18th of May, 1783. He was still
suffering from fever, and his constitution was greatly shattered by the
hardships he had experienced. He therefore retired, for the recovery of
his health, to the beautiful little Moravian village of Bethlehem,
Pennsylvania, about sixty miles northwest of Philadelphia, on the banks
of the Lehigh river. Here he passed the summer, resting from his toils
and employing his time in those literary and scientific studies which
ever deeply interested him.
His health being much improved, he was appointed on the 1st of November,
1783, an agent of the United States Government to collect the amount of
money for prizes taken, in Europe, by vessels under his command. The
ships had been sold, and the money had gone into the French treasury,
and was not yet paid. The question was full of embarrassing
complications. Several years had elapsed since the prizes were captured.
The sailors who had taken them were scattered in all parts of the world,
and many were dead. Was the distribution of the prizes to be adjudged
according to French law, or American law? and these laws were very
different. The Bon Homme Richard was a French ship, purchased and armed
at the expense of the French court, and entitled to raise alike the
French or American flag. What proportion of the prizes she took belonged
to France, and what to America?
It is manifest that, in carrying claims involving such embarrassments
through any court or Congress, there was a fine opportunity for years of
diplomatic struggles. It was in the autumn of 1779, that the prizes were
taken by the Bon Homme Richard. Four years had since elapsed, and yet
nothing had been done toward the settlement of the distribution of the
prize-money. There was not another man in the world so well qualified to
manage this difficult and delicate business as was Commodore Jones.
He was personally familiar with all the facts in the case. By midnight
studies he had made himself thoroughly acquainted with the naval code of
all the European nations. He was well known in the court of France and
was very highly esteemed, alike by the monarch, his cabinet officers,
and the people. And in addition to all this he was a well-bred
gentleman, who scorned all trickery, who would make no claim which he
did not honestly believe to be just, and who, while unyielding in his
righteous demand, was ever courteous and gentle in his bearing. Even
Arthur Lee was one of the committee who recommended to Congress that
this all-important commission should be assigned to Commodore Jones. As
it was expected that a large sum of money would be placed in his hands,
he was required to give bonds, to the amount of two hundred thousand
dollars, in pledge of his faithful administration of the trust. It is
evidence of the high esteem with which he was regarded by the leading
men of the nation, that he found no difficulty in obtaining bondsmen.
On the 10th of November, Jones sailed from Philadelphia, in the ship
Washington. After a stormy wintry passage of twenty days, the ship,
instead of making the French harbor of Havre, baffled by head winds in
the Channel, ran into the English port of Plymouth. As Mr. Jones had
important despatches for John Adams, then our minister at the court of
St. James, he travelled post to London. Mr. Adams, after examining his
documents, informed Commodore Jones that the despatches with which he
was intrusted to Dr. Franklin, in Paris, probably contained
authorization for Adams and Franklin to conclude a commercial treaty
with England.
It required a journey and voyage of five days for Jones to traverse the
distance between London and Paris. Franklin received his old friend with
great cordiality. Marshal de Castries was Minister of Marine, Count de
Vergennes occupied another of the most important positions in the
government. They both received Paul Jones with all those flattering
attentions which render French society so fascinating. The Chevalier
Luzerne had written to them both from Philadelphia, affectionately
commending Paul Jones to their kind regards. With true French politeness
they informed him that they had received such letters, but that they
were entirely unnecessary.
“We have no need of letters,” they said, “to inform us of the merits of
Commodore Jones, or to influence us to do him justice.”
There are different ways of doing things in this world; and certainly
the courteous way is the most agreeable. England had denounced Commodore
Jones as a pirate. Had England captured him, it is not improbable that
he might have been hung like a pirate. Captain Pearson, who commanded
the Serapis in the encounter with the Bon Homme Richard, was a brave
man, perhaps a humane man, but coarse and vulgar, quite unacquainted
with the courtesies which regulate the intercourse of gentlemen. As he
presented his sword to Commodore Jones, the unmanly Briton said:
“It is with great reluctance that I surrender my sword to a man who
fights with a halter about his neck!”
What reply should the commodore make to such an insult, which Pearson
probably regarded merely as British pluck? Should he strike his unarmed
and helpless prisoner? Should he soil his lips in a contest of
blackguardism? His reply was noble.
“Captain Pearson, you have fought like a hero. And I have no doubt that
your sovereign will reward you for it in the most ample manner.”[D]
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Footnote D:
Life of Paul Jones, by Alexander Slidell Mackenzie, Vol. i, p. 195.
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