Chapter Five:
JONATHAN HARADEN, PRIVATEERSMAN (1776-1782)
THE United States navy, with its wealth of splendid
tradition, has few more commanding figures than Captain
Jonathan Haraden, the foremost fighting privateersman of
Salem during the Revolution, and one of the ablest men
that fought in that war, afloat or ashore. His deeds are
well-nigh forgotten by his countrymen, yet he captured
one thousand cannon in British ships and counted his
prizes by the score.
Jonathan Haraden was born in Gloucester, but as a boy
was employed by George Cabot of Salem and made his home
there for the remainder of his life. He followed the sea
from his early youth, and had risen to a command in the
merchant service when the Revolution began. The
Massachusetts Colony placed two small vessels in
commission as State vessels of war, and aboard one of
these, the Tyrannicide, Jonathan Haraden was appointed
lieutenant. On her first cruise, very early in the war,
she fought a king's cutter from Halifax for New York. The
British craft carried a much heavier crew than the
Tyrannicide, but the Yankee seamen took her after a brisk
engagement in which their gunnery was notably
destructive.
Soon after this, Haraden was promoted to the command
of this audacious sloop of the formidable name, but he
desired greater freedom of action. A Salem merchant ship,
the General Pickering, of 180 tons, was fitting out as a
letter of marque, and Haraden was offered the command.
With a cargo of sugar, fourteen six-pounders and
forty-five men and boys he sailed for Bilboa in the
spring of 1780. This port of Spain was a popular
rendezvous for American privateers, where they were close
to the British trade routes. During the voyage across,
before his crew had been hammered into shape, Haraden was
attacked by a British cutter of twenty guns, but managed
to beat her off and proceeded on his way after a two
hours' running fight.
He was a man of superb coolness and audacity and he
showed these qualities to advantage while tacking into
the Bay of Biscay. At nightfall he sighted a British
privateer, the Golden Eagle, considerably larger than the
Pickering, and carrying at least eight more guns. Instead
of crowding on sail and shifting his course to avoid her,
he set after her in the darkness and steered alongside.
Before the enemy could decide whether to fight or run
away Haraden was roaring through his speaking
trumpet:
"What ship is this? An American frigate, Sir.
Strike, or I'll sink you with a broadside."
The British privateer skipper was bewildered by this
startling summons and surrendered without firing a shot.
A prizemaster was put on board and at daylight both
vessels laid their course for Bilboa. As they drew near
the harbor, a sail was sighted making out from the land.
All strange sails were under suspicion in that era of sea
life, and Captain Haraden made ready to clear his ship
for action even before the English captain, taken out of
the prize, cheerfully carried him word that he knew the
stranger to be the Achilles, a powerful and successful
privateer hailing from London, carrying more than forty
guns and at least a hundred and fifty men. The
description might have been that of a formidable sloop of
war rather than a privateer, and the British skipper was
at no pains to hide his satisfaction at the plight of the
Yankee with her fourteen six pounders and her handful of
men.
At the sight of an enemy thrice his fighting strength,
Captain Haraden told the English captain:
"Be that as it may, and you seem sure of your
information, I sha'n't run away from her."
The wind so held that the Achilles first bore down
upon the prize of the Pickering and was able to recapture
and put a prize crew aboard before Captain Haraden could
fetch with gunshot. With a British lieutenant from the
Achilles in command, the prize was ordered to follow her
captor. It was evident to the waiting Americans aboard
the Pickering that the Achilles intended forcing an
engagement, but night was falling and the English
privateer bore off as if purposing to convoy her prize
beyond harm's way and postpone pursuit until morning.
The hostile ships had been sighted from Bilboa harbor
where the Achilles was well known, and the word swiftly
passed through the city that the bold American was
holding pluckily to her landfall as if preparing for an
attempt to recapture her prize. The wind had died during
the late afternoon and by sunset thousands of Spaniards
and seamen from the vessels in the harbor had swarmed to
crowd the headlands and the water's edge where they could
see the towering Achilles and her smaller foe "like ships
upon a painted ocean." An eye witness, Robert Cowan, said
that "the General Pickering in comparison to her
antagonist looked like a long boat by the side of a
ship."
Because of lack of wind and the maneuvers of the
Achilles, Captain Haraden thought there was no danger of
an attack during the night, and he turned in to sleep
without more ado, after ordering the officer of the watch
to have him called if the Achilles drew nearer. His
serene composure had its bracing effect upon the spirits
of the men. At dawn the captain was awakened from a sound
slumber by the news that the Achilles was bearing down
upon them with her crew at quarters. "He calmly rose,
went on deck as if it had been some ordinary occasion,"
and ordered his ship made ready for action.
We know that he was a man of commanding appearance and
an unruffled demeanor; the kind of fighting sailor who
liked to have things done handsomely and with due regard
for the effect of such matters upon his seamen.
Several of his crew had been transferred to the prize,
and were now prisoners to the Achilles. The forty-five
defenders being reduced to thirty-odd, Captain Haraden,
in an eloquent and persuasive address to the sixty
prisoners he had captured in the Golden Eagle, offered
large rewards to volunteers who would enlist with the
crew of the Pickering. A boatswain and ten men, whose
ties of loyalty to the British flag must have been
tenuous in the extreme, stepped forward and were assigned
to stations with the American crew. Her strength was thus
increased to forty-seven men and boys. The captain then
made a final tour of the decks, assuring his men that
although the Achilles appeared to be superior in force,
"he had no doubt they would beat her if they were firm
and steady, and did not throw away their fire." One of
his orders to the men with small arms was: "Take
particular aim at their white boot tops."
The kind of sea fighting that won imperishable
prestige for American seamen belongs with a vanished era
of history. As the gun crews of the General Pickering
clustered behind their open ports, they saw to it that
water tubs were in place, matches lighted, the crowbars,
handspikes and "spung staves" and "rope spunges" placed
in order by the guns. Then as they made ready to deliver
the first broadside, the orders ran down the crowded
low-beamed deck:
"Cast off the tackles and breechings."
"Seize the breechings."
"Unstop the touch-hole."
"Ram home wad and cartridge."
"Shot the gun-wad."
"Run out the gun."
"Lay down handspikes and crows."
"Point your gun."
"Fire."
The Yankee crew could hear the huzzas of the English
gunners as the Achilles sought to gain the advantage of
position. Captain Haraden had so placed his ship between
the land and a line of shoals, that in closing with him
the Achilles must receive a raking broadside fire. He
knew that if it came to boarding, his little band must be
overwhelmed by weight of numbers and he showed superb
seamanship in choosing and maintaining a long range
engagement.
The Pickering was still deep laden with sugar, and
this, together with her small size, made her a difficult
target to hull, while the Achilles towered above water
like a small frigate. The Americans fired low, while the
English broadsides flew high across the decks of the
Pickering. This rain of fire killed the British volunteer
boatswain aboard the Pickering and wounded eight of the
crew early in the fight. Captain Haraden was exposed to
these showers of case and round shot, but one of his crew
reported that "all the time he was as calm and steady as
amid a shower of snowflakes."
Meanwhile a multitude of spectators, estimated to
number at least a hundred thousand, had assembled on
shore. The city of Bilboa had turned out en masse to
enjoy the rare spectacle of a dashing sea duel fought in
the blue amphitheater of the harbor mouth. They crowded
into fishing boats, pinnaces, cutters and row boats until
from within a short distance of the smoke-shrouded
Pickering the gay flotilla stretched to the shore so
closely packed that an onlooker described it as a solid
bridge of boats, across which a man might have made his
way by leaping from one gunwale to another.
Captain Haraden was on the defensive. The stake for
which he fought was to gain entrance to the port of
Bilboa with his cargo and retake his prize, nor did he
need to capture the Achilles to win a most signal
victory. For two hours the two privateers were at it
hammer and tongs, the British ship unable to outmaneuver
the Yankee and the latter holding her vantage ground. At
length the commander of the Achilles was forced to decide
that he must either run away or be sunk where he was. He
had been hulled through and through and his rigging was
so cut up that it was with steadily increasing difficulty
that he was able to avoid a raking from every broadside
of his indomitable foe. It is related that he decided to
run immediately after a flight of crowbars, with which
the guns of the Pickering had been crammed to the
muzzles, made hash of his decks and drove his gunners
from their stations.
Captain Haraden made sail in chase. He offered his
gunners a cash reward if they should be able to carry
away a spar and disable the Achilles so that he might
draw up alongside the enemy and renew the engagement. His
fighting blood was at boiling heat and he no longer
thought of making for Bilboa and thanking his lucky stars
that he had gotten clear of so ugly a foe. But the
Achilles was light, while her mainsail "was large as a
ship of the line," and after a chase of three hours, the
General Pickering had been distanced. Captain Haraden
sorrowfully put about for Bilboa, and took some small
satisfaction in his disappointment by overhauling and
retaking the Golden Eagle, the prize which had been the
original bone of contention.
The prize had been in sight of the action, during
which the captured American prizemaster, master John
Carnes, enjoyed an interesting conversation with the
British prizemaster from the Achilles who had been placed
in charge of the vessel.
Mr. Carnes informed his captor of the fighting
strength of the General Pickering. The British
prizemaster rubbed his eyes when he saw the little Yankee
vessel engage the Achilles and roundly swore that Carnes
had lied to him. The latter stuck to his guns, however,
and added by way of confirmation:
"If you knew Captain Jonathan Haraden as well
as I do, you would not be surprised at this. It is
just what I expected, and I think it not impossible,
notwithstanding the disparity of force, that the
Achilles will at least be beaten off, and I shall have
the command of this prize again before night."
The Spanish populace welcomed Captain Haraden ashore
as if he had been the hero of a bull fight. He was
carried through the streets at the head of a triumphant
procession and later compelled to face veritable
broadsides of dinners and public receptions. His battle
with the Achilles had been rarely spectacular and
theatrical, and at sight of one of his elaborately
embroidered waistcoats to-day, displayed in the Essex
Institute, one fancies that he may have had the fondness
for doing fine things in a fine way which made Nelson pin
his medals on his coat before he went into action at
Trafalgar.
In a narrative compiled from the stories of those who
knew and sailed with this fine figure of a privateersman
we are told that "in his person he was tall and comely;
his countenance was placid, and his manners and
deportment mild. His discipline on board ship was
excellent, especially in time of action. Yet in the
common concerns of life he was easy almost to a fault. So
great was the confidence he inspired that if he but
looked at a sail through his glass, and then told the
helmsman to steer for her, the observation went round,
'If she is an enemy, she is ours.' His great
characteristic was the most consummate self-possession on
all occasions and in midst of perils, in which if any man
equaled, none ever excelled him. His officers and men
insisted he was more calm and cool amid the din of battle
than at any other time; and the more deadly the strife,
the more imminent the peril, the more terrific the scene,
the more perfect his self-command and serene intrepidity.
In a word he was a hero."
Large and resonant words of tribute these, written in
the long ago, and yet they are no fulsome eulogy of
Jonathan Haraden of Salem.
During another voyage from Salem to France as a letter
of marque, the Pickering discovered, one morning at
daylight, a great English ship of the line looming within
cannon shot. The enemy bore down in chase, but did not
open fire, expecting to capture the Yankee cockleshell
without having to injure her. He was fast overhauling the
quarry, and Captain Haraden manned his sweeps. The wind
was light and although one ball fired from a bow chaser
sheared off three of his sweeps, or heavy oars, he
succeeded in rowing away from his pursuer and made his
escape. It was not a fight, but the incident goes to show
how small by modern standards was the ship in which
Jonathan Haraden made his dauntless way, when he could
succeed in rowing her out of danger of certain
capture.
In his early voyages in the Pickering she was
commissioned as a letter of marque, carrying cargoes
across the Atlantic, and fetching home provisions and
munitions needed in the Colonies, but ready to fight "at
the drop of the hat." She was later equipped with a
slightly heavier armament and commissioned as a
full-fledged privateer. With his sixteen guns Captain
Haraden fought and took in one action no less than three
British ships carrying a total number of forty-two guns.
He made the briefest possible mention in his log of a
victory which in its way was as remarkable as the triumph
of the Constitution over the Cyane and the Levant in the
second war with England.
It was while cruising as a privateer that the
Pickering came in sight of three armed vessels sailing in
company from Halifax to New York. This little squadron
comprised a brig of fourteen guns, a ship of sixteen guns
and a sloop of twelve guns. They presented a formidable
array of force, the ship alone appearing to be a match
for the Pickering in guns and men as they exchanged
signals with each other, formed a line and made ready for
action. "Great as was the confidence of the officers and
crew in the bravery and judgment of Captain Haraden, they
evinced, by their looks, that they thought on this
occasion he was going to hazard too much; upon which he
told them he had no doubt whatever that if they would do
their duty, he would quickly capture the three vessels,
and this he did with great ease by going alongside of
each of them, one after another."
This unique feat in the history of privateering
actions was largely due to Captain Haraden's seamanship
in that he was able so to handle the Pickering that he
fought three successive single ship actions instead of
permitting the enemy to concentrate or combine their
attack.
Somewhat similar to these tactics was the manner in
which he took two privateer sloops while he was cruising
off Bermuda. They were uncommonly fast and agile vessels
and they annoyed the Yankee skipper by retaking several
of his prizes before he could send them free of this
molestation. The sloops had no mind to risk an action
with Haraden whose vessel they had recognized. So after
nightfall he sent down his fore topgallant yard and mast,
otherwise disguised the Pickering, and vanished from that
part of the seas. A day later he put about and jogged
back after the two privateers, putting out drags astern
to check his speed. The Pickering appeared to be a
plodding merchantman lumbering along a West India
course.
As soon as he was sighted by his pestiferous and
deluded foes, they set out in chase of him as easy booty.
Letting the first sloop come with easy range, Jonathan
Haraden stripped the Pickering of the painted canvas
screens that had covered her gun ports, let go a
murderous broadside and captured the sloop almost as soon
as it takes to tell it. Then showing English colors above
the Stars and Stripes aboard the Pickering, as if she had
been captured, he went after the consort and look her as
neatly as he had gathered the other.
Captain Haraden knew how to play the gentleman in this
bloody game of war on the ocean. An attractive light is
thrown upon his character by an incident which happened
during a cruise in the Pickering. He fell in with a
humble Yankee trading schooner which had been to the West
Indies with lumber and was jogging home with the beggarly
proceeds of the voyage. Her skipper signaled Captain
Haraden, put out a boat and went aboard the privateer to
tell a tale of woe. A little while before he had been
overhauled by a British letter of marque schooner which
had robbed him of his quadrant, compass and provisions,
stripped his craft of much of her riggings, and with a
curse and a kick from her captain, left him to drift and
starve.
Captain Haraden was very indignant at such wanton and
impolite conduct and at once sent his men aboard the
schooner to re-rig her, provisioned her cabin and
forecastle, loaned the skipper instruments with which to
work his passage home and sent him on his way rejoicing.
Then having inquired the course of the plundering letter
of marque when last seen, he made sail to look for her.
He was lucky enough to fall in and capture the offender
next day. Captain Haraden dressed himself in his best
and, to add dignity to the occasion, summoned the erring
British skipper to his cabin and there roundly rebuked
and denounced him for his piratical conduct toward a
worthless little lumber schooner. He gave his own crew
permission to make reprisals, which probably means that
they helped themselves to whatever pleased their fancy
and kicked and cuffed the offending seamen the length of
their deck. Captain Haraden then allowed the letter of
marque to resume her voyage. "He would not, even under
these circumstances, sink or destroy a ship worthless as
a prize and thus ruin a brother sailor."
Off the Capes of the Delaware, Captain Haraden once
captured an English brig of war, although the odds were
against him, by "the mere terror of his name." He
afterward told friends ashore how this extraordinary
affair occurred. There was a boy on the Pickering, one of
the captain's most ardent adorers, a young hero
worshiper, who believed the Pickering capable of taking
anything short of a line-of-battle ship. He had been put
aboard a prize off the Capes, which prize had been
captured, while making port, by the British brig-of-war.
The lad was transferred to the brig with his comrades of
the prize crew, and was delighted a little later to see
the Pickering standing toward them. Being asked why he
sang and danced with joy, the boy explained with the most
implicit assurance:
"That is my master in that ship, and I shall
soon be with him."
"Your master," cried, the British bos'n, "and who
in the devil is he?"
"Why, Captain Haraden. You can't tell me you never
heard of him? He takes everything he goes alongside
of, and he will soon have you."
This unseemly jubilation on an enemy's deck was
reported to the captain of the brig. He summoned the boy
aft, and was told the same story with even more emphasis.
Presently the Pickering ran close down, and approached
the brig to leeward. There was a strong wind and the
listed deck of the brig lay exposed to the fire of the
privateer. Captain Haraden shouted through his
trumpet:
"Haul down your colors, or I will fire into
you."
The captain of the brig-of-war had wasted precious
moments, and his vessel was so situated at that moment
that her guns could not be worked to leeward because of
the seas that swept along her ports. After a futile fire
from deck swivels and small arms, she surrendered and
next day was anchored off Philadelphia.
One or two more stories and we must needs have done
with the exploits of Jonathan Haraden. One of them
admirably illustrates the sublime assurance of the man
and in an extreme degree that dramatic quality which
adorned his deeds. During one of his last voyages in the
Pickering he attacked a heavily armed "king's mail
packet," bound to England from the West Indies. These
packets were of the largest type of merchant vessels of
that day, usually carrying from fifteen to twenty guns,
and complements of from sixty to eighty men. Such a ship
was expected to fight hard and was more than a match for
most privateers.
The king's packet was a foe to test Captain Haraden's
mettle and he found her a tough antagonist. They fought
four full hours, "or four glasses," as the log records
it, after which Captain Haraden found that he must haul
out of the action and repair damages to rigging and hull.
He discovered also, that he had used all the powder on
board except one charge. It would have been a creditable
conclusion of the matter if he had called the action a
drawn battle and gone on his way.
It was in his mind, however, to try an immensely
audacious plan which could succeed only by means of the
most cold-blooded courage on his part. Ramming home his
last charge of powder and double shotting the gun, he
again ranged alongside his plucky enemy, who was terribly
cut up, but still unconquered, and hailed her:
"I will give you five minutes to haul down
your colors. If they are not down at the end of that
time, I will fire into and sink you, so help me God."
It was a test of mind, not of armament. The British
commander was a brave man who had fought his ship like a
hero. But the sight of this infernally indomitable figure
on the quarterdeck of the shot-rent Pickering, the
thought of being exposed to another broadside at pistol
range, the aspect of the bloodstained, half-naked
privateersmen grouped at their guns with matches lighted,
was too much for him. Captain Haraden stood, watch in
hand, calling off the minutes so that his voice could be
heard aboard the packet:
"ONE." "TWO." "THREE."
But he had not said "Four," when the British colors
fluttered down from the yard and the packet ship was
his.
When a boat from the Pickering went alongside the
prize, the crew "found the blood running from her
scuppers, while the deck appeared more like the floor of
a slaughter house than the deck of a ship. On the
quarterdeck, in an armchair, sat an old gentleman, the
Governor of the island from which the packet came. During
the whole action he had loaded and fired a heavy
blunderbuss, and in the course of the battle had received
a ball in his cheek, which, in consequence of the loss of
teeth, had passed out through the other cheek without
giving a mortal wound."
A truly splendid "old gentleman" and a hero of the
first water!
In the latter part of the war Captain Haraden
commanded the Julius Caesar, and a letter written by an
American in Martinique in 1782 to a friend in Salem is
evidence that his activities had not diminished:
"Captain Jonathan Haraden, in the letter of
marque ship, Julius Caesar, forty men and fourteen
guns, off Bermuda, in sight of two English brigs, one
of twenty and the other of sixteen guns, took a
schooner which was a prize to one of them, but they
both declined to attack him. On the 5th ult., he fell
in with two British vessels, being a ship of eighteen
guns and a brig of sixteen, both of which he fought
five hours and got clear of them. The enemy's ship was
much shattered and so was the Caesar, but the latter's
men were unharmed. Captain Haraden was subsequently
presented with a silver plate by the owners of his
ship, as commemorative of his bravery and skill.
Before he reached Martinico he had a severe battle
with another English vessel which he carried thither
with him as a prize."
Captain Haraden, the man who took a thousand cannon
from the British on the high seas, died in Salem in 1803
in his fifty ninth year. His descendants treasure the
massive pieces of plate given him by the owners of the
Pickering and the Julius Caesar, as memorials of one who
achieved far more to win the independence of his nation
than many a landsman whose military records won him the
recognition of his government and a conspicuous place in
history.
While the important ports of Boston, New York, and
others to the southward were blockaded by squadrons of
British war vessels, the Salem privateers managed to slip
to sea and spread destruction. It happened on a day of
March, in 1781, that two bold English privateers were
cruising off Cape Cod, menacing the coastwise trading
sloops and schooners bound in and out of Salem and nearby
ports. The news was carried ashore by incoming vessels
which had been compelled to run for it, and through the
streets and along the wharves of Salem went the call for
volunteers. The ships Brutus and Neptune were lying in
the stream and with astonishing expedition they were
armed and made ready for sea as privateers.
One of the enemy's vessels was taken and brought into
Salem only two days after the alarm had been given.
Tradition relates that while the two Salem privateers
were sailing home in company with their prize, the Brutus
was hailed by an English sloop which had been loitering
the coast on mischief bent. The Yankee skippers seeking
to get their prize into port without risk of losing her
in battle, had hoisted English colors. Dusk had deepened
into darkness when from the quarterdeck of the British
sloop sounded the husky challenge:
"Ship ahoy. What ship is that?"
"The English armed ship Terror," answered the Salem
captain.
"Where are you bound?"
"Just inside the Cape for safety."
"Safety from what?" asked the guileless
Englishman.
"A whole fleet of damned Yankee privateers."
"Where are they?"
"They bear from the pitch of the Cape, about
sou'east by East, four leagues distant."
"Aye, aye, we'll look out for them and steer
clear," returned John Bull, and thereupon with a free
wind he stood out to sea leaving the Brutus to lay her
course without more trouble.
Not all the Salem privateers were successful. In
fairness to the foe it should be recorded that one in
three, or fifty-four in a total of one hundred and
fifty-eight privateers and letter of marque ships were
lost by capture during the war. Many of these, however,
were scarcely more than decked rowboats armed with one
gun and a few muskets. But of the four hundred and
forty-five prizes taken by Salem ships, nine-tenths of
them reached American ports in safety.
There was a lad who had been captured in a Salem
privateer, and forced to enlist in the English navy. He
was not of that heroic mold which preferred death to
surrender and the hardships of prison life appear to have
frightened him into changing his colors. He wrote home to
Salem in 1781:
"HONORED FATHER AND MOTHER:
"I send you these few lines to let you know that I
am in good health on board the Hyeane Frigate which I
was taken by and 92 I hope I shall be at home in a few
months' time. When I was taken by the Hyeane I was
carried to England, where I left the ship and went on
board a brig going to New York. There I was prest out
of her into the Phoenix, forty-eight gun ship. I
remained in her four months and was then taken on
board the Hyeane again, where I am still kept. We are
lying in Carlisle Bay in Barbadoes. We are now going
on an expedition, but will soon be back again when the
captain says he will let me come home."
Alas, the boy who had weakened when it came to the
test of his loyalty was not so well pleased with his
choice when peace came. In August, 1783, we find him
writing to his mother:
"I cannot think of returning home till the
people of New England are more reconciled, for I hear
they are so inveterate against all who have ever been
in the English navy that I can't tell but their rage
may extend to hang me as they do others."
Another letter of that time, while it does not deal
wholly with privateering, views the war from the
interesting standpoint of a Loyalist or Tory of Salem who
was writing to friends of like sympathies who had also
taken refuge in England. It is to be inferred from his
somewhat caustic comments about certain nouveaux riche
families of the town that the fortunes of privateering
had suddenly prospered some, while it had beggared the
estate of others.
"BRISTOL, England, February 10, 1780.
"Perhaps it may amuse you to be made acquainted
with a few particulars of our own country and town,
that may not have come to your knowledge. . . . It is
a melancholy truth that while some are wallowing in
undeserved wealth that plunder and Rapine has thrown
into their hands, the wisest and most peacable, and
most deserving, such as you and I know, are now
suffering for want, accompanied by many indignities
that a licencious and lawless people can pour forth
upon them. Those who a few years ago were the meaner
people are now by a Strange Revolution become almost
the only men in Power, riches and influences; those
who on the contrary were leaders in the highest line
of life are very glad at this time to be unknown and
unnoticed, to escape insult and plunder and the
wretched condition of all who are not Violent Adopters
of Republican Principles. The Cabots of Beverly, who
you know had but five years ago a very moderate share
of property are now said to be by far the most wealthy
in New England. . . . Nathan Goodale by an agency
concern in Privateers and buying up Shares, counts
almost as many pounds as most of his neighbors."
What may be called the day's work of the Revolutionary
privateers is compactly outlined in the following series
of reports from Salem annals. In an unfinished manuscript
dealing with privateering the late James Kimball of Salem
made this note:
June 20, 1857. This day saw John W. Osgood,
son of John Osgood, who stated that during the war of
the Revolution his father was first Lieutenant of the
Brig Fame commanded by Samuel Hobbs of Salem, from
whence they sailed. When three days out they fell in
with a British man-of-war which gave chase to the
Privateer which outsailed the man-of-war, who, finding
that she was getting away from him, fired a round shot
which came on board and killed Captain Hobbs, which
was the only injury sustained during the chase.
"Upon the death of Captain Hobbs the crew mutinied,
saying the captain was dead, and the cruise was up,
refused further duty and insisted upon returning to
Salem. Lieutenant Osgood now becoming the captain,
persisted in continuing the Cruise, yet with so small
a number as remained on his side, found great
difficulty in working the Ship. The mutineers stood in
fear, but part of the officers stood by Captain
Osgood. No one feeling willing to appear at their
head, they one day Sent him a Round Robin requiring
the return of the Privateer. Captain Osgood still
persisted in continuing the cruise.
"When an English Vessell hove in sight he told them
that there was a Prize, that they had only to take her
and he would soon find others. One of the Crew, to the
leader to whom they all looked, replied that he would
return to his duty. All the rest followed him, sail
was made and they soon came up with the Prize. She
proved to be a man-of-war in disguise, with drags out.
As soon as this was discovered the Privateer attempted
to escape, but she could not and was captured and
carried to Halifax."
Selecting other typical incidents almost at random as
they were condensed in newspaper records, these seem to
be worthy of notice:
"June 31, 1778. Much interest is made here
for the release of Resolved Smith from his captivity.
On his way from the West Indies to North Carolina he
was taken, and confined on board the prison ship
Judith at New York. Describing his situation, he said
that he and other sufferers were shut in
indiscriminately with the sick, dead and dying. 'I am
now closing the eyes of the last two out of five
healthy men that came about three weeks ago with me on
board this ship."'
"July, 1779. The Brig Wild Cat, Captain Daniel
Ropes, seventy-five men, fourteen guns, is reported as
having taken a schooner belonging to the British navy.
The next day, however, he was captured by a frigate
and for his activity against the enemy was confined in
irons at Halifax. On hearing of his severe treatment,
our General Court ordered that an English officer of
equal rank be put in close confinement until Captain
Ropes is liberated and exchanged."
"Feb. 13, 1781. Ship Pilgrim, Captain Robinson,
reported that on Christmas Day he had a battle with a
Spanish Frigate and forced her to retire, and on
January 5th engaged a privateer of thirty-three men,
twenty-two guns, for three hours and took her. He had
nine men killed and two wounded while his opponent had
her captain and four more killed and thirteen
wounded."
" March 13, 1781. It is reported that the Brig
Montgomery, Captain John Carnes, had engaged a large
British cutter, lost his lieutenant and had five
wounded. From another account we learn that after a
hard fight he succeeded in beating his opponent
off."
"It is reported on the 19th of the same month that
the ship Franklin, Captain John Turner, had taken a
ship after a fight of forty minutes, having had one
killed and one wounded. The prize had two killed and
eight wounded."
"August 26, 1781. The ship Marquis de Lafayette,
seventy five men and sixteen guns, reported as having
attacked a brig of thirty-two guns, upwards of two
hours, but was obliged to draw off, much damaged, with
eight killed and fourteen wounded and leaving the
enemy with seventeen killed besides others
wounded."
Privateering was destined to have a powerful influence
upon the seafaring fortunes of Salem. Elias Hasket Derby,
for example, the first great American shipping merchant
and the wealthiest man in the Colonies, found his trading
activities ruined by the Revolution. He swung his
masterly energy and large resources into equipping
privateers. It was his standing offer that after as many
shares as possible had been subscribed for in financing
any Salem privateer, he would take up the remainder, if
more funds were needed. It is claimed that Mr. Derby was
interested in sending to sea more than one-half of the
one hundred and fifty-eight privateers which hailed from
Salem during the Revolution. After the first two years of
war he discerned the importance of speed, and that many
of the small privateers of his town had been lost or
captured because they were unfit for their business. He
established his own shipyards, studied naval
architecture, and began to build a class of vessels
vastly superior in size, model and speed to any
previously launched in the Colonies. They were designed
to be able to meet a British sloop of war on even
terms.
These ships took a large number of prizes, but Elias
Hasket Derby gradually converted them from privateers to
letters of marque, so that they could carry cargoes to
distant ports and at the same time defense themselves
against the largest class of British privateers. At the
beginning of the war he owned seven sloops and schooners.
When peace came he had four ships of from three hundred
to three hundred and fifty tons, which were very imposing
merchant vessels for that time.
It was with these ships, created by the needs of war,
that the commerce of Salem began to reach out for ports
on the other side of the world. They were the vanguard of
the great fleet which through the two generations to
follow were to carry the Stars and Stripes around the
Seven Seas. Ready to man them was the bold company of
privateersmen, schooled in a life of the most hazardous
adventure, braced to face all risks in the peaceful war
for trade where none of their countrymen had ever dared
to seek trade before. While they had been dealing shrewd
blows for their country's cause in war, they had been
also in preparation for the dawning age of Salem
supremacy on the seas in the rivalries of commerce,
pioneers in a brilliant and romantic era which was
destined to win unique fame for their port.