Sailing Off
To Serve Pilgrim Society & Pilgrim Hall Museum |
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| I. Plymouth in the Revolution | ||||||||||||||||||||
| The Town of Plymouth has always focused on the waterfront - and it was no
different during the Revolutionary War! While many Plymoutheans marched off to war, many
more sailed off to serve the Patriot cause. Ships sailing in and out of the Plymouth area fell into two categories, official vessels and privateers. The official vessels included the schooners of George Washington’s first tiny navy. Organized in 1775 as an auxiliary arm of the Continental Army, this fleet of eight small ships was outfitted at Continental expense and reported to Washington himself. The activities associated with these ships, and the Continental naval agents who supplied them, are well documented in the papers of George Washington at the Library of Congress, available online through the American Memory project. (The Continental Navy was not officially organized as an independent branch of the military until 1776; this later navy was never active in the Plymouth area.) The other official ships were those ships outfitted by (and reporting to) the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. Among the 15 ships of the Massachusetts Colonial Navy was the brigantine Independence, built in Kingston in 1776, captained by Simeon Sampson of Plymouth. The second category of ships was comprised of privateers. These were privately-owned vessels authorized either by the Continental Congress, or one of the individual American colonies, to seize enemy vessels carrying troops or supplies - particularly those carrying the ammunition so desperately needed by the Continental forces. Because of the small size of the Continental Navy (only 64 vessels over the entire course of the war), the contributions of the approximately 2,600 authorized privateers were essential to the successful prosecution of the war. According to Lloyds of London, privateers captured 2,087 British ships, while the Continental Navy captured 196 ships. The U.S. Merchant Marine estimates that about 55,000 American seamen served aboard privateers, intercepting British shipping in the Atlantic, Caribbean, and even between Ireland and England. The costs of outfitting a ship for privateering were high. So were the potential financial rewards. Owners, captain and crew shared in the profits of captured cargoes. The risks of privateering were also high, however. Many of the privateers would never return home. Nevertheless, Plymoutheans owned privateers, they outfitted and provisioned privateers, they sailed on privateers. As James Warren wrote to Samuel Adams at the beginning of the war in 1776:
The "spirit of privateering" did not diminish as the war
continued, and privateers continued to be built and outfitted into the 1780s. The
privateer Rattlesnake was built at Plymouth in 1780. Designed for speed by
naval architect John Peck of Boston, she captured a million dollars worth of British goods
on her first (and only) cruise.
Watson was duly appointed. He served his country and his new
commander-in-chief well.
The Washington was a 160-ton schooner, rerigged as a
brigantine, with 10 guns and a crew of 74, captained by Sion Martindale of Rhode Island.
The second ship, the Harrison, was a 64-ton topsail schooner built in 1761
and carrying four guns, captained by William Coit.
After having its weak mainmast replaced, the Harrison
sailed again on November 12 and was chased by British vessels into Barnstable harbor.
Leaving Barnstable on November 29, she took two more prizes : a schooner, which turned out
to be American-owned and was therefore returned to her owner, and another schooner
with a very valuable cargo - four Loyalist pilots who were to guide British transports
safely into Boston harbor. The Washington, under Sion Martindale, was far less successful.
Martindale sent request after request for expensive additional sails, guns, ammunition and
crew and showed no sign of ever sailing, although letters from headquarters urged him on
in more and more explicit terms. When he finally did sail, very late in the season, he
brought in only one small sloop before being captured after he, against direct orders, had
confronted a British man-of-war. A more detailed account of the Washington
and Sion Martindale is given in Part II of this article.
Manley found safe haven in Plymouth Harbor on one memorable occasion
when the British were forced to evacuate Boston in March of 1776. They left by sea,
burning their barracks behind them. The departing troops were loaded onto transport ships
and, escorted by men-of-war, sailed south along the New England coast. Manley, who had
been waiting outside of Boston Harbor for possible prize ships, was almost caught up in
the evacuation. He and several other privateers managed, however, to duck into Plymouth
Harbor just ahead of the huge British fleet.
The pandemonium in the streets with armed men flocking in from the
countryside was exacerbated by panic-stricken citizens pushing in the opposite direction,
trying to "send off many of their women and children and as much furniture as they
could get away."
After the evacuation of Boston, Washington’s fleet also moved south
and, eventually, Congress authorized the formation of a larger independent Continental
Navy. Naval activities in Plymouth did not cease, however. New England waters were still
patrolled by the Massachusetts Provincial Navy and privateers owned and manned by
Plymoutheans continued to sail in the Patriot cause. |
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II. The voyage of the Washington |
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| One of George Washington’s ships that sailed from Plymouth was named
the Washington, captained by Sion Martindale of Rhode Island. There were worries about Martindale from the beginning. Although his original instructions included the caution:
the Continental naval agents were apprehensive of Martindale’s militant intentions. Martindale was reminded again and again that his mission was not to challenge British armed vessels, but "to intercept the enemy’s supplies." The agents also worried about Martindale’s extravagance. After receiving repeated requests from Martindale for additional sails, for additional guns, for additional crew, George Washington’s aide-de-camp responded to the final request for a drum and fife, with
As Martindale’s requests streamed into the Continental headquarters outside of Boston, the sailing season of 1775 was fast winding to a close. Having poured every available cent into his little fleet, George Washington was anxious to see results. Worries over Martindale’s extravagance were now combined with worries over Martindale’s tardiness. Washington’s aide-de-camp asked on November 16:
Just as it seemed that Martindale and the Washington were finally on their way, one more problem erupted. On November 28, Martindale and the Washington had left Plymouth, but promptly returned with a tiny prize in tow. The 80-ton sloop Britannia, loaded with provisions for the English troops in Boston, had been disabled by a lighting strike and was limping towards a landfall on the Gurnet when she was intercepted by the Washington. A dispute arose, however, between Martindale and his crew over the distribution of the anticipated prize money and, on November 29, it was reported that
The response from George Washington’s headquarters was swift and stern. If Captain Martindale could not keep his crew, he was to be replaced with any captain who could, because the ship
The threat of losing his vessel jolted Captain Martindale into action.
The Washington sailed from Plymouth on December 2, 1775.
Of those three Plymoutheans who sailed with Captain Martindale on board
the Washington, two can be identified, the ship’s master Consider
Howland and master’s mate Jacob Taylor.
Washington’s aide replied that a proposal for a prisoner exchange
had been sent to the British General Howe with no response received, but that "Jacob
Taylor will not be forgot." No special plea was made for Consider Howland, who was
well-connected and well-loved but had no dependents.
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III. Charles Dyer in the American Revolution |
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| The ordinary American seaman served in obscurity. His vital, but mundane,
task was to intercept British transport ships, to disrupt British trade, to divert British
ammunition and supplies to the Continental forces. The risks in this endeavor were high
but the contributions of the individual were seldom acknowledged or even remembered. It is
only through rare happenstance - the paths of the ordinary crossing with those of the
great, or a serendipitous record being created and preserved - that an ordinary seaman
such as Charles Dyer was occasionally, momentarily, highlighted for history. Our knowledge of Dyer is due to such a double happenstance. His service record was preserved thanks to a veteran’s pension law passed by the United States Congress in 1836. Charles Dyer, by then, had been dead for 50 years. His widow Bethiah, however, was still living and, at age 86, she promptly applied for benefits as the widow of a veteran. Her pension application, outlining her husband’s naval activity, is still in the National Archives. The second spotlight to shine fleetingly on Charles Dyer emanates from the correspondence of George Washington, now preserved at the Library of Congress and available online through the American Memory project. In 1775, George Washington had asked for volunteers to man a fledgling fleet whose mission would be to intercept supply ships sailing in and out of the British-held port of Boston. Washington took a deep personal interest in his tiny experimental navy. Charles Dyer was among the volunteers to step forward at Washington’s request. He thereby, briefly, stepped into Washington’s correspondence. Charles Dyer was born in Plymouth in 1738, son of Charles and Lucy Cotton Dyer. In 1773, he married his first cousin Bethiah Cotton, the daughter of Theophilus Cotton who, in 1774, would lead Plymouth’s Sons of Liberty in moving Plymouth Rock to Town Square as a symbol of the Patriot movement. Bethiah testified in her pension application that, in the autumn of 1775, Dyer served under Captain William Coit on the Harrison, a small, elderly vessel sailing out of Plymouth as part of Washington’s tiny fleet. When Coit relinquished command of the Harrison in January of 1776, William Watson, the naval agent in Plymouth, sent Dyer to Washington’s headquarters in Cambridge with a letter recommending that he be given the command of the Harrison :
Washington’s response was positive:
Dyer was prevented from sailing immediately by severe winter weather.
Dyer was eventually able to sail and the Harrison served
the Continental forces until early summer of 1776, often venturing out in company with the
privateer Yankee, of which fellow Plymouthean Corban Barnes was master.
When a response was not forthcoming, Dyer accepted a commission in the
Massachusetts Provincial Navy, as First Lieutenant on board the brigantine Independence,
commanded by Simeon Sampson of Kingston and Plymouth. The Independence was
captured by the British and carried into Halifax; Dyer was a prisoner there for about
seven months. After his release, he served as First Lieutenant on board the brigantine Hazard,
also Massachusetts Provincial Navy, and again under the command of Simeon Sampson, until
May of 1778. |
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IV. Simeon Sampson |
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| At the outbreak of hostilities with England, the individual American
colonies authorized armed vessels to be built at public expense to support the Patriot
cause. Massachusetts established its own navy on December 29, 1775. One of the
colony’s first ships was the brigantine Independence, built in Kingston
in 1776. The Independence was placed under the command of Simeon Sampson. Sampson was a descendant of both Myles Standish and John Alden through their mutual granddaughter Lydia Standish. Born in 1736, he became a seafaring man at an early age. James Thacher recounts in his History of Plymouth the story of a Plymouth merchant ship captured by the French in 1762 during the Seven Years War (known in America as the French & Indian War). Sampson was serving on board the captured ship. A ransom amount for the ship was agreed upon and Sampson left as hostage for that amount, while the ship was sailed back to Plymouth.
As already noted, Sampson again found himself involved in a war at sea
more than a decade later. The mission of his vessel, the Independence, was
to travel the seas between the New England coast and the Caribbean, intercepting British
shipping and diverting military supplies from the British forces to the Continental army.
The rules for naval warfare were strict. Action could be taken only against official navy
vessels or against vessels carrying troops or cargo in aid of the British forces. British
merchant vessels whose cargoes were not in support of the military were not fair targets.
Before a captured ship or its cargo could be disposed of, a court had to rule that the
ship taken was a legitimate target. Sampson’s task was twofold : he had to first find
and capture British vessels, then he had to prove that the vessels captured were
specifically aiding British military operations.
The captain of the English vessel was seen to be throwing papers overboard.
The Americans retrieved the soggy papers and received confirmation that the ship was indeed fair game, since the papers proved the English captain
Later that year, the Independence captured a British
supply ship sailing out of Nova Scotia. Sampson must have been shocked and surprised to
come face-to-face with the captain of that vessel : Gideon White, Plymouth-born Loyalist.
(White was sent back to Plymouth as a prisoner. Eventually released, he joined the British
army in New York and ultimately settled in Nova Scotia.)
Sampson was sent to Nova Scotia and placed on board a prison ship, the Boulongua, anchored in Halifax Harbor in the Bay of Fundy. He wrote a letter to the Massachusetts Provincial Congress describing conditions on board the ship
Sampson was exchanged in the summer of 1777 after some seven months of
captivity. His clerk, Henry Goodwin, also survived and was exchanged. Sampson then
received a commission from Massachusetts to command the armed vessel Hazard,
a brigantine built in the fall of 1777 in Plymouth. After cruising the Atlantic coast, he
sailed the West Indies in search of English vessels to intercept. He was forced, however,
to relinquish the command in May of 1778 due to ill health brought on by his earlier
captivity. Sampson later commanded the packet Mercury, in which he carried
Plymouthean Elkanah Watson to France with diplomatic messages.
Sampson retired to a house on Middle Street in Plymouth, where he lived
with his wife Deborah. The Sampsons had 12 children, five died as infants and were buried
on Plymouth’s Burial Hill. In 1788, Sampson purchased a farm in Plympton. He died
there the next year, at the age of 53. After first being buried on his own farm, his body
was moved to Plymouth’s Burial Hill and laid to rest beside the graves of his
children. |
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| V. "A remarkable day": a vignette of Revolutionary Plymouth | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Sally Sever turned 19 years old in 1776. A sprightly and intelligent girl,
she lived with her parents, three younger brothers and a sister in a large house, built in
1768, on Kingston’s Linden Street. Sally’s father, William Sever, was a wealthy merchant and shipbuilder. Active in civic affairs and a staunch Patriot, he served as Kingston’s representative to the Massachusetts General Court. William Sever’s mother had been Sarah Warren of Plymouth. William’s wife - Sally’s mother - was another Sarah Warren of Plymouth, niece of the first Sarah Warren and William’s first cousin. Born into one of Plymouth’s most prominent families, this second Sarah and her brother James Warren were descended from Pilgrims Richard Warren and Edward Winslow. When William and Sarah Warren Sever’s first child, a daughter, was born, she became yet another Sarah. Her name was shortened to Sally within the family. During the turbulent 1770s, William Sever was elected to the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. He spent long weeks away from his family attending the Congress. His wife and daughter, Sarah and Sally, regularly wrote to him, and a number of their letters are in the Archives of Pilgrim Hall Museum. Sarah’s letters show a keen knowledge and strong interest in current events. She does not hesitate to express her political opinions, which are as staunchly patriotic as her husband’s. She wrote to William in the early 1770s:
Sarah also carried gracefully the responsibility for caring for the family’s financial interests during William’s absences. She informs him of goods that are scarce or extremely expensive on the South Shore and asks William to purchase these in Boston and send them to the family in Kingston. She tells her husband of her business decisions, often acknowledging, as in one letter dealing with urgent matters of both farming and maritime trade, that she
Sarah suffered a bout of ill health in 1775. It seems at this time that daughter Sally became the family’s correspondent with the absent William. Sally’s letters are warm and teasing, the letters of a dearly loved and indulged daughter:
In another letter, written soon after, Sally asks for political information on her mother’s behalf:
Sally would sometimes visit her "Uncle and Aunt Warren," her
mother’s brother James Warren and his wife Mercy Otis Warren, in Plymouth. In a
letter dated June 17, 1776, she relates to her father a noteworthy event that occurred
while she was staying at the Warrens’ house. In a wonderful coincidence, the very
same event was described by another participant, Abigail Adams, who was visiting her
friend Mrs. Warren at the same time.
The privateer was the Defense, described by Abigail Adams
as "a fine brig, mounts 16 guns, 12 swivels, and carries 100 and 20 men." The
ship’s officers were acquainted with Dr. Lothrop of Plymouth and invited his wife to
come on board with as many of her friends as she would like. Mrs. Lothrop in turn sent an
invitation to Mercy Otis Warren and her guests. Sally notes that "Aunt Warren was not
well and could not go," but her guests did.
Abigail Adams was far more impressed with the Captain’s management of his crew :
Once on board, the ladies toured the ship, drank tea and were entertained with a mock naval engagement with an enemy. Abigail notes that, while some of "their Jacks played very well upon the violin and German flute," the "young folks" danced. Sarah says with less detail but more natural enthusiasm:
Both ladies, young and mature, agreed that the parting roar from the ship’s cannons as they departed at the end of the day was (in Sally’s words)
They would also have both agreed with Abigail’s characterization,
Abigail Adam’s subsequent life has been, of course, well chronicled. She saw the country gain its independence and form a new system of government. She was beside her husband, John, when he was inaugurated as the second President of the United States. When she died in 1818, their son John Quincy (future President of the United States) was serving as Secretary of State to James Monroe. Sally Sever’s life was far shorter. In 1784, she married Thomas Russell, an eminent Boston merchant. Their only child was born on December 1, 1786. Sally Sever Russell died on November 24, 1787, age 30.
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| Abbreviations used : LC Library of Congress American Memory
Project, Papers of George Washington |
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www.pilgrimhall.org |
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Updated 14 July, 1998
