The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763-1789 (116 page)

Jones next took the
Ranger
across Solway Firth to St. Mary's Isle -it was now mid-morning -- with the intention of abducting the Earl of Selkirk. As things turned out, he was not at home, and the landing

party carried off nothing more valuable than the family silver. But the next day the
Ranger
did capture something of importance -- the sloop of war
Drake,
a well-armed vessel encountered off Belfast Lough. The
Drake
fought effectively for two hours-her captain died with a bullet in his brain, and her executive officer was seriously wounded -- but the
Ranger
fought more effectively.

By May 8, Jones had the
Ranger
safely back at Brest. Her voyage, though it did no great damage either to British ports or commerce, had been a sensational success. The psychological damage -- the blow she struck to British pride and spirit -- was extensive, though there is no evidence that her raid produced a change in the deployment of royal warships. British newspapers gave the raid a great play with shouts of outrage -- at Paul Jones -- and grunts of scorn -- at the navy's inability to run him down.

The shouts soon after in Paris were in a lighter tone. The
Ranger
's voyage had made Jones the lion of French society, the delight of the French government, and the ecstasy of French ladies. Jones got a larger ship, the
Duras,
to command, which he renamed the
Bonhomme Richard
in honor of Benjamin Franklin.

John Paul Jones could be patient, and he could be crafty, but he preferred to exercise other qualities. He was always an ambitious man. John Adams, who saw something of him at this time, said that he was "the most ambitious and intriguing officer in the American navy. Jones has Art, and Secrecy, and aspires very high." Adams expected the unexpected from him. "Excentricities and Irregularities are to be expected from him -- they are in his Character, they are visible in his Eyes. His Voice is soft and still and small, his Eye has keenness, and Wildness and Softness in it." Adams saw, and heard, Jones in polite society -never aboard a ship in battle, which accounts for his impression that Jones spoke in a "soft and still and small" voice. But he was right about the eyes. They were sharp and could blaze with wildness, as the bust by Houdon and the portrait by Charles Willson Peale suggest. The eyes stared out from a strong face with a firm, prominent nose and a well-proportioned jaw. The eyes were important to a commander of rough and sometimes rebellious men, for Jones was not large, probably no taller than five feet, five inches, but he was lean and hard. The look of ferocity that he could throw out cowed weaker men.
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This tough and resourceful commander sailed with seven vessels on August 14, 1779, from Groix Roadstead, intending to create as much

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havoc as possible in the British Isles. His ship, the
Bonhomme Richard,
was the largest ship -- probably around 900 tons -- he had commanded. She was getting old, and with all of her sails piled on, was still slow, but after he armed her she could throw out heavy fire in battle. She mounted 6 eighteen-pounders, 28 twelve-pounders (16 of them new models), and 6 nine-pounders. Of the remaining ships of his command, two were frigates, one was a corvette, one a cutter, and two were privateers. These last two took off on their own shortly after the squadron hit the open sea. Jones was not surprised; he had guessed that they would resist his orders in favor of free-lancing. Nor could he really depend on all the others for instant obedience to his orders. Their skippers were French and, perhaps, were a little jealous of their American commander. One, Pierre Landais, captain of the frigate
Alliance,
hated Jones. Landais has been described as being half-mad; on this voyage he was destined to behave as a full-fledged lunatic or as a traitor.

The squadron made its way at a leisurely pace to the southwest Irish coast and then turned north. On August 24, Landais came aboard the
Richard
and told Jones he intended to operate just as he pleased. Within the next few days the cutter
Cerf
disappeared. Jones had sent her off to find several small boats he had dispatched to reconnoiter the coast. The
Cerf
got lost and eventually made her way back to France.

Not everything went sour: the squadron captured prizes as it proceeded up the coast, and on September 3, just north of the Orkney Islands turned to the south. Off the Firth of Forth, on the east coast of Scotland, Jones decided to put a landing party ashore at Leith, Edinburgh's seaport. His purpose was to threaten Leith with fire and collect a large ransom. The city fathers were terrified by the appearance of his ships, but a gale, which forced Jones's ships out of the firth, saved them from having to buy him off. If nothing more had occurred, the cruise would have been reckoned a success. It had yielded prizes, it had produced fear in the home islands, and it had forced the British Admiralty to send ships of the Royal Navy in fruitless pursuit of John Paul Jones.

What happened next made everything else seem unimportant. On September 23, off Flamborough Head on the Yorkshire coast, the
Bonhomme Richard
fought one of the great battles in American naval history. At mid-afternoon of that day, the squadron sighted a large convoy escorted by the frigate
Serapis
(rated at 44 guns but carrying 50) and sloop of war
Countess of Scarborough
(20 guns). The
Serapis,
a new copper-bottomed frigate was commanded by Captain Richard Pearson, RN, a brave and competent officer.

Jones soon realized that he would have to defeat these escorts before he could attack the merchantmen. The wind was light, and it was sunset before he closed to firing range. The
Alliance
ignored Jones's signal to "form line of battle," as did the corvette
Vengeance,
a small lightly armed vessel. Frigate
Pallas
threatened to follow their example, sailing away rather than toward the enemy, but then put about and engaged the
Countess of Scarborough.
The
Richard
faced the
Serapis,
a more heavily armed ship, alone.

The battle opened with both ships on the same course, the
Serapis
off the
Richard
's starboard bow. Early in the fight two of the
Richard
's old eighteen-pounders burst with terrible effect on the crew serving them and on the entire heavy battery. This event convinced
Jones
that in order to win the battle, he would have to grapple with the
Serapis
and board her. The Bonhomme Richard was outgunned even before her eighteen-pounders exploded and, since it was unsafe to use the four that remained, could not win by trading salvoes with her enemy. Had she been nimbler, Jones, a resourceful seaman, might have used her quickness to escape a heavy battering while punching the
Serapis
with the 28 twelve-pounders. But the
Richard
was anything but quick, and a heavy slugging match could only send her to the bottom. Captain Pearson, in contrast, attempted to maneuver in such a way as to bring his superior firepower to bear while keeping the
Richard
away.

Just after the eighteen-pounders burst, Jones tried to board
Serapis
on her starboard quarter. By skillful ship-handling he brought the
Richard
close, but the boarders were driven off by the English sailors. Pearson then tried to bring
Serapis
across the bow of the
Richard,
only to have Jones put his vessel's bowsprit into the stern of the
Serapis.
It was apparently at this moment that Pearson called to Jones asking if he wanted to surrender, and received Jones's magnificent' reply, "I have not yet begun to fight."

More intricate sailing followed by both ships with topsails backed and filled, vessels falling back, darting ahead (in the case of the
Serapis
), or lumbering in either direction (in the case of the
Richard
). At a crucial juncture, the
Serapis
ran her bowsprit into the
Richard
's rigging and a fluke of her starboard anchor caught on the
Richard
's starboard quarter. The two vessels were now locked together, starboard to starboard, with their guns pounding away. Below decks the advantage belonged to the
Serapis;
her batteries did terrible damage to the
Richard.
But on the open deck and in the top sails the
Richard
clearly had the upper hand. Jones's French marines used their muskets to deadly effect, and

the American sailors hanging above them poured fire and grenades down onto the
Serapis.
Before long only her dead remained above deck, and her crew serving the batteries below gradually gave way to the bullets and grenades that came from overhead, as the Americans worked their way onto the English topsails.

Several times, both ships caught fire and the shooting fell off as their crews attempted to put them out.
Serapis
took a frightful blow when William Hamilton, one of the bravest of the
Richard
's sailors, dropped a grenade through one of her hatches into loose powder cartridges. The explosion that followed killed at least twenty men and wounded many others. This blast may have shattered Captain Pearson's resolve; if it did not, the prospect of losing his mainmast shook him to the point of yielding. Jones had directed the fire of his nine-pounders against the mainmast -- and had helped serve one of the guns himself.

It was now 10:30 P.M. The
Richard
was filling with water; her crew had suffered heavy losses; but her captain would not strike his flag, though several of his men begged him to give up. On the
Serapis
the condition of the crew was no better though the ship was in no danger of sinking.
Pearson
's courage, however, trickled away with the blood of his men, and he himself tore down his ensign.

John Paul Jones had carried the fight to his enemy and had won through courage, spirit, and luck. Grappling with the
Serapis
had, in fact, been accidental though of course he had badly wanted to close with her. On the other hand, luck had also served the
Serapis,
for Captain Pierre Landais of the
Alliance
had decided to enter the fight early in the evening -- against his own commander. The result was the delivery of three broadsides at close range into the
Bonhomme Richard.
Somehow Jones shook off these blows and everything that the
Serapis
could hit him with.

The casualties were dreadful on both sides -- 150 killed and wounded out of a crew of 322 in the
Richard,
and about 100 killed and 68 wounded out of 325 on the
Serapis.
Two days after the battle Jones abandoned the
Richard.
She was a gallant old vessel, but she could not be saved. Jones transferred his flag to the
Serapis,
and joined by the
Pallas,
which had taken the
Countess of Scarborough,
sailed for friendly waters.

Nothing in Jones's career ever equaled his magnificent performance of September 23. He left Europe in December of the following year, leaving behind an admiring France and coming home to countrymen who acclaimed him. They needed heroes, and they found a great one in John Paul Jones.

What happened on the water affected what happened on the land, and both affected the lives of civilians as well as those of soldiers and sailors. The "inside" of campaigns in other words had consequences for the "outside," the civilian society which sustained the war. This distinction between the inside and the outside of the campaigns is to some extent deceptive, of course, and even false. Civilians, for example, participated directly in the campaigns, providing supplies and sometimes carrying the baggage of the armies. They also served as guides and scouts; black slaves and white freemen dug entrenchments; camp followers did laundry and nursed the sick and wounded. These examples of civilian participation can be multiplied.

Since the fighting occurred in America, the Americans suffered the physical destruction that usually accompanies war. In the opening battle of the war, in April 1775, a part of Concord burned. Two months later the battle of Bunker Hill saw almost all of Charlestown, Massachusetts, destroyed by a fire set off by British shelling. In the next seven years, towns and villages in every part of America absorbed severe losses of buildings of all sorts. South Carolina and Georgia were ravaged late in the war; there as elsewhere crops and livestock were lost to the armies of both sides along with fences, pulled down by soldiers for firewood, and farm buildings of all kinds -- especially in the West. To the east, Charleston, South Carolina, received a heavy battering before Clinton captured it in May 1780.
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