[186] Ibid., March 29, 1777.
[187] Rhode Island Colonial Records, VIII, 53.
[188] Journals of Continental Congress, July 11, 1780.
[189] Ibid., August 5, 1776.
[190] In July, 1778, when a joint American and French attack on Newport was planned, the Navy Board at Boston inserted a notice in the Providence Gazette, requiring sailors who were enlisted to repair to their vessels, and calling for recruits. This call was in the following language: “All seamen now in America, who regard the Liberty of Mankind, or the Honor of the United States of America, as well as their own advantage, are now earnestly entreated to enter immediately on board some of the Continental Vessels, in order to afford all possible Aid and Assistance to His Most Christian Majesty’s Fleet, under the Command of the Count de Estaing, the Vice-Admiral of France, now in the American Seas, for the Purpose of assisting these American States in vanquishing a haughty and cruel Enemy, too long triumphant on these Seas. Now is the Time to secure to yourselves Safety in your future Voyages, and to avoid the cruelties which all those experience who have the Misfortune to be captured by the Britons; and now is the time to make your Fortunes.”—Providence Gazette, July 25, 1778. See also advertisement in Connecticut Gazette, March 7, 1777.
[191] A facsimile of a most interesting and rare broadside will be found in C. K. Bolton’s Private Soldier under Washington, page 46. This broadside was designed to attract recruits to the ship “Ranger,” Captain John Paul Jones, fitting out in the summer of 1777 at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, to sail for France.
[192] Collections of New York Historical Society, Deane Papers, V, 466.
[193] For additional information and appropriate references concerning privateers, see Part II, State Navies.
[194] There is much evidence on this point. See especially Publications of Rhode Island Historical Society, VIII, 256, William Vernon, Commissioner of Navy Board at Boston, to John Adams, December 17, 1778; Force, American Archives, 5th, II, 1105, John Paul Jones to Robert Morris, October 17, 1776; Ibid., 599, Mrs. John Adams to John Adams, September 29, 1776; Ibid., 337 and 622; Ibid., 5th, III, 1513, Benjamin Rush to R. H. Lee, December 21, 1776; and C. K. Bolton, Private Soldier under Washington, 45, 46.
[195] In the case of Continental prizes the Navy Board at Boston discovered collusions which were detrimental to the government. Ordered to buy the Continental prize “Thorn,” it writes to the Marine Committee that the agents and captains interested in the prize refuse to let it have the “Thorn” at a price to be fixed by three disinterested appraisers; and that “taking our chance, in the purchase by auction, amongst such circles of men in combinations is a miserable one.” In the same letter the Board writes also concerning the “Thorn” that “bets run high that she will sell for two hundred thousand pounds.”—Records and Papers of Continental Congress, 37, pp. 145, 147.