[Illustration: CHURCH NEAR MONMOUTH BATTLEFIELD, BUILT IN 1752.]
MONMOUTH, JUNE 28, 1778.—Washington decided to pursue, and as Clinton, hampered by an immense train of baggage, moved slowly across New Jersey, he was overtaken by the Americans at Monmouth. Charles Lee [16] was to begin the attack, and Washington, coming up a little later, was to complete the defeat of the enemy. But Lee was a traitor, and having attacked the British, began a retreat which would have lost the day had not Washington come up just in time to lead a new attack. The battle raged till nightfall, and in the darkness Clinton slipped away and went on to New York.
Washington now crossed the Hudson, encamped at White Plains, and during three years remained in that neighborhood, constantly threatening the British in New York. [17]
BEGINNING OF THE NAVY.—More than three years had now passed since the fight at Lexington, and here let us stop and review what the Americans had been doing at sea. At the outset, the colonists had no warships at all. Congress therefore (in December, 1775) ordered thirteen armed vessels to be built at once, bought merchant ships to serve as cruisers, and thus created a navy of thirty vessels before the 4th of July, 1776. [18]
Eight of the cruisers were quickly assembled at Philadelphia, and early in January, 1776, Esek Hopkins, commander in chief, stepped on board of one of them and took command. As he did so, Lieutenant John Paul Jones hoisted a yellow silk flag on which was the device of a pine tree and a coiled rattlesnake and the motto "Don't tread on me." This was the first flag ever displayed on an American man-of-war. Ice delayed the departure of the squadron; but in February it put to sea, went to the Bahama Islands, captured the forts on the island of New Providence, and carried off a quantity of powder and cannon.
CAPTAIN BARRY.—Soon afterward another cruiser, the sixteen-gun brig Lexington, Captain John Barry, [19] fell in with a British armed vessel off the coast of Virginia, and after a sharp engagement captured her. She was the first prize brought in by a commissioned officer of the American navy.
THE CRUISERS IN EUROPE.—In 1777 the cruisers carried the war into British ports and waters, across the Atlantic. The Reprisal (which had carried Franklin to France), under Captain Wilkes, in company with two other vessels, sailed twice around Ireland, made fifteen prizes, and alarmed the whole coast. [20] Another cruiser, the Revenge, scoured British waters, and when in need of repairs boldly entered a British port in disguise and refitted.
In 1778 John Paul Jones, [21] in the Ranger, sailed to the Irish Channel, destroyed four vessels, set fire to the shipping in a British port, fought and captured a British armed schooner, sailed around Ireland with her, and reached France in safety.
The next year (1779) Jones, in the Bonhomme Richard (bo-nom' re-shar'), fell in with the British frigate Serapis off the east coast of Great Britain, and on a moonlight night fought one of the most desperate battles in naval history and won it.
[Illustration: GOLD MEDAL GIVEN TO JONES. [22]