This plan would have been successful, but for one foolish mistake. The squadron sailed so close to the harbor during the night that in the morning all the ships could be seen from the shore. The war vessels should have remained out of sight until the marines had been safely landed from the sloops. The alarm was spread, and the sloops were not allowed to cross the bar.
The commander of the squadron then planned to land on the opposite side of the island and take the forts from the rear, but Paul Jones told him he could not do this. There was no place to anchor the squadron, and no road to the forts.
However, he had learned from the pilots of a good landing not far from the harbor. When he told the commander of this, he was only rebuked for confiding in pilots.
So Paul Jones undertook, alone, to conduct the Alfred to the landing he had found. He succeeded in doing this and the whole squadron afterwards followed.
The English soldiers abandoned the forts, and the squadron sailed away the same day, carrying a hundred cannon and other military stores.
VI.—Captain Paul Jones.
A short time after this, the American squadron tried to capture a British ship called the Glasgow, but the attempt was not successful.
Because of this failure, one of the captains was dismissed from the navy, and the command of his vessel was given to Lieutenant Jones. This vessel was named the Providence.
With it and the Alfred, which he also commanded, Captain Jones captured sixteen prizes in six weeks. Among them were cargoes of coal and dry goods.
Best of all, he captured an English vessel bound for Canada, full of warm clothing for the British soldiers. This was a prize that proved of great value to General Washington's poorly clothed army.