“There! we’ll get off tomorrow morning, Master Dunn.”
He went over to Marblehead that evening and when he returned he carried a huge bundle in his arms. To his executive officer, Lieutenant Fettyplace, he explained:
“It’s a banner my wife has been making for us. Tomorrow, before we sail, we’ll break it out from the masthead.”
Naturally curious to see it, Master Fettyplace, Lieutenant Salter, the second officer, and myself, who stood near, waited for him to show the flag to us. But he did not do it. It was not until my own hands pulled the cord the next morning which unfurled the banner from the frigate’s peak that we saw the beautiful piece which Mistress Tucker had wrought.
There it floated on the gentle breeze: a white field, a green union, made in the form of a pine tree, with the motto beneath it: “An appeal to heaven.” And under that flag we fought until Congress had adopted the stars and stripes.
Ten minutes later with every foot of the ship’s canvas stretched to the north-west wind, we were standing out to sea. Once out of the harbor, our bow was turned towards Cape Cod, and a man was sent to the cross-trees to be on the lookout for prizes. We found not one, but two, much sooner than we expected. The circumstances as near as I can recall were these:
Just before dark, hearing a loud cannonading on our left, and apparently some distance away, we directed our course thither. Before the night fairly shut down, we came near enough to see four vessels engaged in conflict. Two of these, a ship and a brig, were flying the British flag, while the other two were schooners, and clearly American privateers.
Not wishing to take the English vessels from those who had first discovered them, and who had the first right to them as prizes if they could capture them, we refrained from entering into the engagement. But when the enemy beat off our friends, and sailed away towards Boston, we immediately gave chase. The Britishers and our own ship were evidently faster sailers than the privateers, and soon we had left them behind. At nine o’clock they were out of sight, and the chase was all our own. Then the wind nearly failed, and for an hour or two we drifted along a mile behind our prey.
About this time our lookout reported another sail some distance away off our starboard. It was too dark to make her out, and Captain Tucker immediately ordered out a boat, and putting me in charge, directed me to go over and reconnoitre the strange vessel.
“Take a dark lantern with you, Master Dunn,” he said, “and, if she prove to be an English cruiser, suspend your light near the edge of the water as a signal of your immediate return. We’ll be on the lookout for you. If, however, she be an American vessel, then elevate your light in the air, and we’ll come down, pick you up, and speak with her.”