Gallant John Barry • Chapter 10

Guns muttered daily down the river like the rumble of distant thunder. During daylight their low booming reverberations were incessant. At night the air quieted. Occasionally the sounds rose to a high crescendo. When this happened, John Barry and Thomas Read waited impatiently for the express who would, in due time, come up through New Jersey with an account of what had happened.

Once, on the morning of October 23, the heavy cannonading was punctuated by a terrific detonation. It rattled the windows in the houses in White Hill, and set the Effingham and Washington a tremble. From the frigates, they could see a prodigious column of smoke far to the southward. As it slowly dissipated in the clear fall air, the roar of a second, but lesser, explosion came to their ears. After that was silence below and suspense on the frigates until long after dark came word of the brilliant success at the river pass. The two concussions had spelled the end of his Majesty's sixty-four gun ship Augusta and the eighteen gun sloop-of‑war Merlin, both blown up when aground below the chevaux-de‑frise during a fruitless British effort to storm Fort Mifflin.

Letters describing this victory were filled with predictions that the enemy could never force the Delaware. One man, at headquarters on the Skippack road, was not misled. That man was Washington. He knew the inadequate numbers of the American troops clinging precariously to forts Mifflin and Mercer and the little naval force supporting them. Casting about for reinforcements, he thought of the frigates ordered up the Delaware, and wrote to the Navy Board at Bordentown, p127 on October 25, asking for a return of their crews and whether all hands could be released to the fleet.

Francis Hopkinson and John Wharton had their own ideas about the frigates and the 160 men on board them, and Washington's inquiry was not to their liking. They had already suggested to the Marine Committee that both vessels be lightened and hauled up a creek, with obstructions placed below them, and a battery erected to defend the obstructions from molestation by the enemy. If the emergency arose, combustibles could be placed on the frigates to burn them rather than let them fall into British hands. So, while they dutifully procured returns from Barry and Read, their letter to Washington pointed out that the men were needed to defend the frigates from cutting‑out parties. A larger force, because of "the Difficulties of the Channel," could not, in their opinion, get up the river. However, as the General's desires were "a Law to us," they would dispatch the men upon his order, and, in that case, the frigates could be prepared for scuttling, a step they saw no need for "till the Enemy have got up to the City with their Shipping."

Washington penned a prompt reply on October 27. Didn't they know the enemy, in addition to the frigate Delaware, were fitting out two large vessels in Philadelphia? If the Effingham and Washington had ascended the river, what was to prevent the British from doing the same? Suppose the two frigates at White Hill were taken, and sent against the river pass from the north, could not the result be foretold "without the spirit of divination?"

"The fatal consequences are too obvious," Washington wrote, "to need more arguments to prove them. At present these frigates are of no use to us, while their crews are greatly wanted."

Then came his dictum. If no other method could be devised he would favor burning them, but the end might be answered by scuttling and sinking, with or without ballast, and dispatching their hands at once to the fleet. As Washington had been invested by Congress with supreme executive power, there was no alternative for the Navy Board, but prompt compliance. They received his letter on October 28, and sent an immediate verbal order to Barry and Read to attend them at Bordentown.

p128 For three days there had been continuous rain. The river was high, creeks swollen, and the downpour was heavy when the two captains squashed through the mud two miles to the board's office. They announced their arrival, but Barry alone was ushered into the room. Hopkinson greeted him with no great cordiality, and handed him a written letter, directed to him as senior officer. It was brief — a terse instruction to prepare both frigates for sinking or burning. No verbal explanations accompanied this, to Barry, inexplicable mandate. He hesitated for a moment, angered that he and Read should be called upon to plough two miles though rain and mire to receive an order that might just as well have been delivered by a messenger. Stifling a desire to demand reasons for the procedure, he bowed and withdrew. Outside, in the rain, he communicated the order to Read, and the pair returned to White Hill, conjecturing upon it, and growing angrier at the treatment accorded them.

The task of removing stores and other materials began next morning, but with slim crews, progress was slow. About noon, it was agreed that Read should go to Bordentown to hire more hands. He was back in two hours, disgust written plainly on his features.

"Mr. Wharton told me the frigates should be sunk tonight or tomorrow morning," he said, "and would give no word of explanation."

"What! Now, by the powers," Barry exploded, "we'll see about that. It's damned foolishness. These frigates are in no danger, and I'll not see them rashly destroyed without a protest. Come along, Tom."

Off they strode, anger lending them speed, and literally burst upon the Navy Board. Oh, for Colonel Nixon's presence then.

"Captain Read has given me an extraordinary order he received from you gentlemen," Barry began. "Being sure there must be some mistake, I felt it my duty to repair here and remonstrate against sinking either the Washington or the Effingham."

Hopkinson gazed at the speaker, his mien coolly hostile, his voice a bit supercilious.

p129 "There has been no mistake, Mr. Barry," he said. "The Board resents being charged with making mistakes. The frigates are to be sunk, and the order comes from General Washington."

"From General Washington," he repeated, "who has been informed by a lad from Philadelphia that the British are preparing boats and that the frigates are their likely objective."

"That's ridiculous," Barry protested. "You know the measures we have taken. No boats could possibly board us. Why, the heavy fresh in the river makes it impossible for any enemy boats to come up."

"I prefer to take General Washington's opinion sooner than yours," Hopkinson retorted, his voice curt.

"I don't doubt it," snapped Barry, the last vestige of restraint gone in the face of the other's insulting manner, "but I happen to know more about a ship than General Washington and the Navy Board put together."

"Let me go to camp to see his Excellency," he demanded. "Were he fully acquainted with the precautions we have taken, he would not order the frigates to be sunk. They can be made ready for sinking should the worst happen, but it is criminal to destroy them now."

"The Board has written the General the ships will be sunk." Hopkinson was shaking with rage as he made this statement. "Sooner than disobey one jot of his orders, the Board would, if necessary, sink every one of the thirteen frigates."

"I shall protest against any order to sink my ship unless by direction of the Marine Committee," said he. "I was commissioned by Congress to command her, and I expect to be consulted before she is destroyed."

"You shall obey our orders," Hopkinson shouted, his face flushed, his hand pounding the table.

Thomas Read plucked at Barry's sleeve, and shook his head in warning. Nothing good could come of such quarreling. The Captain suddenly realized this, swallowed hard, turned on his heel and left the room. In a wild rage, he went back to White p130 Hill, with his fellow captain striving to calm him. Read's wise counsel prevailed, and the work of emptying the Washington and Effingham was renewed.

All was in readiness by November 2. The cannon were on shore; every item of stores and supplies had been transferred to several shallops to be taken farther up the river. Disdaining to meet the Navy Board again, Barry sent a brief note, and received as curt a one in return. As the frigates were "now scuttled and ready for sinking," they should be removed a little below White Hill, and, having found a suitable berth with a soft bottom where they could be easily gotten off at low tide, should be sunk without more delay.

"We expect this Business shall be compleated by sunset this evening and Report thereof made to this Board," the letter concluded.

Scarcely had the order been received when Hopkinson put in his appearance, and proceeded to take control of the operations.

"Haul the ships on shores and sink them," he told Read, ignoring Barry entirely.

Not satisfied with this affront, the chairman boarded the Effingham to supervise the sinking personally. John Barry, his face grim, stepped aside and said nothing. He knew it was the wrong time of the tide, but he nodded to his officers to obey each order given. The inevitable happened as it always does when a novice takes command. The Effingham swung in toward shore. The moment she grounded, Hopkinson ordered the plugs out. In rushed the water, so rapidly that the frigate could not be heeled to the bank. And, as the tide began to fall, she started slowly to list away from the shore. Gradually she righted, lying down on her beam ends. For one tense moment, it looked as if she would overset. Neither understanding what he had done, nor how to rectify it, the Navy Board chairman, his confidence in himself considerably shaken, departed hastily for Bordentown.

To the Board next morning went John Barry, his heart sick over the fiasco. It had been no fault of his, but he regretted he had not acted upon his first impulse, ordered Hopkinson off the frigate, and handled the job himself. Had he done so, the Effingham, like the Washington, would be resting on the bottom p131 and safely heeled toward shore, instead of pitching outward in constant danger of capsizing. Therefore, it was in a milder tone than he had recently used, that he informed the board of the frigate's precarious condition. Overnight, Hopkinson had recovered his poise.

"It is a great misfortune, Captain Barry," he said suavely, "and we must do our best to remedy it."

"Nothing shall be wanting on my part," Barry assured them, pointing out that he would require a large number of hands if the frigate was to be raised.

"You have our authority to hire all you need, and give them orders on the boat for their pay," said Hopkinson. "We will also procure plenty of men to help you from Colonel Nicola's regiment of invalids quartered here."

Hiring hands Barry found no easy task. No one wanted to go to White Hill in the cold weather on a job that promised hard work in icy water. Those he could procure demanded extravagant wages. He did get about twenty-five men from the invalid regiment. These, with his own and Read's crew, made the first attempt to raise the frigate about November 5. It was unsuccessful. A second try, three days later and with the same force, fared no better. Hopkinson grew uneasy. He savored in the failures a deliberate attempt on Barry's part to add to his discomfiture, and Washington was beginning to wonder why the men from the two frigates had not gone down the river to join the hard-pressed American fleet. On November 10, in a letter to the Commander-in‑Chief, he confessed what had happened, but not who had been responsible.

"In sinking one of the Ships," he wrote, "she unfortunately lay against a steep Bank, which on the Tide's falling, caused her to heal outwards from the Shoar As this is an uneasy situation & may injure the Ship we have been obliged to retain all the Hands & even hire more to get her up‑right again. We have not yet been able to Effect this Purpose, but hope to do it in a few Days with the Purchases & Powers we are preparing to apply."

The third attempt to raise the Effingham occurred two days later, when the weather cleared after a period of snowfall. The night before Barry had notified the board of his intention and had received an insulting reply from Hopkinson that the latter p132 would come down and raise her himself. The Captain read the note and gritted his teeth. Having lined up all possible purchases from ship to shore, and made sure that tackle and windlasses were in first class condition, he sent to Bordentown for Colonel Nicola's invalids. Until their arrival, he collected his seamen, distributed them to the ropes and started them heaving away. The frigate refused to budge. Shortly after noon, a sergeant and seven men arrived from the invalid regiment.

"How's this?" he asked the sergeant. "I had twenty or twenty-five of you for the previous tries."

"Orders from Mr. Hopkinson and Mr. Wharton, sir, were to bring only men who were well clothed."

Barry looked at his own men, many of whom were almost in rags, and swore softly. The sergeant and his squad joined the sweating, heaving groups on the purchases, and the effort continued. In the midst of the futile pulling, Hopkinson arrived.

"Go along and mind your business, you scoundrel," was the retort. "I said it is a lie."

A bit alarmed at Barry's threatening mien, Hopkinson qualified his previous remark.

Barry wheeled and beckoned the sergeant from out of the throng; a throng which had ceased all work to listen to the quarrel of their superiors. The man stepped forward none too eagerly.

"Yes sir, Cap'n," the sergeant faltered. "It was, sir, that I should bring only the well clothed men down."

"You're a liar!" Barry's words rang sharply. "The Continental Congress knows that I have always minded my duty. And I'll tell you, if you had minded yours, this ship would not be in her present condition."

The chairman of the Navy Board beat a hasty retreat, venturing no further exchange with the infuriated Captain. The latter turned back to his gangs.

Backs strained. The ropes stretched taut. The frigate stirred not an inch from her uneasy berth on the river, and, with a crack and a whirr, one of the purchases gave way. The third and final effort to raise the Effingham had failed.

The gallant defense of the forts and the river pass below Philadelphia was nearing an end. Howe's great guns had reduced Fort Mifflin to a pile of shattered masonry, from which the garrison was removed on the night of November 15. Three days later, at a council of war, the military heads at Fort Mercer decided that post was untenable and determined to retreat. The little naval force was left to shift for itself. Thirteen Pennsylvania row‑galleys and seven of the state's armed boats stole undetected past Philadelphia before dawn of November 20, bringing to Burlington, two days later, the first news that the siege was about over. Next day more of the state fleet got through, but not unscathed.

Around daybreak, of November 23, a haggard band of about 350 officers and men came trooping into Bordentown with the dire tidings. The little Continental fleet was no more. Just when it had been ready to run past the city, the wind had failed. Behind them, the American forces had already abandoned Fort Mercer. Across the river, British infantry and artillery were in full possession of Fort Mifflin. Below them, the great British fleet was in motion northward. Isaiah Robinson, senior Continental captain in the fleet, gave the only order p134 possible — burn the vessels. Thus, during Friday, November 21 the brigantine Andrew Doria, the sloops Racehorse and Fly, and the xebecs Repulse and Champion had gone up in a great conflagration. Their crews, landing on the Jersey shore, began the •thirty mile march that brought them finally into the presence and under the direction of the Navy Board.

Hopkinson and Wharton listened aghast to the story and dashed off a note to Washington. They had no chance yet to institute an inquiry into the reasons for "so desperate a measure," but, whatever the cause, the loss seemed "to be irreparable." And what should they do, they asked the Marine Committee, with the crews of the five burned vessels? To this letter inquiry, they received a prompt reply.

"We would have you by all means keep them together in good humor and in Action until you hear further from us on the subject," the committee wrote.

This was a little easier to direct than to execute, as we learn when we read a letter from one of the Pennsylvania Navy Board members at Burlington.

"The sailors belonging to the Continental Fleet," said he, "went up to Borden Town, and are mostly deserted."

To Messrs. Hopkinson and Wharton, however, the instructions from the Marine Committee connoted the possibility of again utilizing the Effingham and Washington. They suggested it to Washington, reminding him that the former "still lyes on her Beam Ends in a very disagreeable Situation." If the frigates were afloat, how easy it would be to accommodate the Continental seamen, they pointed out, adding that the plugs could be so fixed that both vessels might be sunk should the enemy make an attempt upon them. Washington vetoed the suggestion. He saw no reason, he told them, to change his former opinion. And that was that.

The return of the fleetless crews again had placed John Barry at their head as senior captain. One of his first duties was to assemble a court martial to try five members of the crew of the xebec Repulse, charged with deserting their vessel, on November 20, the eve of the evacuation of the river pass. The court convened in the cabin of the ship Lion, a merchantman under charter of Congress, on November 25. Twelve officers sat in judgment upon the defendants and found them guilty. p135 Four were sentenced to be hanged from the yard arm of any Continental vessel — a place of execution certainly not available in that vicinity. The fifth, a mere boy, was to receive thirty‑six lashes "on his bare back with a Cat of Nine tails."

As presiding officer, Barry forwarded a transcript of the proceedings to the Marine Committee. The prisoners, he said, were in "close confinement in Burlington Gaol," and would remain there until the pleasure of Congress was made known. To anticipate, Congress later pardoned the five upon condition that they entered the army and served the duration of the war.

By the beginning of December, Barry was chafing at the inactivity at Bordentown. To most of the others, who had just passed through a strenuous two months' siege, the inactivity was enjoyable. Not, however, to the Captain, who knew, further, that he had a bitter enemy in the chairman of the Navy Board, and that this enmity might be exerted to make a longer sojourn in the little town decidedly unpleasant. In Barry's mind a plan was formulating, the execution of which could never be attained as long as Hopkinson, in a sense, controlled his destiny. Therefore, ignoring the Navy Board, he applied directly to the Marine Committee for a brief leave of absence to spend the Christmas holidays with his bride in Reading.

The proposed vacation was but the ostensible objective. Behind it lay a determination to visit Washington, and, if necessary, Congress. Two purposes motivated him. He wanted his own story of the trouble with the Navy Board told to the proper authorities, and he desired the approval of both Washington and the Marine Committee upon the plan he had concocted. When the desired permission arrived, on December 13, he notified the Navy Board he was bound for Reading, and departed that day.

Until then, Hopkinson had taken no steps to bring the Captain to the promised accounting. With Barry going over his head to secure leave of absence, the chairman sensed his hand had been forced. On December 14, he and Wharton prepared a letter preferring charges. They complained of the disrespect and ill treatment accorded them by the Captain, and specifically stated that "In the presence of several Strangers he in the most indecent terms refused to execute our orders." Instead of p136 sending the charges directly to the Marine Committee, however, they addressed them to Robert Morris, who was dwelling in his country home in Manheim, a little hamlet about midway between Reading and York.

Meanwhile, Barry had proceeded to army headquarters at Valley Forge. Of his interview with Washington there is no record. At the camp, to his delight, he happened upon Morris, who was there on a mission from Congress. Pleased with the opportunity thus presented, the Captain started to tell of his troubles with Hopkinson. Morris stopped him.

"I believe, Captain, it is not proper for me to hear just one side of the story," he explained. "You see, I might, as a member of the Marine Committee, some day have to become judge in this affair."

"True enough," Barry admitted. "Let me merely say, then, that I think myself capable of making a defence against any accusation from the Navy Board. I am willing to submit the matter entirely to the Marine Committee. Secretary Brown knows where to reach me — with Mrs. Barry at Reading until after the New Year."

On his return to Manheim, on December 19, Morris found the Navy Board letter. He forwarded it to Congress, remarking that he believed it was sent to him "not only to obtain my opinion on the subject it relates to, but also for me to introduce it to the Marine Committee." At York the next day, Congress received the charges and referred them to the committee with an injunction "to prepare proper resolutions for supporting the authority of the navy board, and report the same to Congress."

John and Sarah Barry were reunited in Reading shortly after the middle of December. They had been separated a full three months — an unconscionable long time for a bride and groom, whose marriage had been consummated less than a half year before. It was not their lot, however, to enjoy an untroubled reunion in the little Dutch-speaking city lying snow-covered and cold in the shadow of Mt. Penn. Sarah's woes were too great to be shelved even in the joy of again having her husband with her. The Captain promptly learned all her troubles.

p137 First of all, William Austin had never joined them in Reading. Instead, he had remained in Philadelphia, taken the oath of allegiance to the king, and accepted a commission in a loyalist regiment. Sarah had heard from him. One of his excuses was that his action had saved their joint properties from confiscation. To top this misfortune, Reynold Keen, for some inexplicable reason, had departed from Reading, leaving his family unprovided for, and also had gone over to the enemy in Philadelphia. Sarah's half-sister, Christiana Keen, had died on November 3 in childbirth, leaving her large brood of eleven children dependent upon the generosity of Sarah and Isaac Austin. The Berks county lieutenant had seized all the household furniture Reynold Keen had brought with him to Reading, and proposed selling it at public vendue. Also, Keen had contracted numerous debts in Reading, and his creditors were threatening action.

It was a sorry mess, but there was little John Barry could do about it. The Christmas holidays in Reading were not of a nature to carry pleasant memories into the future. It was a season filled with more sorrow than happiness. It climaxed with a reminder to the Captain that his own troubles had reached a head. About January 3 came a letter from his friend, John Brown, secretary of the Marine Committee. Brown enclosed two resolutions passed by Congress on December 30.

One resolution demanded Barry's presence in York to answer before Congress the complaint against him filed by the Navy Board. The second, based upon his alleged insubordination, empowered the navy boards (there had been a second one created for New England) to suspend any officer who refused to obey their orders, or offered them any indecency or disrespect. With the first resolution, Brown had enclosed an extract from Hopkinson's letter, so the Captain would better be able to prepare his defense.

An aroused and angry John Barry reached York on January 10. He was in a fighting mood; wanted to appear before Congress immediately; would make a sweeping answer to the Navy Board charges. Somebody, and most likely it was John Brown, prevailed upon him to take a wiser course. As a result, the Captain sat down in his room in a York tavern and penned an account of his trouble with the board. This letter is an able p138 document, detailed in its relation of each incident that occurred in the sinking of the Effingham. He hoped it would set his conduct "in a fairer point of View in the Eyes of your Honors than that in which the Navy Board would have placed it." No penitence was expressed anywhere. Barry knew he was in the right. He did not propose to crawl before Congress or anybody else. He had always behaved with the greatest respect to the board, and he wondered why "the good of the Service does not require the Captains of the Navy to be treated with Complaisance and as Gentlemen as long as they observe their duty." He ended the letter with a clear statement of his creed:

"I should think myself unworthy of the Commission the Honorable Congress had been plasedº to give me," he wrote, "could I tamely put up with different Treatment."

His letter was read in Congress three days later, and referred to the Marine Committee. That body called the Captain before it, but it is apparent little time was spent upon the Hopkinson charge. Barry had staunch friends on the committee. His record on the Lexington was known to every member. Also, Hopkinson's personality had not won the Navy Board chairman any great respect. From the evidence, it would seem that Barry's time with the committee was spent largely in perfecting the plan he had already broached to Washington. Of that plan, more later. Suffice it for the present, that one of Hopkinson's friends in Congress got wind of what was proposed. On January 29, a second letter was received from the Navy Board chairman — a letter complaining of the failure of Congress to act upon the charges.

"Resolved, That Captain Barry be not employed on the expedition assigned to his conduct by the approbation of Congress, until further orders from Congress."

The question was put. The roll was called. Members voted "aye" or "nay" and the clerks tallied the results. The house was equally divided, so the resolution failed of passage. By that narrow margin were the services of John Barry preserved for his country against the malice of the Navy Board chairman.

As a sop to the disgruntled Hopkinson, the Marine Committee, about three weeks later, found that "Captain Barry hath treated the said Board, in the person of Mr. Hopkinson, one of p139 that board, with indecency and disrespect." Its recommendation to Congress was that the Captain, within twenty days after the passage of the resolve had been signified to him by the board, "ought to make such acknowledgment as shall be satisfactory to them." Congress concurred, but nowhere on record is there evidence of an apology from Barry, nor of any effort of the Navy Board to secure one.

p126 X. The Navy Board of the Middle District

p126 X.

The Navy Board of the Middle District