p72  VI.

The First Cruise of the Lexington

John Barry's surmise that active service in the Continental navy was but a remote possibility terminated abruptly, on the morning of March 14, when a message summoned him before the Marine Committee. Most of the thirteen members were gathered in the committee room when he entered. Three of them, Richard Henry Lee, Joseph Hewes and Stephen Hopkins, had been on the now extinct Naval Committee. Among the others were the new president of Congress, John Hancock, of Massachusetts, and Barry's friend and former employer, Robert Morris.

As chairman of the committee, Hancock went into a preliminary explanation. Since the departure of the Continental fleet, the mouth of the Delaware had been without protection, but unmolested, a happier state than existed off the Chesapeake. A few days before a brigantine, the Wild Duck, with some powder abroad from St. Eustatia, had been sighted by one of the British tenders from Dunmore's Virginia squadron, and had been chased to within a few hours' run of Cape Henlopen. Coupled with this, the committee had the alarming intelligence from New York that his Majesty's ship Phoenix, stationed there, was outfitting a tender to cruise between Sandy Hook and the Delaware capes.

"In view of these circumstances," said Hancock, "Congress has authorized us to purchase the Wild Duck, convert her to purposes of war — she is already armed with sixteen 4‑pounders — and send her immediately to sea to destroy these small enemy cruisers."

"We bought her last evening from the Maryland delegate to whom she was consigned," Morris interjected.

"Exactly," agreed Hancock, "and we have renamed her the  p73 Lexington. Mr. Morris has strongly recommended you to command her, Mr. Barry. We understand a commission in the Continental navy will not be displeasing to you, and your reputation as an excellent seaman and a man of resolute courage is not unknown to us. If 'tis to your liking, a commission is already drawn up appointing you captain of the Lexington effective this day."

Almost at a loss for words, Barry received the proffered commission. The effect upon him of this unexpected preferment is told in his own words.

"I accepted the command," he said, "with a determined resolution of distressing the enemy as much as in my power."

Thus, on March 14, 1776, the tall Irish-born shipmaster, in his thirty-first year, won the reward of that decade of superb seaman­ship in the colonial marine and entered the infant naval service of his adopted country. The date is important and authentic. It again dispels the myth that Barry received the first commission to the first war vessel purchased by Congress.

The balance of the commissioned personnel was appointed by the Marine Committee in the ensuing few days — Luke Matthewman, first lieutenant; Robert Scott, second lieutenant, and John Bellinger, sailing master. There was, likewise, a lieutenant of marines, but his identity is not clear. It is unlikely that Barry took any part in the selection of his subordinates. The committee had urged the necessity of speedy outfitting and early departure, and upon these objectives he concentrated with his usual compelling energy.

Before noon of the day he received his commission, he had the little brigantine in the Continental shipyard — formerly John Wharton's private yard. Her reconditioning was assigned to Joshua Humphreys. As she was already pierced for her sixteen guns, the master-builder's principal tasks were to have her bulwarks thickened by a ceiling of •two‑inch pine boards, her hull scraped and her seams re‑caulked. Carpenters and caulkers went to work upon her with a will, and Barry turned his attention to the sails and rigging. Both were in excellent condition. A Tory informer, on March 18, stated that she was "to carry 110 men and to Mount sixteen 4 Pounders and 16 Oars." Recruiting was assigned to Lieutenant Matthewman and a rendezvous was opened in the city on March 17.

 p74  "I believe she will not be readily manned," croaked the same Tory informer, "for a great many has engaged of necessity, but are very unwilling."

This spy's premise was that Philadelphia seamen needed but a little encouragement and promise of a discharge "at the end of the Trouble," to be attracted to the King's rather than to the rebel service. Despite his prediction, the rendezvous flourished, and, within a week, the Lexington had more than seventy hands. Earliest of the volunteers had been the mariners who had brought her into port as the Wild Duck. These men, smarting under the humiliation of flight from a King's tender, signed on eagerly upon learning their late pursuer was an objective of the proposed cruise.

Gunner's and other stores were being assembled in the shipyard warehouse; a ton of powder was supplied by the Secret Committee of Congress, and 112 fathoms of cable were placed on board on March 20. Next day, armed with an order from the Marine Committee, Barry visited James Wharton's shop, examined the merchant's collection of pistols, and selected one with a stock that fitted his hand and a hammer that snapped to his liking.

"deld Capt. Barry for ye Brig Lexington 1 Pistol £1,0,0" Wharton entered in his Charge Book.

Anticipating almost immediate departure, the Marine Committee gave him sailing orders on March 25. No copy of these instructions exist, but Barry tells us their contents authorized him "to Cruise from the Capes of Virginia to Sandey hook and to Keep in Soundance [soundings] the Coast being at the time invested [sic!] with Small Cruisers of the Enemy." Appended was a letter addressed to all Committees of Safety and Inspection, recommending him, "now bound on a cruise," to their assistance and favor.

To sail that day, or for several days thereafter was impossible because of insufficient arms. Barry lacked muskets, cartridges and bayonets. He had been pressing for them in vain. Now the Marine Committee, in turn, appealed to the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety. Promises of delivery were given, but nothing materialized.

In the interim, news from Colonel Henry Fisher, the Continental watch‑dog at Cape Henlopen, brought a slight change in  p75 Barry's orders. A sloop-of‑war, according to Fisher's hastily penned note of warning, had entered the bay after dark of March 25. The alarm, forwarded by express riders, reached Philadelphia late in the afternoon of March 26. Marine Committee and the Committee of Safety, concluding this was one of the long-expected enemy tenders, conceived joint action. Four of the row‑galleys were ordered down the river as far as Reddy Island, there "to Act in concert with, and by the advice of Cap't Barry, of the Brig't Lexington, and exercise their utmost endeavours to take or destroy all such Vessels of the Enemy as they shall find in the River Delaware."

John Barry's long legs carried him frequently, on March 27, to the Marine Committee meeting room and the Committee of Safety headquarters with earnest appeals for the needed small arms. He was by no means completely manned. His lieutenant of marines was off inland on a recruiting mission. But give him the muskets and cartridges and he would sail, short-handed, to meet this newest menace. His insistence was rewarded. During that night, the Provincial Commissary placed on board a miscellaneous assortment of thirteen Dutch firelocks, two wall pieces, five bayonets, eight scabbards, five pounds of saltpeter and some musket cartridges.

Philadelphia was still slumbering when, at dawn of March 28, the Lexington stood down stream. She was not a very large vessel; about seventy feet long on deck, with a breadth of •twenty‑one feet, and a depth of •nine feet. She had been built in Bermuda on the model later to become famous as the "Baltimore Clipper." Speed there was in every line of her hull, from the curved stem to the rounded, lead-colored transom. Her low black topsides, with their sweetly-shaped yellow mouldings, were pierced for sixteen 4‑pounders and the sixteen oars that would sweep her into action during calm weather. Aloft, tall sharply raking masts carried a full brig rig, even fore and main royals — a great spread of cloth that would drive her through the water at a good clip. Her 4‑pounders were housed, hidden from view behind the closed lids of the gunports, but the flag of the Grand Union, thirteen stripes of alternating red and white, with the Union Jack next the staff, rippled from the peak. A Mrs. Bridges had made the ensign and had been paid seven pounds, ten shillings for her handiwork. There appear to  p76 have been other flag-sempstresses than Betsy Ross in Philadelphia.⁠a

John Barry had accomplished the remarkable task of outfitting, arming and manning the Lexington in the brief period of two weeks — a record of speed that stands alone in the annals of the Continental navy. He could well be proud of his achievement and prouder yet of his brigantine as the pilot nosed her through the narrow channel between the upper chevaux-de‑frise. He was off at last to carry out his "determined resolution of distressing the Enemy as much as in my power." And his first quarry was that sloop-of‑war known to be lurking below in the bay.

As the Lexington dropped farther down the winding channel, an express-rider from the capes galloped into Philadelphia. He bore a second letter from Henry Fisher, one written on March 26, when dawn had given opportunity to study the vessel previously identified as a sloop-of‑war. It was no sloop-of‑war, wrote Fisher, but a frigate! Members of the Marine Committee, summoned from their breakfasts, quaked for the fate of their little brigantine.

"There is a forty gun ship now laying at the Capes," wailed William Whipple, "the brig Lexington went down before we heard of her being there."

But the Lexington's destiny was out of their hands. The problem was now John Barry's alone.

* * *

It was his Majesty's frigate Roebuck, of forty-four guns. Andrew Snape Hamond commander, which Henry Fisher, of Lewes, Delaware, had mistaken for a sloop-of‑war when she rounded the pitch of Cape Henlopen and dropped anchor in Whorekiln road on the evening of March 25. She was "one of the handsomest ships-of‑war" in the British navy; had been built the previous summer, and had for captain an able and experienced sea‑dog. Hamond had come to the Delaware under orders "to destroy the floating Batteries, and to weigh up or otherwise render useless the Machines sunk in the Channel of the River Delaware to obstruct the Navigation thereof." A sizable order that, as the British captain realized. Before sailing from Virginia, he had written his superior at Boston for  p77 more ships, some howitzers and a landing force of several hundred men. Until they arrived, he would not venture beyond the navigable waters of the lower bay. Not that he was inactive. A tender had accompanied him. Two others were equipped from the numerous unsuspecting craft he bagged in the first twenty-four hours on his new cruising ground, and the Roebuck and her tenders immediately indulged in an orgy of prize taking.

One little Continental vessel had an opportunity to deal with Hamond's largest tender, but failed. This was the ten‑gun sloop Hornet, which with the armed schooner Wasp, both outfitted at Baltimore, had sailed from the cape in February as units of the Continental fleet. The Hornet, separated from Hopkins in a gale, had been driven far south along the coast. In beating back to the Delaware, she encountered the tender a few leagues off Henlopen and threw a monster scare into the British vessel. Unfortunately, the Hornet's captain, William Stone, was just as badly frightened. Instead of a vigorous attack, he fled under Cape May and up the bay, finally running ashore on Egg Island flats. The fiasco is cited merely for its bearing upon future events.

Fortunately for John Barry, the Lexington had not passed far below Chester, on March 28, when the real character of the adversary at the cape was disclosed. Thoughtful Henry Fisher had not confined his second warning to a land express. A boat had been dispatched with word to "all persons along the Bay" that the enemy ship was of "not less force than forty Guns." This intelligence changed the complexion of the proposed offensive. The four row‑galleys lay to at Reedy Island as ordered and the Lexington, about midnight, proceeded cautiously down the bay alone.

Barry had no fears for the safety of his brigantine. Here is where his years of sailing in and out of the Delaware stood him in good stead. He knew every shoal in the bay, the depth of each channel, the contour of both shore lines. Light of draft, the Lexington could venture into water too shallow for the frigate, and he stood in no awe of her tenders. Just let one of them within reach, and there would be a quick reckoning. Even with a raw crew, he had no doubts as to the outcome. So, through March 29, he continued his southward course, veering to port into the eastern, or New England channel, and, no doubt, passing  p78 close to the shoal upon which the Hornet had succeeded in entangling herself. About dusk he came under Cape May and could make out the distant bulk of the frigate far off to the southeast. He did not know that Hamond had spotted him coming down the bay about five o'clock, and had stood across in a vain hope of intercepting him.

Next day was a busy one on the Lexington. Barry had concluded he could be of no service lying under the cape, and knew the futility of pitting a lightly armed brigantine against a heavily armed frigate. He could do better at sea, following his original cruising instructions. Before venturing out, however, he wanted to be sure his hands knew their various duties, received some slight training in handling the 4‑pounders, and had instilled in them as much discipline as could be absorbed in twenty-four hours.

On Sunday morning, March 31, he weighed and stood around the cape, keeping the Overfalls shoals between him and the frigate. He saw her get under sail in pursuit, but in three hours he had run her out of sight. A spanking breeze helped him along on his northward course. Staying within soundings, per orders, he hugged the Jersey shore, proceeding well past the mouth of Barnegat bay before he turned southward. On April 3, he put into Little Egg Harbor Inlet, some fifty miles north of Cape May. The Committee of Safety and Observation there had some news of the tender from the Phoenix. She had taken two sloops and a brig off the port about a week before and had landed and plundered a house on Absecon beach.

From the date of the depredations, Barry concluded the tender had returned to New York. As he conceived his opportunities greater around the Delaware, he continued southward on April 4, and that afternoon boarded a sloop whose actions aroused his suspicions. She was from St. Croix, and her master protested he was engaged in a peaceful voyage to New York.

"Maybe so," Barry admitted, "but there's a non‑importation agreement that I'm feeling you're trying to evade. I'm going to send you in and let Congress decide."

The St. Croix sloop was manned with a half-dozen hands under Lieutenant Scott. Both vessels, favored by hazy weather, rounded Cape May that night. Several New England merchantmen  p79 were at anchor under the cape, awaiting a chance to slip to sea. Dispatching the sloop up the bay with her prize crew, Barry, on Friday morning, April 5, convoyed out the merchant vessels, the weather still concealing them from the Roebuck. Once they had a good offing he turned the Lexington's prow southward. If the run up the Jersey coast had been profitless, perhaps he would have better luck off the eastern shore of Maryland and Virginia.

Abreast of Cape Charles, in the early afternoon of Sunday, April 7, a lookout reported a strange sloop approaching from the southwest. The Lexington, guns housed and colors lowered, was proceeding leisurely along southward. Barry called his crew to quarters, made quiet preparations, and veered eastward as though trying to escape. He would do nothing to alarm the stranger. As the minutes wore on and she continued to approach he felt sure she was a British tender. Her intention to speak him was evidence of that. She was almost within hail when a commotion drew his attention to the waist of his own vessel. Young Coe Hendricks, one of the volunteers from the Wild Duck, was struggling with a boatswain who was holding him back. But Hendricks wanted to speak to Barry.

"It's her, Cap'n," he shrilled. "It's her what chased us last month! The same damn privateer! Let's give her hell!"

His message delivered, the lad permitted his captor to shove him back to his station. Barry grinned. Lax discipline, he knew, but Hendrick's excited announcement had struck the right spark for his untried crew.

Unsuspecting, arrogant in her presumed superiority, the tender swept nearer, firing a warning gun as she approached.

"Heave to, or I'll sink you," a British voice proclaimed. "What ship is that?"

"The Continental brigantine Lexington," Barry replied.

With his answer, the gun ports opened. Eight 4‑pounders, the whole starboard battery, revealed themselves to the startled crew of the sloop. The broadside that thundered from the guns reverberated to the distant shore line and brought the few denizens of the barren coast out on the sand dunes as spectators. Few of the shots went home, but the tender, like a frightened duck, sheered off, lost her headway, and, before she could get  p80 back into the wind, received a second fire. Above the powder smoke, the flag of the Grand Union jerked upwards toward the Lexington's main peak.

There was pluck in the Britisher. And why not? The sloop was the Edward, tender of the Liverpool frigate on the Virginia station with Lord Dunmore. She was armed with six carriage and six swivel guns, and, hence, inferior to the Lexington. But she was manned by Lieutenant Richard Boger and a crew of twenty-nine picked men from the Liverpool, as against Barry's eighty‑odd recruits, not one of whom had ever before smelled battle-smoke. Recovering from his astonishment, Boger opened a brisk fire on this amazing and unexpected opponent. At the same time, he tried to beat a graceful retreat, heading for the mouth of the Chesapeake in an effort to outdistance his opponent. The British guns were well directed. One shot killed two of Barry's men; another wounded several.

The Lexington proved the better sailer, and, after a few minutes of wild firing, her gun crews steadied to their task. The 4‑pound balls began to rip into the Edward, sli­cing long splinters from her hull and bulwarks ripping her sails and rigging, silencing her guns. The end came after a running fight of almost an hour. A lucky shot from the brigantine smacked into the tender's stern between wind and water, killed a man in the cabin, and opened a hole in her hull too large to plug. The British flag came down, and a wild cheer arose from the powder-stained men clustered around the Lexington's guns.

A little later, after Sailing Master Bellinger and a prize crew had taken over the Edward, and the shot hole had been patched, John Barry sat in his own snug cabin and composed a brief report of victory. His elation is apparent in every terse sentence of this short dispatch, which he headed, "In sight of the Capes of Virginia, April 7, 1776," and addressed to the Marine Committee.

The exultant captain convoyed the Edward northward. On the night of April 8, the sloop slipped into the bay by the Cape May channel, Prizemaster Bellinger bearing the famous dispatch. The Lexington continued up the coast, and, on April 9, Barry landed his prisoners at Egg Harbor, handing them over to a militia guard to be marched across Jersey to Philadelphia.

* * *

On the afternoon of March 28, the day Barry had sailed from Philadelphia, and as a result of the identification of the enemy in the lower bay as a frigate, Congress empowered the Marine Committee to purchase and arm a second vessel. The ship Molly was acquired and named the Reprisal. Lambert Wickes, a Maryland shipmaster, longtime friend of Barry and formerly also in the employ of Willing, Morris & Co., was appointed her commander. Her armament was fixed at eighteen 6‑pounders, and there were sanguine hopes of equipping her within a week. As the Lexington's refitting had absorbed all the available stores, the Reprisal was fated to be almost a month before getting ready.

Meanwhile, on the morning of April 4, the eight gun schooner Wasp, Captain William Hallock, with a sickly crew and a leaky hull, hauled into James Cuthbert's wharf with news at last of Hopkins's fleet. The old commodore, dragging his orders to disperse Governor Dunmore's squadron in the Chesapeake, had sailed south to the Bahama Islands and taken New Providence. When the Wasp had parted with her consorts in a storm off Bermuda, they had been Rhode Island bound, each vessel laden with cannon from the captured town.

Robert Morris, guiding spirit in the Marine Committee, saw opportunity to make emergency use of the Wasp. In the Delaware off Gloucester lay the sloop Betsy, outward-bound for Bermuda with Congress's first emissary to France — none other than Silas Deane, of Connecticut, former member of the Naval Committee. Deane had observed the Wasp going up the river, and had sent a letter to Morris by her, urging that she be ordered to give him convoy to the capes, and then be stationed there.

 p82  "I conceive that as Capt. Barry has got out & will Cruize from Sandy Hook to ye Capes of Virginia, No small Vessels of war will keep the Coast," Deane wrote, "and if you prevent their lying in the Eastern or Cape May Channel, your Navigation will be in a great Measure Free."

The idea appealed to Morris. He would send the Wasp down with orders to attend Deane, but the latter would have to determine whether he wished to wait for her.

"You know how hard it will be to get the People on bd again," Morris explained, "but all the dispatch that is possible shall be made."

Four days were required before Captain Hallock was ready to sail. As Barry's lieutenant of marines had reached the city with a number of recruits, Morris ordered him on board the Wasp. At the same time, Lieutenant Scott came up the river with the St. Croix sloop. Much against the grain, the Marine Committee concluded the vessel could not be legally condemned, and released her.

In a hasty session on the evening of April 8, the committee, having just heard that Barry had been at Cape May three days before, concluded to enlist his services in giving Deane convoy well off the capes. Orders were prepared in duplicate, one copy to go by Hallock in the Wasp, the other, by Lieutenant Scott overland to Egg Harbor. If Barry met the Wasp at Cape May, he was to take his marines on board and give Deane the desired convoy. If he first learned of the matter from Lieutenant Scott at Egg Harbor, he would know that his marines had been landed at the cape, where he could pick them up, still take the sloop under his protection, "and see her Two, three or four days Run of[f] the Coast, until you and Mr Deane Shall think her out of danger of the Enemies Tenders and Cutters." The committee also told him it had released the St. Croix sloop, "yet as the circumstances attending her appeared Suspicious you did right."

Scott and his prize crew left for Egg Harbor on the morning of April 9, but it was evening before the Wasp weighed and stood down the river. She reached Chester at noon the next day, but her arrival was almost unnoticed in the excitement permeating the little town. The battered Edward lay in the stream  p83 and Prizemaster Bellinger had just sent ashore for a chevaux-de‑frise pilot.

"I have the inexpressible pleasure of informing you that Captn Barre has been amazingly success­ful," enthused Lieutenant Colonel Johnson, of Anthony Wayne's regiment of riflemen, in a letter to his superior.

Johnston's letter, sent by land, beat the Edward to Philadelphia. The rebel capital, therefore, was out along the shore in force when, on the morning of April 11, the ex‑enemy tender came limping up the stream, the first British war vessel to reach an American port as a prize. Barry's graphic note was read in Congress, and the forms of Town's Pennsylvania Evening Post were held open to receive it that day. Two days later the Edward was libeled against as a prize; legally condemned at the court-house, on April 29; bought by the Marine Committee, on May 2, and outfitted for the Continent, in due time, as the ten gun sloop Sachem.

* * *

At egg Harbor, John Barry was finding the limited facilities of the little port prevented rapid repairs to the Lexington. He was at anchor in the inlet when Lieutenant Scott arrived from Philadelphia about April 12. Nor could he clear for several more days, anxious as he was to comply with his new orders to meet Deane. It was past noon, on April 15, before he finally rounded Cape May and dropped anchor in its lee. The day was foggy, blotting out any sight of the Roebuck on the Cape Henlopen side of the bay.

The long-boat was sent ashore and returned shortly with the lieutenant of marines, who gave him a quick picture of events.

"Mr. Deane sailed two days ago," the lieutenant explained. "He had word you had gone into Egg Harbor and concluded he could not expect you. So he asked Captain Hallock to give him a short offing. I went out in the Wasp, and we returned this morning. Captain Hallock put us ashore and the Wasp went back up the bay."

"And the Roebuck?" Barry questioned.

"She chased us several hours, but we finally lost sight of her. I think she's still over in the roadstead."

 p84  Barry considered the situation. The Lexington was a fast sailer. Given a bit of luck, he might overtake Deane. His orders were emphatic that a safe convoy was essential. His decision was to make the effort, and, before dark, he cleared the cape, sailing southeasterly with a brisk gale at his back.

While Barry forsook the waters around the mouth of the Delaware, Captain Hamond, of the Roebuck, continued to labor under the delusion that the little brigantine was still lurking in the neighborhood. Neither John Barry nor anyone else ever realized what a thorn in the flesh the Lexington had proved to the British captain. Hamond had learned the name of the brigantine and that of her commander. Tories from the Delaware shore had boarded him early in April with this information, and an invitation to accept some provisions collected south of Indian river. He had sent his tenders for the supplies, but they had been frustrated by "Barry's brig." This episode, together with the encounter of his tender with the Hornet — an encounter he also accredited to the Lexington — had induced him to dismantle both tenders and send them off for Virginia. Thereafter, he operated with his boats only, fearing to hazard any detachments away from the frigate over night. As April wore on, the Lexington became an obsession with him, as he frankly admitted.

"I would give more than I can express to have the Otter, or even the Otter's tender here for a few days," he wrote Lord Dunmore, "as without a small Vessel that can go in shallow water it is totally impossible (or at least very unlikely) that I shall be able to do anything with this Brig Lexington."

Several times he had chased her, and a number of times he was under the impression that he had. Once he felt sure the brigantine had deliberately lured him on the Overfalls, and admitted that he had with difficulty weathered the shoal. Hamond was rather familiar with the shallow water around Cape May. He knew he could not venture into the one channel of •fourteen feet depth, "and this passage Mr Barry is at present master of."

A circumstantial account of the taking of the Edward reached him on April 25, together with information that the former tender of the Liverpool was being outfitted at Philadelphia as a privateer. She would undoubtedly be sent to the Virginia capes, he warned Lord Dunmore, where "not being well  p85 known for an Enemy, she might do a great deal of Mischief among our small Tenders."

The real heights of Hamond's delusion regarding Barry's operations came at about that time. On April 24, the Roebuck's commander was certain he had chased the Lexington back of the Overfalls, "where I was very near doing his business." The disappointed Britisher consoled himself with the thought that Barry's reign "will be of short duration, especially as his success of late had made him bold."

On the day that Hamond came so near, as he believed, to capturing the Lexington, that little brigantine was some 600 miles away in the latitude of Bermuda!

Despite the sailing qualities of his vessel, John Barry had not succeeded in overtaking Silas Deane. He had followed the course he knew the Betsy would pursue, keeping sharp lookout day and night. He gave over the effort with Bermuda not many leagues away. When he turned back, on April 25, he was in latitude 31° north, and about 127 leagues southeast of Cape Roman, on the South Carolina coast.

Dawn of Sunday, April 26, disclosed a fleet of seventeen sail off to the southeast. For a time he contemplated reconnoitering them, although suspicious of their numbers. Any thought of prize-taking vanished, when one of the distant squadron stood toward him. As the day brightened, his glass showed she was a frigate. That was enough. Clapping on all the sail the Lexington could carry, he fled northwesterly, the vessel-of‑war in pursuit.

Not until long afterwards did Barry learn that he had fallen in with Admiral Sir Peter Parker and a portion of a British fleet bound on an expedition against Charlestown, South Carolina. He never knew the identity of the frigate which took after him. We can supply that identity now. She was the Solebay, of twenty-eight guns. Detached by Sir Peter to "Chace a Sail in the N Wt Quarter," the frigate set off with dispatch, and kept after the Lexington for several hours.

"Could not come up with her," the Solebay's log records, "haul'd our wind to join the Conv[oy]."

Lack of perseverance robbed the frigate of a fat prize, for the Lexington, under too heavy a press of canvas, carried away her foremast. The crew cleared the wreckage, while Barry, lowering  p86 his glass, heaved a sigh of relief. The frigate had ceased pursuit. The one thing to do, and do promptly, was to make the best of his way back to port. Fortunately, no more enemy vessels were encountered. They approached the Delaware under cover of darkness, and got behind Cape May just before dawn of May 4.

As they started up the bay, daylight disclosed the Roebuck and two other frigates in Whorekiln road — the Liverpool and Fowey, as Barry learned later. Captain Hamond, in turn, spotted his aggravating opponent, recognized him, and set off in pursuit. The Liverpool joined the chase, but neither vessel dared venture too near the shallows along the Jersey shore. As a last resort, the Roebuck fired a gun, but the range was too long.

"We'll return the compliment," Barry grinned. "Give him a single shot."

One of the Lexington's little 4‑pounders barked a derisive farewell. Once again, Captain Hamond had failed to do John Barry's "business."

---

Thayer's Note:

a To go a step further, Mrs. Bridges might even be in the running at some later point as the first maker of the American flag, given the substantial doubts now cast upon the Betsy Ross story.

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