I 7 7 9 of the "Serapis" a row of 18-pounder cartridges had been piled. One of the grenades, dropped through the main hatchway, fired one of these cartridges and a flash followed the train each way through the ship. The explosion was Hi V W F Corset Winids Premarkis on Flour/day Soyt H. 23:1777 Stint 24h hushet Beyond with a satte Briz.

The
"Serapis '
Surrenders

A Page from the Log of the "Bon Homme Richard"

terrific. More than twenty men were blown to pieces and many more were badly burned and wounded. This demoralized all the crew in that part of the vessel, disabled the main battery, and proved to be the crisis of the action. Meanwhile, the situation on the "Richard" was frightful. The ship was on fire, there was six feet of water in the hold, and the cry arose that the vessel was sinking. The master-at-arms, believing that all was lost, released more than a hundred prisoners some of whom scrambled through the ports, gained footing on the "Serapis," and assured Captain Pearson that, if he could keep up the fighting a few

But the 1779

minutes more, the "Richard" would be his.
remaining prisoners were convinced by Lieutenant
Richard Dale that both ships were sinking; impelled
by fear and threats, they worked at the pumps like
madmen instead of making further trouble. According

some accounts, Pearson again asked Jones if he
had struck and, when he got no answer, called for
boarders. But Jones had no notion of
surrender and, when the boarders reached
the deck of the "Richard," they found
Jones with a pike at the head of his men.
The boarding party was driven back and,
at half-past ten, Pearson pulled down the
flag of the "Serapis" with his own hands.

The End of
"Bon
Homme
Richard"

Although both British vessels were captured, the brave resistance they had made enabled the convoy to escape. Captain Pearson was knighted for his gallantry a circumstance that, tradition says, led Jones to remark: "He deserved it, and if I fall in with him again, I'll make a lord of him." The "Richard" was SO badly injured that it was impossible to take her into port. Her crew and the prisoners were transferred to the other vessels and, on the morning of the twentyfifth, the decayed and riddled hulk went to the bottom. With the prizes and his remaining vessels, Jones arrived at the Texel in safety. The British remonstrated October 3 mightily against his presence and Jones turned all the vessels over to France with the exception of the "Alliance" in which he went again to sea in order to relieve the embarrassment of the Dutch government.

Brass Candlestick saved from the sinking
Wreck of the "Bon Homme Rich-
ard" after her Engagement
with the " "Serapis

Death

On one side of the Channel, it was "the pirate Jones;" Jones's Later on the other side, Jones was a hero. The king of Life and France gave him a gold-mounted sword and asked the consent of congress to decorate him with the Order of Military Merit. Somewhat tardily, congress voted him

1 7 7 9 its thanks and a gold medal. This was, however, Jones's 1906 last important service. Later in the war, he was assigned to command the line-of-battle ship

April 24, 1906

The

Ubiquitous
Privateer

:6

America," but the ship was not finished until the close of hostilities and

then was given to France. In 1788,

he entered the Russian service as a rear-admiral and fought against the Turks, but, through the intrigues of enemies, he soon fell into disfavor at court and was relieved of his command. He died at Paris in July, 1792. After a long search, his remains were discovered in 1905 and brought to the United States where, with elaborate commemorative exercises, they were reinterred at the naval academy at Annapolis.

The fight between the "Serapis" and the "Richard" was the last important action between British and American ships during the war. Little was left of the American navy and France relieved congress of

Sword presented to Jones
by Louis XVI.

the "expensive necessity of meeting at sea the greatest 1 7 79 naval power in the world." American privateers, however, continued as ubiquitous as ever. In the one month of May, 1779, eighteen prizes were brought into New London and the admiralty courts were kept in busy operation. The total number of vessels and men engaged in privateering can never be known. Edward Everett Hale estimates that more than five hundred privateers were commissioned by the several states and thinks it probable that Great Britain "often had more American enemies afloat on the Atlantic than she had seamen and officers of her own upon that ocean."

Florida Blanca

Vergennes

S'

PAIN entered the war in 1779. The decisive step followed long negotiation and much hesitation. Spain hated England, but she feared the effect of the success of the United States upon her own American possessions, a fear that time has justified. Florida Blanca, the Spanish secretary of state, had characterized the FrancoAmerican treaty of alliance as "worthy of Don Quixote' and proposed an alliance on the terms that Spain should receive Florida, the eastern valley of the Mississippi, the exclusive navigation of that river, and that, at the peace, New York and Rhode Island should be left in British hands, "thus sowing seeds of future strife between England and America." Vergennes stood firm in a diplomatic loyalty to his pledges to America, but said that France was far from desiring the United States to control the whole continent.

Vergennes