Smuggler Nation (62 page)

6
. Stephenson, “The Supply of Gunpowder in 1776,” 279.

7
. See
The Writings of George Washington: 1775–1776
, ed. Worthington Chauncey Ford (New York: Putnam, 1889), 3:299.

8
. Stephenson, “The Supply of Gunpowder in 1776,” 274.

9
. James. A. Huston,
Logistics of Liberty: American Services of Supply in the Revolutionary War and After
(Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1991), 111.

10
. Nuxoll,
Congress and the Munitions Merchants
, 8–9.

11
. Robert H. Patton,
Patriot Pirates: The Privateer War for Freedom and Fortune in the American Revolution
(New York: Pantheon, 2008), 16.

12
. Charles Rappleye,
Sons of Providence: The Brown Brothers, the Slave Trade, and the American Revolution
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006), 210–211.

13
. Quoted in
American Archives: Fourth Series, Containing a Documentary History of the English Colonies in North America from the King’s Message to Parliament of 7 March 1774 to the Declaration of Independence of the United States
, ed. Peter Force (Washington, DC: Published by M. St. Clair Clarke and Peter Force, 1840), 3:1688.

14
.
The Writings of George Washington from the Original Manuscript Sources, 1745–1799
, ed. John C Fitzpatrick (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1936), 13:335.

15
.
The Writings of George Washington
, 3:459.

16
. York, “Clandestine Aid,” 27.

17
. Quoted in William Armstrong Fairburn,
Merchant Sail
(Center Lovell, ME: Fairburn Marine Educational Foundation, 1955), 1:379. Derby wrote this letter to his ship captain, Nathaniel Silsbee, stationed at Hispaniola.

18
. Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 17.

19
. York, “Clandestine Aid,” 27.

20
. York, “Clandestine Aid,” 27.

21
. Huston,
Logistics of Liberty
, 105.

22
. By 1777, the British naval blockade had tightened enough to make the smuggling business riskier and thus discourage private merchants. However, by this time greater French support had been secured, leading to official French aid in 1778 with the Treaty of Amity and Commerce. See York, “Clandestine Aid,” 28–29.

23
. York, “Clandestine Aid,” 28.

24
. York, “Clandestine Aid,” 28.

25
. See Thomas Perkins Abernethy, “The Commercial Activities of Silas Deane in France,”
American Historical Review
39 (April 1934): 477–85.

26
. Indeed, neutrality violations provided the pretext for more than 150 British seizures of French vessels in the first half of 1778 prior to France’s
entry into the war. James M. Volo,
Blue Water Patriots: The American Revolution Afloat
(Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006), 232.

27
. Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 77.

28
. George L. Clark,
Silas Deane, A Connecticut Leader in the American Revolution
(Charleston, SC: Nabu Press, 2010 reprint, original 1913), 90.

29
. Clark,
Silas Deane
, 90.

30
. Clark,
Silas Deane
, 90–91.

31
. See Elizabeth S. Kite, “French ‘Secret Aid’ Precursor to the French American Alliance 1776–1777,”
French-American Review
I (1948): 151; John J. Meng, “A Footnote to Secret Aid in the American Revolution,”
American Historical Review
43, no. 4 (July 1938): 791.

32
. C. H. Van Tyne, “French Aid Before the Alliance of 1778,”
American Historical Review
31, no. 1 (October 1925): 40.

33
.
Correspondence of the American Revolution; Being Letters of Eminent Men to George Washington from the Time of his Taking Command of the Army to the End of his Presidency
, ed. Jared Sparks (Boston: Little, Brown, 1853), 1:394.

34
. Clark,
Silas Deane
, 89–91.

35
. Nuxoll,
Congress and the Ammunitions Merchants
, 444–45.

36
. Robert Middlekauff,
The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–1789
, rev. ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 405. See also Samuel Flagg Bemis,
The Diplomacy of the American Revolution
(1935; reprint Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1957), 23–28; and Julian P. Boyd, “Silas Deane: Death by a Kindly Teacher of Treason?”
William and Mary Quarterly
, 3rd series, 16 (1959): 165–87, 319–42.

37
. Huston,
Logistics of Liberty
, 110.

38
. Quoted in Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 109.

39
. Quoted in Nancy Rubin Stuart,
The Muse of the Revolution: The Secret Pen of Mercy Otis Warren and the Founding of a Nation
(Boston: Beacon Press, 2008), 141.

40
. Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 115.

41
. Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 115.

42
. Robert A. East,
Business Enterprise in the American Revolutionary Era
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1938), 65.

43
. See Volo,
Blue Water Patriots
.

44
. As William Whipple wrote to the former Continental Congress delegate Josiah Bartlett from Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on 12 July 1778: “[Y]ou may depend no public ship will ever be manned while there is a privateer fitting out. The reason is plain:—those people who have the most influence with the seamen think it their interest to discourage the public service [the navy], because by that they advance promote their own interest, viz., Privateering.” Whipple’s letter can be found in
The Papers of Josiah Bartlett
, ed. Frank C. Mevers (Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1979), 196.

45
. This was a source of great frustration for those attempting to build up a viable navy. While stationed in Providence with the five-vessel Continental fleet in the fall of 1776, Continental Navy officer John Paul Jones denounced those who “wink at, encourage, and employ deserters from the navy.” Quoted in Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 80.

46
. Entitled “A Song for the Montgomery,” this chantey was written for the privateer
Montgomery
, based out of Providence. This is reprinted in
Naval Documents of the American Revolution
, ed. William James Morgan (Washington, DC: Naval History Division, Department of the Navy, 1972), 6:117.

47
. Middlekauff,
The Glorious Cause
, 535.

48
. Volo,
Blue Water Patriots
, 47.

49
. Nathanael Greene, “Letters of General Nathanael Greene to Colonel Jeremiah Wadsworth,”
The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography
22, no. 2 (1898): 211.

50
. Greene, “Letters of General Nathanael Greene to Colonel Jeremiah Wadsworth,” 214.

51
. E. James Ferguson, “Business, Government, and Congressional Investigation in the Revolution,”
William and Mary Quarterly
, 3rd series, 16, no. 3 (July 1959): 313–15.

52
. East,
Business Enterprise in the American Revolutionary Era
, 229.

53
. Morris’s letter is available in
Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789
, ed. Paul H. Smith, et al. (Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 1976), 5:147.

54
. Quoted in Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 73.

55
. For a detailed account, see Nuxoll,
Congress and the Munitions Merchants
. The committee was composed of men with experience in international trade, and much of the committee’s dealings went through merchants and others with close connections to committee members. According to Nuxoll, “The Committee’s far-flung commercial activities helped build the wealth and political careers of many merchants” (vi).

56
. See Charles Rappleye,
Robert Morris: Financier of the American Revolution
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010); Clarence L. Ver Steeg,
Robert Morris: Revolutionary Financier: With an Analysis of his Earlier Career
(Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1954); Nuxoll,
Congress and the Munitions Merchants
.

57
. Morris’s letter is available in New-York Historical Society,
Collections of the New York Historical Society for the Year 1886
(New York: printed for the Society, 1887), 174.

58
. Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, xix.

59
. Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 158, 165.

60
. Quoted in Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 172.

61
. Huston,
Logistics of Liberty
, 106.

62
. Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 67, 71–72.

63
. Quoted in Patton,
Patriot Pirates
, 216.

64
. Nuxoll,
Congress and the Munitions Merchants
, 455.

65
. Barbara W. Tuchman,
The First Salute: A View of the American Revolution
(New York: Knopf, 1988), 18. See also Franklin Jameson, “St. Eustatius in the American Revolution,”
American Historical Review
8, no. 4 (July 1903): 683–708; Ronald Hurst,
The Golden Rock: An Episode of the American War of Independence
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1996).

66
. Tuchman,
The First Salute
, 19, 21.

67
. Huston,
Logistics of Liberty
, 109.

68
. Abraham Van Bibber’s letter (written with his business partner Richard Harrison) is available in
Archives of Maryland: Journal and Correspondence of the Maryland Council of Safety, July 7–31 December 1776
, ed. William Hand Browne (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, 1893), 12:457).

69
. Quoted in Tuchman,
The First Salute
, 16.

70
. Quoted in Tuchman,
The First Salute
, 13.

71
. Huston,
Logistics of Liberty
, 109–10.

72
. Hence the title of Tuchman’s book
The First Salute
(New York: Random House, 1988).

73
. East,
Business Enterprise in the American Revolutionary Era
, 177.

74
. Tellingly, during the war Nova Scotia imported British goods valued at ten times higher than what it could domestically consume. Stuart D. Brandes,
Warhogs: A History of War Profits in America
(Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1997), 42. According to Brandes, Canada was the biggest leak in the British embargo of the colonies.

75
. Thomas Victor Goodrich,
The Opening of the British West Indies Trade to American Vessels
(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1908), 10–11.

76
. Middlekauff,
The Glorious Cause
, 420.

77
. East,
Business Enterprise in the American Revolutionary Era
, 181.

78
. See Arthur D. Pierce,
Smuggler’s Woods: Jaunts and Journeys in Colonial and Revolutionary New Jersey
(New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1984), 39.

79
. East,
Business Enterprise in the American Revolutionary Era
, 181.

80
. Quoted in East,
Business Enterprise in the American Revolutionary Era
, 182.

81
. See Richard Buel,
Dear Liberty: Connecticut’s Mobilization for the Revolutionary War
(Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1980), 257–67.

82
. Buel,
Dear Liberty
, 261.

83
. Brandes,
Warhogs
, 42.

84
. Buel,
Dear Liberty
, 257.

85
. Washington’s letter available in Charles S. Hall,
Life and Letters of Samuel Holden Parsons: Major-General in the Continental Army and Chief Judge of the Northwestern Territory, 1737–1789
(Binghamton, NY: Otseningo, 1905), 725.

86
. Quoted in East,
Business Enterprise in the American Revolutionary Era
, 31.