25 September 1779: The Rev. William Whytehead writes from Hornsea to his cousin four miles away with news of the Battle of Flamborough Head
Scottish-born American naval officer and privateer John Paul Jones shooting a sailor (Lieut. Grubb in some accounts) for attempting to lower a curious American flag during an engagement with the Royal Navy off Flamborough Head (Anon after John Collet 1779ish).
T.B. Whytehead. 1905. Paul Jones, Pirate. Yorkshire Archaeological Journal, Vol. 18. Leeds: John Whitehead and Son for the Yorkshire Archaeological Society. Get it:
.Unedited excerpt
The excerpt in the book is shorter, edited and, where applicable, translated.
Madam,
Supposing that you are desirous of hearing all the Reports in this Town concerning Paul Jones’s Squadron, have sent you what is stirring here since the Departure of your Servt. One of our neighbours was at Burlington yesterday, & brings us word that there was a desperate and bloody engagement off Flamboro Head on Thursday night between two of our armed ships, which had a Fleet of loaden Ships from the Baltic under convoy; that they engaged the large Man of War that Jones commands for two hours, & were upon the point of boarding her when the two other Frigates belonging to them came up to his assistance, so that our two ships were then obliged to strike; it is said his Ship is greatly shattered & that he has lost 70 of his men killd in the engagment. Two english sailors during the hurry of the Fight swum on shore, and he shot another for not fighting valiantly. He takes no ships, they say, but sinks them after he has taken out their Hands; 14 sail are sunk by him already. But I hope soon to hear better news about Him, for they say there are now in Bridlington Bay 2 small men of war waiting for a reinforcement of 3 ships more from Yarmouth Roads, and as the wind now blows fresh at South they cannot be long in coming from thence, so that if he continues about the Head a Day or two longer we may expect to hear of another Engagement. He spent most of yesterday there in refitting.
As I was returning Home on Thursday Even from Silston Mr. Bethels Steward overtook me & told me that they had taken up 7 of Jones’s men near Pattrington, but I hear since that they are Deserters from one of His Majesty’s Ships at Hull, and that the three men whom your Brother Constable sent to the Key yesterday belong to the same gang. If we continue quiet untill Monday I purpose to fetch Rachel then. With my wife’s most respectful Compts.
I am, Madam,
Yr. most obliged hble. Servt.,
Wm. Whytehead.
Hornsea, 25th Sept.
P.S. Noon. I have been enquiring of a Person just come from Burlington what news is stirring there this morn. He says that the Baltic Fleet are all safe in Scarbro’ Piers, that Mr. Greame of Swerby had left their house, & Mrs. Heblethwaite of Burlington.
P.S. The good family at Wassand have sent us word that they intend to honour us with their Company tomorrow in ye afternoon.
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I think the blue-and-white-striped flag is artistic idealism, and that it reminds readers to the (ahem) barry (field) of thirteen azure (deep ultramarine) and argent (silver) on the canton of the flag given in 1775 by Abraham Markoe to his Philadelphia Light Horse, later the First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry, which, according to Wikipedia, fought at the battles of Trenton, Princeton, Brandywine, and Germantown, and which often served as George Washington’s personal bodyguard:
Similarly, the stars and stripes design shown in The Life and History of PAUL JONES, the English Corsair wasn’t afaik in circulation or perhaps even existence in 1779, and reflects instead popular vexillology at the time and place of the book’s publication – Portsea in around 1820:
What symbols was the so-called pirate/privateer Jones actually displaying that day? I’ve read an attempt to answer the question, but can’t remember where.
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Tags
Tags are assigned inclusively on the basis of an entry’s original text and any comment. You may find this confusing if you only read an entry excerpt.
- American Revolutionary War (2) W/G ·
- Baltic Sea (6) W/G ·
- Baltic maritime trade (c. 1400–1800) (6) W/G ·
- Battle of Brandywine (1) W/G ·
- 📌Battle of Flamborough Head (1), naval battle on 23 September 1779 between a combined Franco-American squadron, led by Continental Navy officer John Paul Jones, and two British escort vessels protecting a large merchant convoy; one of the most celebrated naval actions of the war in America, despite its relatively small size and a dispute over what had actually occurred W/G ·
- Battle of Germantown (1) W/G ·
- Battle of Princeton (1) W/G ·
- Battle of Trenton (1) W/G ·
- Betsy Ross flag (1), early design for the US flag implementing the 1777 Flag Act, which specified 13 alternating red and white horizontal stripes and 13 white stars in a blue canton, fictionally created by upholsterer and flag maker Betsy Ross W/G ·
- Bridlington (10) W/G ·
- Desertion (1) W/G ·
- Flag of the United States (1) W/G ·
- 📌Flamborough Head (5) W/G ·
- France (33) W/G ·
- Frigate (1) W/G ·
- George Washington (1) W/G ·
- HMS Serapis (1779) (1) W/G ·
- 📌Hornsea (3), seaside town and civil parish in the East Riding W/G ·
- Jones, John Paul (1747-92) (1), Scottish-born American naval officer and privateer in the Continental Navy during the Revolutionary War, attacking shipping around British coasts, often referred to as the "Father of the American Navy" W/G ·
- 📌Kingston upon Hull (74) W/G ·
- Man-of-war (1) W/G ·
- Naval warfare (2) W/G ·
- Patrington (2) W/G ·
- Royal Navy (11) W/G ·
- 📌Scarborough (21) W/G ·
- Serapis flag (1) W/G ·
- 📌Sigglesthorne (1), small village and civil parish in the East Riding, 4.8 km west of Hornsea on the A1035 where it meets the B1243 W/G ·
- USS Alliance (1778) (1) W/G ·
- United States Navy (2) W/G ·
- United States (20) W/G ·
- William Whytehead (1) W/G ·
- Yarmouth Roads (2) W/G ·
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Comment
I think the blue-and-white-striped flag is artistic idealism, and that it reminds readers to the (ahem) barry (field) of thirteen azure (deep ultramarine) and argent (silver) on the canton of the flag given in 1775 by Abraham Markoe to his Philadelphia Light Horse, later the First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry, which, according to Wikipedia, fought at the battles of Trenton, Princeton, Brandywine, and Germantown, and which often served as George Washington’s personal bodyguard:
Similarly, the stars and stripes design shown in The Life and History of PAUL JONES, the English Corsair wasn’t afaik in circulation or perhaps even existence in 1779, and reflects instead popular vexillology at the time and place of the book’s publication – Portsea in around 1820:
What symbols was the so-called pirate/privateer Jones actually displaying that day? I’ve read an attempt to answer the question, but can’t remember where.
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Similar
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28 November 1796: The Royal Navy seeks recruits among the seamen of Sculcoates, Cottingham and Little Weighton (ER)
24 August 1921: The British-built United States Navy R.38 airship collapses, explodes, and crashes into the Humber at Hull, killing 44 of the 49 crew
16 December 1914: The Imperial German Navy’s official report on the bombardment today of Scarborough by the southern cruiser group under Rear Admiral Tapken
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John Keane:
Whether the bridge was ever erected over the Don is unknown. During April 1789, Paine and Yates supervised the erection of a three-ton rib arch, which was framed with wood and, Paine later told John Hall, test-loaded for twelve months with six tons of scrap iron. He wrote long preliminary accounts, which have been newly discovered, of the erection and test and forwarded them on May 25, 1789, to Sir Joseph Banks for submission to the Royal Society and to Sir George Staunton for submission to the Society of Arts. In June, Banks informed him that his report had been read and accepted by the Royal Society, but for some reason Staunton, an Irish baronet with diplomatic experience in Indian and Chinese affairs, delayed sending his copy to the Society of Arts until April 1790. The completed section of the bridge remained on display at Masborough. The last recorded viewing of it was by John Byng, whose journal entry for June 11, 1789, reads simply, “In Mr. Walker’s work-yard we survey’d an arch of an iron bridge just cast.” (Keane 1995)
Paine’s contemporary, John Adolphus:
Paine now employed himself with great assiduity building his bridge. For this end, he made a journey to Rotherham in Yorkshire, in order to superintend the casting of the iron by Mr Walker. While thus occupied at Rotherham, his French familiarity is said not to have much pleased the English ladies, and their displeasure induced Mr Walker to turn Paine out of his house. The bridge, however, was at length erected in a close at [Lisson Green, London]; being an arch constructed of iron, one hundred and ten feet in the span, five feet from the spring, and twenty two feet in breadth. It was erected chiefly at the charge of Mr. Walker; but the project had cost the projector a large sum, which was mostly furnished by Mr Whiteside. The bridge was shown for some time at the Yorkshire Stingo [a London pub], for a shilling. As this was not the first iron bridge which was known to the English, it is not easy to discover why the projector, who had a model, should incur so great an expense, merely to make a show (Adolphus 1799).
The Walkers probably made more money working for Paine’s enemies:
The Walker companies made a variety of iron and steel products, including household items such as kettles, irons and fireplaces. They were particularly renowned for making cannon. They secured a contract from local landowner the Marquis of Rockingham [!!!!] who was Prime Minister (1765-1766 and 1782), to supply cannon to the British during the American Wars of Independence, and the wars against France. Between 1774 and 1815 they made 13,000 tons of cannon, including 80 of the 105 cannon on board HMS Victory, Nelson’s flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar.
The fuller version of Paine’s letter cited by Foner includes the following technical detail, which may be more interesting in some ways than my excerpt, and which I suspect is plagiarised from Billy Yates, just as some of Paine’s big bridge design concepts were plagiarised from the French (as was, it seems, part of The Rights of Man):
These circumstances determined me to begin an arch of 90 feet with an elevation of 5 feet. This extent I could manage within doors by working half the arch at a time. Having found a short wall suited to my purpose, I set off a center and five feet for the height of the arch, and forty five feet each way for the extent, then suspended a cord and left it to stretch itself for a day, then took off the ordinates at every foot (for one half the arch only). Having already calculated the ordinates of an arch of a circle of the same extent I compared them together and found scarcely any certain distinguishable difference, the reason of this is that however considerable the difference may be when the segment is a semi-circle that difference is contained between the 1st and 60th is 70 degrees reckoning from the bases of the arch, and above that the catenary appears to me to unite with the arch of the circle or exceedingly nearly thereto so that I conclude that the treatises on catenarian arches apply to the semi-circle or a very large portion of it. I annex a sketch to help out my meaning. [See diagram on p. 1039.]
Having taken my measurements I transferred them to the working floor. 1st I set off half the line divided into feet; 2d the ordinates upon it; 3rd drove nails at the extremity of every ordinate; 4th bent a bar of wood over them corresponding to the swinging cord on the wall, above this first bar, and at the distance the blocks would occupy, I set off all the other bars and struck the radii through the whole number; which marked the places where the holes were to be cut and consequently the wooden bars became patterns for the iron bars.
I had calculated on drilling the holes for which I had allowed 8 sterling each in my private estimation, but I found, when at the works, that I could punch a square, or oblong square hole for 1 or 1 4 each. This was gratifying to me, not only because it was under my estimation, but because it took away less of the bar in breadth than a round hole of the same capacity would do, and made the work in every respect stronger and firmer. I was very unwilling to cut the bar longitudinally, and for the same reasons you mention therefore did not do it, yet I was apprehensive of difficulty in getting the work together owing to diverging of the bolts, but this I think I have completely got over by putting the work together with wood bolts, and then driving them out with the iron ones.
Having made all my patterns of bars, and a pattern for my blocks, and chosen my iron 3 inches by ¾ we began punching the holes. To do this it is necessary the iron bar be treated hot. When this was mentioned to me I pondered a little on the effects of heat, and instead of marking the iron bar when cold from the wood pattern, I first treated it and then marked and punched it, and that only one hole at a time; by this method the changes of atmospherical heat and cold are prevented operating on the bars while they are under the operation, as it is always the same season to the bar whether the season of the year be summer or winter, and as the wood patterns is laid to the bar for every fresh hole, there can be no accumulation of error, if any, would happen, and the square hole I I can be corrected by a file whereas the round one could not.
A great part of our time, as you will naturally suppose was taken up in preparations, but after we began to work we went on rapidly, and that without any mistake, or anything to alter or amend. The foreman of the works is a relation to the proprietors, an excellent mechanic, and who fell into all my ideas with great ease and penetration. I stayed at the works till one half the rib, 45 feet, was completed and framed horizontally together, and came up to London at the meeting of Parliament on the 4th of December. The foreman, whom, as I told him, I should appoint “President of the Board of Works in my absence,” wrote me word that he has got the other half together with much less trouble than the first. He is now preparing for erecting, and I for returning.
(Paine 1945)
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