Continental Navy

     Son of Esther McIntyre (1717-1776) and Neal McIntyre, Sr. (1718-1776) of Boston, William McIntyer or McIntyre was born on 27 April 1747 at Boston. His brothers included Neal McIntyer (1743-1812) who operated a store on Portsmouth’s Spring Hill and James McIntyer (1755) who served alongside with William in early 1776 with Captain Titus Salter’s Company of Artillery protecting Portsmouth’s harbor from Fort Washington on Pierce Island and Fort Sullivan on Seavey Island. William’s younger brother James earlier served as a musician in Captain Tobias Fernald’s Company of Col. James Scammon’s 30th Regiment of Foot in 1775 and later was entered on the frigate Raleigh’s roll in February 1777. In November 1777, James McIntier served yet again at Fort Sullivan in Captain Eliphlet Daniel’s Company of New Hampshire Militia. William McIntyre was married to Ruth Bigelow (1753-1807) on 6 April 1775 at Portsmouth.

     William McIntyer first served as a private under Captain Eliphalet Daniels unit of Capt. Titus Salter’s company of artillery where he was “coxswain of ye boats.” He is listed on a return dated 5 November 1775 taken at Fort Sullivan but not on one dated 18 March 1776. Captain Titus Salter (1722–1798) was a merchant and privateer who was commander of the 180 man garrison at Fort Washington between 1775 and 1778. Salter later captained John Langdon’s ship Hampden during the failed Penobscot Expedition in 1779. Located on Peirce’s Island, Fort Washington was built in 1775 under orders of Major General John Sullivan, overall commander of the Portsmouth harbor defenses at that time, to control the Piscataqua River at “the Narrows” and to provide crossfire with Fort Sullivan directly across the river on Seavey’s Island at Kittery. A log boom defense was placed in the river between the two forts.

     William McIntyer, or McIntyre, next appears on the List of Officers and Men of the Frigate Boston (1777) appearing on pages 41-45 of Gardner Weld Allen’s publication “Captain Hector McNeill of the Continental Navy” (1922). That list was drafted on the ship Boston at Wichcasset in the Sheepscott River on 16 July 1777 where McIntyer is noted as assigned to the starboard watch and to gun number 29 in battle quarters. Boston was commissioned under the command of Captain Hector McNeill. On 21 May 1777, Boston sailed in company with USS Hancock for a cruise in the North Atlantic. The two frigates captured three prizes including the 28-gun frigate HMS Fox on 7 June. On 7 July; Boston, Hancock, and Fox engaged the British vessels HMS Flora, HMS Rainbow, and HMS Victor. The British captured Hancock and Fox, but the frigate Boston escaped to Sheepscot River on the Maine coast. McNeill was finally court-martialed in June 1779 for his failure to support Hancock and was dismissed from the Navy.

     On 8 September 1777, William McIntyre was enlisted into Capt. Nicholas Rawlings’ Company of Col. Abraham Drake’s New Hampshire Regiment of Militia to reinforce continental forces at Stillwater. Drake’s Regiment was also known as the 2nd New Hampshire Militia Regiment attached to General Ebenezer Learned’s brigade of the Continental Army. The regiment marched quickly to join the gathering forces of General Horatio Gates as he faced British General John Burgoyne in northern New York during the Saratoga Campaign. With the surrender of Burgoyne’s Army on October 17 the regiment was disbanded on December 15, 1777. However, according to the 15 January 1778 roll of Rawling’s Company, William McIntyre deserted twenty-one days after his enlistment in October 1777.

     Marine William McIntyre appears next on the 1778 Bounty Roll of the Continental brig General Gates (Essex Institute, LXXV, Oct, pp 382-385) under the command of Captain John Skimmer. Formerly known as the Industrious Bee, the vessel had been captured on 29 August 1777 by Skimmer, then in command of the Continental schooner Lee. The Bee was purchased by the Navy Board at Boston on 19 December 1777, fitted out with 18 guns, and renamed General Gates with John Skimmer in command. The Continental brig General Gates sailed from Marblehead on 24 May 1778 and in company with the privateer brig Hawk took as prizes the ship Jenny and brigantines Thomas and Nancy. Parting company with Hawk in early August, the General Gates next took the schooner Polly before engaging the brig Montague in a long and hot action. Montague resorted to firing “every piece of iron of all kinds that could be rammed into the tube of the cannon” with one “shot striking a swivel gun on the State’s brig divided, and one part of it glancing instantly killed the active and brave Captain Skimmer.” General Gates returned to Boston on 31 August 1778 accompanied by the Polly and Montague. It is not known if William McIntyre joined the vessel for her next cruise, departing on 14 November 1778 and returning on 13 April 1779 after taking the schooner Friendship, schooner General Leslie and brigs Active and Union.

     William McIntyre was likely close to home in late 1778 as a daughter Polly, who died in childbirth or infancy in 1779, was born to his wife that same year. Another daughter Eunice (1776-1849) born to the couple three years earlier, survived childhood to marry Samuel Brookings. Thirty-nine year old mariner William McIntyre died of unknown causes sometime before his widow posted a bond as Administratrix of his modest estate on 24 August 1786. Ruth Bigelow McIntyre married leather dresser James Haslett at Portsmouth later that same year. Formerly of Boston, James and brother Matthew Haslett initially opened their factory and shop at the “Sign of the BUCK and GLOVE” adjoining Canoe Bridge in 1767, later moving their operation “to the House lately belonging to Mr. Matelin, next Door to Capt. George Boyd’s, and almost opposite the Sign of the State House.”

     John Thompson’s Continental Navy service is most fully documented in Philadelphia’s Exemplification Book 11 Page 225 where he clearly articulates serving as Armourer on the sloop Hornet from 6 May 1776 to 10 October 1776 and subsequently as Armourer on the brigantine Lexington from 18 October 1776 to 18 February 1777 when he was advanced to Gunner on the Lexington from 18 February 1777 till her capture on 19 September 1777. Thompson further notes that his wages were paid in full until his return home from confinement in England and has received half pay from 19 May 1778 until 17 September 1779 when his statement was dated. Thompson’s declaration was recorded in the Exemplification Book on 6 October 1779. The merchant sloop Hornet was chartered from Captain William Stone to bolster the fledgling Continental Navy fleet being assembled at Philadelphia under Commodore Esek Hopkins. Col. Benjamin Harrison was dispatched by Congress to Baltimore on 2 December 1775 to acquire several vessels, identified as the Hornet and the Wasp. Both were fitted out by 18 December 1775 and commissioned into service after joining the fleet at Philadelphia on 13 February 1776. Hornet sailed with the fleet on her expedition to New Providence on 18 February 1776 but returned to port due to an unfortunate accident at sea with the Fly off the Virginia Capes resulting in the loss of her mast-head and boom.

     It was during this time that Irish-born Philadelphian John Thompson joined the vessel as Armorer in May 1776. Congress moved to purchase the 100 ton Bermudian-built sloop from William Stone in late August 1776 and the ten gun vessel with her compliment of thirty-five men patrolled the Delaware Bay for the next year. Thompson was with the Hornet while on 28 June 1776, the Pennsylvania State brig Nancy arrived near the mouth of the Bay with a substantial cargo of gunpowder and was driven ashore by the British warships Kingfisher and Orpheus blockading the bay entrance. The Continental Navy vessels Wasp and Hornet had been joined by the Lexington and Reprisal out of Philadelphia eight days earlier. In command of the Lexington, Captain John Barry supervised the removal of most of the gunpowder safely to shore at night before the remaining charge was exploded by a delayed action fuse just as a British boarding party entered their prize. Unfortunately Lieutenant Richard Wickes, brother of Reprisal’s Captain Lambert Wickes, was killed by cannon fire in the incident which became known as the Battle of Turtle Gut Inlet. While it is uncertain whether the crew of the Hornet participated in the salvage of the gunpowder it is certain that by 8 July 1776, Captain William Hallock of the sloop Hornet that “delivery of the Wreck” of the Nancy was into his care. Hallock was next placed in command of the Lexington following Barry’s advancement, leaving the Hornet in the hands of Captain John Nicholson. After Thompson’s departure from the Hornet, the sloop sailed from the icy Delaware in February 1777 initially for Charleston and then Martinique. On her return voyage the Hornet was taken by the British schooner Porcupine with her captive crew taken into Jamaica.

     Armorer John Thompson joined the 140-ton brig Lexington at Philadelphia in mid-October 1776 following his former captain, while the vessel was undergoing repairs. Soon afterwards, Hallock took the Lexington to Cape Francois to secure a cargo of military goods. At the end of her homeward bound cruise, Lexington was taken by the British frigate Pearl just outside of the Delaware Capes on 20 December 1777. Pearl’s commander made the mistake of leaving seventy of her men below decks while manning his new conquest with a skeletal prize crew. Lexington’s men recaptured the vessel and brought her into Baltimore where Captain Henry Johnson was placed in command. Two days after John Thompson’s advancement to Gunner, the brig sailed for France on 20 February 1777, taking two prizes before arriving at Bordeaux in March. The monthly return of men entered on the Continental Navy brig Lexington for March 1777 published in Part 2 of Volume 8 of “Naval Documents of the American Revolution” indicates that gunner John Thompson was born in Ireland. On 28 May 1777, Lexington in company with Wickes’ Reprisal and the Dolphin left France to raid Irish waters where from 18 June to 25 June 1777 the little squadron captured fourteen prizes, scuttling four and releasing three. Almost out of ammunition from their endeavors and overloaded with prisoners, the American vessels dispersed when British ship-of-the-line Burford was sighted. Lexington slipped into the Brittany fishing village of Morlaix where she lay trapped for the summer. Thompson’s name appears among the “List of 86 Officers and Men of the Brig Lexington who received Slops delivered at Bordeaux on 27 June 1777” which was transcribed by Joseph and Joshua Ross in February 2014 from the original document found among the prize court records pertaining to the brig Lexington (HCA 32/388) at the National Archives in Kew, England.

     The three vessels were ordered out of France on 12 September 1777, that country still feigning neutrality, and when the more heavily armed 16-gun Lexington was becalmed near Ushant seven days later she was attacked by the 10-gun cutter Alert under the command of Lieutenant John Bazely. Bazely’s journal records the engagement, the Alert then “made Sail after him… [and] at 1/2 past 1 PM came up with the Enemy (cut and let run the small Sails overboard) renew’d the Action when at 1/2 past 2 she struck found her to be the Lexington Brig Arm’d by the American Congress Henry Johnstone Master, mounting 14 four & 2 six Pounders 12 Swivels & 84 Men the Enemy had 7 Men kill’d and 11 wounded in the former was the Master & Lieutenant of Marines in the latter was the 1st Lieut & Gunner, the loss on our side was three Men wounded and two kill’d with both our Mast & Rigging very much dammag’d sent a Midn & 17 Men onboard to take charge of the Prize receiv’d 68 Prisoners from her…at 9 made Sail the Prize in Compy.” Based on Bazely’s notes, the brig Lexington’s Master Jeremiah Holden and Lieutenant of Marines James Connelly were among the seven dead and among the eleven wounded, 1st Lieutenant Elijah Bowen had his arm blown off and Gunner John Thompson lost a leg. Thompson again appears on the “List of 68 Officers and Men of the Brig Lexington captured on 19 September 1777” derived from the muster of the HM cutter Alert (ADM 36/7942) transcribed at the National Archives in Kew, England by Joseph and Joshua Ross in February 2014.

     At the orders of British warship Trident Captain John Elliot, the Lexington first landed “into the Downs” on the Southeast coast of England her five most severely wounded “as it is thought necessary they should all undergo an Amputation, to be sent to the Hospital at Deal.” Subsequently, the balance of her prisoners and the prize were taken into Plymouth where both Alert and Lexington underwent repairs after the action. Details of Lexington gunner John Thompson’s recovery and escape are revealed in his circa 27 June 1778 petition written in the third person from Brest to Benjamin Franklin found in the collection of the American Philosophical Society. “He was a gunner on the Lexington when she was captured on December [September] 19, 1777, following an engagement in which he lost his leg. After five months in hospital in England he escaped to Dunkirk and Franklin provided him with clothes. On May 3 he left for Nantes to get home, but was driven ashore in Brittany and went to Brest, where the French commissary gave him a little money and the intendant sent him to hospital. He is still there, and the surgeon’s certificate will show that he is cured. Please send him some clothes and cash to pay for his laundry, and help him get passage to America.”

     Additional details of both his and Lexington Captain Henry Johnson’s escape appear in another 2 March 1778 letter from Flemish agent Francis Coffyn at Dunkirk to American Commissioners Benjamin Franklin, Silas Dean and Arthur Lee at Passy. This letter, also in the collection of the American Philosophical Society, “cheafly serves to inform you of the arrival at this place of Capn. Henry Johnson, late Commander of the Continental Brigantine Lexington, and Eliazad [Eleazor] Johnson Capn. of the Brigantine Dolton Privateer of Newberry.They both broke out of Plymouth prison with two of their officers, which were since press’d in London; but the former had the good fortune to get a passage on board the Prince of orange packett from Harwich to Hellevoet-Sluys, and from thence came over here by land. Capn. Henry Johnson is so much fatigued that he is not able to write to you this day; I beg you would communicate to him and to me your intention relating his future destination; he had some thoughts of proceeding to Paris with his fellow traveller, but I advised him to wait your orders which you’ll be pleased to give me as Soon as convenient and mention wether I may Suply him with necessarys and money, and to what amount. Interim I have also to inform you of the arrival of Capn. John Chandler of the brigantine Triton of Newberry, bound to Bilbao with a Cargo of Fish, which was taken off Cape Finistere by the Tetis. This Capn. with John Thompson (who is almost recovr’d of his wounds) will be sent to Nantes by the first vessell bound to that port…”

     Yet another petition, now in the unpublished Franklin Papers at Yale, was sent from Brest on 22 January 1779 from Thompson to Benjamin Franklin at Passy begging for assistance to get home, “Sir. I beg Pardon for troubling you with the following Lines. You’ll remember you had a Copy of a Gunners warrant from Mr Coffin American Agent at Dunkirk, whereby I am appointed Gunner of the Lexington Bigg Cap. Johnston commander; I left Dunkirk the first day of May last in order to proceed to America by first Opportunity: and came to Brest expecting an Opportunity, but you must know that I lost my legg in the Lexington, and when I arrived at Brest found it dangerously bad, and went to the Royall Hospital where I have continued ever since, but am at present cured and has been for some time. I have applied to the Agent here for a passage: but can receive none, tho’ there has since I was cured two different fleets sailed for America: had the Intendant of this place been here, I had got a passage without troubling you, but he went sometime ago [to] Paris, by which means I lost my best… for the Agent here appointed to see the Americans righted seems to give themselves no trouble about any Men belonging to the united States. If you are not good enough to send me an order directed to Mr Billiard first Surgeon of the Hospital here, I may continue here for Months more at a great expence to the Congress, which will be prevented by your giving an order as above. You’ll receive a Certificate inclosed from the first Surgeon here by which youll see I have stayed here without reason in expecting you orders. I remain Sir Your most Obedient Humble Servant, John Thompson”.

     A receipt of settled account dated at Portsmouth on 19 April 1779 and addressed to John Langdon from John Thompson, “Leet guner of the Lexinton” [Late gunner of the Lexington] for “Sixty pounds Lmy” [Lawful money] “to pay my Expences for which I promise to Acct with the Navy Board at Boston” suggests that Thompson gained passage on a trans-Atlantic crossing sometime after late January 1779, arriving at Portsmouth by mid-April 1779. It appears he settled his accounts with the Navy Board about 19 May when he commenced half pay, which he received until his return home to Philadelphia and 17 September 1779 discharge entry in Exemplification Book 11 Page 225. This record was entered on 6 October 1779 and a certificate of Thompson’s service, now in the Library of Congress, was apparently issued by Captain Henry Johnson on 11 October 1779. A court decision made on 12 December 1785 published in Volume 42 of “The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography” (1918), provides details of Thompson’s initial pension award, “To John Thompson late a Gunner on Board the Brig Lexington of Sixteen Guns, Commanded by Captain Henry Johnson aged about thirty-five Years- that he was wounded on Board the said Brig in an Engagement with the Albert [Alert] Cutter, whereby he lost his Leg in the Service of the United States, by which he is disabled of getting a livelihood by labor, the Court do allow him a Pension of five dollars per Month to be paid him as aforesaid.”

     Continental Navy veteran John Thompson applied again for pension benefits on 20 September 1819, his application stating, “City of Phila., John Thompson having been duly sworn says that he was a sailor in the brig Lexington, Capt Henry Johnson, and lost his leg in the service of the United States during the Rev. War. that he has received a pension ever since, but having lost his certificate, must obtain it without a new one for obtaining which be makes this deposition.” The survivor’s Certificate of Pension was granted as # S-3796 and sent to Thompson’s agent William J. Duane, Esq. of Philadelphia. Duane was an influential Philadelphia lawyer who was married to Benjamin Franklin’s granddaughter and brief served as the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States in 1833. Interestingly, correspondence in the pension file dated 1923 from Mrs. W.A. Joyce of Hanford, WA incorrectly suggests that the Lexington sailor was also the father of army Col. John Thompson who filed for a pension as # S-7715. There is nothing in the historical record to support this association. In fact, it is strongly believed that Thompson died unmarried with no children shortly before his 8 July 1817 will was probated on 4 February 1820. Although there were a number of Philadelphians with this name, it is likely he is the mariner who left his small estate “to my friend, Barnard Payne, of the City of Philadelphia, Boarding House Keeper. Between 1815 and 1817, at least four mariners left similar wills to Payne, who himself died on Tuesday evening 12 May 1818. Payne’s funeral was held out of his dwelling at 21 South Street. As Thompson did not correct his will, his estate was administered by Barnard’s widow Ann Payne of Southwark. Because Thompson’s death occurred in early 1820, it is not likely he received pension benefits from his recent application made just four months earlier.   

     As the Revolution erupted, Charles Bulkley was returning from a voyage to the West Indies when off Montauk Point his vessel was boarded by a tender of the British frigate Rose under Captain Wallace who informed the crew of the recent events at Lexington and took their sloop as a prize. Bulkley was one of the men left on board with the British prize crew with orders to sail her to the Rose. “The Narrative of Captain Charles Bulkeley” recounts the rest of the incident in his own words, “In September 1775 I was from the West Indies bound to New London in the Sloop- Capt. Daniel Starr. We were captured by a tender belonging to the Rose Man of War off Block Island, and soon after it became calm, and remained so all that day and night. Just at night a Block Island boat with two men and a boy came off and within hail and they were ordered to keep off. I then ran out on the squaresail boom and jumped over board and swam to the boat and then went ashore on Block Island and arrived there in the night and manned that boat and got another boat to assist us to recapture the Sloop. We went off and lay until daylight and after day broke we discovered the Sloop and retook her and brot her in to New London.” According to his pension testimony, “the following winter [1775-1776] I went into the Old Fort as a Volunteer near the market.”

     Son of Major Charles Bulkley 3rd and Ann Latimer, Charles Bulkley (1753-1848) was a lifelong resident of New London where he entered the ship Alfred, then laying at Philadelphia, as a midshipman under the command of Dudley Saltonstall in January 1776. A merchantman named Black Prince under the command of John Barry before the war, the 30-gun Alfred was acquired by the Continental Congress in November 1775 and placed in commission a month later on 3 December. The vessel would serve as Commodore Esek Hopkin’s flagship during the New Providence Expedition and is documented to have been the first Continental Navy ship to fly the Grand Union flag. According to his pension application S-12349, Bulkley sailed to the Delaware and then on to New Providence under Saltonstall. Along with friends Peter and Nathaniel Richards, Charles Bulkley entered on board the sloop Lizard under the command of Joshua Hempstead, Jr. on 13 January 1776 to sail six days later for Reedy Island, PA. Although the Lizard’s passage was rough, she successfully landed the eighty or so naval recruits from Connecticut in New Jersey where they were picked up and delivered to Commodore Esek Hopkin’s Continental Navy fleet about 13 February 1776.

     The Alfred was part of the fleet which sailed from the Delaware Capes on 17 February 1776 under Commodore Esek Hopkins which included the Cabot under John B. Hopkins, Andrea Doria under Nicholas Biddle, Columbus under Abraham Whipple and the sloop Providence. Arriving at New Providence in the Bahamas on 3 March, the port was quickly captured with the harbor forts’ cannon loaded for American use at home. The fleet sailed for New London on 17 March 1776. During the return voyage, Commodore Hopkins’ Continental fleet took two prizes, the British schooner Hawke under Lieutenant John Wallace, tender to the frigate Rose, on 2 April off Long Island and the brigantine Bolton serving as a bomb vessel under Lieutenant Edward Sneyd off Block Island on 5 April. That evening two more prizes were taken however, in the early morning hours of 6 April 1776 as the fleet “all went helter skelter”, the 16-gun brig Cabot was the first to engage the 26 gun frigate HMS Glasgow under the command of Tryingham Howe. When challenged to identify his ship and companions while closing for action, John B. Hopkins replied “the Columbus and Alfred, a two and twenty gun frigate”. This first fleet action sea battle in U.S. Navy history began when one of the Cabot’s marines in the “fighting top” threw a grenade onto the deck of the Glasgow. The Cabot then unleashed a broadside into the Glasgow, killing one British marine and wounding a second. After the brig Cabot sustained “considerable damage in her hull, spars and rigging which occasioned her falling astern of the Glasgow” from two unanswered broadsides from the superior frigate; the Alfred and Andrea Doria immediately picked up the fight- the entire engagement lasting “3 glasses”. After chasing the Glasgow for more than three more hours before her escape to the protection of the British fleet anchored off Newport, Commodore Hopkin’s little fleet put in at New London. Charles Bulkley apparently distinguished himself in the hot action with the Glasgow “for the cool intrepidity with which he stood at his gun”.

     Subsequent to her return, the Alfred sailed to the Providence River in Rhode Island, arriving on 28 April 1776, where “they were for some time”. One crew list suggests that Bulkley may have been advanced to Master’s Mate by 2 May 1776. According to his pension testimony, while there Bulkley was appointed Sailing Master of the brig Hamden but by permission of Commodore Esek Hopkins, “continued onboard the Alfred”. Soon afterwards about October 1776, the ship Alfred was placed in the command of John Paul Jones at Newport. In company with the sloop Providence under Capt. Hoysted Hacker, the two vessels sailed toward Cape Breton Island where they “took sundry prizes”, including the brig Active on 11 November, the armed transport Mellish with her cargo of winter uniforms for British troops at Quebec on the following day and the scow Kitty bound to Barbados on 16 November 1776. On 22 November 1776, Jones and the crew of the Alfred raided the town of Canso, Nova Scotia- Jones second attack on the town in two months. His first attack while in command of the Providence on 22 September resulted in much property damage and the destruction of fifteen vessels. During this second raid, the American sailors burned a transport ship and stocked warehouse and captured a prize schooner. On 24 November, Alfred took three colliers bound to New York and two days later the 10-gun British privateer John of Liverpool. Afterwards, Jones and his crew sailed to present-day Sydney, NS to liberate 300 American prisoners forced to labor in British coal mines. Alfred was pursued unsuccessfully by the HMS Milford on her return to Boston after her six week cruise “to the eastward”, arriving on 15 December 1776. Charles Bulkley is noted as the 2nd Master on Jones’ undated list of officers and men due prize shares for the ship Mellish and brig Active. It is assumed that one of the two was assigned as sailing master of the schooner taken in Canso as it was highly unusual for any vessel to sail with two masters, as well as experienced masters mates. Soon after John Paul Jones’ return, feuding with Commodore Esek Hopkins resulted in a change of command for the ship Alfred.

     There Captain Elisha Hinman took command of the Alfred about 19 January 1777 and Charles Bulkley was appointed Third Lieutenant by Commodore Hopkins. About the same time, boyhood friends Nathaniel Richards was commissioned Alfred’s Second Lieutenant of Marines and his older brother Peter Richards First Lieutenant of the ship. The vessel sailed from Boston to Portsmouth where Captain Hinman superintended a major refit. Apparently during this time, Bulkley commanded the Ann, possibly named for his daughter, on a cruise to Martinique as the vessel was taken as a prize by the British warship Daphne on her homeward bound voyage on 3 April 1777. The 5 July 1777 edition of the New Hampshire Gazette reported that on “Last Wednesday Evening [25 June] a Flag of Truce arrived from New York, which Place she left at 2 o’clock on Tuesday afternoon. Capt. Charles Bulkley, (who was taken in a Vessel belonging to this State, and has been Prisoner in a Guard ship in New York near three Months past) came Passenger…”

     The Continental Navy ship Alfred sailed from Portsmouth bound to France in company with the newly-constructed 32-gun frigate Raleigh under the command of Captain Thomas Thompson on Friday 22 August 1777. Two weeks later on September 4, the two vessels encountered HMS Druid and despite Raleigh’s punishing attack, the severely damaged enemy warship escaped. According to Bulkley’s pension testimony, the Alfred took two Jamaicamen as prizes on the crossing. Resuming their course, Alfred and Raleigh reached France on 6 October 1777. Several months later on December 29, the two again departed port in company homeward bound with military stores. After cruising the coast of Africa and taking one prize, the pair made a trans-Atlantic crossing to the West Indies where the ship Alfred was taken by British frigate Ariadne and sloop Ceres a little windward of Barbados on 9 March 1778, at least partly as a result of Captain Thompson and the Raleigh avoiding engagement. Alfred’s officers and men were taken to Barbadoes as prisoners. Here Peter Richards and his brother Nathaniel, were recognized by British Captain Nicholas Vincent of the 74-gun Yarmouth, as he knew the Richards’ boys as children through intimacy with their father’s family. Through the influence of Ariadne’s Captain Pringle and the intercession of Elisha Hinman, Nathaniel Richards was permitted to return home on parole.

     Captain Vincent of the Yarmouth took Hinman and five other officers including Lieutenants Peter Richards and Bulkley on board his vessel, transporting his captives to England where they were confined at Forton Prison on 18 July 1778. Confined at Forton but a short time, Captain Hinman escaped by digging under the wall of the prison on a dark, rainy night and walking ten wet miles before finding sanctuary with an American sympathizer who arranged for a Londoner to spirit the Continental Navy Captain off to safety in France. Soon afterwards Bulkley and Alfred’s other officers also escaped by digging under the prison walls, escaping to Deal via Gosport and London. While staying in London for a few days, Bulkley and Richards took in the sights, finding St. Paul’s Church and the Tower of London both “well worth seeing”. From Deal, about 75 miles from London, the pair “got passage in a open Smuggler’s Boat and crossed the channel for France in the night and landed at Calais.” From that place, they travelled to Paris where they met Franklin and Adams. Pension testimony of Charles Bulkley reveals that he and Peter Richards “took passage from Bordeaux to Baltimore and off the Cape of Virginia was again taken. A few days after which he & Lieut. Peter Richards were put on shore, about ten leagues to the southward of Cape Henry & traveled on to Boston, where they arrived in 1779 when they settled with the Navy board.” Stopping at Philadelphia along the way, Bulkley writes in his narrative that he there “received a large sum of money from Col. Pickering, he being, I believe the Quarter Master Gen’l, to carry to New Hampshire.”

     Little is known of Charles Bulkley’s maritime activities in the two years between his return from English captivity and his commission to command the 10-gun Connecticut privateer sloop Active and her compliment of sixty on 22 May 1781. Bulkley is recorded in those documents as hailing from Wethersfield, Colchester and New London. Owners of the Active were noted as John Wright and Justis Riley, both of Wethersfield. Under Bulkley’s command, the Active captured the British schooner Hazzard with a cargo of lumber bound from the Penobscot River to New York about 10 August 1781 with assistance from Connecticut privateers sloop Randolph and schooner Young Cromwell. Active was listed among the privateers belonging to New London on 10 August and armed with twelve 3-pounder guns. In company with his old friend Peter Richards in command of the brig Hancock and another Connecticut privateer, Bulkley captured another un-named sloop about 25 August near Fire Island Inlet. The prize was sent into New London, arriving on 29 August. The sloop Active was laying at wharf there with one of her masts out for repair when on 6 September 1781 turncoat Benedict Arnold led a dastardly raid with tragic consequences on the town. While Captain Buckley participated in the resistance, his vessel was heavily damaged by fire.

     Bulkley’s friend and compatriot, former Continental Navy Lieutenant Peter Richards arrived at New London in the Hancock on 31 August 1781 and volunteered his services for the defense of Fort Griswold upon encouragement by commanding officer Colonel William Ledyard who had earlier assisted Richards with the manning of his vessel. One week later on September 6, British General Benedict Arnold raided and burned the town, attacking the fort whose layout he was familiar. Earlier that morning, Richards had gone on board the Hancock seeking volunteers to accompany him in aiding the garrison at Fort Griswold. It is said his entire crew followed their captain into battle where Peter Richards was killed in action, one of the 88 of about 165 defenders massacred by British forces. When the enemy finally breached the fort’s defenses and Colonel Ledyard surrendered his sword, he was run through with it and killed. As Colonel Ledyard was stricken, “Captain Peter Richards and a few others, standing near, rushed upon the enemy and were killed, fighting to the last.” Richards’ former lieutenant, Christopher Prince writes that his friend suffered “32 bayonet holes in his murdered body”, killed on his wife’s twenty-seventh birthday. In Bulkley’s narrative he writes, “When the enemy retreated after burning N. London, by that traitor Arnold, they were pursued by a small party of men & I being in advance on Manwaring Hill I took a prisoner”.

     Captain Charles Bulkley next assumed command of the 14-gun Connecticut privateer brig Marshall on 25 July 1782. Bulkley experienced difficulty in recruiting his compliment of eighty for the vessel, “I took the command of the Brig Marshall of 14 Guns and all the officers and men we could get to man her was forty-nine. The cause was if captured they would be sent to the Jersey Prison Ship and they were almost sure to die.” After first taking the prize sloop Hunter on 30 August 1782, the Marshall engaged two British letter-of-marque vessels, the 8-gun brig Ann and ship New Salt Spring, both armed with 8 guns and carrying cargoes of rum and sugar on 3 September 1782. Bulkley writes: “This cruise we captured a Schooner from the W. I. and a Ship and brig from Jamaica- the Ship and Brig we took in tow about a week and never cast them off until we arrived opposite Fisher’s Island Point.” Both prizes were sent into New London, arriving on September 10. Subsequently, Bulkley and the Marshall also took the prize brig Thomas on 22 October 1782.

     After the War for Independence, Charles Bulkley returned to Merchant Marine service; selling rum, molasses and dry goods acquired on shipping ventures and eventually manufacturing and merchandising vinegar. In 1790 the sea captain built a large dwelling which also served as his store on the East side of Bank Street at the site of a former structure burned by Benedict Arnold’s troops in 1781. Slated for demolition in 1976, the building was saved and restored in the 1980’s and today is known as the Bulkley House Saloon at 111 Bank Street. Often called the Second War for Independence, the War of 1812 drew Charles Bulkley back into privateer service when he took command of the 9-gun schooner Mars and her crew of 93, a “larger and better class [of privateer] with an increased number of gun and men”. Sailing out of New London on 7 November 1812 for the Azores and Madeira on a cruise off the coast of Spain, it is reported that Bulkley’s cruise in the Mars may have been one of the most successful of the war as the vessel participated in the taking of eleven prizes, 94 prisoners and over $100,000 in cash before returning home on 24 February 1813. The Mars fired only seven shots during the cruise, which would have been yet more successful had not four of her prizes been recaptured in addition to the one destroyed and other put to use as a cartel returning prisoners.

     Captain Charles Bulkley and his wife Elizabeth shared seven children, all of whom died single. Some of the captain’s sons sailed with him on the privateer Mars during the War of 1812. Mrs. Elizabeth Bulkley died at New London on 21 May 1823 at the age of sixty-seven. Upon the death of Charles’ unmarried son Leonard Bulkley, who was the only child to survive him and who inherited his father’s business, “the family became extinct”. Leonard left a sizable bequeath founding the Bulkeley School for Boys in 1873, which subsequently merged with Chapman Tech to form New London High School. Plenty of inaccurate genealogical sources incorrectly name Charles Bulkley (1749-1824) of Wethersfield as the Revolutionary War naval lieutenant probably due to a faulty 1912 application to the Daughters of the American Revolution.

     When the Morning News incorrectly reported the death of Nathaniel Cook of Cumberland, RI as the last survivor of those who served with John Paul Jones in the Revolution on 14 October 1846, an alert reader response was published the following day, “Capt. Charles Bulkeley, now living at New London, nearly ninety four years, was an early companion and brother officer with the gallant Jones…. As regards Capt. Bulkeley, the immunities of the grave, as yet happily forbid that we should speak of him as at some future time it may be more fitting, but we assure the public, that if ever his history shall be written, it will form an interesting page in the annuls of our country’s naval fame…. But the brave old sailor is now enfeebled by the weight of extreme old age, and his condition indicates the truth, that however successful as even conquerors we may have been, there is one conqueror at least, before whom we must all, sooner or later bow; and our prayers are, that his remaining days, however few, may be rendered as peaceful, as his active life has been filled with adventure and commotion, and that when his sun shall set, it may go down in peace, and the present life of change, be relinquished for one of unfading brightness and perpetual joy.” Captain Charles Bulkley died at the age of 95 in 1848 at New London where he is buried in Cedar Grove Cemetery. One account declares “he had white brandy at his decrease, taken by him under Capt. Hinman, in the Alfred, during the Revolution.”