Continental Navy

The frigate Randolph’s surgeon Dr. Thomas Hore has proved to be an elusive figure in the historical record. No mention of his upbringing, education, Philadelphia connections or private pre-war practice has yet been uncovered. In “Give Me a Fast Ship: The Continental Navy and America’s Revolution at Sea” (2015), Tim McGrath notes Hore as the medical professional attending to wounds inflicted by the cat-o-nine tails judgement on the mutinous ringleader of some of her crew. William Bell Clark in “Captain Dauntless” (1949) records Dr. Hore as the surgeon who saved young Midshipman John McPherson’s life and limb with his great skill in treating a severe splinter wound to the leg and groin gained in hot action. In Appendix B of “Captain Dauntless”, Clark also definitively identifies Thomas Hore as the ship’s surgeon and notes his service as commencing on 11 October 1776, the same date as Captain Nicholas Biddle and other ranking officers on the Randolph. The only record I have been able to associate with Thomas Hore is a petition of the “Officers of the Continental Navy Frigate Randolph” dated 1 September 1777 in Charleston to Captain Nicholas Biddle which appears on pages 864-865 in Volume 9 of the “Naval Documents of the American Revolution” requesting that Second Lieutenant of Marines Panatiere de la Falconer be dismissed from service on the vessel for behavior “very unbecoming an Officer” and being “a disgrace to the Randolph”. In addition to Hore, the petition was signed by 1st Lieutenant William Barnes, Captain of Marines Samuel Shaw, 2nd Lieutenant John McDougall, Sailing Master Robert Johnson and 3rd Lieutenant Joshua Fanning. In response to a 20 November 1777 advertisement appearing in the South Carolina and American General Gazette, “WANTED immediately on board the Frigate Randolph…two young gentlemen who can fill the office of Surgeon’s Mate: Such, by making application on board said ship, will meet with proper encouragement”, Joseph Cauffman and Thomas Budd were apparently engaged to serve as Thomas Hore’s medical assistants. Little known Dr. Thomas Hore would lose his life in service to his shipmates and the Continental Navy in the explosion of the frigate Randolph on 7 March 1778.

     Dr. Thomas Budd appears to have been one of two Surgeon’s Mates serving on the frigate Randolph at the time of her 7 March 1778 catastrophic destruction. Much of Dr. Budd’s biographical information comes from Stephen Wickes’ “History of Medicine in New Jersey: And of Its Medical Men, from the Settlement of the Province to A.D. 1800” (1879) which identifies an address delivered six years earlier by F.W. Earl to the West Jersey Surveyors’ Association as its prime source. Likely born between 1732 and 1742, Thomas was one of six children born to John Budd of Hanover, Morris County, NJ. Three of John Budd’s four sons became physicians, sharing also in common, difficulties with the law. Thomas’ older brother Dr. John Budd resided in Salem County as early as 1758 when he married Rosanna Shivers of Gloucester County. In 1771, Dr. John Budd successfully petitioned the New Jersey assembly for release from his debts and shortly thereafter relocated to South Carolina where he practiced medicine until his death in 1791. According to Joseph Johnson in “Traditions and Reminiscences, Chiefly of the American Revolution in the South (1851), Dr. John Budd’s early professional success and “independence in fortune may have trained him in expensive habits; he was certainly inconsiderate and improvident. He ran through all his property during his life, and became involved in certain unpleasant difficulties. He never knew how to keep his hands out of his pockets, or to keep his money in them. He was, in his youth, like most young men of fortune, rather flighty in his pursuits, and without foresight in his movements. One instance of the kind may illustrate this turn of mind. He disappeared from among his relatives and friends, without giving them any notice of his intentions—without writing a line to any one- without assigning a cause for his absence, even by a messenger, verbally, or stating where he was going, or for what length of time. The first tidings of him were from England, that he had gone there without money or letters of credit, and was then in jail.” Perhaps these same expensive habits ran in the family of brothers. Dr. Berne Budd, younger brother of Thomas, while “highly esteemed” as a physician somehow fell “into a most criminal deportment” of counterfeiting colonial currency. Although convicted and sentenced to death, Dr. Berne Budd was eventually pardoned. By 1766, Dr. Thomas Budd was practicing medicine while residing in Hanover Township and in May of the following year was admitted to the Medical Society of New Jersey upon the recommendation of his brother Berne. Sources indicate Thomas served an apprenticeship in Salem, likely under the supervision of his older brother John, while also attending Dr. William Shippen Jr’s anatomical lectures in Philadelphia. Shippen instituted America’s first series of such lectures in 1762 and three years later founded the colonies’ first medical school- the College of Philadelphia, later to become the University of Pennsylvania.

     About this same time, Budd’s name appears twice in newspapers circulated in upstate New Jersey. An advertisement of 4 September 1766 published in the New York Gazette states, “Removed away on Saturday Aug. 23rd, from Nathan Richards at Newark, a negro man, formerly belonging to Thomas Budde at Morristown, who two or three months ago sold him to the widow Mrs. Elizabeth Finn, at Prakens, Co. Bergen.” Another newspaper elaborates, “run away on Saturday the 23d of August last, from Nathaniel Richards, at Newark, a negro Man named Ben, about 5 feet 8 or 9 Inches high, aged 28, slim made, thin Visage, yellow Complexion, a likely lively cunning Fellow, speaks good English, and can speak Low Dutch. He formerly belonged to Thomas Budde, at Morris-Town in New-Jersey, who two or three Months ago sold him to the Widow Mrs. Elizabeth Finn, at Prakenas in the County of Bergen, from whom he run away soon after, and being advertised, was taken and brought Home to his Mistress, by whom he was soon after sold to the Subscriber.” The 17 August 1767 edition of the New York Mercury advertises, “To be sold at the Plantation at Hanover, Co. Morris, about 12 miles from Newark, 400-500 acres of which 300 Bog meadow, a small lionse and Orchard. Apply to Doctor Thomas Budd in Hanover or Augustinus Moore, Esq., attorney-at-law in Morristown.” In November 1767, Thomas was credentialed by the Medical Society just prior to a West Indies voyage, perhaps facilitating an escape from personal financial difficulties hinted by his earlier real estate sale. One family tradition holds that he was an adventurer “fond of the sea” and according to “The Healing Art” published at http://historyofmedicinenj.com, Dr. Thomas Budd then entered sea service as a ship’s surgeon.

     The doctor’s financial troubles come to a head by 1775 when the New York Journal publishes on 13 April the sale “at vendue on Monday, the 15th day of May next, [of] all the lands belonging to the said Thomas Budd, situated in Hanover, in the county of Morris, adjoining the plantations of Messrs. Ralph and Jasper Smith, supposed to be about two hundred acres, to be sold in small lots.” The auction of land was held at the home of Budd’s neighbor Ralph Smith at the instigation of William D’ Hart, Esq. Ralph Smith purchased for himself at least the ten acres of “land I bought of auditors of Dr. Thomas Budd’s estate” mentioned in his 16 September 1783 will. Some light on the circumstances of Budd’s legal situation with Hart is offered in the adjudication of ownership of one of his former slaves the previous year acknowledged by none other than William Alexander, Lord Stirling who would soon serve the revolutionary cause as Major General. “This Indenture made this twenty-fourth Day of January in the year of Our Lord One Thousand Seven Hundred and Seventy Four Between Matthew Lum and Jabez Campfield of this Town and County of Morris, and Province of New Jersey, of the One part, and William Barnet Esq., of Elizabeth Town in the Province aforesaid of the other part, Witnesseth that Whereas a certain Negro or Mulatto Wench named Mercy was attached as the Property of Thomas Budd, an Absconding Debtor at the suit of William De Hart one of the Creditors of the said Budd, and by virtue of the Rule of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas of the said County of Morris, we the said Matthew & Jabez were appointed Auditors to the. Estate of said Budd, and in Virtue of a Rule of the said Court, did sell and dispose of the said wench to the said William Barnet, Esq., for the Consideration of Thirty Seven Pounds, and we the said Matthew & Jabez do hereby Alien Convey and Confirm unto the said William Barnet, all the Right, Title, and Interest of the said Thomas Budd in and to the said wench in as full and ample a manner as we should or aught to do…” No causes for Budd’s financial stress have been published save the innuendo of an extravagant lifestyle by Dr. Stephen Wickes in ”History of the Medical Men of New Jersey” writing that he “has seen a charge to him (as a physician) on the books of a fashionable tailor in Elizabethtown for a pair of velvet brooches.”

     Details of Dr. Thomas Budd’s personal life during his last decade are not known, however Matilda Badger in “genealogy of the Linthicum and allied families” (1934) states that Budd was married to Ann Hawkhurst in 1778 before he was “blown up during war”. Badger’s claim of a surviving son Samuel Budd who married Marie De La Rue is supported by other DAR and genealogical sources which trace the family tree to Thomas’ grandson Hiram Budd and his spouse Catherine Ann Smedes. Another genealogical source indicates the date of the doctor’s marriage to Oyster Bay, NY native Hawkhurst as 27 November 1773. Both suggested marriage dates are a bit baffling as the couple’s son Samuel appears to have been born in 1768. Samuel Budd (1768-1835), his wife Marie (1769-1822) and their son Hiram (1802-1837) are all interred at Huguenot Cemetery in New Paltz, Ulster County, NY; the De La Rue family being French Huguenots. In the “History of New Paltz, New York, and Its Old Families” (1909), author Ralph Le Fevre writes of son Samuel Budd that he “was a prominent citizen of New Paltz…had a wheelwright shop, procured the establishment of a stage line through the village and had an inn at the corner of Chestnut and North Front Street.” Le Favre additionally writes that “During the battle of Monmouth, the house and other buildings on the Budd property were burned by the British and Hessians and Samuel Budd, then a boy of ten fled to the residence of an uncle (William Budd) in Philadelphia, and did not see his mother until a considerable time afterwards.” On a hot and humid 28 June 1778, the Battle of Monmouth was fought less than four months after the tragic death of the ten year old Samuel’s father.

     Charles E. Claghorn in “Naval Officers of the American Revolution: A Concise Biographical Dictionary” (1988) indicates Dr. Thomas Budd entered service on the Continental Navy frigate Randolph at Charleston in January 1777. By that time, Thomas’ older brother Dr. John Budd was well established in that city and assumed by some to be hosting his younger sibling. John Budd had already proved himself a committed patriot when in November 1775, the doctor paddled a canoe to the South Carolina schooner Defence in Charleston harbor while under fire from two British armed vessels in order to offer aid to Captain Tufts and his crew. Later upon the capture of Charleston in 1780, Dr. John Budd was exiled to St. Augustine rather than renounce allegiance to the rebel cause. Younger brother Dr. Berne Budd also served as Surgeon to a regiment of South Carolina artillery before his confinement on a British prison ship at Amelia Island. Claghorn’s timing however appears problematic since the Randolph was still in Philadelphia until early February 1777. The vessel did not arrive in Charleston until the second week of March 1777 after losing her masts in a 16 February storm. As Dr. Thomas Hore is identified as the frigate Randolph’s Surgeon by both William Bell Clark in “Captain Dauntless” (1949) and Tim McGrath in “Give Me a Fast Ship: The Continental Navy and America’s Revolution at Sea” (2015), it is almost certain that Dr. Thomas Budd instead was serving as one of the vessel’s two Surgeon’s Mates alongside Dr. Joseph Cauffman. In “Captain Dauntless”, Clark transcribes a 20 November 1777 advertisement appearing in the South Carolina and American General Gazette, “WANTED immediately on board the Frigate Randolph…two young gentlemen who can fill the office of Surgeon’s Mate: Such, by making application on board said ship, will meet with proper encouragement.” One of these two- Cauffman or Budd- were referred to in an account of the Randolph’s explosion later related by one of the four survivors to Charles Biddle, brother of Captain Nicholas Biddle and referenced in Volume IX of Naval Documents of the American Revolution. “He told me he was stationed at one of the quarterdeck guns near Capt. Biddle, who early in the action was wounded in the thigh. He fell, but immediately sitting up again, and encouraging his crew, told them it was only a slight touch he had received. He ordered a chair, and one of the surgeon’s mates was dressing him at the time of the explosion. None of the men saved could tell by what means the accident happened.”

What is known of Joseph Cauffman (1755-1778) comes primarily from his letter of Wednesday 23 April 1777 sent from Vienna, Austria to Benjamin Franklin and found in the American Philosophical Society. The letter indicates that Cauffman was born in Philadelphia, educated in Europe from a young age and studied “Anatomy and Surgery” under the “the renowned Dr. [Anton] De Haen [and] … learned Dr. [Maximilian] Stoll his successor.” According to T. F. Rodenbough in “Autumn Leaves from Family Trees” (1892), the eleven year old eldest son of prosperous Philadelphia merchant Joseph Theophilus Cauffman (1720-1807) and his first wife Anna Catharine was placed in a Bruges parochial school for four years under the care of Jesuit priest Father Rector in the Flemish region of Belgium before enrolling at the University of Vienna in 1771. The sixteen year old is reputed to be the first American-born student enrolled at that university. While in Vienna, the young Cauffman struck up an acquaintance with Dutch physician and scientist Jan Ingenhousz (1730-1799). A close friend of Benjamin Franklin, Ingenhousz was the court physician to Austrian monarchs Joseph II and Maria Theresa at Vienna from 1769 to 1779. Ingenhousz wrote to Franklin of their fellowship in a 15 November 1776 letter also in the American Philosophical Society, “I enjoye sometimes the company of one Mr. Kauffman from Philadelphia, who studies physic here, and intends to settle in his native country.” Having earned a medical degree from the University of Vienna in 1776, the young Dr. Cauffman exploited Ingenhousz’ connection to Franklin by seeking direct advice concerning entering service in the American cause to which he espouses fealty, “My only wish and desire is to prove one day or other serviceable to my Country, for which, tho’ my youth and my not having accomplished my studies till now have rendered me hitherto incapable, I should be happy in spending the rest of my days, my repose and blood. Let our foolish modern moralists ridicule love for one’s Country as much as they please, I shall always think it the first duty of Man to serve his Country, as much as ever lies in his power, it being the dictate of reason, Nature and own proper instinct.” Cauffman suggests that his wealthy German Catholic family is probably known to Franklin and frankly shares his difficulties in receiving funds from his father at home in Philadelphia. The elder Cauffman, a native of Strasborg, Germany had emigrated to America in 1749 and was a staunch loyalist.  “I have given no description of my Family, as I suppose it known to you: all we have to boast of is honesty, and this, I think, is sufficient in the depraved age we live in. Nor do I imagine that my being educated in the catholic religion will prove any obstacle to serving my Country, and doing the duty of an honest and worthy citizen.” A note written by Benjamin Franklin in Latin dated 20 May 1777 regarding Joseph Cauffman in the collection of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania may shed light on Franklin’s involvement in obtaining a warrant for the young doctor in the Continental Navy. One source indicates that Dr. Cauffman “after a brief experience in the hospitals of London and Edinburg” returned to Philadelphia in 1777. Referencing Rodenbough, Jonathan Singerton in “Not Just the Hessians: The Habsburgs and the War of American Independence” posted on http://botstiber.org suggests that “Cauffman completed his studies early in September 1777 and set off with a few other medical students for the American colonies via France. They boarded the frigate Randolph, serving as the ship’s makeshift medics.” As Dr. Thomas Hore is identified as the frigate Randolph’s Surgeon by both William Bell Clark in “Captain Dauntless” (1949) and Tim McGrath in “Give Me a Fast Ship: The Continental Navy and America’s Revolution at Sea” (2015), it is almost certain that Dr. Joseph Cauffman instead was serving as one of the vessel’s two Surgeon’s Mates alongside Dr. Thomas Budd. In “Captain Dauntless”, Clark transcribes a 20 November 1777 advertisement appearing in the South Carolina and American General Gazette, “WANTED immediately on board the Frigate Randolph…two young gentlemen who can fill the office of Surgeon’s Mate: Such, by making application on board said ship, will meet with proper encouragement.” One of these two- Cauffman or Budd- were referred to in an account of the Randolph’s explosion later related by one of the four survivors to Charles Biddle, brother of Captain Nicholas Biddle and referenced in Volume IX of Naval Documents of the American Revolution. “He told me he was stationed at one of the quarterdeck guns near Capt. Biddle, who early in the action was wounded in the thigh. He fell, but immediately sitting up again, and encouraging his crew, told them it was only a slight touch he had received. He ordered a chair, and one of the surgeon’s mates was dressing him at the time of the explosion. None of the men saved could tell by what means the accident happened.”