REVOLUTIONARY
WAR HISTORY
THE
WAR SHIP PROVIDENCE
Providence
was commissioned by the U. S. Navy to fight the British
during
the Revolutionary War. A wooden sailing ship, she sunk or
captured
40 enemy vessels between 1775 and 1779, sixteen of the
British
ships were destroyed in 1776 when the ship was under the
command
of Captain John Paul Jones. Also that year the
Providence
destroyed British fisheries in Nova Scotia.
On
September 14 – 17, 2006, a replica built in 1976, was
visiting
`` Lewes
water with other ' tall ships ' like the Kalmar Nyckel,
for
the
375th Lewes port anniversary.
Source:
Lewes 375th Anniversary Magazine, by Lynn R.
Parks.
*
* *
The
USS Providence, a sloop of war of the Continental Navy,
was
originally
the Kathy belonging to the Rhode Island General Assembly,
built
by John Brown of Providence, Rhode Island, for $1250 and
launched
in 1775, she was 65 feet long, had a 20 foot beam, her sail
set
was jib, flying jib, staysail, square sail, fore and aft
mainsail,
manned by 6 officers, 22 seamen and 26 Marines, carried twelve
4
pounder guns and 14 railside swivel guns.
In
1775 British men of war stopped and searched Rhode Island shipping
which
annoyed the colony's merchants so the General Assembly ordered
two
ships fitted out to defend shipping. The sloops Kathy and
Washington
were
chartered with Captain Abraham Whipple commander of Kathy
which
cruised Narragansett Bay protecting shipping. October 31, 1775
Kathy
was purchased by Rhode Island and December 3, 1775 she was
taken
by the Continental Navy while in the port of Philadelphia ,
renamed
USS
Prividence and Captain John Hazard took command and was
ordered
to sail to Chesapeake Bay on January 5, 1776 with a squadron
in
command of Commander In Chief Esex Hopkins to clear out English
and Tory ships of Virginia's governor Dunmore, that were
ravaging the
shores
and rivers of the Chesapeake Bay and Maryland.
With that task completed squadron they were to move south to
clear the Carlolinas coast of enemy shipping , then north to Rhode
Island. Harsh weather and ice delayed the departure of the
Providence and her consorts until 17th of February and
Hopkins felt it unwise to cruise the Carolinas
coast
and sailed his fleet to Abaco Island, Bahamas, arriving March 1st.
There
they staged a raid on the Bahamas Island of New Providence,
seized
two sloops and went ashore with a landing party of 200
Marines
and 50 sailors who were at first unopposed then met with fire
from
Fort Montague which slowed their progress. The next day Nassau
surrendered
and Hopkins sailed into the harbor to spend two weeks to
regroup,
load captured munitions, before heading home on March 17th.
During
April the Hopkins ships took the “Hawk' off block Island,
the
brig Bolton before dawn and in the evening a brigantine and a
sloop
out of New York, before going in New London, Connecticut.
In
May, Lt. John Paul Jones took command of the Providence and took
100
Continental soldiers to George Washington at New York where he
hove
down the vessel to clean her bottom. August 1, Jones received his
captains
commission in Philadelphia and later cleared the Delaware Capes
to
begin a cruise on which she took the brigantine Britannia, and
the Sea
Nymph
loaded with sugar, rum, ginger and oil.
July
25, 1779 after being assigned to Commodore Saltonstall's
squadron,
Providence entered Penobscot Bay and was engaged in the
failed
Penobscot Expedition during which she was destroyed by her
crew
to prevent her from falling into British hands.
Source:
Wikipedia 2018.
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