“His Majesty’s Ship under my Command ran on the Rocks”

On 11 Dec 1774, Capt. William Maltby of H.M.S. Glasgow wrote from off Cohasset to his commander, Adm. Samuel Graves, with some bad news:

His Majesty’s Ship under my Command ran on the Rocks at this Place Yesterday Morning at 5 O’Clock.

She is now at an Anchor in a very narrow Place environ’d with Rocks and about half her Length from some of them, her Rudder is lost and she has received very considerable damage, if timely Assistance arrives, I hope She will be saved, She now makes as much Water as all the Pumps can free, I am taking every Method for her Preservation, but want Craft for Her Guns &ca.

as there is a little more Water than She draws at Low Water, but it would be very dangerous to throw her Guns Overboard here as She would strike on them at Low Water; for other particulars I refer You to the Bearer who seems to be a very communicative and civil Person.

The man Maltby entrusted with that message was Ebenezer Dickinson. He evidently did his job since the next afternoon Maltby could file this report:

Sir, I have your favor by Mr Dickinson, Lieutenant [Alexander] Greme is arrived in the Sloop; Lieutenant [Joseph] Nunn in the Halifax; Mr [William] Lechmere by Land; You may be assured I shall lose no time or Opportunity in doing everything in my power for the Preservation of the Ship,

an able Carpenter with two or three of that Profession would be of great Service in constructing a Rudder of this Plan.

I purpose to get the Ship in safety to Night if possible, until I can get. her in a Condition to come to Boston; If the 40 Men are completed to a 100. it will vastly contribute to forward the Ship as her Men are much fatigued already; I must refer You to Lt Lechmere for particulars of which he has heard and seen

In a postscript the captain added: “the reason I mention the Men after what You have said in your Letter, the Officers are of Opinion that the King’s Men are more to be depended on than Others.”

Graves’s letter doesn’t appear to have survived, but I’m guessing Maltby wanted men already in the Royal Navy to help with the salvage effort, not trusting locals, even if they were experienced sailors. In late December, there was already an open split between rural Massachusetts and the Crown.

Graves was especially displeased about this accident since H.M.S. Glasgow had just been refurbished in Halifax. It was, he wrote, “a clean Ship, compleatly stored and victualled.” And it had nearly reached Boston. As Capt. John Barker of the army wrote in his diary, the Glasgow ran aground “within two or three Leagues of the Light House.” But that proximity also meant the navy was able to hurry resources out to Maltby. The frigate was refloated, moved into Boston, and slowly repaired by early March.

At the time of the accident, the Admiralty office had sent orders for Capt. Maltby to report to Spithead because he had “served three years successively.” He was in line for a new command. However, the grounding spelled the end of Capt. Maltby’s naval career.

On 10 Jan 1775 the merchant John Rowe wrote in his diary:

Capt. Maltby of the Glasgow Man of Warr was try’d this day by a Court Martial on board the Somerset & suspended.

The Glasgow’s gunner was court-martialed at the same time. Presumably Maltby sailed home to Britain shortly afterward, but I can’t trace him.

Adm. Graves reassigned the Glasgow to Capt. Tyringham Howe. During the Battle of Bunker Hill, the frigate fired shot across Charlestown Neck to discourage more provincials from going onto the peninsula.

Meanwhile, Lt. William Finnie, whom Maltby had wounded in a duel on Noddle’s Island back in 1773, was serving with the Marines’ 61st Company, also listed as grenadiers. He was among the many Marine officers killed in the Bunker Hill battle.

(The map shown above, viewable at Boston Rare Maps, was published in 1774. It includes at the bottom right “Konohasset Harbour” and the “Konohasset rocks.”)

“We shall not fail of informing our readers thereof”

Prof. Carl Robert Keyes, a historian of print culture and advertising at Assumption University, alerted me to a free database of the Maryland Gazette during the Revolutionary period, courtesy of that state’s government.

That made me think back on my look at newspapers that George Washington might have read at Mount Vernon at the start of 1773. [And looking back made me realize that posting had never posted while I was traveling last week, but it’s up now.]

The Virginia Gazettes carried only the barest news about the Crown’s investigation into the Gaspée affair. In contrast, the Pennsylvania Journal reprinted incendiary reports and commentary New England. What did Anne Catherine Green (shown here) and her son Frederick tells readers of their Maryland Gazette?

Their 31 December issue didn’t mention the Gaspée by name anywhere. But it reprinted items from the 14 December Boston Evening-Post, including:

Last Thursday evening an express came to town from New-York (which left that place the Sunday morning before) with dispatches brought thither by the Cruizer sloop of war, Capt. [Tyringham] Howe, who sailed from English the beginning of September, destined to this port; but meeting with bad weather, &c., was obliged to put away for South-Carolina, where he arrived the 10th of November, and has since got to New-York.

In consequence of the above dispatches, the Lizard frigate, Capt. [Charles] Inglish, with some of the armed schooners, which lay unrigged in this harbour, received orders from the admiral on Saturday morning to be immediately fitted for the sea, and accordingly before night were equipped ready for sailing, with a design (as we are told) to repair to Lord Hillsborough’s loyal colony of Rhode-Island.

The same morning an express set off from hence for New-York, with like orders for the Arethusa to sail for the same place, and letters to Gen. [Thomas] Gage and Governor [William] Tryon. Another express was sent to Capt. [Robert] Keeler, commander of the Mercury frigate at Newport: but the consequence of this unexpected naval manoeuvre we must leave for time to discover; though should any thing of importance transpire, further than that his Majesty’s ships lay this winter in the harbour of Newport with the same security from storms and tempests that they have hitherto done in that of Boston, we shall not fail of informing our readers thereof.

It is also further said, that two regiments are to be sent to Rhode-Island from New-York; and that a motion was intended to be made at the next session of Parliament to have the charter of that colony vacated.

These paragraphs suggested that the British military, both navy and army, was converging on little Rhode Island, and that Parliament was even going to change its constitution.

And for what? With no mention of smugglers attacking H.M.S. Gaspée, these measures looked even more tyrannical.

Of course, none of that happened. But rumors like these both reflected and raised the political tensions in North America, and perhaps at Mount Vernon.