On April 7, 1776, Easter Sunday, Lewistown was presented with the opportunity to demonstrate their bolstered forces and “Yankee Play” to the British.[38] A month prior Lewistown pilot and merchant captain Nehemiah Field set sail from the port of Lewistown for St Eustatia aboard his schooner Farmer. [39] For the sum of thirty pounds, Field was hired by the Council of Safety to deliver a cargo of corn and return with any powder and arms that he could procure. Field’s voyage began prior to Roebuck’s arrival, but he promptly learned of British presence upon his return. On April 7, the alarm post at the lighthouse sent an express to Lewistown announcing Captain Field’s return and demanding assistance to unload his schooner.
The inhabitants of Lewistown provided maritime aid, ferrying soldiers from the Delaware Regiment across Lewes Creek so they could march to the support of Farmer. Field’s schooner was now grounded off Cape Henlopen due to gunfire from Roebuck’s tender, not far from where Fisher’s pilot boat remained beached. Prior to the arrival of reinforcements from Lewistown, Roebuck’s tender opened fire on the men stationed at the lighthouse with both swivel guns and cannon fire. After the cargo was unloaded the beached Farmer was able to return “a constant fire” with her two swivel guns loaded with grape shot. For two hours this engagement endured, with Roebuck’s tender sustaining heavy causalities. Finally, shots from the men stationed at the lighthouse and Farmer’s swivels were able to cut one of the halyards on the tender, causing the mainsail to collapse, thus immobilizing the vessel. Roebuck responded by sending a boat to tow her tender back to safety, ending the engagement. Capt. Charles Pope proudly wrote that “the militia officers, at Lewes, acted with a spirt that does honor to their country.”[40] The following week, the Pennsylvania Gazette praised the actions of the defenders at Lewistown, stating that “the cargoe was safely landed from the schooner and secured, without the loss of a man, either killed or wounded. The militia officers at Lewes behaved with that courage and magnanimity which does honour to their country.”[41]
Following the events of Easter Sunday, the defenses of the lower Delaware continued to be strengthened. On April 8 the Continental Brig Lexington and Continental Sloop Hornet made their way down the Delaware River and sailed through the bay avoiding capture by Roebuck. Over a week later two newly commissioned privateers, the sloop Congress and sloop Chance, each sailed down the Delaware and through the Cape May Channel, also evading Roebuck.[42] Captain Hamond was well aware that this stream of vessels, now sailing south from Philadelphia, were “fitted out with the intention of clearing the coast of our [Roebuck’s] tenders.”[43]
During late March and early April 1776, the defensive measures established on Delaware Bay held their own against the initial encroachment of the Royal Navy and Roebuck. The actions of the Committee of Safety and initiatives implemented by Henry Fisher created an infrastructure and communication network that proved vital in relaying information along the Delaware coastline. By mid-April, Roebuck remained off Lewistown, but “the town maintained between fifty and a hundred men on guard night and day at the lighthouse [Cape Henlopen], Arnold’s[44], and the creek’s mouth [Lewes Creek]; and are determined to watch them closely.”[45] In a letter dated April 17, it was stated that “Lewistown is at this time made up of officers and soldiers, and the people all together seem determined to defend our little place.”[46] Although the tides of war would soon shift, in the spring of 1776 the port of Lewistown remained Hearty in the Cause.
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Bibliography
[1]“Minutes of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, September 16, 1775,” William Bell Clark ed., Naval Documents of the American Revolution (Washington DC: Naval History Center, Navy Department, 1969), 2: 120-121 (NDAR).
[2]“Pennsylvania Colonial Records, X, 509, 510,” NDAR, 4:267.
[3]“Instructions from the Committee of Safety at Philadelphia to Mr. Henry Fisher at Lewis Town, Pennsylvania Colonial Records, X, 336-339,” NDAR, 2: 120-121.
[4]“Minutes of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, March 20, 1776,” NDAR, 4:422.
[5]John W. Jackson, The Pennsylvania Navy: 1775–1781: The Defense of the Delaware (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1974), 30.
[7]Ibid., 414; “State Navy Board, April 10, 1777, Pennsylvania Archives, Samuel Hazard et. al, eds. (Philadelphia: J. Stevens, 1852-1935), 2nd series, 1:121.
[8]“Instructions from The Committee of Safety at Philadelphia to Mr. Henry Fisher at Lewis Town,” NDAR, 2:122.
[9]Jackson, The Pennsylvania Navy, 29.
[10]Colonial Records of Pennsylvania, Samuel Hazard, ed. (Harrisburg: T. Fenn, 1831-1853), 10: 338, 352.
[11]“Pennsylvania Committee of Safety to James Maul, Philadelphia November 17, 1775, Pennsylvania Archives, 1st series, 4: 680, 681,” NDAR: 2: 1061.
[12]“Minutes of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, Philadelphia March 23, 1776, “Pennsylvania Colonial Records, X, 523,” NDAR, 4: 483.
[13]“PRO, Admiralty 1/487; copy in Graves’s Conduct, Appendix, 112, BM. Vice Admiral Samuel Graves to Captain Andrew Snape Hamond, HMS Roebuck,” NDAR 3:112
[14]Andrew Snape Hamond to Molyneux Shuldham, March 3, 1776, NDAR, 4: 152.
[17]Muster Table, HMS Roebuck, Supernumeraries borne for Victuals entry 67, 83, 313, 94, 120, 121, National Archives of the United Kingdom (TNA), ADM 36/8638.
[18]“Henry Fisher to the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, March 25, 1775. Pennsylvania Archives, 1st series, 4: 724-25.” NDAR, 4: 510.
[19]“Minutes of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, March 26, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 526
[20]“Journal of HMS Roebuck, Captain Andrew Snape Hamond, March 25- 31, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 595.
[21]“Narrative of Captain Andrew Snape Hamond, March 26, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 529.
[22]“Henry Fisher to the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, April 1, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 618-619.
[23]“Journal of HMS Roebuck, Captain Andrew Snape Hamond, March 25- 31, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 595.
[24]“List of Vessels seized as Prizes” The London Gazette, May 13, 1777.
[26]“Henry Fisher to the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, April 1, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 618.
[27]John Haslet to John Hancock, April 7, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 701.
[28]Fisher to the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, April 1, 1776. Papers CC (Pennsylvania State Papers) 69, I, 113-15, NA.” NDAR, 4: 618.
[29]Fisher to the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, April 1, 1776, NDAR, 4: 618.
[31]“William Price to the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety,” NDAR, 4: 617-618.
[32]“Minutes of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, April 3, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 647.
[33]“Journal of the Continental Congress, April 3, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 648.
[35]Haslet to Hancock, April 7, 1776, NDAR, 4: 701.
[36]“Minutes of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, April 4, 1776,” NDAR, 4: 665.
[37]Fisher to the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, NDAR, 4: 671.
[38]Pennsylvania Evening Post, April 20, 1776. “Extract of a Letter from Lewestown, 17 April 1776,” NDAR, 4: 1153.
[39]Delaware Archives: Revolutionary War in Three Volumes (Wilmington, DE: Public Archives Commission of Delaware/Chas. L. Story Company Press, 1919), 2: 944.
[40]“Pennsylvania Evening Post, April 13, 1776,” NDAR, 4:742.
[41]“Pennsylvania Gazette, April 17, 1776,” NDAR 4: 871.
[42]“Narrative of Captain Andrew Snape Hamond, April 22, 1776,” NDAR, 4:1202.
[43]Hamond to Henry Bellew, April 8, 1776, NDAR, 4: 728-30.
[44]Likely referencing land on Cape Henlopen near the property of William Arnold of Lewes Town who maintained salt works near Cape Henlopen. See Claudia L. Bushman, Harold B. Hancock, and Elizabeth Moyne Homsey, ed., Proceedings of the Assembly of the Lower Counties on the Delaware 1770-1776, of the Constitutional Convention of 1776, and of the House of Assembly of the Delaware State 1776-1781 (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1986,) 284.
[45]“Extract of a Letter from Lewestown,” April 17, 1776, NDAR, 4:871.