^oLfuJi. S.) ^2/ , . - .^ I/lAv^'^^O^ THE CRUISE OF THE "QUERO" HOW WE CARRIED THE NEWS TO THE KING A Neglected Chapter in Local History By Robert S. Rantoul. [From the Histobical Collections of the Essex Institute VOL. XXXVI, 1900.] / THE CRUISE OF THE "QUERO" HOW WE CARRIED THE NEWS TO THE KING. A NEGLECTED CHAPTER IN LOCAL HISTORY. BY ROBERT S. RANTOUL. [This paper is reproduced from the Ccnturi/ Illustrated Monthly Mar/azine for September, 7S09, with considerable additioH.f and changes. The courteous per- rmssion of the publishers has been f/runted, and also the use of the two fine por- traits prepared for that number of the Century. For these favors the thanks of the Essex Institute are due, as well as to Dr. Richard H. Derby of Neto York for much assistance rendered.] No American'3 advent in London ever produced so real a sensation as did that of a Salem sailor, Capt. John Derby, in May, 1775. He brought the news of Concord and Lexington in advance of the King's messenger, and made it known to the British public. His appearance upon that excited scene was unheralded and startling. To liken the patriot, making struggles and sacrifices for his country, to Jack-in-the-box or to Harlequin in the panto- mime, shot up through a stage trap-door, is not dignified nor proper, but the appearance of neither is more electric. The mystery of his coming and of his going was equally impenetrable. The incident was dramatic, but it was also ..••; -•J. : 0^ c 2 THE CRUISE OF THE QUERO. terribly momentous. It convulsed an empire. A word of preface must be pardoned to sketch in outline the situa- tion then existing — the stage and its setting upon which entered this unknown actor. There were, so to say, two joint governors of this province in 1774-5. Hutchinson, relieved of the actual administration of the office, summoned to England and hurried into the presence of the King for a two hours' audience, without time to exchange his sea-clothing for the tinsel of the court — bidden to kiss hands, contrary to custom, in his Majesty's private closet, and taken at once into the closest contidence of the circle next the throne, was, from his arrival, June, 1774, until his death in London, June, 1780, a sort of Advisory Governor near the Court of St. James. Without his counsels no act of the ministry seems to have been decided on, though if his pacific promptings had been oitener heeded things might have gone better. Gage, who succeeded him here on the spot in May, 1774, discharged the active functions of " Captain-General and Governor-in- chief," and was the actual Governor-Resident of Massachusetts, — helping for- ward the agitation he was sent to quell by little displa3's of a willingness to conciliate in small matters, by a lack of decision in greater things, by an utter incapacity generally to grasp the situation. After Bunker Hill, Gage was superseded. The letters which we shall print give hints of all this suf- ficient for our purpose. If one reads between the lines they tell enough. Hutchinson, we need not add, was a native of Boston, an ex-chief Justice as well as an ex- Governor of Massachusetts Bay, and the distinguished historian of the Province. Gage was a soldier with an honorable record, bearing scars received while fighting by the side of Washington at the defeat of Braddock. He had earned all his honors on this continent — had been for the ten years just past Commander-in-chief of all the King's forces in America, and had married an American wife. He was the second son of Viscount Gage of Sussex and the Lord Gage, at whose manor in Sussex Hutchinson was a frequent visitor, was his elder brother. I shall make no attempt to describe the feverish flutter P. Author. (person). 240 '01 THE CKUISE OF THE QUEKO. 3 of the English mind in May, 1775. "The stocks," says Horace Walpole, " beo;an to grow a little nervous." The merchants of London were feeling that the American war which threatened would destroy them if it came. John Wilkes, the eccentric and fearless radical who was at the moment Lord Mayor of London, openly espoused the contention of the Colonies. The Quakers, a large and influential body, deprecated force, as was their wont. In Court circles, and the more strongl}"^ in the ratio of near- ness to the throne, the impression prevailed that all pre- tence on our part of a determination to resist was put on for effect, and that the first serious demonstration of the home government would result in our submission. Frank- lin and Lee were in LondcAi as the agents of Massachu- setts. The pronounced friends of America in England were without a policy — they were little better than ob- structionists seeking to postpone the final stroke in hopes some favorable chance might save the country — and they, with a great mass of well-disposed but ill-instructed Englishmen, who shrank from taking arms against their kindred but felt that loyalty would soon demand it, awaited nervously the arrival of news which must put the hoped-for conciliation beyond their reach. Neither war nor martial law had been decLired ; recruiting in the American regiments was slow ; nor had the large force which Gage demanded been sent him. Gage's late dis- patches to Dartmouth, the then Secretary of State for the Colonies in Lord North's cabinet, had been intended to allay apprehension of an early issue and had measurably done so. He was a temporizer by habit and dreaded an outbreak. Gage had been relieved as Commander-in- chief in America and had been sent to Massachusetts pri- marily to enforce the Boston Port Bill or, as Lord North said in the House of Peers, to make of Boston an inland town, sixteen miles from any harbor, and to transfer the capital of the state by the King's orders to Salem, to- gether with all the commercial and social advantages to Salem, Marblehead and Beverly, which must incidentally result to them from the distress of Boston.^ 1 Neither Hutchinson nor Gage were strangers to Salem society. Hutchinson had been royally entertained here at the old Assembly House which stood where 4 THE CRUISE OF THE QUERO. The close terms of intimacy existing between Hutchin- S(ni and such men as Dr. Samuel Johnson, the lexicog- rapher and author of " Taxation no Tyranny," Edward Gibbon, the historian ofthe "Decline and Fall," then hold- ing a seat in the House of Commons, General Gage, Lord Gage his brother, Lord Dartmouth, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, the three Major Generals, Howe, Clinton and Bnrgoyne, just setting out with fresh instructions for America, ex-Governors Pownall and Bernard, and all the colonial refugees in London, are patent to the reader of Hutchinson's diary. In the midst of surroundings like these, the public mind intensely and vaguely apprehensive and for the moment without definite expectation, an unknown sailor bursts upon the scene. Reaching London so soon after the events he claimed to herald, his story seemed on that account even to be tainted with suspicion. Walpole dubbed him the " Accidental Captain." Coming in a fashion which he did not explain and which they could not understand, proclaiming in the highways that which both friends and enemies of the Colonies were at the moment alike averse to hear, he naturally had the ear of everybody. A collision, he said, had occurred and the government had lost. Who was this unbidden guest charged with such a startling message? Was it safe to rely on the presumptions against his honesty and to dis- miss the tale as groundless? Was there not rather a verisimilitude about it which, like Banquo's ghost, would not away at anybody's bidding? The streets were agi- tated but the Court circles w^ere more profoundly agitated. If a battle had been fought, where was the government the South Church Chapel now stands, in May, 1774, on the occasion of his last military review, and he had clung- for years to the notion of removing the Capi- tal of the Province to Salem. John Adams wrote to his wife that he knew this to be the fact and stated his grounds. (See Hist. Coll. Essex Institute, Vol. xxxi, pages 71, 82-3-4.) Gage had been welcomed with a ball at the same place on the King's Birthday in June, 1774, and had passed that summer ^t the Hooper Mansion in Danvers, convening the Provincial Legislature in the Salem Town House. The Boston Cadets, when they resented his treatment of their commander, John Hancock, came to Salem to deliver up their colors. When Gage marched a regiment up from Salem Neck as far as the Williams House, now the site of the Cadet Ar- mory, to disperse a Salem Town Meeting in August, 1774, Captain Richard Derby the father of Capt. John Derby, was one of the public spirited men who stood forth to oppose this hot-headed policy and was of the committee who confronted Gage in the historic scene at the Colonel Brown Mansion located where now ia Derby Square. THE CRUISE OF THE "QUERO." 5 messenger with the authorized dispatch which should have reported it? It a battle had not been fought why this crafty tale invented out of nothing for a nine days' won- der? It was proposed to arrest Derby and bring him before the Privy Council. But was this politic? Would this not show that the stocks, grown nervous, had, as Walpole wrote, "affected other pulses?" Hutchinson could not wholly reject the story. He wrote in his diary, June 10th, when the government dispatches finally reached Lon- don : " I assured many gentlemen who would give no credit to Darby's account that it would prove near the truth. And now they are more struck than if they had not been so sanguine before." Let us deal with Events in their sequence. Derby reached London on Sunday evening, May 28th, and took lodgings. He had with him copies of the Salem Gazette for April 21st and 25th, containing a pretty good account of the transactions of the 19th, attributed in part to the pen of Timothy Pickering. He had, also, a letter of in- structions from the Provincial Congress then sitting at Watertown, dated April 26, accrediting him and his secret mission to Franklin and Lee. And ' especially he had with him copies of several affidavits, giving sworn state- ments of what had happened, from the lips not only of Americans who had taken part but of British prisoners also. Ensign Gould nmong them. This evidence he lost no time in putting into the hands of the Lord Mayor of London, and this ardent partisan was prompt to dis- seminate the statements furnished. On May 29th the news was well abroad and was received with consterna- tion and with the wildest comment. Hutchinson's entry in his diary for May 29, 1775, is this : " Cap° Darby came to town last evening. He is sent by the Provincial Congress in a vessel in ballast, to pub- lish here their account of an action between the troops and the inhabitants on the 19th of April. A vessel which sailed four days before with dispatches from Gage is not arrived. 2 The opposition here rejoice that the Americans ait is not without interest to observe that Capt. Derby's statement, to the effect that a Government dispatch had sailed four days before him in the "Sukey " was accepted without question by everybody in London, King and commoner'alike The Massachusetts Governor knew something of Salem shipmasters in general b THK CRUISE OF THE QUERO. fight, after it had been geneially said they would not. The conduct of the Boston leaders is much the same as it was after the inhabitants were killed the 5 of March, 1770. They hurry away a vessel that their partial accounts may make the first impression, I think Gage's will be diflTereut. The inhabitants, after this action, collected together and have formed an army at Cambridge under Ward their general : Stop'd all communication between country and town and Gage suffers none of the town to go out. I am greatly anxious for my family and friends. "I carried the news to Lord Dartmouth, who was much struck with it. The first accounts were very unfavoral)le, it not being known that they all came from one side. The alarm abated before night, and we wait with a greater degree of calmness for the accounts from the other side. Darby sailed from Salem the 29th of April." Next day Lord Dartmouth published, in the govern- ment Gazette, an official caution in these Avords : " Secretary of State's Ofiice, Whitehall, INIay 30, 1775. "A report having been spread, Hud an account having been printed and published, of a skirmish between some of the people in the Province of MassacJtuseUs Bay and a detachment of His Majesty's troops, it is proper to in- form the publick that no advices have as yet been received in the American Department of any such event. " There is reason to believe that there are dispatches from General Gage on board the Sukey, Captain Broivn, which, though she sailed four days before the vessel that brought the printed accounts, is not arrived." This bulletin in turn called forth a counter-blast in these words from Lee (Franklin had sailed for America) which appeared, May 31, in the joiu'uals favorable to the Colonies : " London, May 30. As a doubt of the authenticity of the account from Salem, touching an engagement between the King's troops and the provincials in the Massachusetts and of the Derby family in particular. No other evidence of the fact had reached London save Derby's assertion. Yet it figures in all the speculations and dis- cussions of the hour. At last a story reached London, June 3, from vessels arrived at Liverpool and at Bristol, that there had been lighting-, but it gave no details. Derby left London, June 1, and Gage's dispatch reached Whiteliall, June 10. THE CRUISE OF THE QUEKO. 7 Bay, may arise from a paragraph in the Gazette of this evening, I desire to inform all those who wish to see the original affitlavits, which confirm the account, that they are deposited at the Mansit)n House with the Right Hon. the Lord Mayor, for their inspection." [Signed] "Arthur Lee, the Agent for the House of Representativ^es of the Massachusetts Bay." Home Tooke assumed the statement to be true, and commented on it in print in terms which soon cost him a trial for high treason and a year's imprisonment.^ On the same day we tind Gibbon, the independent member of Parliament for St. Ives, writing this interest- ing account to his friend Holroyd, afterwards to become Lord Sheffield and a person of much distinction as well aa his biographer : " You will probably see in the papers the Boston Gazette Extraordinary.^ I shall therefore mention a few circum- stances which I have from Governor Hutchinson. 3 The Rev. John Home, first a curate in Kent, who afterwards studied law, but was refused a license to practise because he had taken Holy Orders, became a famous pliilological authority, commended by Doctor Johnson, and a relentless political agitator. He had been educated at Eton and Cambridge. He later added the name of Tooke, and was first the friend and supporter arid then the bitter opponent of John Wilkes. He was twice defeated for tlie House of Commons and at last, in 1801, elected only to be refused his seat on the same ground on which he had been excluded from the bar. He was tried for high treason on ac- count of the sympathy he expressed with the French Revolution, and was suc- cessfully defended by Erskine. He was among the most ardent friends of America, and on the arrival of Derby with his dispatches he did not hesitate to stigmatize the action of Gage and the King's troops as murder. This he did in a publication dated June 9, before the promulgation of Gage's dispatch, and he forthwith proceeded to raise a fund of £100 for the relief of the families of victims." the sum, a large part of which he himself paid, to be forwarded to Frankliu. For all this, "done in contempt of our Sovereign Lord and King," HorneTooke was put upon his trial, July 4, 1777. Mansfield was judge andTh'urlow attorney-general, and that prosecuting officer urged that the pillory was the proper penalty for the offence. But no such pen- alty was inflicted. He was duly found guilty after a trial of extraordinary length and bitterness, which is reported in full in the volume of State Trials for the six- teenth year of George HI, and he served a sentence of a year's imprisonment and a fine of £200. Ensign Gould was in the witness-box and swore, among other things, that he saw no scalping of British soldiers at Concord or at Lexington, but that he heard of it. He swore to the continued firing of cannon as alarm guns after their start from Boston on the march to Concord" At this disclosure Lord Mansfield showed much surprise and doubt and cross-examined him closely, but Ensign Gould ad- liered to his statement that the Provincials had cannon. Perhaps some of Rich- ard Derby's guns had found their way to Charlestown. (See British State Trials for 1776, in Volume XI, published 1781, for years from 11th Richard II to 16th George III. Also Hutchinson's Diary, pp. 463-7.) « Boston was at this time in the military occupation of the British. There was no Boston Gazette. Salem will be found, in the course of this paper, to be con- founded by English authorities with both Marblehead and Boston. Gibbon in writing Holroyd, March 15, 1774, about removing the seat of government, calls it " New Salem," perhaps contrasting us with Salem in the Province of Madras, for the British occupation of India was just commencing. The Englishman of the period knew less of the geography of Massachusetts than he knew of the moun- 8 THE CRUISE OF THE " QUERO." "That Gazette is the only account arrived. As soon as the business was over the Proviuciul Congress dispatched a vessel with the news for the good people of England. The vessel was taken up to sail instantly at a considerable loss and expense, as she went without any lading but her ballast. No other letters were allowed to be put on board nor did the crew know their destination 'till they were on the banks of Newfoundland. The master is a man of character and moderation, and from his mouth the follow- ing particulars have been drawn. Fides sit penes auctorem. " It cannot fairly be called a defeat of the King's troops ; since they marched to Concord, destroyed or brought away the stores, and then returned back. They were so much fatigued with their day's work — they had marched above thirty miles — that they encamped in the evening at some distance from Boston without being attacked in the night. It can hardly be called an engagement ; there never was any large body of provincials. Our troops during the march and retreat were chiefly harassed by flying parties from behind the stone walls along the road and by many shots from the windows as they passed through the villages. It was then they were guilty of settins: fire to some of those hostile houses. Ensign Gould had been sent with only twelve men to repair a wooden bridge for the retreat ; he was attacked by the Saints with a Minister at their head, who killed two men and took the ensign with the others prisoners. The next day the Country rose. When the Master came away he says that Boston was invested by a camp of about fifteen hundred tents. They have cannon. Their general is a Col. Ward, a member of the late council, and who served with credit in the last war. His outposts are advanced so near the town that they can talk to those of General Gage. tains of the moon. Lord North stated in the House of Peers, in discussing the Boston Port Bill, that hereafter all vessels would be "searched at Marblenead in the province of Salem." In 1877, I was asked, across a dinner talile in Switz- erland, by the cousin of a conspicuous London writer, who had passed her whole life as a governesa teaching the girls of some of the best families in London, whether the Americans had begun to colonize west of the Alleghany Mountains! The geography of this Continent, except in outline, was no part of an English education until the unexpected result of our Civil War made it necessary to Ijnow more about us. If there is one thing tlie typical Englishman respects it is power, and after the Union triumphed, both in arms and in finance, the educated Briton made haste to study the phenomenon. By a " Gazette Extraordinary" I suppose is meant what our newsboys would now call a " Gazette Extra." CAPTAIN RICHARD DERBY I 7 12-1 783 Engraved for the Century Magazine from a portrait copied by J. Alden Weir after the original painting by Colonel Henry Sargent THE CRUISE OF THE QUEIiO. V "This looks serious, and is indeed so, but the Governor observed to me that the month of May is the time for sowing Indian corn, the great sustenance of the Province, and that, unless the Insurgents are determined to hasten a famine, they must have returned to their own habita- tions : especially as the restraining act (they had already heard of it) cuts off all foreign supply, which indeed generally becomes necessary to the Province before winter."^ In writinir to his son Thomas, Hutchinson says : "London, St. James's Strket 31 May, 1775. " My Dear Son, Captain Darby, in ballast, arrived at Southampton from Marble- head the 27, and came to London the next evening. I am greatly distressed for you. Darby's own accounts confirm many material parts of the narrative from the congress, and they that know him say he deserves credit and that he has a good character : but I think those people would not have been at the expense of a vessel from Marblehead or Salem to England for the sake of telling the truth." On the same day Hutchinson wrote Gage as follows : " St. James's Street, 31 May, 1775. " Dear Sir, — The arrival of Captain Darby from Salem on the 28th with dis- patches from the Congress at WatertoAvn, immediately published in the papers, has caused a general anxiety in the minds of all who wish the happiness of Britain and her Colonies. I have known the former interesting events have been partially represented : I therefore be- lieve with discretion the representation now received. It is unfortu- nate to have the first impression made from that quarter. I am informed that this manoeuver Avas conducted so privately that the ship's crew did not know they were bound to England until they B This is quite in line witii what Governoi- Hutchinson had told George III of the resources of this Province. The King. — " To what produce is yoiir climate best adapted?" Gov. Hutchinson. — " To grazing, Sir; 5"0ur Majesty has not a liner Colony for gi-ass in all your dominions: And nothing is more profitable in America than pasture, because labour is very dear." The King.—" Then you import all your bread corn from the other Colonies?" Gov. Hutchinson. — "No, Sir, scarce any, except for the use of the maritime towns. In the country towns the people raise grain enough for their own ex- pending and sometimes for exportation. They live upon coarse bread made of rye and corn mixed, and by long use they learn to prefer this to flour or wheat bread." The King. — " What corn ?" Got'. Hutchinson. — " Indian corn, or, as it is called in Authors, Maize." The King. — " Ay, I know it. Does that make good bread?" Gov. Hutchinson. — "Not by itself, Sir; the bread will soon be dry and husky; but the Rye keeps it moist, and some of our country people prefer a bushel of Rye to a bushel of Wheat, if the price should be the same." The King. — " That's very strange." 10 THE CRUISE OF THE "qUEKO." were on the Newfoundland Banks. It is said your dispatches are on Tjoard Captain Brown, who sailed some days before Darby. I hope they are at liand and -will aflbrd us some relief." Lord Dartmouth, the next day, addresses this official •cominiiiiicatioii to General Gage: " WHirEH.\LL, 1st June, 1775. " Sir: Since my letter to you of 27tli ult. au account has been printed here, accompanied "with depositions to verify it, of skirmishes be- tween a detachment of the troops under your command and difl'erent bodies of the Provincial Militia. It appears upon the fullest inquiry that this account, which is chiefly taken from a Salem newspaper, lias been published by a Capt. Darby, who arrived on Friday or Saturday at Southampton in a small vessel in bfillast, directly from Salem, and from every circumstance, relat- ing to this person and the vessel, it is evident he was employed by the Provincial Congress to bring this account, which is plainly made up for the purpose of conveying every possible prejudice and mis- representation of the truth. From the answers he has given to such questions as have been asked, there is the greatest probability that the whole amounts to no more than that a Detachment, sent by you to destroy Cannon and Stores collected at Concord for the purpose of aiding Rebellion, were fired upon, at difi'erent times, by the people of the Country in small bodies from behind trees & houses, but that the party effected the service tliey went upon, and returned to Boston, and I have the satis- faction to tell you that, the affair being considered in that light by all discerning men, it has had no other effect here than to raise that "just indignation Avhich every honest man must feel at the rebellions con- duct of the New England Colonies. At the same time it is very much to be lamented, that we have not some account from you of the transaction, Avhicli I do not mention from any supposition that you did not send the earliest intelligence of it, for we know from Darby that a vessel with dispatches sailed four days before him. We ex- pect the arrival of that vessel with great impatience, but 'till she ar- rives I can form no decisive judgment of what has happened, and therefore can have nothing more to add but that I am &c, Dartmouth." A private letter from London, dated the same day, reached the Provincial Conji^ress at Watertovvn and was there promulgated. Here is an extract : " The intelligence by Captain Darby of the defeat of General Gage's men under Lord Percy by the Americans on the 19th of April last has given very general pleasure here, as the newspapers will testify. 'Tis not with certainty that one can speak of the disposition of people in England with respect to the contest with America, though we are clear that the friends of America increase every day, particularly since the above intelligence. It is believed the ministers have not as yet formed any plan in consequence of the action of April 19. They are in total confusion and consternaticn and wait for General Gage's despatches by Captain Brown." THE CRUISE OF THE " QUEKO." 11 Urban's '' Gentleman's Magazine" of London, for May and June, 1775, contains expressions of the feeling awak- ened by these events and introduces Captain Derby to its readers in the first instance as a bearer of Government dispatches. It accepts his statements without question. Gibbon writes again to Holroyd : " Bentinck Street, June 3rd, 1775. "The American news becomes everj' hour more problematical. Darby, the master of the ship, has not coudescendecl to show to any one tiie original of the Salem Gazette. He has refused to come to Lord Dartmouth, and what is still more extraordinary, though he says he left his ship at Southampton, a person of consequence sent down there by government has not been able to learn the least news about it. Yet, on the other hand, a ship from New York is certainly ar- rived at Bristol with the report that k skirmish at Boston was talked of. No news from Gage." And again later in these words : " Though Darby's vessel cannot be found, it is pretty clear he is no impostor. He arrived in his boat at Southampton, and probal)ly left his ship in some creek of the Isle of Wight. He has now left town, and is gone, it is said, on a trading voyage to purchase ammunition in France and Spain. Do you not admire the lenity of government? This day news came that a sliip arrived at Liverpool from Rhode Isl- and. She sailed the 20th, the day after the Skirmish, -and has brought a general confirmation of it. There was a report that evening of the arrival of the " Sukey" from Gage, but it certainly is not true, and you know as much of the matter as Lord North." And so feeling rose higher as the mystery deepened. On June 3, Hutchinson wrote to his friend Dr. Samuel Johnson in these words : "London, St. James Street, 3rd Junk, 1775. " Our latest advices from New England are of a very serious na- ture to all ; they are very distressing to me, who ara so immediately interested in them. Bella ! Horrida Bella ! We have only one side, the Congress at Watertown having sent a light schooner which has been arrived six or seven days and no intelligence yet from the Gen- eral ; until that arrives, sentiments upon measures seem to be sus- pended. I hoar one and another of the king's ministers say there is no receding. And yet to think of going on makes me shudder. May God Almighty order the event in mercy to my unhappy country !" On that day Hutchinson'makes this entry in his diary : "June 3rd. Went into the City to Mr. Lane's counting room." [Lane and Fraser were for several generations 12 THE CRUISE OF THE "QDERO." the London correspoiulcMits of the Derby family.] " Found that Captain Darby had not been seen since tlie first in- stant ; that he had a letter of credit from Lane on some house in Spain. Afterwards I saw Mr. Pownall" [assist- ant Secretary of State under Lord Dartmouth] " at Lord Dartmouth's office, where I carried Colonel Pickman" [of Salem] "and Pownall was of opinion Darby was gone to Spain to pnrchase ammunition, arms, &c. We are still in a state of uncertainty concerning the action in Massachusetts. Vessels are arrived at Bristol, which met with other vessels on their passage, and received as news that there had been a battle, but could tell no particulars." The entry in the same diary I'or June 4th is as follows : " Mr. Keene " [a member of Parliament] " called, and seems much affected with the American news. He gave a hint about the Hessian and Hanoverian troops, but seemed to suppose them to serve as a suppletory for troops to go from home, rather than to be sent to America them- selves. "Wind still easterly and no intelligence. " It is said that Darby left his lodging:^ the first instant, and is supposed to have sailed. Mr. Pownall sent to Southampton to inquire, and the collector knew of no such vessel there, [t is supposed he left her in some small harbor or inlet and came in his boat to Southamp- ton. Many people began to complain of the publication, and wondered he had not been taken up and examined. He took a letter of credit, Colonel Pickman intimated, for Spain. He has said to some that he had a vessel gone or going to Spain with a cargo of fish : to others, that he was going for a load of mules." A Vienna correspondent of the New York " Gazette and Mercury " makes this explanation of the quandary in which Derby's seamanship had placed the ministry : "The ship SuKEY not yet arriving, on board of which the gov- ernment dispatches are, causes much altercati(m among the politicians. And yet it is what happens every day in the commercial world. " Captain Darby's ship which brought over the printed account, is a small vessel of about 60 tons, schooner rigged, and quite light ; and the ship Sukey is a large THE CRUISE OF THE " QUERO." 13 «hip, about 200 tons, and heavily loaded to a capital house in the Boston trade. These circumstances may very well account for the difference of time between the arrival of the two ships." On June 9th the " Sukey " with Gage's dispatch arrived at last. It did not much allay the feverish unrest. Hutchinson's diary contains this entry for June 10th : " A lieutenant in the navy arrived about noon at Lord Dartmouth's office. Mr. Pownall gave me notice, know- ing my anxiety ; but though relieved from suspense, yet received but little comfort, from the accounts themselves being much the same with what Darby brought. The material difference is the declaration by Smith, who was the commander of the first party though not present at the first action, that the inhabitants fired first, and though by the re- turns only 63 were killed outright, yet 157 were wounded, and 24 missing; which upon the whole is a greater num- ber than Darby reported but not so many killed." A private letter from Leeds, dated June 10, says : . . . " One of the Lords in administration was actually at St. Dunstan's Church on Thursday evening to offer up his prayers for the arrival of the Sukey, and good iiews from the king's friends in America." The London Press contained this comment : " To THE PUBLICK. " London, Junk 12, 1775. " When the news of a massacre first arrived, the pensioned writer of the Gazette entreated the publick 'to suspend their judgment, as Government had received no tidings of the matter.' It was added that there was every reason to expect despatches from General Gage, by a vessel called the Sukey.' The publick have suspended their judgment; they have waited the arrival of the Sukey ; and the humane part of mankind have wished that the fatal tale related by Captain Derby might prove altogether fictitious. To the great grief of every thinking man, this is not the case. We are now in possession of both the accounts. The Americans have given their narrative of the mas- sacre ; the favourite official servants have given a Scotch account of the skirmish. In what one material fact do the two relations, when contrasted with each other, disagree? The Americans said ' that a detachment of the King's Troops advanced towards Concord; that they attempted to secure two bridges on different roads beyond Con- cord ; that when they reached Lexington they found a body of Provin- cials exercising on a green ; that on discovering the Provincial militia thus employed, the King's Troops called out to them to disperse, 14 THE CRUISE OF THE " QUERO." damned them for a parcel of rebels, and killed one or two, as the most effectual method of intimidating the rest.' This the writer of the Scotch account in the Gazette stj'les, ' niarchino; up to the rebels to inquire the reason of being so assembled.' Botli relations, however, agree in this, that a question was asked ; the pensioned varnisher only sa3'ing that it was asked in a civil way, attended Avith the loss of blood. "Thus far, then, the facts, in every material circumstance, precisely agree ; and as yet, we have every reason to believe that the Salem Gazette is to the full as authentick as our Government paper, which, as a literary composition, is a disgrace to the Kingdom. "The Salem Gazette assuredus that the King's Troops were compelled to return from Concord; that a handful of militia put them to rout, and killed and wounded several as they fled. Is this contradicted in the English Gazette? quite the contrary ; it is confirmed. The Scotch account of the skirmish acknowledges that ' on the hasty return of the troops from Concord, they were very much annoyed, and several of them were killed and wounded.' The Scotch account also adds ' that the Provincials kept up a scattering fire during the whole of the march of the King's Troops of fifteen miles, by which means several of them were killed and wounded.' If the American Militia ' kept up a scattering fire on the King's Troops, of fifteen miles,' the Pro- vincials must have pursued, and the Regulars must have fled, which confirms the account given in the Salem Gazette, wherein it is asserted that the liegulars ' were forced to retreat.' Whether they marched like mutes at a funeral, or whether they fled like the relations and friends of the present ministry who were amongst the rebel army at the battle of Cullodon, is left entirely to the conjecture of the reader ; though it should seem that a scattering Are, poured in upon a retreat- ing enemy for fifteen miles together, would naturally, like goads ap- plied to the sides of oxen, make them march off as fast as they could." July 1st, Dartmouth sent Gage this mild rebuke : "Whitehall, 1st July, 1775. *' Sir : On the 10th of last month in the morninu:. Lieutenant Nunn arrived at my oftlce with your despatch containing an account of the transaction on the 19th of April of which the public had before received intelligence by a schooner, to all appearances sent by the enemies of government, on purpose to make an impression here by representing the afl'air between the King's troops and the rebel Pro- vincials in a light the most favorable to their own view. Their industry on this occasion had its effect, in leaving for some days a false im- pression upon people's minds, and I mention it to you with a hope that, in any future event of importance, it will be thought proper, both by yourself and the admiral, to send your dispatches by one of the light vessels of the fleet. "^ We have quoted enough to show the state of panic into which the arrival of the Salem sailor plunged British • Dartmoutli's dispatch from Gage, with its inclosui-ef?, is printed in full in the Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, Vol. xiv, pp. 348-53. THE CRUISE OF THE " QUEUO." 15- society near the throne. A word will he psirdoned ex- plaining the scheme upon which Captain Derby acted. The hot, tumultuous April day of blood was scarcely over before the more sagacious of the Patriots about Bos- ton were planning how to make the most of the new sit- uation. It was their first care to show that they were within the law ; not the aggressors, — not disturbers of the peace of the realm, but champions of the rights of Englishmen. Let them tell the story in their own words. Three days after the battle, Saturday, April 22nd, the Provincial Congress sat at Concord, and voted a com- mittee " to take depositions in perpetuam from which a full account of the transactions of the troops under Gen- eral Gage in the route to and from Concord on Wednes- day last may be collected to be sent to England by the first ship from Salem." Captain Richard Derby, a retired shipmaster of Salem, seems to have been a member of that Congress. It had organized itself at Salem in the preceding October. He had been present at the North Bridge in Salem in February, and had helped to frustrate there Gage's attempt to seize some nineteen ships' guns which were being mounted for the use of Massachusetts as field artillery. Eight of these guns belonged to him. He had suffered, both in purse and person, from the arro- gance of the ministerial policy, and was ready on the in- stant to do what he could to further the purposes of the Provincial Congress. He was engaged at the moment, as a prosperous merchant, in trade with the West Indies and the Mediterranean ports. In this trade he employed, for the most part, small craft of fifty or sixty tons burden. The typical seagoing schooner of the period is here depict- ed from a painting of the "Baltick," one of the three water-color drawings of her in possession of the Essex Institute, though the " Baltick " was not owned by Captain Derby .'^ The spirit in which Captain Derby received news 'The relative tonna":e of trading craft before and since the Revolution is a point of intereet. William Gray's great lleet, claimed to have been at times the largest in the country, when it did not employ lighters, came up the South River to hie little wharf, which was located at the South Bridge. Richard Derby, at various dates, owned amongst his fleet the schooner "Three Brothers," of fifty- five tons, navigated by a master, mate, and three men, which was captured, July, 1759, by a British Privateer, and which was bound to St. Eustatia in 1761 ; also the "Betsey," of fifty tons, taken in 1761 by a French Cruiser between Newfound- land and Guadeloupe; also the twenty-ton schooner "Mary," sailing, in 1762,, 16 THE CRUISE OF THE " QUEKO." of the first bloodshed appears in his letter of instructions to Captain Hathorne, not before in print, which follows: "Salem, May y*^ 9, 1775. " Capt. Dan' Hathorn of Scfiooner Patty, West Indies : " Sir " I suppose you will be glad to hear from liorae, but thiugs are in such a confused state I know uot what to write you. Boston is now blocked up by at least 30,000 men. We have had no action since y* 19 of April, which was very bloody. They, y" Regulars, came out in y« night, silently up Cambridge river, and got almost to Concord be- fore ^ay, so that y^ country had a very short time to get out. Had we had one hour longer not a soul of those blood-thirsty creatures would ever have reached Boston. However, they got a dire drubbing so that they have not played y^ Yankee tune since. We have lost a number of brave men but we have killed, taken and rendered justice, I believe, at least 8 to 1, and I believe such a spirit never was, every- body striving to excel. We have no Tories, saving what is noAv shut up in Boston or gone off. There hath not been as yet any stopping of y** trade, so I'would have you get a load of molasses as good and cheap and as quick as you can and proceed home. If you have not sold, and y'' markets are bad where you are, you have liberty to pro- ceed any other ways, either to y« Mole, Jamaica, or to make a fresh with three men, to Cape Francois and the Island of Hispaniola; also the schooners " Polly " and " Ransrer," besides the " Patty," Captain Hathorne. few of the Custom House books, kept before the Revolution, are at the State House, and their loss is in no way accounted for unless by the Are of October, 1774, at Town House Square, or by the evacuation of Boston, March 17, 1776. The Records made between 1774 and 1789 have not been traced at all, although the State Archives contain seven volumes of maritime papers dated between 1775 and 1781. The svstem of admeasurement has, of course, been changed several times, so that the'relative capacity of bottoms is not to be exactly estimated by the nominal tonnage of to-day. I am indebted to Special Deputy Collector Hitchings of the Custom House at this port, for these facts : The first Act of Congress since the Constitution, for the admeasurement of vessels, was passed Aug. 4, 1790. It was modified by Act of March 2, 1799, which did not chani^e the method, and this svstem continued until the Act of May G, 1864, which made the nominal tonnage of a vessel less. For instance, the Schr. " Montezuma," measuring 99 3-95 under Act of Aug. 4, 1790, measured 65 19100 tons under Act of Mav 6, 1S64. The Act of Aug. 2, 1882, allowed the deduction of spaces for crew on the gross tonnage, not to exceed 5 per cent. This made the Alontezuma's tonnage 65 19-10!i gross, —61 9.'!-100 net. The Act of March 5, 1895, allowed the deduction of all spaces which the crew occupied, and that part of the cabin used exclusively by the Master; also that part used for Boatswain's stores, Anchor gear, Steering gear, Chart-house and Storage of sails, not to ex- ceed 2 1-2 per cent of the gross tonnage, so that the present nominal tonnage nets a little less than two-thirds that of 1790. There is no information on file at the Custom House of this Port governing the tonnage of vessels prior to the above dates, but if the prerevolutionary system of admeasurement was like that adopted in 1790, which, in the absence of fig- ures, seems improbable, then it would appear that the " Quero," measuring 62 tons, would if measured since March, 1895, net only 39 2-3 tons. The size of these vessels, carrying a fewguns, used in foreign trade and encountering all the perils of freebooters, privateers, and hostile navies, besides those of Atlantic naviga- tion, cannot but excite "our special wonder." See the Driver Family by Harriet Ruth Waters-Cooke (1889) pp. 103-13. Also Hunt's Merchants' Magazine, " Elias Hasket Derby." Vol. xxxvi, pp. 149-53. THE CRUISE OF THE QUERO. 17 bottom, or anything else that you may think likely to help y« voyage, but always to keep your money in your own hands. 1 remain your friend and employer, pr. Capt. Clkaveland Richard Derby." Captain Richard Derby owned at that time a little, fast- sailing schooner called the "Qnero," of 62 tons burden — a mere yacht — and to prepare so small a craft for sea would take bnt little time, and would employ bnt few hands, so that the secret conld be the better kept. He offered her to the Cong'reas. Captain Derby's two sons, Richard Junior, and John, enlisted with him in the venture. His younger son,Elias Hasket Derby, was in his counting-room keep- ing books. Richard was to fit out and John, thirty-four years old, was to command the " Quero."^ In a very few days she was ready to weigh anchor. Gage's dispatch by the Royal express-packet " Sukey " had sailed, April 24 ; 8 A Latinist might say that the Quero had been well named, for a craft that was to play at "hide-and-seei" with the Britisli Navy. In point of fact there was a fishing ground al)out a hundred miles to the eastward of Cape Sable, known as the "Bank of Quero," and much frequented by our hardy flsher-folk in former years. Also there is a river in Honduras, bearing the name "Quero," and flowing Into the Caribbean Sea. The river would not be unknown to our traders in the West Indies. From one or the other of these the brave little schooner doubtless got her name. There is a town of ."Quero" in the mountains of Spain and another In Italy. But these are both interior towns in no way related to American com- merce. What "Quero" means in these connections, the linguists must determine. 18 THE CRUISE OF THE " QUERO." but that gave no uneasiness, for the packet was slow and deep-laden. The first difficulty to be encountered was in getting out of port. The "Lively " frigate, destined soon after to fire the opening shot at Bunker Hill, was then on guard off the harbors of Salem, Marblehead and Beverly, to enforce the Port Bill and search every out-going and in-coming vessel. The Congress at Watertown had, on April 26th, passed a vote accrediting to Franklin Captain Derby's mission, and reciting the grievances which had produced the out- break. It was in these words : "In Provincial Congress, Watertown, April 26, 1775. " To THE Hon. Benjamin Franklin, Esq., London: "Sir: From the entire confldence we repose in your faithfulness and abilities, we consider it the happiness of this Colony that the im- portant trust of ajs^eucy for it, on tliis day of unequalled distress, is devolved on your hands ; and we doubt not your attachment to the cause of the liberties of mankind will make every possible exertion In our behalf a pleasure to you, although our circumstances will com- pel us often to interrupt your repose by matters that will surely give you pain. A single instance hereof is the occasion of the present letter; the contents of this packet will be our apology for troubling you with it. From these you will see how and by Avhom we are at last plunged into the horrours of a most unnatural war. Our enemies, we are told, have despatched to Great Britain a fallacious account of the tragedy they have begun ; to prevent the operation of which to the publick injury, we have engaged the vessel that conveys this to you as a packet in the service of this Colony, and we request your assistance in supplying Captain Derby, who commands her, with such necessaries as he shall want, on the credit of your constituents in Massachusetts- Bay. But we most ardently wish that the several pa- pers herewith enclosed may be immediately printed and dispersed through every Town in England, and especially communicated to the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Common Council of the City of London, that they may take such order thereon as they may think proper ; and we are confident your fidelity will make such improvement of them as shall convince all who are not determined to be in everlasting blindness, that it is the united efforts of both Englands that must save either. But whatever price our brethren in one may be pleased to put on their constitutional liberties, we are authorized to assure you that the inhabitants of the other, with the greatest unanimity, are inflex- ibly resolved to sell theirs only at the price of their lives. " Signed by order of the Provincial Congress : Jos. Warren, President pro tern." The following order had previously passed, the same day: "In provincial Congress, Watertown, Apr 26-1775 " Ordered that y^ Hona Richd Derby, Esq^, be & he here- THE CRUISE OF THE *' QUERO." 19 by is impoweied to fit out his vessel as a packet to Great Britain in y*' Service of this Colony & to Charge y® Col- ony with y^ hire of y® Vessel & all other expences which he shall be at for port charges Victiielling, necessaries &c "Ordered that a Committee be now appointed to draught a letter to y® agent of this Colony Benjamin Franklin Esqre to be sent with y'' papers now preparing for G. Britain & that y® agent be desired to supply Capt. John Derby with such Necessaries as he shall want, on y'' Credit of this Colony & to assist & serve sd Capt. Derby in any other respect. "Ordered that Henry Gardner, Esqre, deliver to the Hon' Richard Derby, Esqre, Thirteen Pounds, Six Shill- ings & eight pence for "fitting out his vessel as a packet in y^ service of this Colony." Endorsed " order for fitting out a packet handed in by y^ Committee of safety and passed as an order, April 26, 1775." At last, on the 27th of April, sailing orders passed the Congress. And the " Quero " seems to have escaped at some hour of the night between the 28th and 29th. Whether the order to land in Ireland was meant in good faith to be observed, or merely as a blind. Captain Derby appears to have disregarded it. The vote of April 27 was as follows : " Resolved : that Captain Derby be directed and he hereby is directed to make for Dublin or any other good port in Ireland, and from ihence to cross to Scotland or England, and hasten to London. This direc- tion is given that so he may escape all enemies that may be in the chops of the channel to stop the communication of the Provincial in- telligence to the agent. He will forthwith deliver his papers to the agent on reaching London. J. Warren, chairman. " P. S. You are to keep this order a profound secret from every person on earth." Thus stoutly equipped the Salem Captain gave himself to the work in hand. He made the best of his way across the ocean and reached port after a twenty-nine days pas- sage — a good passage in those days. Just where he made land it is impossible to say. The conjecture that he was put ashore in a boat in some inlet of the Isle of 20 THE CRUISE OF THE QUERO. Wight, having put his first officer iu command, and ordered the "Quero " to Falmouth, at the southwestern extremity of Enghind, and that he crossed by public conveyance from the Isle of Wight to Southampton, and thence pushed on THE CKUISE OF THE "QUERO." 21 to London, would seem to explain all the facts that are absolutely known. The " Quero " can hardly have been at;^outham[>ton, from the fact that the Customs Officers in that section, acting upon urgent directions from White- hall, could find no trace of her. The chances of a suc- cessful landing would seem to have been better almost anywhere than in the Channel and close by Portsmouth, the great naval station. Yet the point was near London, and American sailors were at home in those waters, and the boldest risk is often the safest. In one way or an- other Captain Derby reached London unmolested, May 28, and with his startling intelligence set the Kingdom on fire. The bills rendered for this extraordinary service are unique and, together with the action of the Congress, are to be read in full in the Archives of Massachusetts. It will be noted that while the Derbys were wonderfully favored in avoiding collisions with the King's Navy they did not wholly escape doing violence to the King's Eng- lish. They only asserted that common eighteenth-century right, now so generally renounced, which made the spell- ing of the mother tongue, at that day, a " matter of pri- vate judgment." The bill for fitting out the "Quero " was rendered by Richard Derby, Jr., and was paid to Elias Hasket Derby, August 1, 1775. William Gray, the great merchant, seems to have contributed £10, sterling, to- wards her outfit. The voucher is in these words : the Province Massachusetts-Bay to Eichard Derby ju. D'' for the Hire Victueling, Port Charges, Portledg Bill, &c for the Schooner Quero, Voyage from Salem in New England to Great Britain and back to Salem aforesaid, in the Service of this Coloney — viz : Avith Depo- sitions relative to Battle of Lexington. 1775. th April 25 To 3 barrils Bread w. 2. 3. N. a 25/4 p 3. 9. 8. To 1 bus. Beans 6/, I 1/2 bus. Pease a 4/ . 12. . To Ibi . . Flour 18/, 25"> Candles a 9 ^ 1. 16. 9 Charges of Clearing at the Several Offices 3 . . To 20 Tuns Ballust a 2/8 175 feet Plank (.P. Measure) a 8/ .p 3. 7. 4. To 2 Cords wood a 13/4 p mile / 4. 1.").0 My Expences in London 7. 17. Post Chaise hire from London to Falmouth in the ■west of England by the way of Portsmouth 294 miles a Qd p mile, Except the two First Stages from London which is 1/ p mile 11. 8. To My Expences from London to Falmouth 2. 5. To paid the Sarcher & waiters at Falmouth 1. 0. Sum See Coles for Fireing 1. 4. To Light money, Pierage, & Clearance at Castle &c 3. 12. S^bi Bread a 19/ & Carriage 2. 17. 8 Seib Beef a B"!, 12»» Candles a 9