| History | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Name: | Charming Sally |
| Fate: | Scuttled 14 August 1779 |
| General characteristics | |
| Tons burthen: | c.300 (bm) |
| Sail plan: | Sloop |
| Complement: | 70 |
| Armament: | 18–22 × 6 &/or 9-pounder guns |
Charming Sally was a privateer in service with the Continental Navy in 1779, during the American Revolutionary War.
A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. The commission, also known as a letter of marque, empowers the person to carry on all forms of hostility permissible at sea by the usages of war, including attacking foreign vessels during wartime and taking them as prizes. Historically, captured ships were subject to condemnation and sale under prize law, with the proceeds divided between the privateer sponsors, shipowners, captains and crew. A percentage share usually went to the issuer of the commission. Since robbery under arms was once common to seaborne trade, all merchant ships were already armed. During war, naval resources were auxiliary to operations on land so privateering was a way of subsidizing state power by mobilizing armed ships and sailors.
The Continental Navy was the navy of the United States during the American Revolutionary War, and was formed in 1775. The fleet cumulatively became relatively substantial through the efforts of the Continental Navy's patron John Adams and vigorous Congressional support in the face of stiff opposition, when considering the limitations imposed upon the Patriot supply pool.
The American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), also known as the American War of Independence, was an 18th-century war between Great Britain and its Thirteen Colonies which declared independence as the United States of America.
Previously a merchant ship, Charming Sally entered Continental Navy service when her master, Alexander Holmes, master, received a letter of marque on 27 January 1779. [1]
A letter of marque and reprisal was a government license in the Age of Sail that authorized a private person, known as a privateer or corsair, to attack and capture vessels of a nation at war with the issuer. Once captured, the privateer could then bring the case of that prize before their own admiralty court for condemnation and transfer of ownership to the privateer. A letter of marque and reprisal would include permission to cross an international border to effect a reprisal and was authorized by an issuing jurisdiction to conduct reprisal operations outside its borders.
Around 20 May, Charming Sally, the Massachusetts letter of marque Cadwallader, and the New Hampshire letter of marque Minerva sailed from Portsmouth, New Hampshire, with cargoes of lumber for the West Indies. [2] In early June the three encountered the British privateer Revenge, of some 24 carriage guns, Sheppard, master, which had left Halifax, Nova Scotia, some 12 days earlier. [Note 1] A two-hour engagement ensued, with Charming Sally bearing the brunt of the action. Revenge struck after she had five men killed and several wounded, and had sustained substantial damage. Charming Sally had lost one man killed and three men wounded. The three American ships then escorted their prize to Boston, where they arrived on 10 June. Charming Sally remained in Boston to refit, while her two companions resumed their journeys, only to have the British capture them later. [3]
Portsmouth is a city in Rockingham County, New Hampshire, United States. As of the 2010 census it had a population of 21,233, and in 2017 the estimated population was 21,796. A historic seaport and popular summer tourist destination on the Piscataqua River bordering the state of Maine, Portsmouth was formerly the home of the Strategic Air Command's Pease Air Force Base, since converted to Portsmouth International Airport at Pease.
Halifax, formally known as the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM), is the capital of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. It had a population of 403,131 in 2016, with 316,701 in the urban area centred on Halifax Harbour. The regional municipality consists of four former municipalities that were amalgamated in 1996: Halifax, Dartmouth, Bedford, and Halifax County.
Charming Sally participated in the disastrous, for the Americans, Penobscot Expedition in July and was destroyed there to prevent her capture. [1] The American colonel John Brewer declared her "burnt and blown up". [4] As Sally, she is one of the 15 American vessels that Schomberg lists as having been scuttled on 14 August by their crews to avoid their being captured. [5]
The Penobscot Expedition was a 44-ship American naval task force mounted during the Revolutionary War by the Provincial Congress of the Province of Massachusetts Bay. The flotilla of 19 warships and 25 smaller support vessels sailed from Boston on July 19, 1779 for the upper Penobscot Bay in the District of Maine carrying a ground expeditionary force of more than 1,000 colonial Marines and militiamen. Also included was a 100-man artillery detachment under the command of Lt. Colonel Paul Revere. The Expedition's goal was to reclaim control of what is now mid-coast Maine from the British who had seized it a month earlier and renamed it New Ireland. It was the largest American naval expedition of the war. The fighting took place both on land and at sea in and around the mouth of the Penobscot and Bagaduce Rivers at what is today Castine, Maine over a period of three weeks in July and August of 1779. One of its greatest victories of the war for the British, the Expedition was also the United States' worst naval defeat until Pearl Harbor 162 years later in 1941.
