LIFE

OF

COMMODORE JOHN PAUL JONES.

CHAPTER I.

OHN PAUL JONES was born on the 6th of July, 1747, at Arbigland, in the parish of Kirkbean, and stewartry of Kirckudbright, in Scotland.

The family of the Pauls was originally from Fife; but the grandfather of John Paul,-the name of Jones being long after

wards assumed, kept a public, or as it was then called, a mail-garden in Leith, on a spot long since covered with buildings. His son, the father of John Paul Jones, followed the same profession; and, on finishing his apprenticeship, entered into the employment of Mr. Craik of Arbigland, in which he remained till his death, in 1767.

A gardener at that period was understood to be a person of better education than a common operative mechanic in ordinary handicrafts. The father of Paul Jones must have been a man both of intelligence and worth. The garden of

Arbigland was laid out by him; and he planted the trees that now embellish the mansion. The period of his service, and the interest which his employer took in his orphan family, established the general worth and respectability of his character.

*

Shortly after entering into the employment of Mr. Craik, John Paul married Jean Macduff, the daughter of a small farmer in the neighbouring parish of New-Abby. The Macduffs were a respectable rural race in their own district; and some of them had been small landed proprietors in the parish of Kirkbean, for an immemorial period. Of this marriage there were seven children, of whom John-afterwards known as John Paul Jones-was the fifth: he may indeed be called the youngest, as two children born after him died in infancy. The first-born of the family, William Paul, went abroad early in life, and finally settled and married in Fredericksburgh, in Virginia. He appears to have been a man of enterprise and judgment. Beyond his early education and virtuous habits he could have derived no advantage from his family; and, in 1772 or 1773, when he died, still a young man, he left a considerable fortune. Of the daughters, the eldest, Elizabeth, died unmarried,-Janet, the second, married Mr. Taylor, a watchmaker in Dumfries,-and the third, Mary Ann, was twice married, first to a Mr. Young, and afterwards to Mr. Louden. Of the relations of Admiral Jones, several nieces, and a grand-nephew, now in the United States, still survive.

* Among the many calumnies by which the memory of Admiral Paul Jones has been loaded, and the numerous vulgar traditions that hang about his reputation, and conceal his genuine character, is an absurd story of his having been the son of either Mr. Craik, his father's employer, of one of the Earls of Selkirk, or of some other great personage, name unknown; as if it were impossible that a man so distinguished by gallantry and enterprise, could be, in very deed, merely the fifth child of Mr. John Paul, the gardener. His correspondence in the farther progress of his narrative will sufficiently refute an obsolete slander which was perhaps scarcely worth notice.

.

The residence of his father, near the shores of the Solway, in one of the most beautifui points of the Frith, must have been favourable to the genius of one who was destined to play the part of John Paul Jones-to have,

"His march upon the mountain wave,

His home upon the deep."

In the traditions of his family, young Paul is described as launching, while a mere child, his mimic-ship, hoisting his flag, and issuing his mandates to his imaginary crew with all the firmness and dignity of one born to lead and to command his fellows.

Among the numerous unfounded slanders and rumours of which this brave and misrepresented man has been the object, is the assertion, that he ran off to sea against the will of his relations. Even this transgression might have been atoned by his after life; but it was not committed. His inclination for the bold and hardy mode of life which he adopted, appears, as it often does in boyhood, to have been a strong passion, fostered by his childish pastimes, and encouraged by much that he saw and heard in his daily intercourse with ships and seamen. Man or boy, Paul Jones was not moulded in the stamp of character which shrinks from facing out what is once firmly resolved. A sailor's life was his decided choice; and at the age of twelve he was sent across the Solway by his relations, and bound apprentice to Mr. Younger, of Whitehaven. This gentleman, who was then a respectable merchant in the American trade, he found a kind and liberal master.

Though Paul Jones was thus early estranged from his family, and was afterwards prevented from much personal intercourse with them, this narrative will afford abundant evidence that, like almost every other young Scottish adventurer to the national honour be it told he continued a most affectionate son and brother, even when at the highest eleva

tion of his fortune; giving constant proof, not merely of his readiness to minister to the comforts of his relations, but of his anxiety for the union, respectability, and prosperity of his sisters and their families.-To them he at last bequeathed the whole of his fortune.

The education which young Paul received at the parishschool of Kirkbean, must have terminated when he went to sea. His after acquirements—and they were considerable— were the fruits of private study, and of such casual opportunities as in boyhood he had the forethought and good sense to improve as often as his ship came into port. His first voyage was made to America, the country of his after adoption. (He sailed in the Friendship, of Whitehaven; and, before he was thirteen, landed on the shores of Rappahannock. While the Friendship remained in port, young Paul lived in the house of his brother William, and assiduously studied navigation and other branches of learning, either connected with his profession or of general utility.

In the course of a short time, his good conduct, intelligence, and knowledge of his profession, procured him the confidence and friendship of his master, who promised him his future protection and favour. From the subsequent embarrassment of his own affairs, Mr. Younger was unable to fulfil this promise; but, in giving the young seaman up his indentures, he did all he could then perform. Thus honourably released from his early engagements, Paul Jones, while still a mere boy, obtained the appointment of third mate of the King George of Whitehaven, a vessel engaged in the slave-trade. From this ship he went about the year 1766, being now nineteen years of age, into the brigantine Two Friends, of Kingston, Jamaica, as chief mate. This ship was engaged in the same nefarious traffic. It is stated by his relatives, the only source of information on the early period of his life that is either accessible or to be relied on, that he quitted this abominable trade in disgust at its enormities; and, in conse