f Paria - Ins and Outs of Trinidad & Tobago 2013

History
In 1761, at the age of thirteen, he was
apprenticed to John Younger and was
bound for seven years during which time
he would learn the mariner’s profession,
and he embarked as ship’s boy in the
brig Friendship outward bound for
Barbados and Virginia. In 1764, due to a
depression in trade, John Younger sold
the Friendship and relieved John Paul of
his apprenticeship.
John Paul, then at the age of seventeen,
served as third mate on the King George
out of Whitehaven for two years and
afterwards as mate on the Two Friends
from which after one round voyage, he
obtained his discharge. He secured a
passage back to Scotland in the sixtyton
brig, John, during which the master
and mate died, and John Paul assumed
command and brought the ship safely
home to the owners at Kirkcudbright. As a
result he was appointed to the command
of the John and in that capacity he made
at least two voyages to the West Indies,
including Tobago, where he established
business contacts. The owners sold the
John in 1771 and John Paul received an
honourable discharge from her.
By October 1772, when John Paul was
twenty-five years old, he had accumulated
enough funds and goodwill to purchase his
own ship the Betsy and traded between
England, Ireland, Madeira and Tobago.
The Betsy was a sound ship and John Paul,
a clever trader. In Tobago, he established
a partnership with Archibald Stuart who
was one of the leading merchants and
planters of the island and part owner of the
Roxborough Estate. In 1773, John Paul was
well on his way to realising his dream of
becoming a gentleman farmer in Virginia,
for some fifty gentlemen in Tobago owed
him a total of £2,000 for merchandise and
services rendered.
While anchored in Rockley Bay,
Scarborough, in October of that year, he
went ashore to visit friends and business
associates and on his return to the ship he
found a sorry state of affairs. One member
of the crew had enticed other members
to mutiny. The ringleader, a Tobagonian,
then attacked John Paul with a bludgeon.
The Captain rushed to his cabin seeking
something to protect himself with; his
sword was the only thing in sight. As the
ringleader was about to strike, he stabbed
him with it and the mutineer died on the
spot.
Following this unfortunate incident,
Captain Paul immediately went to a Justice
of the Peace and offered to surrender
himself. The Governor, William Young,
advised him to flee the island and return
when an Admiralty Court was in session.
He took this advice and rode on horseback
to Courland Bay where he got passage
on a ship sailing to a neighbouring
island where he was able to make his
way to America. To conceal his identity,
he changed his name to John Paul Jones
and never returned to Tobago to stand
trial because some twenty months later,
fighting began between England and the
American colonies in what was to be the
American War of Independence.
John Paul Jones was given a commission
in the new continental navy and in
December 1775, was made Lieutenant of
the frigate Alfred. In 1776, he was given
command of the sloop Providence and
proceeded to capture more than twenty
Englishmen. In 1777, Capt. Jones (as he
had then become) was given the Ranger
in which he sailed to France in 1778, and
knowing the English and Scottish coasts,
boldly began a foray which ended when
he spiked the guns at Whitehaven without
having a single man wounded.
Finally in 1779, he was given the
Bonhomme Richard, and along the east
coast of England, off Flamborough Head,
he challenged the might of the British
navy on September 23, when in combat
with the frigate Serapis. Captain Richard
Pearson offered Jones quarter but he
refused, shouting, “I have not yet begun
to fight!” Jones won the battle.
John Paul Jones became a famous
Captain in the American War of
Independence, and is regarded by many
as the father of the United States Navy.
He died in Paris in 1792. In 1905, the
U.S. Congress voted £7,000 to remove
his remains from Paris to the USA where
they were placed in the Naval Academy
at Anapolis in 1906. His casket was finally
interred in the crypt of the Academy’s
chapel on January 26, 1913.
140
The Ins & Outs of Trinidad and Tobago