Maritime Historical Studies Centre, University of Hull
HMS Rose and the American War of Independence
FAR HORIZONS – to the ends of the Earth | Robb Robinson
HMS Rose and the American War of Independence
HMS Rose was built by the Blaydes family in Hull in 1757. Carrying only twenty
guns, she was classified as a sixth rate ship, the smallest size of frigate to be
commanded by someone holding the rank of captain. She was the equivalent of a
modern day destroyer and was not intended to participate in major fleet
engagements, except for communications, but was designed to operate as a scout
ship or for patrol duties off enemy coasts.
The Seven Years War started in the year that the Rose was launched. This conflict
was a grim global struggle between Britain and France and, after leaving Hull and
being commissioned, the vessel saw action off the French coasts and in the
Caribbean. In 1768 the Navy Board considered the Rose for Cook’s first voyage but
in the end the frigate was despatched to the North America station.
Blaydes House, High Street, Hull - home and place of business of the
Blaydes family who built the HMS Rose in 1757
(source: Maritime Historical Studies Centre - www.hull.ac.uk/mhsc)
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HMS Rose and the American War of Independence
The warship arrived off the coast of New England at a time when the relationship
between the colonies and the government in London was deteriorating. Many
economic, social and political factors contributed to an increasing rift between Britain
and her original thirteen North American colonies and the simmering discontents
came to the boil in the years following the British victory in the Seven Years War
which pushed the French out of Canada and lifted any threat of their invading the
British colonies. Trade and taxes were certainly a source of intense aggravation:
many in the colonies were irked by the imposition of new taxes intended to recoup
some of the costs of defeating the French. Moreover, in the past there had been
widespread colonial evasion of several British regulations which the Americans
regarded as oppressive but renewed attempts by the British government to enforce
the letter of the law increased tensions and widened the rift.
The Rose sailed straight into this simmering conflict for a key part of her new role
was to enforce British policy and stamp out smuggling. This soon brought the ship
and her crew into conflict with the colonists. The British garrison in Boston became
increasingly beleaguered as relations between the two sides worsened and the Rose
spent a good deal of her time patrolling the north east coast of America, enforcing
the hated regulations seeking out provisions and sometimes impressing American
seamen. The Press was, of course, hated in American as well as in British ports and
in 1768, the year that the Rose arrived on station there had been press gang riots in
Boston. A year later, in 1769, four Americans killed an officer whilst resisting a press
gang from the Rose and were brought before a Boston court on charges of piracy
and murder but the American jury found the accused men not guilty on the grounds
of ‘justifiable homicide’. Their acquittal could be seen as a significant event in terms
of the approaching revolution for, as Tager says, Bostonians had made a stand
about protecting themselves. ‘This position easily translated into a willingness to
rebel’.
Relations between the British and the American colonies became worse after the
Tea Act of 1773 by which the British government exempted the East India Company
on paying import duties on goods destined for the colonies. This gave the East India
Company a virtual monopoly and injured the interests of American importers.
American business interests were incensed, attempts were made to block tea
imports and, of course, on the 16th December 1773, a group of Boston citizens
dressed up as American Indians, boarded vessels in the harbour and emptied tea
into the harbour. The ‘Boston Tea Party’, as it was known, brought retaliatory action
from the British in the form of the Coercive Acts of 1774 which closed the port of
Boston until the duties were paid.
Events gathered pace, provincial congresses had already been formed in a number
of colonies and in September 1774, the first continental congress of the colonies met
in Philadelphia. This urged a boycott of British trade and drew up a declaration or
rights and grievances. At this time there seems to have been little call for
independence but armed resistance began in April 1775 when colonial militia
opposed British forces sent to Lexington and Concord to collect arms. Soon
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HMS Rose and the American War of Independence
afterwards the American militias besieged Boston and the British forces evacuated
the port about eleven months later.
The hard line taken by the British authorities ashore and in London was certainly
echoed by the Rose’s commander, James Wallace. He later expressed the opinion
that America had grown rich at the expense and not the advantage of Great Britain
and that North Americans in particular were rivals to British trade rather than
merchants in it. His actions, as the situation deteriorated during 1774, were hardly
conciliatory. In December 1774 the Rose and HMS Glasgow, along with several
smaller vessels were sent to the colony of Rhode Island with orders to stamp out
smuggling.
During the following months, the deteriorating situation made it difficult for the ships
to get provisions in Newport but Wallace’s response was nothing if not robust. He
allowed his sailors and marines to take what they wanted from the town but supplies
dried up as the townsfolk drove their livestock deep into the countryside. Undeterred,
on the 7th October, Wallace weighed anchor and sailed down the coast: to the small
town of Bristol. Wallace probably knew that some townsfolk of Bristol had joined the
militias and may have heard reports that some privately armed craft from there had
harassed and attacked British shipping.
Wallace’s vessels dropped anchor close to the port. After some brief formalities he
issued an ultimatum to the town. He requested that four representatives come
aboard the Rose and that if this did not happen, the town would be attacked. The
Bristol officials did not come on board and after an hour the fleet began a heavy
cannonade that lasted for several hours. Terrified townsfolk ran in every direction
and although most of the guns were set to fire over the buildings and into the
neighbouring fields, several buildings including the church, courthouse and a
brewery were hit.
The firing continued into the night but after a meeting with one of the town’s leaders
who came aboard, Wallace agreed to give Bristol six hours to send a full committee
of townsfolk on board to parley. The town’s representatives rowed across to the ship
before dawn and terms were negotiated. Although Wallace initially demanded much
more he agreed to settle for forty sheep which were duly delivered. . The following
day his vessels had moved along the coast to Poppasquash Point and his men
plundered ninety cows and various chickens and other livestock from nearby farms.
Next the fleet opened fire on the community of Bristol Ferry and soon after the fleet
departed, never to return. Only one person appears to have died in the British attack
but Wallace’s actions merely heaped fuel on the revolutionary fires. A few months
later, on the 4th May 1776, the Colony of Rhode Island declared itself to be sovereign
and free of foreign domination. It has been said that the now city of Bristol has been
celebrating American independence Day longer than any other place, no doubt
thanks to the actions of Wallace and the Rose.
After Boston was evacuated by the British in 1776, the centre of the war shifted to
the middle states and the British formulated a strategy to capture New York and
send an expedition down from Canada to cut off New England from the other
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HMS Rose and the American War of Independence
colonies. A force of soldiers commanded by Sir William Howe and a fleet under his
brother, Lord Howe, drove General Washington out of New York and HMS Rose,
which had been in action in the vicinity through much of that summer played a key
role in the campaign.
Washington had reinforced the town during the summer but had dispersed his forces
to various points. The British in return sent small parties to harass the American
defenders at various points; small parties raided New Jersey whilst others forayed
along the coasts of Long Island. On the afternoon of 12th July, eight days after the
Declaration of Independence, Admiral Howe ordered HMS Rose and her fellow
frigate HMS Phoenix to force a passage up the Hudson River. As they got underway
they were fired on by everything the Americans could muster. Both ships were hit on
many occasions but suffered little real damage and few casualties. As they came
abreast of Governor’s Island and Paulus Hook they crashed broadsides into the
shore, causing havoc amongst the defences.
The two ships sailed on past Lower Manhattan where they came under further fire
from the battery. In return the Rose and the Phoenix sent round shot through New
York and the village of Greenwich. Panic and general Washington noted ‘that the
shrieks and cries of (the) poor creatures running in every direction was truly
distressing’ and feared it would have ‘an unhappy effect on our young and
inexperienced soldiers.’ The action between ships and shore continued for two hours
and only ceased after the Rose and Phoenix had sailed beyond the American
fortifications. Here, the vessels stopped and their situation threatened to strangle
river traffic. The Americans sent fire ships amongst them but to no avail and the two
ships soon sailed south again, passing New York once more. Their almost total
disregard for the shore fortifications was a shock to the Americans who regarded
these fortifications as one of their strongest points.
The Rose was in action at later stages in the campaign. In early September, for
example, she was attacked by enemy batteries whilst sailing down the East River
and received many hits on her hull and amongst her masts but only one man was
lost in the action and her brisk cannonade silenced one of the batteries. Washington
was, of course, driven out of New York and New Jersey and the Rose’s Commander,
James Wallace was knighted for his part in the campaign.
In the long-term, however, the campaign did not go the way of the British and they
were eventually defeated after first the French, then the Dutch and Spanish sided
with the Americans. One of the two principal British armies was captured at Saratoga
in 1777 and eventually General Cornwallis, stranded on the Yorktown Peninsula, had
to surrender his army in 1781. By this time the Rose was no longer afloat. Her epic
naval career had ended in 1779 in the defence of Savannah. The British had
occupied the town but the French fleet determined on sailing up the river and
attacking the waterfront whilst the Americans with their other allies attacked from the
land. However, the then commander of the Rose, Captain Brown, moved the vessel
into the river and over the bar where he scuttled it. The tactic proved successful and
the hulk of the Rose blocked their passage upriver. Captain Brown then took his men
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HMS Rose and the American War of Independence
to man the fortifications and was later killed but some have said that that his action
with the Rose saved Savannah from destruction by French bombardment.
Replica of HMS Rose fitted out as HMS Surprise at the San Diego Maritime Museum
(Source: http://www.sdmaritime.com/ContentPage.asp?ContentID=152)
The official end of the American War of Independence came with the signing of the
Treaty of Paris in 1883 and the exploits of the Rose have gone down in history.
Some historians have since attributed the formation of the Continental Navy, the
precursor, of the United States Navy, to the depredations of HMS Rose. As to the
vessel itself, after the cessation of hostilities its remains were dispersed to allow
vessel to pass into the port but this was not quite the end of the story. In 1970 a
replica ‘HMS’ Rose was built in Lunenburg Nova Scotia - in the same yard that had
earlier built the replica Bounty – by the Newport Historian John Fitzhugh Millar using
originals plans obtained from the National Maritime Museum. This vessel has since
had an interesting history in its own right and featured as HMS Surprise, in the film
Master and Commander starring Russell Crowe.
Robb Robinson, January 2009
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HMS Rose and the American War of Independence
Select Bibliography
Lincoln Diamant, Chaining the Hudson (USA: Fordham University Press 2004)
David Hackett, Washington’s Crossing (UK: Oxford University Press 2006)
Mark V Kwasny, Washington’s Partisan War 1775 – 1783 (USA: Kent State
University Press 1998)
Lincoln P. Paine, Ships of the World (USA: Houghton Miffin 1997)
Ambrose Serle, The American Journal of Ambrose Serle, Secretary to Lord Howe,
1776 – 1778 (USA: Ayer Publishing1969)
Jack Tager, Boston Riots. Three Centuries of Social Violence (USA: UPNE, 2001)
On-line References
http://www.bruzelius.info/Nautica/Ships/War/GB/Rose(1757).html
Sailing Warships: HMS Rose
http://www.sdmaritime.com/contentpage.asp?ContentID=152
San Diego Maritime Museum: HMS Surprise
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