The Montgomery advertiser., 1902-03-23
JOHN PAUL JONES AND
 HIS MELODRAMIC CAREER
LoOSened First American Flag from Pennant Of a
 War Ship and Taught British How to Fight /

and means and promised commission as soon as there was official authoriza- ton. There followed many vexatious de- lays and some disappOintments. Even thus early sectional jealousies began to show themselves, and since Washington, a Virginian. had been named General-in- Chief of :he army, John Adams, the foremost representative of New England, claimed the Hons share of the navy cap tains and got it. He seemed to have been particularly hostile to Jones. and thereby hangs tale. The handsome Scot was quite beau in the society of the Quaker City, and of this society the gayest center was the mansion of the a constant and favored guest. At an evening party, which included both the future president and the embryo admi- ral MT. Adams. who was nothing if not pedantic, undertook to recite in French to company of young ladies thoroughly versed in that language, 8 fable of F'on- tinelle. It may be assumed that neither his accent nor his version was strictly Parisian. and after he had gone the young ladies turned to Jones and asked what he thought of Mr. Adams's French, when Jones' with something of the su- percilionsness of the aoxcomb. along with the audacitX of youth, exclaimed: Tt Is fortunate that Mir. Adamss politics be not as English as his French. because if 1t was he would be Tory"' The epi- gram cost him dear. An Adams is never to be tri1ed with. The bonmot in due season reached the ears of the sturdy old patriot. and when the list of the new navy appointments appeared the name of John Paul Jones' who had reason to ex- pect nothing less than a captaincy. led only the first lieutenants.
 In Command of Yankee Frigate.
 MT. watterson narrated the opening scenes of the revolutionary war. the founding of little navy. appointment by John Adams, and the political shippers, " and all that followed. War" said he. leveler. MT. Adams had his way. But oi the 'politicali shippers as his nominees came to be called, but one Nicholas Bid dle, made his work. all too soon glorious ly passing from the scene; while of the rest the ranking officer was dismissed from the service after his first cruise and the others fell into innocuous desue- tude. surviving the war, leaving Jones alone to give the world assurance that we were possessed of a navy. It is a suggestive coincidence that Jones wa. first to receive his commission, that 1t was he who hoist the first flag of the Continental Congress and that. later on, the resolution of Congress defining the Stars and Stripes as the ensign of the republic named. him to command the crack frigate of the time. This wal enough. It squared the account. Jones | accepted it as more than compensation
 
 and are twins said he:- born the same hour from the same womb of destiny We cannot be parted in life or in death So long as we can float we shall float to- gether. If we must sink, we shall ge I down as one."
 Here is how Paul Jones first sailed across the sea in command of a Yankee frigate:
 ''rhe 17th of October. TIT. is a red let. ter day in American annals. On that day the best accredited, haughtiest and most self-confident of British commanders yielded his army and his sword to the Americans. Out-generaled by Schuyler all the way from Fort Edward to IT. | conderoga, fiayed alive by Stark at Ben- | nington, harassed from Remis Heights by Morgan, and finally In the open al Freeman's farm and at Saltwater. beat en and dismayed by the intrepidity and rendered to Horatio Gates at Saratoga Springs. 1t was the turning point in the war of the Revolution. It snatched the cause of the colonials from the jaws oi despair. It secured us the alliance with
 France. That John Paul Jones was the naval captain chosen to carry the news to Europe in the first Yankee frigate
 that ever crossed the ocean seems a kind of disposition of providence; for nc other man could have done what he did with the succeeding opportunity; an' | yet there were both method and fore | sight in the circumstances. Jones gave | good reason why an armed cruiser should be sent abroad. He gave good reason l why he himself should command her IT.
 the end. he more than justified his prom | ises But of that later on. In the stancf
 frigate Ranger he sailed from Ports
 mouth N. H., and cleared the Isles of Shoals at daylight the morning of the
 1st of November, TIT, having received
 the evening before sealed dispatches | from Congress to it's foreign represent
 atives. and returning by the courier that | brought them the assurance, I will
 spread this news through France in thr- | ty days He did actually cast anchor 1T | the Loire just below Nantes the 2nd oi
 December following in thirty-two days
 an unexampled passage. and, posting di
 rect to Paris, placed his priceless mes
 sage with its accompanying document; | in the hands of Dr. Franklin"