The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1905-07-13
LESSON IN THE CAREER
OF OUR JOHN PAUL JONES

not only purchased it at the sale, but
restored 1t to the countess, explaining
his inability to prevent the seizure.
While the merely episodical features of
Jones career are pursued for the budding
mind of the school child attention will be
paid to the conversion of the Due de
Ducas 14-year-old French vessel, into
the Bon Homme Richard, named in COM
pliment to Benjamin Franklin, then
commissioner in Paris and editor of
Poor Richards Almanac, phrase in
which regarding the doing of business at
first hands when anything of Importance
was at stake induced the naming of the
ship. Jones had long been delayed by
the French with promises of a ship.
Thus by easy STANCES what many will
consider the main lesson of the honor
now shown the remains of the naval hero
will be reached. Does it not lie in the
comparison enforced of the fighting ships
of that engagement off Marlborough
Head and the huge men-of-war today?
Admiral Sigsbee, of the ill-starred Maine.
whose memory brings up sharp decisive
war and history not yet ended, steams to
Cherbourg the Brooklyn. Admiral
Schley's flagship, when he sank Cervera's
vessels in Santiago bay, July 8, 1898. With
its eigh s-inch guns and a dozen rifles.
and then a secondary armament of is g.
inch guns and more rifles, with speed
of % knots an hour, and armor plate en-
casing its vast expanse, with every mod
ern appliance for offense and defense,
sanitary precautions coal bunkers, wire
less telegraphy and every minutiae in
ventive minds can devise-what a con-
trast would 1t present to the Bon Homme
Richard were that past worthy of the
deep sailing under commission today?
The Bon Homme was this old French
frigate with 40 guns and the Scraps had
its A. Those were the days when the
broadside was the main reliance and clos
ing in and fighting at close quarters the
object sought. The leviathans of war
were the line of batteships carrying ON
their three decks often 100 guns, of smooth
| bore, and measured by the weight of shell
they carried The frigate with two decks
were the earlier idea of the modern
cruiser and use to chase merchantmen
or to deploy in search of enemy's ships
like the scouts of the present day. Sails
and the wind had to be in closet alli-
ance and instead of armor plate only
great walls of oak warded off the balls
from lannon's mouth No hospital SER
vice. was known and few appliances that
looked toward comfort. No electrical adj
justment aided the human hand and eye
or relieved tired nature in the arduous
battle
| If there was one thing that was mod
ern in survival it was the first pro-
nouncement by Catharine IL of Russia,
whom Jones was afterward to serve OF
that principle, Free ships make free
goods" which was to be inserted among
the declarations of Paris in 1856, and rep
resents today the farthest advance con-
corning neutral cargoes the civilized world
has made.
| It is in this contrast between the
American navy of today and the ships
of the Revolution that national progress
| can be best detected 1t was years before
steam supplanted wind and more decades
before armor plate was riveted where
wood had done most valiant service.
| Among all the vicisstudes of that day.
starving armies, defeats here and there.
and lack of funds, the patriots had
navy to construct, and with 1t came dis
appointment, delay, and in the navy it.
| self characterization and needless cap
lures Even during the Scraps engage
ment the captain of the Alliance, ship
! in Jones' little squadron had a broadside
fired by mistake into the Bon Homme
| Richard that told disastrously.