The original organization of the American Navy is noticed on pages 59–60 of the text.
On the thirteenth of December, 1775, several frigates, were authorized, the annexed figures indicating their rate, by guns:
| Alliance (32), twice identified with Lafayette (pp. 253, 361), and sold after the war. | |
| Andrea Doria (32), burned in the Delaware to prevent capture | 1777 |
| Boston (28), captured at Charleston | 1780 |
| [8]Congress, burned in the Hudson, to prevent capture | 1777 |
| Delaware (24), captured by the British, in the Delaware | 1777 |
| Effingham (28), destroyed by the British, in the Delaware | 1777 |
| Hancock (32), taken by British ships Rainbow (44) and Victor (16) | 1777 |
| [8]Montgomery (24), burned in the Hudson to prevent capture | 1777 |
| Providence (28), captured at Charleston | 1780 |
| Queen of France (18), captured at Charleston | 1780 |
| Raleigh (32), captured by the British ships Experiment (50) and Unicorn (16) | 1777 |
| Randolph (32), blown up in action with the Yarmouth (64) | 1778 |
| The Confederacy (32), taken by a British ship-of-the-line, off the Virginia coast | 1781 |
| Trumbull (28), taken by British fleet, near Cape Henry | 1778 |
| Virginia (28), taken by British fleet, near Cape Henry, | 1778 |
| Warren (32), burned in the Penobscot, by the Americans | 1779 |
| Washington (32), destroyed by the British, in the Delaware | 1778 |
8. Never went to sea.
Note.—John Paul, who took the name of John Paul Jones through gratitude to a citizen of North Carolina who assisted him in securing a naval commission (noticed on page 60 of the text), distinguished himself upon the British coast, and in his capture of the British ship Serapis, Sept. 23, 1779. His own ship, the Bon Homme Richard, was fitted out in France, by the aid of Benjamin Franklin, to war against British commerce. Franklin, in the issue of his “Almanack,” with shrewd business and moral maxims at the bottoms of the pages, used the nom-de-plume, “Poor Richard.” It was graceful in John Paul to name the ship Richard, in Franklin’s honor, with a complimentary prefix.
Of the later navy, that of 1812, the Brandywine (44), named after the battle of that name, was placed at the service of Lafayette when he visited America in 1825. (See note at end of Chapter XVIII., concerning Lafayette as first appearing in that battle.)