Next in importance to the Bonhomtne Richard's fight with the Serapis, the most cred itable naval engagement of the war was Ben edict Arnold's battle on Lake Champlain. The importance of the naval, battles on this inland lake is hardly realizable now; but till the time of railroads the lake was the one route for a large invading expedition between Canada and New York or New England, enabling supplies to be transported where otherwise the moun tains or the forests would have made it im practicable. The English had 29 vessels with 89 guns ; four longboats with stores; 697 men of the regular navy; and Indian allies. Arnold had 15 vastly infenor vessels, with 88 lighter guns, and about 750 men ignorant of naval service. Several of Arnold's vessels had to be abandoned and destroyed; two were captured; but several were saved in spots the English could not reach, by Arnold's heroic risk of himself. The British loss was about 40, the American about 80. But the battle lost the British the campaign; the struggle had been so severe that Sir Guy Carleton, the commander, did not venture to assail Ticonderoga, and shortly after retired to winter quarters.
The most famous work done by the navy, however, resulted from commerce-destroying in British waters. Our fleets were nearly as much masters of the English Channel as the English were at the time of the Armada, though we never had more than three or four ships there at a time; for the English could not protect their own commerce. No other enemy ever disturbed the marine insurance rates, not even France across the channel; but in a short time now they rose to prohibitive rates, and the com panies even refused to insure English bottoms at any premium, so that the Thames was crowded with Frenc.h vessels. The alarm and •fury of the English were shown not only in the execrations of °pirate° which they lavished on the lawfully conunissioned war vessels and their captains and crews, and in the barbarous misusage of the latter with which they revenged themselves when they captured any, but in the abiding hereditary tradition of their writers: they then invented false accounts of John Paul Jones, and still term him a °notorious pirate,° al though he was no more a pirate than Nelson, and much less than Rodney, who even turned pirate on his own people. In 1776-77 the Lex ington was engaged in this work, and in 1778 was joined by the Reprisal; but the former was finally captured and the latter foundered. The Surprise was then secretly bought from Eng land and fitted out at Dunkirk; but on her be ginning to make captures the English govern ment forced the French by threats to give her up. The Revenge was then bought, and became even more successful. But the most magnifi cent success was won by Jones (see BONHOMME RICHARD), in 1778-79. In the former year he closed a wonderfully successful 28 days' cruise in the Ranger— from 10 April to 8 May— by capturing the Drake, a more powerful vessel than his own. In the latter the marvelous en gagement of the Bonhomme Richard with the Serapis, the most creditable naval victory of the war, dwarfs all else. See JONES, JOHN PAUL Meantime Congress had ordered the con struction of three 74-gun men-of-war, five large frigates and one or two smaller vessels; but as money ran short, they were never finished. At the end of 1778 the navy consisted of four 32 gun ships, two 28's, one 24, one 20, three 18's, one 12 and one 10-14 in all, with 332 guns; while England had on the American coast 89 ships with 2,576 guns. In 1779 the most notable events were the capture on 7 May of seven transports with about 50 guns and some 300 men, by a Boston squadron under Capt. J. B.
Hopldns, son of the ex-commodore; that of eight prizes worth over $1,000,000, in July; that in August, by two Continental vessels on a short cruise, of six prizes with 54 guns; and on 7 May, the same day as the first, a most bloody and desperate action of an hour between two 12-gun brigs, the United States Providence and the British Diligent, in which the latter lost 8 killed and 19 wounded out of a crew of 53, or over half. In 1779 and 1780 Capt. John F. Williams won two brilliant victories in 14-gun and 18-gun Massachusetts State vessels. But on 13 Aug. 1779 a heavy disaster befell the waning little Continental navy. Three vessels, a 32, a 14 and a 12, accompanied a fleet of Massachusetts privateers to dislodge the Eng lish from a fort near the mouth of the Penob scot; but, seven English war-ships coming up to reinforce the three already there, the privateers fled, and the Continental vessels had to be run up the river and destroyed. By the fall of Charleston four more—two 28's, a 24, and the celebrated 18-gun sloop Ranger—were captured or destroyed ; another had been lost; and at the end of 1779 the navy had but six vessels left, so that it was very hard to run the English blockade. Officers and seamen were scarce also; for the English dreaded the Amer ican privateers and naval destroyers so much, few as they were, that they systematically re fused to exchange prisoners, and connived at the destruction of the Americans in pestilential hulks or prisons. In October 1780 the Saratoga, after taking three prizes, which were recap tured, foundered; and in 1781 the Trumbull was captured after a fight against superior force in which she was crippled. But the small rem nant still won some victories. The Alliance on 28 May 1781 captured a 16-gun and a 14-gun brig; and early in 1782 the Deane captured four vessels with 48 guns. In April 1782 was fought a very brilliant action by a privateer, one of the most remarkable of the war: the Pennsylvania State cruiser Hyder Ally, Lieut. Joshua Barney, having 16 6-pounder guns and 110 men, engaged the British sloop-of-war General Monk with 20 9-pounders and 136 men. Despite this enor mous disparity of force-96 pounds of metal against 180 pounds — the American vessel forced the British to strike in half an hour, with a loss of 20 killed and 33 wounded, against 4 killed and 11 wounded. Another remarkable contest was won by a private Philadelphia cruiser, the Congress, off the Southern coast. She had 20 guns, but was manned almost en tirely by landsmen, seamen being unobtainable. On 6 Sept. 1781 she fell in with a British 16-gun sloop-of-war, the Savage, with her regular com plement of seamen. In about an hour and a half, lying so close that the guns scorched the opposing gunners, and shot were thrown by hand, the British vessel was fairly shot to pieces, and forced to surrender, with a loss of 8 killed and 24 wounded, against 30 of both on the privateer. The last naval fight of the war was between the Alliance, Capt. John Barry, and a heavy English ship, which the former drove off during a run to Havana. The Con tinental vessels lost during the Revolution num bered 24, with 470 guns. The British loss was 102, with 2,622 guns. The American navy and the privateers together captured about 800 prizes from the British. British privateers did not capture a single Continental vessel; Amer ican privateers captured 16 English cruisers, with 226 guns. Consult Maclay,